Yelling at Old People- In Depth Analysis of When It's Fine

by David Kilimnick

Thoughts from a Waiting Room #7

I saw people yelling "applesauce" at an old guy. It was shocking. Caused me to have nightmares about apples getting crushed.
I am now trying to figure out when it's fine to yell at an old person.
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Times You Can Yell
If they're pulling up their pants in public, you can yell. I get it. "Grandpa. We're at the park. Pull up your pants in the bathroom! Children don't need to see your belt adjustment routine." Pant adjustment seems to happen regularly by old people walking, trying to keep their pants at chest height. Sometimes you need urgency to stop that in front of families. How their waste gets so high, I don't know.
You can also yell if you have cinnamon to sprinkle on the applesauce. That's exciting. Screaming "cinnamon" brings joy. 
For joy and excitement, it's fine. You can scream, "It's your grandson's Bar Mitzvah." For Nachis, you can yell. Even if it might cause a heart attack. 
If they're throwing the Mazel Tov candy, you might want to yell to wake grandpa up. That's less abusive than whacking him with sour sticks.
Now the aide is yelling "cottage cheese." Any food that's in post-chewable form. You yell that. "Soup!!!" "Borscht!!!" "Pudding!!!" "APPLESAUCE!!!" It kind of gets you excited. It's kind of exciting to not have to chew. Get a little of that cinnamon in there, I'm starting to get worked up for the applesauce.
Ice cream. You can always scream ice cream. It's never abusive to scream ice cream.
You can yell at the assisted living residence. They're loud there. Regular amplitude at assisted living is loud. Staff greets you like you're working the auto assembly line at the plant. You can tell assisted living by loudness and walkers.
If you see somebody with a walker, you can scream. Anybody who has a walker has bad balance and a hearing problem.
Fire. If there's a fire, you can yell. The only problem is that with the amount of yelling at these assisted living places, I don't think anybody would take you seriously.

Outside of Hospitals
Outside of hospitals and nursing homes, yelling at old people is considered abuse. That's tricky. Cause when they call up Max to the Torah at shul, he doesn't hear it.
The Gabai had to yell, "Ya'amod. Coming up to the Torah!!! Max Ben Baruch HaLevi!!! Max!!! Come up to the Torah!!!" And now everybody thinks our Gabai is abusive. And he's still yelling, "Max!!! Get up here!!!"
I've seen people at department stores yell at old people. It would appear that when you're angry at them for asking a question, you're allowed to scream "Sir!!!" "Ma'am" also works. As long as it's a pleasantry, you can berate an old person. "Excuse me! Ma'am!!!" "Please!!! Sir!!!" "Thank you!!!" 
Grandkids. You can yell at old people when their grandchildren are there and they're looking the other way. For pictures too. Ever seen old people looking off the other direction in a family portrait? It's because nobody was yelling at them.

If They Yell
You can always yell at their level. The key is to not yell louder. That's abuse. You have to catch their volume and ride their amplification.
When they get loud, that means they need help hearing. If you have to scream so that you can hear, you're going to have a hard time hearing something that is not in your cochlea. And don't scream "cochlea." That doesn't sound proper.
When they scream at you, that's when you should be yelling at them. First, you have to be abused. When they scream, "What did you say?" you can yell back. "What did you say?" That's a cue. Maybe you should stop whispering that it's dangerous and their drapes caught on fire.
Your yelling voice is eighty-five-year-old-room-voice. That's assisted living dinner conversation amplitude. 
When they yell, "You piece of ----!!!" it's a hard to say what to do. I would say, if they cut you off in traffic, you can yell back.

Lower the Loud
It's always good to try to lower the volume. You never know when grandma is going to say something offensive. If grandma and grandpa are racist, you want to get them hearing aids. Hearing aids make older people less racist. 
Hearing aids help in bringing the voice down and you not losing your job.
General rule is to try to keep them from sharing too much with anybody under forty years of age. You never know when their racist ninety-two-year-old self with start saying something they think is normal. Like, "That's a Chinese guy."  
I can care less how much you trust them, you can’t trust their new ninety-year-old-discussion-level. When they're screaming offensive racist stuff, because that’s how they think, because they are ninety-five, that's not the time to scream, "I hear you. I understand what you're saying." I can care less how many times they yell, "I've told you that's a Chinese guy. Is that not a Chinese guy. He's right there."
And I'm not saying they're wrong. They think they're whispering. And when you whisper, it's not racism.

Enjoy the Loudness
Yelling makes people feel good. Old people have it down. They know how to make people feel good. When Merv and Sadie are yelling, "Great to see yah," everybody feels loved. They think it's for them. It might just be for Sadie, but the whole room feels good.

Lessons Learned
Don't share any secrets with an old person. They think they're whispering. Now everybody knows you don't like your middle child, and you're a racist.
Some older people need to be yelled at. Their hearing is gone, and applesauce with cinnamon, followed by ice cream, is very exciting.
If they softly ask, "What did you say?" maybe they just don’t understand. Old people have the right to not understand.
Only yell at old people in nursing homes and hospitals. Outside of nursing facilities yelling at old people may be considered abuse, unless if there is applesauce or a car coming.
You can't yell for them. But you can yell at them. I know that, because the aide at the nursing home didn't yell, "That's a Chinese guy!!!"
You can definitely yell "applesauce!!!"
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***Thoughts From a Waiting Room was first written in 2019-20. These are the thoughts revisited in 2026 form. LRefuah Sheleyma LKol HaCholim and shared laughter with their family and friends, bZchut Avi HaRav Yeshaya Ben Yechezkel HaLevi ZT"L vImi HaRabbanit Necha Bat Chayim Zeydel A"H LAliyat Nishmatam.