Today we pour one out for the aspirational sex life of 69-year-old DJ Emile Ratelband, who unsuccessfully argued in a Dutch court that he should be allowed to legally knock 20 years off of his age because he, personally, feels like a “young god.”
On Monday, a court of appeals in Arnhem, Netherlands, shut down Ratelband’s monthlong legal battle, during which the near-septuagenarian attempted to draw parallels between changing one’s gender and changing one’s age. He claimed in court that doctors had told him he has the body of a 45-year-old, and cited what seems to be the grounds of his legal action: that he’s not getting enough attention on Tinder, presumably from younger women, because when they see his real age, he doesn’t “get an answer.” Unfortunately for Ratelband, the court was not sympathetic to his argument that he suffers from age discrimination.
“Mr. Ratelband is at liberty to feel 20 years younger than his real age and to act accordingly,” an Arnhem court of appeals said in a press statement. “But amending his date of birth would cause 20 years of records to vanish from the register of births, deaths, marriages and registered partnerships. This would have a variety of undesirable legal and societal implications.”
While the court commended Ratelband’s commitment to wellness, it wrote in its ruling that because Dutch law assigns rights based on age — voting and educational obligations, for example — Ratelband’s request cannot be granted because “those age requirements would become meaningless.”
Unfortunately for the 69-year-old DJ, he will simply have to try an alternative route to accomplishing his goals — say, dating someone closer to his age.