I recently watched an LGBT aging film entitled Gen Silent. I highly recommend everyone watch it because it opened my eyes to many of the issues we face as a community involving the elderly LGBT community and the kind of discrimination that they face. Some of these discriminations include healthcare discrepancies, unequal treatment in institutional settings, isolation, and harassment.
The fact that this is even happening and that the number of elderly people in the LGBT community is expected to grow to approximately 7 million by 2030 means that there needs to be a change. It is a proven fact that elders of the LGBT community and their caregivers are at a higher risk mental and physical health problems. The people that are being affected by this discrimination are those that were fighting for rights and equality in the LGBT community before some of us were even born. The reason that discrimination has come so far since those times are because of the fact that when these people were young they were fighting for the rights of all of us. It is vital that we protect them and their rights and make sure they get the care that they deserve.