Hot take ... ageism toward younger people should be 1,000 times more acceptable than ageism toward older people. The latter is completely tasteless and void of class.
I'm of the complete opposite opinion. Young people are still trying to figure out how everything works and how to control their emotions, yet we often hold them to the standard of someone who is of our own age, all while denying them the ability to participate in large parts of society. I have zero issues with calling out old people for behavior that they should know is unacceptable, especially when corporate boards, the government, and really all organizations with significant power to impact people's lives are disproportionately filled with older people.
I'm assuming your post was more about straight up harassment and abuse, however, and I think we should all agree that is equally unacceptable regardless of who is the target.
On a personal level, you shouldn't really criticize anyone unless you've "walked a mile in their shoes" before. We've all been younger than we are right now (so we have some context for what younger folks may be thinking/feeling), but no one can ever claim the experience of being older than they currently are
That's true to some extent, but there's a limit to how far that goes. I was 15 once, but that doesn't mean I share the experience of every 15-year-old in existence. And it's still not OK to "criticize someone" for something they can't control.
And some ageism is actually better described as "generationism" for lack of a better term--I certainly don't know anything about what people younger than me are experiencing right now.
Ageism is one of those things that's very much a two-way street. It's not like racism where one group is clearly privileged over another.
