"Respect your elders" - that is in the bible and it used to have meaning, in that the older a person got, the more wisdom they accumulated.

It is also very important to respect your lineage. (for reasons that were removed from the Bible)

Where things have gone off the rails is that we now live in a society that respects (or at least last decade) the name tag.
V.P. of Accounting, Lead developer, Garbage Engineer...

It used to be that you moved into higher positions through a system of meritocracy. So, the boss knew what was happening on the floor, because, well, he was there once. However, now we hire kids out of MBA programs straight into middle management. So, the boss now knows less than nothing.

The same with elders. They lived for a long time and learned a lot.
But today, the elders don't know anything. They were fed bullshit and kept in the dark. Grandma doesn't know about smart-phones. But, she may be the last in her lineage that learned how to can and preserve foods.

There are so many old people who have basically been saying the same thing for 60 years. They haven't improved. They haven't gained any wisdom.

And thus, we get to today. Where the Elders in the church are chosen based on the groups preferences. Its not that they know their stuff, it is that they spout the same rhetoric.

There is no wisdom, there is only indoctrination.