THE world belongs to the young, and it’s definitely fun to be happy, crazy and foolish when you’re in the pink. Welcome to the age of ageism.

According the World Health Organisation, ageism is “the stereotyping and discrimination against individuals or groups on the basis of their age; ageism can take many forms, including prejudicial attitudes, discriminatory practices, or institutional policies and practices that perpetuate stereotypical beliefs”.

Ageism affects everyone; if we don’t die young, we’ll get old someday. Today we may be the perpetrator of ageism, someday soon we’ll be its victims.

In politics, some young people have been promoting the idea that young leaders are better than the older ones. Never mind their ideological stance, principles or systems of government. As long as they’re young – some say those below 40 years old – they must be good.

In a Facebook posting by one young leader of Parti Sosialis Malaysia, K.S. Bawani, dated January 7, she had praised people of other countries for choosing young leaders to lead their respective nation. I suppose it’s her attempt to ridicule opposition Pakatan Harapan’s choice of Dr Mahathir Mohamad as Prime Minister’s candidate.

I don’t know whether she or PSM endorses those foreign leaders but it’s eerie that the names she listed include fascists, neo-liberals, unelected monarchs and a young dictator. It was a colleague of mine, Lim Yi Wei, a DAP Selangor councilor who first noticed her strange list.

Among those who made Bawani’s list are:

• Austria’s Sebastian Kurz, 31, the leader of a far-right party supported by another fascist party;
• Qatar’s Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, 37, the Emir of Qatar – the king of his country;
• Bhutan’s Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck, 37, the Druk Gyalpo – the king of his country;
• France’s Emmanuel Macron, 39, the President of France and promoter of neo-liberal economy; and
• Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s (known to the world as North Korea) Kim Jong Un, 34, the Supreme Leader and Dear Beloved Respected Comrade of his country who inherited the position after the death of his father who also inherited the position from his father the founder of the republic.

Other honourable mentions in her list include New Zealand’s Jacinda Ardern, 37; Republic of Ireland’s Leo Varadkar, 38, and Estonia’s Juri Ratas, 39. Except for Ardern who is a social democrat, the other two are centrists with neo-liberal economic tendencies. The San Marino guys she mentioned, I know nothing about.

There’s something wrong with this kind of political ageism. Do we accept fascist, racist, sexist and religious bigots to be our leader merely because they’re young?

In showing support, shouldn’t progressives be proud of leaders such as the American democratic socialist Bernie Sanders, 76, and the British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, 68, despite their age? In the case of France, instead of Macron, shouldn’t Jean-Luc Mélenchon, 66, the left-wing leader be the socialist choice for presidential candidate?

Perhaps in their anger and hatred against Dr Mahathir, and PH to a certain extent, some left-wing ageist rebels can’t see the forest for the trees.

It’s a similar case with another group of young angry rebels who can’t stand both Dr Mahathir and prime minister Najib Razak. Their solution is to abstain from voting or spoil the vote.

The sad thing is that it’s not about preventing Dr Mahathir from becoming Prime Minister (although it’s just to pave way for Anwar Ibrahim) but rather ensuring Najib to continue being in power for at least another half decade.

It also means indirectly supporting Barisan Nasional government to continue with its discriminatory policies, racial politics, religious bigotry, regional divide, and the usual scandals here and there.

Perhaps it’ll make us look cool if we don’t vote. We can always complain, protest and whine after. We can even do more petitions against the next BN government that we didn’t vote for.

Perhaps it’s fun to be young and reckless enough not to care. Perhaps it’s true that there’s no country for old men. Perhaps Oscar Wilde was right about “the old believe everything; the middle-aged suspect everything; the young know everything”. – January 12, 2017.

* Wan Hamidi Hamid is a veteran journalist with a deep love and knowledge of rock music

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.