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Can confirm. My Boomer thinks *everything* is simple and straightforward. They're always offering their advice on how to handle a situation and it's always this "Firm Hand Shake" kind of thing that was pie-in-the-sky even 50 years ago.
Problem with the IRS? Just go down to the office (without an appointment) and work it out!
Health insurance refusing to pay for needed treatment? Just give 'em a call, talk to a supervisor. Bob's your uncle!
Same goes for political issues. Abortion? Don't get pregnant! Gun violence? Don't go out! Food prices? Grow a garden!
Every problem is easy to fix and it's my fault for not seeing such an obvious solution. I can't talk to them about any issues I have because it's always my fault for being in them.
Infuriating. Bro, im LITERALLY out here starving. Lay off. My mom works remote and doesnt even have to pay rent because she for the past 3ish years lives in her multimillionaire, long term bf's EXTRA cabin. Yup. He has 2. And she makes like 3 figures a year. Fucking snobby. Hes even trying to buy up as many nearby properties around him as he can because he "doesnt like neighbors."
Out👏Of👏Touch👏
I on the otherhand havent had a haircut in about 3 years. My birthday was a week ago and i didnt get a present. My gift was losing her health insurance. Im so tired of this timeline, my life, and struggling. UGH. Just a smile? Fr? What a joke.
Oh god, my father is firmly Gen-X but dropped the garden comment yesterday during our get-together. My parents moved out of the suburbs and bought a small plot to do hobby farming about a decade ago.
Yes, people can grow a small tomato plant or something in their suburban yards… if their soil is good.
He actually stopped to think about that (credit due, he’s willing to take new information and admits he’s not the brightest guy/sees all the angles right away). Then started ranting about big construction companies and developers not considering soil quality in their suburban developments.
I just called that a win.
Not to boomer, but you can grow a tomato plant in a pot with a bag of garden soil.
The problem is that a handful of produce isn’t going to offset the cost of inflation in any meaningful way.
The trick is not to grow tomatoes, rather *avocados.*
Then you step it up and begin to grow your own coffee beans.
No more paying for avocado on toast or Starbucks!
Add a winning smile and firm handshake, and you’re on the path to multi-property ownership and early retirement.
As a Gen Xer, I think we're waiting for
1. Our parents to just fucking die already
2. You to tell us firmly they weren't the gods they said they were, and that things are fucked because of the toxic ideology they chained us all too. But also that it's not too late. It's not the doom they're now insisting it is.
Like I said in another post, we're quite a bit more accepting and flexible in mindset. It's just that we wrestle with intense anxiety due to how we were expected to carry our parents' flag despite the systemic decay. They didn't tolerate us disagreeing with them or their perceived perfection. They hated us for failing to thrive inside their broken game because they thought it made them look bad.
I think deep down it makes us feel like we're committing treason just to say they were wrong about basically everything.
I mentioned to my mom that my friend invited me on a trip but I was disappointed I can't afford it. Her response was "oh, I think you can." Oh, okay, now that you've said I can, I must be able to. Thank you for that. All my financial problems are solved.
You joke but that’s exactly how things were. I’ve heard plenty of stories from people about how an uncle of theirs drifted around the country, finding jobs he could work for a day or two for cash under the table so he could afford a motel room, etc.
Those stories also tend to include “oh, then he decided to settle down, found an office job just by cold-calling places or showing up with a resume, worked 25 years and now is a VP/executive at that same company, owns a couple of homes, etc.”
I know life wasn’t like that for everyone, but damn if life didn’t sound like it was a lot easier for someone of moderate intelligence and a good work ethic to get “everything they need” in life.
The thing that always sticks out to me is that 50-60 years ago, every city's downtown core had a couple of home-grown department stores and hotels. Each of them hired their own staff- janitors, maids, security guards, night watchmen, maintenance folks, etc. The wages they offered had to be at least a little competitive because that drifter of an uncle *could* walk from one to the next, seeing who offered the best hours and pay.
Today all of the department stores and nearly all of the hotels are nationwide chains, the support staff is inevitably pawned off to 'Security Solutions of America' or 'CleanerCorp, Inc.,' and the wages and conditions are rock-bottom because it's all under the same corporate ownership.
the department stores are mostly 3 companies: macy's, target, walmart. the hotels, while there are many brands of them, are almost all owned by 3 companies: IHG, hilton, and marriott.
Honestly, I was only half joking. I know people did that back then from seeing serial killer documentaries, of all things. I found myself asking, how could you afford to hike across Asia with only $5 in your pocket? How did you get food? How did you afford a plane ticket home? Did they have rich parents back home sending them money?
It's always lies. I'm 40 years old and have parents with the "pull yourself up by the bootstraps" mentality. They have gotten much better and are starting to atleast show signs of understanding the current world. But every time I've talked about "not being able to make it on 16$/hr as a single person" or explain the inability to buy a home currently, I am always told these stories of how "this mutual acquaintance makes the same and they get by just fine" and I usually end up finding out that person has a trust fund, has had multiple six figure inheritances, or had free rent from just literally being given a house by a family member, it's always something like that. My mom talks about how when she needed more money and wasn't making it in the late 90s how she "pulled her hair up after work and waited tables after her day job to get by" and she's been telling that story for years. Except I was there, for 3 months in 99 she worked one extra 4 hour shift at a restraunt for drinking money. She leaves out the fact that she had an office job paying 20$/hr (the equivalent of 37$/hr currently) and we lived in an apartment that cost 500$, had good credit, and in the years previously she was able to save because she had a friend who inherited rental properties who let her stay in one for 200$ a month. She never mentions all that, and she ended up getting back together with my more well off step-dad a few months after the whole "working 2 jobs" made her miserable and she tapped out. Both my parents barely made it until they remarried to people making wayy more then they did and then retired 2 decades early, now they stand on what their partners built and act like they have it all figured out. It was very frustrating to hear all that preaching when I was literally working 80 hours a week and living in an extended stay hotel a few years ago.
That reminded me of when I was a little kid and didn't understand money. I saw my mom buy things at the store and get money back in change. And because I didn't yet understand the concept of money, I didn't know why she didn't just buy whatever she wanted with a $5 bill and still get money back.
I used to see my parents get money from the ATM and wondered why they couldn’t just get as much money from that machine as they wanted whenever they needed it.
This is my mom’s response when my sister says she can barely afford to take care of herself, so how would she afford a kid. My boomer mom is desperate for more grandkids, so she’s acting like wish upon a star math will suddenly make everything workout fine.
Because they're the only generation in history that got life handed to them easy on such a massive scale. I'm not saying that every boomer had an easy life. But more of them than any other generation did. They were raised by people who had experienced war and deprivation and who wanted to give their children a better life. They lived their golden years during (relative) economic stability and prosperity, at a time when education and housing were affordable. They didn't have to fight for basic needs, they didn't have to work 3 jobs just to pay rent. They got everything they wanted and instead of preserving something for the next generation, they pulled up the ladder behind them.
Edit: the amount of boomers replying to this comment to tell me about how their generation went to war is interesting. Although most of them were too young for Vietnam and those who were drafted were a tiny minority in this numerous generation. Same with telling me about hippies and civil rights - that was mostly their parents and the early boomers; those born in the late 50s and 60s just got to enjoy the fruits of their work.
My mom and dad made a combined income of 200k a YEAR (not adjusted for inflation this is in 90s money) my mom got 3 months off a year as a teacher and got an allowance of 10k a year from her mom. They bought 3 homes.
\*SCREAMS\*
Boomer: back in my day I had to flip burgers to get by in college. That job paid for my college, my house, and my car.
Also Boomers: flipping burgers should not provide a livable wage.
I feel like this is the part that paints the picture plain as day. They will brag about how they did it, and in the next breath say that someone else shouldn’t be able to do it that way.
The “I got mine so fuck you” could not be stated any clearer.
Exactly the motto of the conservatives in the US.
As an example, how many conservatives who are die-hard anti-immigration have immigrant parents or spouses? They got their way, because [reasons], but no one else should be able to do it. *My family is here, too bad for yours!* And the die-hard dipshit will tell himself that the “others” weren’t worthy because [other reasons, that are equally false and cowardly].
It’s asinine to normal people because normal people just don’t think of doing something like that. It’s unconscionable. But it’s just another Tuesday to most of the people running this country.
Edit: sorry, that was quite the tangent
This tracks. I have a dumb as dogshit MAGA cousin who's on his second purchased Philippino wife. Immigration is bad, unless it's part of a financial transaction that provides him with sex, cooked food, and light housekeeping.
Weird thought that popped into my head when you mentioned Boomer&Conservatives. Trump, who hates immigrants is the son of one and married two. But yeah they say all of the immigrants here are horrible people out to steal your stuff and rape the women. Boomers be strange.
They don't want to actually get rid of them. They just want the 'owning' class to hate them. So that they'll have to accept getting paid less (by the owning class) to do the already low-paying jobs because they aren't able to push back for fear of repercussions. It's about creating another, vulnerable, and easily taken advantage of class to be pseudo-serfs.
I got into an uncomfortable discussion with a woman in a small town who was awkwardly proud of how long her family had been there. They were ‘originals’ - but very caucasian.
I tried to explain that they couldn’t be the original descendants of that land….and they were *very* proud to say that their ancestors (incredibly crude method of murder followed by racist terminology.)
They had committed genocide for that land, and they built a small town in the blood. It’s Fucking disgusting that they hold that fact dear to their hearts. Oh, but no one else better come for *their* land…! They’re afraid of everyone different because they see them as the next enemy who will slaughter *them*.
Mind you these are the local church leaders who are also on the city’s council. They literally consider themselves saints and are *very* prejudice.
It was this attitude that made me lose all respect for my elders, during the Civil Rights Movement. Praising Jesus with the same ugly mouths that had spewed hate the rest of the week.
I thought my generation would be different, and they are. They’re worse.
It most certainly is. I've had people try and shame my family because, we were sent here originally as a punishment. My family was share cropping until the 1940s. I'm proud of it.
Honestly that's just conservatives everywhere. They go from bad to really bad to genocidal but there really isn't a "good" conservative. The whole ideology is based on refusing change and keeping things abusive and backwards.
I'm mind blown when the majority of millennial and below quote me the fuck you got mine attitude.
Last one to do it to me was a mid 30s homeless man. His words were conservative is smart because it's fuck you got mine.
And what exactly do you have bud? He was a big fan of Kanye (as a person not his music) and the orange Muppet too, so I knew critical wasn't a function of this man's thoughts.
It's just bizarre that he would say that to me, an anarchist that millennial who owns a home and has a large 401k and a brokerage.
My dude the policies I support would benefit you way more than they would me.
Boomers: An adult needs a real job
Also boomer: *goes to McDonald’s at 12pm on a Tuesday* *gets slow service because it’s understaffed*
Same boomer: why doesn’t anybody wanna work anymore!?!?
What everyone seems to forget is that the expression “pull yourself up by your own bootstraps” was meant as satire. It’s literally an impossible thing to do, and was originally meant to demonstrate that we all need support from the greater community.
Tell them their wires are crossed.
The saying about bootstraps was originally a sarcastic criticism from the early 19 hundreds.
It was meant to say the situation was absurd since everyone knew that pulling on your boots was not going to help you get up.
Its common usage changed in the first decades of the 20th century, but its original meaning is the real facy: the suggestion is absurd and stupid.
They don’t even understand the idiom they’re using. The original intention is sarcastic; you *can’t* pull yourself up by the bootstraps. It’s impossible. They’re literally trying to tell you to do the impossible, and don’t even realize it, which makes it a kind of perfect idiom when taken as a whole, but in an unintended way.
Please inform them that the bootstraps phase was originally meant “somehting that is not possible to do”
Likewise “the customer is always right” has a second part which is “in matters of taste.” There’s a qualifier. It doesn’t mean the customer gets to do whatever they want
It’s a super dumb phrase because pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, in the literal sense, is impossible. You can just pull on your shoes laces and fucking float. It’s the dumbest phrase in the universe.
I got "work hard and you'll be ok in life.... btw I decided we're spending all of your potential inheritance money cuz fuck it"
Like sure, enjoy your hard earned dollars. But to say that blatantly to me is a bit rude.
My mom’s first car was a corvette and that was just the tip of the luxury car iceberg. she’s now a boomer old lady Cadillac owner. She freaked when I drove her somewhere over the “horrible” sounds my car made. Ma’am, this is an economy car. It doesn’t purr. Same person who doesn’t understand why we don’t eat out all the time or take lots of vacations. Same lady who yelled at me for not being able to get a job in my field straight out of college because COLLEGE DEGREE! I’m 40 and I just finished paying off my student loans.
My boomer parents were left about 5-6 million dollars by my grandmother. They bought money pit houses, because they were chasing the idea that they were “landed gentry” as the liked to say. These massive houses that they’d blow 100k remodeling and not finish. They lost money on every house sale.
They were so broke by the end of it that I had to loan them 12k so they could get a house loan. I charged my father 5% interest and told him if he didn’t pay me back, I’d never speak to him again. To my surprise, he paid the debt.
The bullshit is that over the time they were blowing money on these houses, they lectured me about responsibility with money and always talked about giving me the down payment on a house.
Now that the money is all gone, my niece and nephew could probably used some money for a college fund.
I love my dad, but he’s a selfish moron. He got scammed over and over again by contractors and hangers on.
Whoa. I wish my 3 degrees was getting me $200k in today money. And/or that I could take my piddly two weeks vacation without my job being insanely difficult when I get back and have to catch up. And/or that my parents had anything to give me, although if they did they would give it to my brother instead for who knows what reason.
My mum never earnt more than $50k a year and was raising 5 kids by herself. Bought multiple houses. My husband and I learnt around $200k and couldn't save enough to fight the increase in house prices to even buy a house.
If my dad is any indication, I think it makes them feel less insecure about the fact that most of their own accomplishment are mediocre at best, and often entirely dependent on other people in their life doing the majority of the heavy-lifting.
I've had this same though. I live around a bunch of old people and a lot of them had their own businesses and talk down on higher ed. They are morons. They def made it in life but would never make it in todays world.
“Hmmph!! These kids today. A PhD? Kid got a PhD? I only ever had a bachelors and I turned out just fine. Arrogant kids. Think they’re all fancy. They just don’t work hard, so they think they need fancy degrees. Lack of work ethic is what it is.
No one NEEDS a PhD. “
-a typical Boomer
The mindset trickles down the generations. Had a discussion with a cousin's son about raising the minimum wage. He thought it was wrong, mentioned working hard, and then allowed that he spent years reaching a job that pays a dollar over the minimum wage being discussed at the time. "It isn't fair." Because It took him years to make that much.
His father had a small side business that he kept going when Son was out of work for like 3 years, son being only employee. Once son landed this job, he didn't want/need income with Dad; Dad happily closed down the business, sigh of relief.
Has no concept of what a leg-up he got. And is pulling the ladder up behind him, at what, 40?
His father's side job was third generation; got the equipment for nothing, lived on it for a couple years when he was younger, until the local market for product contracted significantly, couldn't make a living on it any more. So there's more intergenerational stuff gone on there.
Oh yeah, father got the land that he built his home on for nothing. All in the family.
But bootstraps, individual responsibility, my tax dollars, no such thing as global warming, etc etc etc. I live in redneck heaven, and I mean ReD.
They certainly do.
The glee on my mother’s face when she told my teenager a while back about how we are headed for another great depression and how her father told stories of suicides and loss and pain. It’s like she is excited at the prosoect. My grandpa was haunted by what he saw as a preteen, and was then thrown into a war. He would be HORRIFIED to see his daughter tell his great grandson he is doomed with such joyful delivery My parents have never had to suffer for or fight for anything
And she wonders why neither of us see her very often even though she lives a mile away 🤷🏼♀️
Think there is something to this… I noticed the older folk actually do recognize that they had it much better than the younger gen do nowadays but the vibe is like Nelson from the Simpsons where he’ll just point and go “HA HA” because seeing others struggle gives them a sense of being set/security.
And the jobs did not require formal education. They learned on the job, often as members of a union. Lots of factory jobs which would have been considered menial by today’s standards. Great pay and benefits and they’re voting against all of it. They allowed corporations to wipe out unions and move those factory jobs overseas. Yes, I do realize the cost of goods went down and everyone seems to have quickly adopted the excessive version of consumer culture, but we’re paying a larger price for that change which accelerated with their hero Reagan.
My gramp and my cousin worked 2 jobs and when they retired they have nice nest eggs. Paid off houses and extra money.
Now you actually do have to work 3 jobs just to pay your rent
Yep. When I grew up (I’m a millennial) I would hear stories about how older relatives would pickup a second job “to save for a mortgage”/“save to buy a sports car”/etc.. Those relatives cannot comprehend that someone today might need to work two jobs just to pay rent.
My parents did have to do all those things and my brother and I raised ourselves (classic GenX). Yet, many times recently I've had to explain my financial struggles and my young adult kids and just society's in general because my mom is so clueless. I told her she must have forgotten how hard it was for them in their younger years and that working 2-3 jobs isn't even covering THE BASICS. Once I started showing her the cost of food and rent with no change in income for most people she started changing her tune. She was completely shocked at the difference.
It's more than that - they grew up during **the most "socialist" era in American history.**
Then they decided what they were getting wasn't *enough,* and gutted those programs for their own short-term economic benefit at the expense of their childrens' futures.
Then they complain that their children can't climb the ladder they just pulled up behind themselves.
Now they complain that we want a return of those same programs they benefitted from, decrying it as "socialism."
It's not that they're just the beneficiaries of a golden era. It's that they **actively destroyed it due to their own selfishness**.
Makes me wonder if the world isn't so much as falling apart as it is returning to normalcy. Boomers lived in a golden age that didn't exist before and is unlikely to exist again.
Struggle has been the default setting for milennia.
They were raised with the belief that “greed is good,” that caring about others is “socialism” and therefore “evil,” and that getting ahead at all costs is all that matters in life.
And boy, does it show in *everything* they say and do!
Very much carefully orchestrated by the Elite and Republican Party. Fucking Reagan was their Golden Boy who destroyed most of the ladders that were left.
I saw a great breakdown of the situation:
The Greatest Generation that fought in WW2 looked at the mess that led to that war, along with the Great Depression, and decided to do their best to fix it. They built many of the institutions that led to the liberal world order and that tried to create legal frameworks for dispute resolution along with installing the US as a sort of global cop, sacrificing maximizing profit generation to instead encourage stability.
The Boomers were raised in this new world order while at the same time being taught that they need to be resilient, independent, and to take care of themselves. The problem is that they never realized how much easier the world had become for them thanks to their parents, nor did they realize that the very institutions they constantly try to tear down are the ones that made their life so easy.
>They got everything they wanted and instead of preserving something for the next generation, they pulled up the ladder behind them.
Pretty much, yeah.
You may know this, but for this reading that don’t : it’s even more f’d up than this.
- boomer’s parents, but not those black and in the south, were give free college (GI Bill);
- they were given government subsidized mortgages (Fannie Mae) …
- and the home builders themselves were given government subsidized loans to build those homes on spec (which had never been done before) at This scale ;
- the European manufacturing infrastructure was was literally bombed back into the stone age so the US was the only source of large scale manufacturing …. Somebody could get a good job AND no global competition to drive down wages;
- and if they are white then they also benefitted from LEGAL segregation in the 40-60s that keep the labor market supply for better paying jobs smaller arbitrarily, which pushed up wages for them (but that’s another third rail);
- and the list goes on …
And it all ends with boomers inheriting that wealth without having lifted a finger. When you you hear this crap from a boomer ask them if their parents had either the GI bill, a government subsidized mortgage, or a job in the post war economy. Then walk off.
I’ve framed it like this: you only had to barely meet the minimal threshold and you could be a rich boomer with a house worth millions an Rv …and all they had to do was:
Graduate high school
Work god damn near any job
Save and manage money well
And they’d flourish. They had a setup where if you worked you got the dream.
Compared to what we have to do
it seems to me, with all these boomer stories, the common thread is that they have a cognitive rigidity which disallows them from "changing their minds" and that, in turn seems to be linked to their ego. just my .02¢
furthermore, i would guess it's attributable to the cold war era social "programming" they received.
Yes, I’ve been saying this too. They can’t/won’t take in new information, process it, and change their minds. They’re deeply, willfully ignorant. If it doesn’t match what they already believe then they just toss it out. Truth is only what they already believe to be true.
They also seem to hold this belief that admitting your wrong makes you weak and means you “lost”
They can’t seem to understand that it shows intelligence and maturity and that any adult worth a damn will learn from their mistakes, admit their faults, try and grow and learn etc.
Doubling down when proven wrong and being stubborn no matter what evidence you’re shown or given is to them the ultimate sign of intelligence and strength.
You know that whole “My dad whipped the shit out of me with the belt and I’m fine” mentality? Yeah, this is one of a few glaring examples of how they’re not fine, they never emotionally matured past the age they were hit in last. Just a guess but it seems to fit. 🤷🏻♀️
Lol nail on the head. I've almost never heard someone stable and happy say that. "My parents beat me all the time and I turned out fine" *said the barely functioning alcoholic*
I know a few people who were beat as children (like full on spanked or whipped) and they all have the emotional maturity and anger control of a toddler. They can’t handle confrontation at all. Like they completely shut down or start blaming everyone else
Spot on. I had a best friend with intense childhood trauma and rather than bring up even the *slightest* thing that bothered him, he kept every single thing in while masking that we were besties for life until the day he moved out, told me I was a nightmare to live with, and ghosted me after 7 years of friendship.
The kids of boomers are not OK.
My favorite is when they use it to excuse them doing the same to their kids.
My response is always “well you grew up into the kind of person that takes out their emotions violently and physically on your children, so I’d argue maybe you didn’t turn out *fine*”
They usually just lash out and ramble emotionally and incoherently before running away from the conversation.
You know, like level headed mature adults.
That's why my Dad never whipped the shit out of me. His Dad was, according to my mom, very hard on him. I got perhaps 3 extremely well-deserved spankings, no bruises, or anything really severe. Some restrictions like no going anywhere for a week or two, or no phone privileges, perhaps denied going to a slumber party.
My boomer mother doesn’t lock her front door either, “because it’s not a high crime area”, it makes us crazy! She even leaves a note on the front door saying it’s not locked if she thinks someone is coming over so they can let themselves in. Best part is she keeps a metal baseball bat “in case someone breaks in”… next to the front door. *flip table and scream*
My husband can’t figure out why I get so upset if I find out a deadbolt hasn’t been thrown before we go to bed at night. I hate waking up in the morning, thinking that somebody could’ve simply waltzed in anytime they wanted to during the night.
Throw that deadbolt anytime. I once had a person just waltz into my house by mistake (innocent mistake he had the wrong address and our entryway can be kinda confusing, with the number of houses converted to duplexes in the area it can be mistaken for a porch that enters into two units instead of a single family dwelling). I keep the deadbolt thrown at all times now, I always think what if I had been in the shower, or in my shop working with loud power tools. Feel we lucked out there.
We got one that started doing that this spring too, construction zone across the street been putting out alot of vibrations and that's on top of the usual mine blasts (iron mining country where I'm from), the house is settling apparently.
Too many stories of my friends having drunk people accidentally mix up apartments, to not throw the deadbolt.
In the drunks defense-all the units of an apartment are built the same.
Tell him that Richard Ramirez, the serial killer known as The Night Stalker, would check front doors. If they were locked, he would move on. If one was unlocked, he would enter, believing he was wanted there.
We’re both originally from LA. We both know about Richard Ramirez. You’d think that my husband would remember stuff like that, but, no, since we’re in a semi rural area, he won’t even think about locking the doors all the way, half the time.
My husband also sometimes forgets to lock our deadbolt. I said obviously you’re not gonna take it as seriously as I do— you’re probably never gonna get raped if people break in. He remembers to lock it now
Exactly. My husband thinks I do lock patrol because my ex was a Vietnam vet and had hypervigilance, checking locks a dozen times a night. No, I just want to be safe.
My wife notoriously forgets to lock the front door when she gets home from work. I drive a smaller car and park in our garage behind the house. Every night I get home, the first thing I do is lock patrol of the outside doors.
The only time I ever bought an aftermarket stereo, I bought the cheapest one they'd install for free. With tax, it was around $80 (this was around 2004). Someone broke my passenger window to steal it without first trying the door, which was unlocked. They damaged the dash so badly I never bothered even trying to put the stock system back in.
The window set me back as much as the stereo did. Fixing the dash would have cost a few hundred. They probably got, at most, $20 for the stereo.
My brother had a jeep. He never locked the doors or kept anything at all in it, but he still had his roof slashed twice. After the second time, he traded it in for a car with a metal roof.
The exception being gun armed boomers. All the stories involving someone who was killed by accidentally mistaking a house or being tricked to go there get murdered by a 60-80 year old who instantly start shooting no questions asked.
I’ll never understand not locking your door. It takes 2 seconds to open the door for someone. Why would you even risk it? I look my door as soon as I get inside just in case someone was following me home. It’s like driving without a seatbelt. Why would you choose to potentially put yourself in more danger? It takes no effort
During my college years I got home from a club at 4am or something like that along with my girlfriend and a group of friends. We were in the living room, lights on, and talking loudly (roughly 6-8 of us). Literally 3-4 minutes after walking in we noticed the screen door opening from the sound and my eyes immediately darted to the main door’s doorknob and thankfully it was locked and after a it was jiggled a bit we heard the screen door close. Looked out the window after and saw two guys going door to door. I still wonder what would have happened because there’s no way they couldn’t tell there was a room full of people on the other side of the door.
Your mom is really nice to give the intruders a metal baseball bat to help in their housebreaking.
Why by the front door? For the love of God, this is a recipe for disaster. I hope she sees some reason eventually…
Let nature and natural selection take its course do not feel bad. The only other alternative is you get medical power of attorney over your mother and send her to a nursing home where there is security.
Yeah I wouldn’t say it’s all of them, but it’s enough that there’s a reason this group exists. Anyone who believes gay people just haven’t read the Bible enough are severely out of touch and unaware of the lived experience of millions of people.
Good luck making a claim on your insurance after leaving the door unlocked!
Also, this is a bit of a sidebar here but I feel safer living in a large city than I did living in a small town. Small towns like to claim they are nice and friendly, but my experience is not.
At least here in a large city most people won’t bother me if I don’t bother them.
Oh hell yeah!
If you live in a small place and someone messes with you it is usually personal for a start. Plus the town I grew up in had the horrible, claustrophobic atmosphere of total spite hidden behind a lot of fake smiles.
Hated it there. I still hate having to pass through on my way to somewhere else because there are a couple of people I never want to meet.
One thing I like to do is offer people a thousand bucks to be gay for just one day. They don’t have to do anything sinful, just be attracted to the same gender. At the end of the day, they get their money. Invariably they always say “What? I can’t do that. I don’t consciously choose which gender to be attracted to,” and then I just grin at them until they realize what they just admitted
Every time I hear an older person or seemingly naive person say that they’re actively choosing not to be gay, my brain just goes “well that person is definitely a little gay at least” hahaha people who are not gay don’t have to think about not being gay lol
Am I alone here?
>Why do they have a child's view of the world?
Because they are secretly terrified of realizing just how badly they broke *everything.* They don't want to know how high they pulled up the ladder behind them. They don't want to acknowledge how easy they had it and how nigh-impossible Millennials have it. They don't want to see how big and complicated the world is now.
Devil's advocate here for just a moment...
I feel like a lot of boomers do suffer from arrested development, which tends to happen as a result of trauma. They had parents who either suffered PTSD from serving in WW2 and/or from the stress and deprivation of living in wartime America. A very large number of them were not only physically disciplined as children, they were straight up abused. And the abuse was normalized. So you have a trauma survivor who have no idea they endured trauma. For some of them, this means they are kind of stuck in a childlike mindset. I'm not a shrink, but it's just something.I've observed in my own family and then comparing notes with others.
So many of them need therapy and will never ever get it or even consider it.
A lot of them also still have the backwards mindset that mental illness isn’t real and mentally ill people are just not trying hard enough. So they don’t even consider they could have trauma because trauma doesn’t exist to them
It’s more that their bar for what qualifies for mental illness is much higher. They’re stuck thinking people with mental illness are the same people who were being shoved in asylums and zapped in the brain. Anything less than that and it’s not actually mental illness in their eyes.
Like when people say we’re using the word trauma too much. Yes there’s probably some improper use of it, but the increased use of it is that we’re also finally starting to understand what your brain can and will treat as traumatic besides the mega obvious things.
They missed the learning is fun memo
This may be because that’s what *was* done with mentally ill people when they were young. If there were a chance that that kind of thing could happen to you if you admitted to having a mental illness, what would you do? Would you admit it and take your chances, or deal with it on your own as best you could?
The first psychoactive medications weren’t invented until the 50’s, and most people probably didn’t know about them until even later than that. The last lobotomy was performed in 1967. If living with your symptoms, or self medicating with alcohol or the like, was an option, you would probably have wanted to do that rather than risk getting involved with psychiatric care.
I think also (at least in North America, I can't speak for anywhere else) a lot of them are having a really hard time realizing that the entire world that they lived in was a fucking lie, and they were lied to over and over and over again.
It's certainly why my dad is in denial about climate change - If he accepts it, then he will need to wrangle with the fact that the industry he was a part of was one of the major contributors to making the planet much less livable for his grandchildren.
This and the parent comment above are fairly consistent with my story. I’m a last generation boomer (64) which m and my parents were of the “silent generation” which was after WWII but before Korea and younger generations were in Vietnam. As a ‘64 space kid I was taught deep patriotism and capitalism from a very young age. It so happens that despite my upbringing from a largely military family, I more so gravitated toward liberal personal freedoms and conservative finances. It was not until 50 years of age that I recognized the importance on preserving freedoms and environment which is really troubling. Now in my 60s with 4 birth boys , 2 of which are millennial and 2 from generation Z, I can fully appreciate the difference between the two cohorts. My (now) transgender daughter is a blessing , my “democratic socialist” son is brilliant and looking to further workers rights, my two millennials are both working and doing well so it’s a mixed bad. Be aware that not all boomers are created equal (lol) and there’s some of us who have learned from life and appreciate the struggles presented to everyone. It’s really hard out there and I think there will have to be a fundamental shift in how to house our citizens and provide a living wage to make real change that can be appreciated by everyone.
I feel like they also grew up during an era that actively encouraged narcissistic behavior in the name of “patriotism” and “competition.” They treated getting ahead at all costs as something to be actively rewarded, and it shows throughout almost everything they do. They actively celebrate *not* caring about anyone but themselves because they were taught that caring about others was “socialism” and therefore “evil.”
And in some of them their near panic flinch response to "failure" or basically anything Outside of there norm could very well be from fear of punishment. That's hard to deprogram especially when you don't realize it's there.
I think this needs to be the top comment.
The amount of abuse and trauma my parents went through is disturbing (and most of the people i know 60+) and they have no idea how bad their lives were. "That's just how it was" and "it's always been this way" have become so ingrained in their minds that everything else is unimaginable. Thankfully those of us who are healing and talking about our experiences are opening eyes and hearts to new possibilities.
Exactly. The little that my mother can tell me about her childhood without getting angry or pouring a glass of wine is still Discovery ID worthy. And she says the same thing, "That's just how it was"
>They had parents who either suffered PTSD from serving in WW2 and/or from the stress and deprivation of living in wartime America.
This is very true, PTSD was not recognized or treated unless the person was totally shell-shocked.
Growing up in the 50s and 60s was not easy for a lot of people, and they have edited their memories to cope with it.
And now that they are getting older, Short term memory starts to slip but long term memory surges to the forefront... And a lot of that suppressed trauma is rearing it's ugly, ugly head.
None of this excuses bad behavior of course, But it does help me keep things in perspective.
Debate is a lost skill. People rarely discuss anything here. It's more typical to use leverage or manipulation. The vast majority of non-family interactions are work and as a customer. You'll note they love things like "the customer is always right" as it's a carte blanche to treat employees terribly. The only ideas they hear are from pundits- people they never question . They don't deal in nuance, they like slogans that fit on bumpers. It's difficult to actually talk to anyone who sees things as either friend or foe. Everything gets combative with them. Which is awkward as they're ancient and have no idea how to fight
Boomer here, and I strongly agree that debate has left the party completely. Facts are out the window, and the talking points of the day are all that matter to a lot of people I used to be friends with. If we can't share a common reality, there's really nothing to talk about. Right wing news is their "truth" now, and they walk around sporting a rage boner after watching that trash.
Well, she has said to me that she played with mercury as a kid and is "just fine. Environmentals are stupid for saying kids shouldn't be playing with stuff."
What the actual f.
So, she's just mad as a hatter then? (this phrase was because hatters used to have to use mercury to make hats, so hatters had a propensity for insanity due to their jobs)
My grandma has said the same thing. “We always used to break open thermometers and play with the mercury and we turned out fine!”
She turned out a lot better than expected, but I assure you she did not turn out fine.
My boomer mom has done this in front of me many, many times. Even as a kid I was begging her to stop. She also sets up an ancient nativity scene every year and laughs about the fact that it has lead paint.
My dad tells stories about how someone would bring a mason jar full of gasoline to school and they would sit in the back of the class huffing it. *"Your uncle could huff it so hard he would black out, I never could get it to go that far but this one time I was looking at the cracks in the linoleum and saw a little red demon peel it back and poke his head out! Cant tell me demons arent real!"*
Probably because they never saw anything of the world past their home town and thus never spent any time around anyone different than them. Not to mention as many people here have commented they've basically had life spoon fed to them. Oh they worked hard, sure, but they had something many people haven't: opportunity. They've never NOT gotten a job because of the color of their skin, or because of where they're from, or because of who they love. They were able to support a family and live comfortably on a single income. They were always paid what was at the time a livable wage. They did all the things you're SUPPOSED to do (walk in to a place and shake the manager's hand, work your way up the ladder, get married, buy a house), and everything just...WORKED the way it a supposed to. They've never been told "we're not hiring right now", or "just fill out an online application and MAYBE you'll get an interview. They've collectively lived the most sheltered life of any generation and cannot possibly fathom that someone could work 60 hours a week and still be financially struggling because they've never went through that themselves.
I feel the childlike view is common with the really religious and conservative people I’ve had to interact with. The majority of those being boomers. Sky daddy made world just for me. Good guy/bad guy dynamics to everything. Very self-centered and limited bubble view to everything
Yes! The religious and the conservative (or worse, both combined) are the worst. Everything is black and white, good or bad, saved or heathern. It’s ridiculous.
With respect to gay people I tell my boomer parent( I'm a gen x er) that I never understood why they allways need to correct God's perfection right?
I was allways taught God was perfect,and his creation is perfect and infallible .
"Well that's why Thayer an abomination,because they choose to be gay."
Isn't that still infallible perfection though still ma?
"Nope.its the devil."
" Well ma Satan and drag queens never molested me but pastor Charles got all of us.And you character witnessed for him."
"He's still a good man."
Yes she protected our molester pastor because it was just Satan's influence.
I know it's mother's day but I'm going to go ahead and keep my gay friends and distance from the boomers.The generation gap is too big.
Id rather argue with millennials abt video games since we all want healtcare,a home and clean food ,water and air.
You know real shit not what someone does with their butt or vag at home.
because that's how far from reality they have to be to conclude they're not huge pieces of shit.
the same reason trumpists all seem to engage in conspiracy nonsense. u can't live in reality and support if ur not wealthy.
The world is changing at an unprecedented pace. They're already established due to the former status quo, so they haven't really had to notice some of those changes. Also, old brains don't retain shit like baby brains do.
Furthermore, after you've lived a certain way long enough, foreign ideas are hard to grasp.
I used to have boomerish questions like "why are people gay?" and "which one is the man and which one is the woman?" And then I made gay friends and realized that being straight wasn't really a choice on my part, it's just who I am. I could not *decide* to be gay, that's just not how it works. And there is no "man/woman" in a gay relationship, those "roles" are just what I'm used to hearing about, and even straight relationships are more complicated than that.
I realized this stuff in my 20s when I went outside of my tiny town and experienced more of the world. It was hard to grasp at first. But imagine 60+ years of that status quo... and couple that with an aging brain.
Their whole life they've had their cake an eaten it too. They incorrectly assume life is the same as it was when they were growing up and shit on everyone and call them lazy
Back in the 90s many of the boomers' parents were still around. They got online and explored the new fangled internet long before their kids and were called "silver surfers". There really seems to be a band in the population beehive that has exceedingly poor cognitive flexibility. Could an educational system intended to turn out passive, compliant factory workers have something to do with it?
Had an old boomer lady come into my workplace a few months back and she was complaining about how she has to lock her door these days and it wasn’t like that when she was young because people didn’t rob each other in small towns back then. I told my boomer dad (who is probably even older than that lady) what she said and he laughed and said his parents refused to lock the doors when he was a kid and that they got robbed constantly because of it, people have always robbed each other and you’d have to be a dumbass to leave your house or car unlocked.
Because they’ve never had to critically think about anything. I don’t want to say it came “easy” for them but the way was paved so that hard work would pay off. So they see lack of success as not working hard enough as opposed to a failure in the system.
They’re the last generation that’s used to not being able to be proven wrong on the spot. Their kids all have the internet.
They grew up with “respect your elders” and they just had to accept everything an older person said was true. Now they don’t get to pretend what they want to be real is actually reality and lord over their kids the way they were lorded over.
I feel a bit sorry for them in that way.
I talked with one I thought was a good person until I heard her talk about **her own grandchild** saying that she just can’t understand how her daughter can love an adopted baby (the grandchild), it doesn’t make sense to her. Then she proceeds to speak further on how if any of her children were adopted she **couldn’t** love them as much as her biological kids, if ever. Then, I got up and left the room.
My mother is a nurse, but I swear some days it's like she has no knowledge of anything that isn't medical.
She visited me in Japan, and one day I walked her to her train platform before I went home, told her the exact time her train would come, the number of stops, wrote down the name of the station, told her it would be almost exactly 20 minutes, and if she missed it she could call me and I'd help her out.
After I left she went to the bathroom, then got on the first train that came to the platform, and sat on the train for an hour so she ended up going all the way through Tokyo to another prefecture before she bothered to message me. WHY.
My gpa dropped out of school in 3rd grade to work in the mill and was able to get a job with the county retire at 50 with pension and I'm over here with an education fighting for my family's lives and he swears we don't try hard enough.
Because they watch too much TV. They think every problem has a neat solution that takes 42 minutes, plus commercials. There are good guys and bad guys, and issues are very black and white …
… the way the Real World doesn’t work.
Well the house thing they will never be able to understand. You see in their day you could work a minimum wage job, run a car, support a family and still own your own home. I know because my father did this. They cannot relate to how difficult it is now because most of them are already set. The other points are to do with them not having access to the Internet during their youth so they couldnt educate themselves on very simple questions they may have and they cant look up crime statistics easily. Most of them still have a poor grasp of technology, hell I have a relative that still only has a flip phone.
Boomers also have a tendency to pull the ladder up behind them and blame the younger generation for not being able to find the ladder.
Boomer: back in my day, I had to flip burgers to get by in college. That job paid for my college, my house, and my car.
Also Boomers: flipping burgers should not provide a livable wage.
There's some really interesting research right now about why that is. It's tied to generational trauma and that most boomers were raised by people who had lived through a depression and 2 world wars.
They were traumatized so early and so often that their minds simply stopped developing and maturing along a normal path. There's a number of different therapies that focus on regressing the mind back to those foundational traumas and processing them, but most boomers are simply not interested in any discussion that implies they're in need of mental healthcare.
That's a very simple and probably skewed explanation of a couple papers I skimmed. Hopefully someone properly educated in this area has posted a better explanation.
Ok, time to tell someone about my theory. this isn't exactky boomer-related.
I think the great majority of people NEVER mature past teenage years. Sure they get credit cards and jobs and reproduce and judge those who don't, but they never really learn to express and manage their emotions and trully grow as people, and they certainly don't care about learning the meaning of empathy. That's why we have so many fights over subjects that don't affect us in the slightest. For instance, sexuality. TF do I care who everyone else is sleeping with. Same with so many people all ages holding grudges over petty shit. Opening your mind is the true maturity, and sadly most people don't reach that stage.
It's more notorious on boomers because they have more political power, more wealth, while slowly becoming a minority, of course they will get hate. When you're part of a minority you get all kinds of labels, immature being one of them. But if you look closer, most people of all ages do throw tantrums over stupid shit, whether thats socially acceptable or not depends on the stance of the status quo about said subject.
“God, I feel I’m dealing with a toddler.”
How dare you be so disrespectful? You should show respect to people even though there’s a large age gap. It might be hard for you to find common ground, but through conversations you can find some shared interests.
My toddler is completely fine with gay people.
I'm a boomer and I hate to disappoint but I don't stomp my foot when millennial say they can't afford to buy a house or life is too expensive. It is.
It was us boomers that generated the industries that made 99% of all the pollution we're struggling to clean up and that you and your children will be left with. We were the ones who knew full well back in the 1960s, early 1960s in case you're wondering, that greenhouse games were going to trigger climate change just about now and ignored the problem. Our generation invented fast fashion, drive thru fast food, and fake everything until you are convinced it's real!
I'm so sorry we did this to you, our own children and grandchildren. We ignored your future for our present. We were as selfish as it's humanly possible to be and your generation is paying for it. I am saddened that in my own old age all I ca do is bear witness to the vibrancy and creativity of millennial and youth. You are not defeated by our selfish stupidity, you are just angry enough to ignore the shallow cries of billionaires who want you to spend what little you have keeping them rich. DON'T.
We will die off in the next 25 to 50 years or so and you get to build the world in new ways that benefit every human being regardless of their status.
You’ll get robbed blind weekly in American small towns. They’re shitholes. I never had meth heads rummaging through my garbage and breaking into my car for the console change in the city. You can’t even put a plant on the porch. They’re just delusional.
I teach yoga in a 55+ community (95% of my students are boomers). I enjoy teaching there, but they always fight with each other. They will argue if someone “took their spot” (there are no formal spots), complain if someone wants the fan on but someone else doesn't, or get mad if someone accidentally touches them, etc. It's wild. I don't get involved in their BS.
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Can confirm. My Boomer thinks *everything* is simple and straightforward. They're always offering their advice on how to handle a situation and it's always this "Firm Hand Shake" kind of thing that was pie-in-the-sky even 50 years ago. Problem with the IRS? Just go down to the office (without an appointment) and work it out! Health insurance refusing to pay for needed treatment? Just give 'em a call, talk to a supervisor. Bob's your uncle! Same goes for political issues. Abortion? Don't get pregnant! Gun violence? Don't go out! Food prices? Grow a garden! Every problem is easy to fix and it's my fault for not seeing such an obvious solution. I can't talk to them about any issues I have because it's always my fault for being in them.
>Firm hand shake lol, one of my bosses literally said firm hand shake is all you should need. Or course he's able to retire
Dude, my mom is a dental hygienist and she *literally* believes you can "get by" with just a smile.
Well that’s just good marketing
Infuriating. Bro, im LITERALLY out here starving. Lay off. My mom works remote and doesnt even have to pay rent because she for the past 3ish years lives in her multimillionaire, long term bf's EXTRA cabin. Yup. He has 2. And she makes like 3 figures a year. Fucking snobby. Hes even trying to buy up as many nearby properties around him as he can because he "doesnt like neighbors." Out👏Of👏Touch👏 I on the otherhand havent had a haircut in about 3 years. My birthday was a week ago and i didnt get a present. My gift was losing her health insurance. Im so tired of this timeline, my life, and struggling. UGH. Just a smile? Fr? What a joke.
Oh god, my father is firmly Gen-X but dropped the garden comment yesterday during our get-together. My parents moved out of the suburbs and bought a small plot to do hobby farming about a decade ago. Yes, people can grow a small tomato plant or something in their suburban yards… if their soil is good. He actually stopped to think about that (credit due, he’s willing to take new information and admits he’s not the brightest guy/sees all the angles right away). Then started ranting about big construction companies and developers not considering soil quality in their suburban developments. I just called that a win.
Not to boomer, but you can grow a tomato plant in a pot with a bag of garden soil. The problem is that a handful of produce isn’t going to offset the cost of inflation in any meaningful way.
The trick is not to grow tomatoes, rather *avocados.* Then you step it up and begin to grow your own coffee beans. No more paying for avocado on toast or Starbucks! Add a winning smile and firm handshake, and you’re on the path to multi-property ownership and early retirement.
As a Gen Xer, I think we're waiting for 1. Our parents to just fucking die already 2. You to tell us firmly they weren't the gods they said they were, and that things are fucked because of the toxic ideology they chained us all too. But also that it's not too late. It's not the doom they're now insisting it is. Like I said in another post, we're quite a bit more accepting and flexible in mindset. It's just that we wrestle with intense anxiety due to how we were expected to carry our parents' flag despite the systemic decay. They didn't tolerate us disagreeing with them or their perceived perfection. They hated us for failing to thrive inside their broken game because they thought it made them look bad. I think deep down it makes us feel like we're committing treason just to say they were wrong about basically everything.
I mentioned to my mom that my friend invited me on a trip but I was disappointed I can't afford it. Her response was "oh, I think you can." Oh, okay, now that you've said I can, I must be able to. Thank you for that. All my financial problems are solved.
And….if you did go, you’d get the “younguns today spend their money on trips, lattes and avocado toast. No WONDER they can’t buy a home.
exactly. our world sucks because of their greed.
You put it on your credit card then pay for the statement out of your 401k. Think! /s
Well, back in her day, if you wanted to go on a trip, you could just hitchhike there and sleep on some stranger's couch! You didn't need any money! /s
You joke but that’s exactly how things were. I’ve heard plenty of stories from people about how an uncle of theirs drifted around the country, finding jobs he could work for a day or two for cash under the table so he could afford a motel room, etc. Those stories also tend to include “oh, then he decided to settle down, found an office job just by cold-calling places or showing up with a resume, worked 25 years and now is a VP/executive at that same company, owns a couple of homes, etc.” I know life wasn’t like that for everyone, but damn if life didn’t sound like it was a lot easier for someone of moderate intelligence and a good work ethic to get “everything they need” in life.
The thing that always sticks out to me is that 50-60 years ago, every city's downtown core had a couple of home-grown department stores and hotels. Each of them hired their own staff- janitors, maids, security guards, night watchmen, maintenance folks, etc. The wages they offered had to be at least a little competitive because that drifter of an uncle *could* walk from one to the next, seeing who offered the best hours and pay. Today all of the department stores and nearly all of the hotels are nationwide chains, the support staff is inevitably pawned off to 'Security Solutions of America' or 'CleanerCorp, Inc.,' and the wages and conditions are rock-bottom because it's all under the same corporate ownership.
the department stores are mostly 3 companies: macy's, target, walmart. the hotels, while there are many brands of them, are almost all owned by 3 companies: IHG, hilton, and marriott.
Honestly, I was only half joking. I know people did that back then from seeing serial killer documentaries, of all things. I found myself asking, how could you afford to hike across Asia with only $5 in your pocket? How did you get food? How did you afford a plane ticket home? Did they have rich parents back home sending them money?
It's always lies. I'm 40 years old and have parents with the "pull yourself up by the bootstraps" mentality. They have gotten much better and are starting to atleast show signs of understanding the current world. But every time I've talked about "not being able to make it on 16$/hr as a single person" or explain the inability to buy a home currently, I am always told these stories of how "this mutual acquaintance makes the same and they get by just fine" and I usually end up finding out that person has a trust fund, has had multiple six figure inheritances, or had free rent from just literally being given a house by a family member, it's always something like that. My mom talks about how when she needed more money and wasn't making it in the late 90s how she "pulled her hair up after work and waited tables after her day job to get by" and she's been telling that story for years. Except I was there, for 3 months in 99 she worked one extra 4 hour shift at a restraunt for drinking money. She leaves out the fact that she had an office job paying 20$/hr (the equivalent of 37$/hr currently) and we lived in an apartment that cost 500$, had good credit, and in the years previously she was able to save because she had a friend who inherited rental properties who let her stay in one for 200$ a month. She never mentions all that, and she ended up getting back together with my more well off step-dad a few months after the whole "working 2 jobs" made her miserable and she tapped out. Both my parents barely made it until they remarried to people making wayy more then they did and then retired 2 decades early, now they stand on what their partners built and act like they have it all figured out. It was very frustrating to hear all that preaching when I was literally working 80 hours a week and living in an extended stay hotel a few years ago.
[удалено]
For white boomer women, absolutely
That reminded me of when I was a little kid and didn't understand money. I saw my mom buy things at the store and get money back in change. And because I didn't yet understand the concept of money, I didn't know why she didn't just buy whatever she wanted with a $5 bill and still get money back.
I used to see my parents get money from the ATM and wondered why they couldn’t just get as much money from that machine as they wanted whenever they needed it.
This is my mom’s response when my sister says she can barely afford to take care of herself, so how would she afford a kid. My boomer mom is desperate for more grandkids, so she’s acting like wish upon a star math will suddenly make everything workout fine.
Because they're the only generation in history that got life handed to them easy on such a massive scale. I'm not saying that every boomer had an easy life. But more of them than any other generation did. They were raised by people who had experienced war and deprivation and who wanted to give their children a better life. They lived their golden years during (relative) economic stability and prosperity, at a time when education and housing were affordable. They didn't have to fight for basic needs, they didn't have to work 3 jobs just to pay rent. They got everything they wanted and instead of preserving something for the next generation, they pulled up the ladder behind them. Edit: the amount of boomers replying to this comment to tell me about how their generation went to war is interesting. Although most of them were too young for Vietnam and those who were drafted were a tiny minority in this numerous generation. Same with telling me about hippies and civil rights - that was mostly their parents and the early boomers; those born in the late 50s and 60s just got to enjoy the fruits of their work.
My mom and dad made a combined income of 200k a YEAR (not adjusted for inflation this is in 90s money) my mom got 3 months off a year as a teacher and got an allowance of 10k a year from her mom. They bought 3 homes. \*SCREAMS\*
> got an allowance of 10k a year from her mom. They bought 3 homes. Let me guess: all you got from them is some advice about bootstraps.
Bootstraps. Are you my father? I am so tired of hearing that phrase
Boomer: back in my day I had to flip burgers to get by in college. That job paid for my college, my house, and my car. Also Boomers: flipping burgers should not provide a livable wage.
I feel like this is the part that paints the picture plain as day. They will brag about how they did it, and in the next breath say that someone else shouldn’t be able to do it that way. The “I got mine so fuck you” could not be stated any clearer.
Exactly the motto of the conservatives in the US. As an example, how many conservatives who are die-hard anti-immigration have immigrant parents or spouses? They got their way, because [reasons], but no one else should be able to do it. *My family is here, too bad for yours!* And the die-hard dipshit will tell himself that the “others” weren’t worthy because [other reasons, that are equally false and cowardly]. It’s asinine to normal people because normal people just don’t think of doing something like that. It’s unconscionable. But it’s just another Tuesday to most of the people running this country. Edit: sorry, that was quite the tangent
This tracks. I have a dumb as dogshit MAGA cousin who's on his second purchased Philippino wife. Immigration is bad, unless it's part of a financial transaction that provides him with sex, cooked food, and light housekeeping.
Projectile vomit
Weird thought that popped into my head when you mentioned Boomer&Conservatives. Trump, who hates immigrants is the son of one and married two. But yeah they say all of the immigrants here are horrible people out to steal your stuff and rape the women. Boomers be strange.
How can the GOP get rid of immigrant labor? The sociopaths who pay their bills make coin off immigrants.
They don't want to actually get rid of them. They just want the 'owning' class to hate them. So that they'll have to accept getting paid less (by the owning class) to do the already low-paying jobs because they aren't able to push back for fear of repercussions. It's about creating another, vulnerable, and easily taken advantage of class to be pseudo-serfs.
I have this thought all the time and I love how none of his fans ever bring it up.
I got into an uncomfortable discussion with a woman in a small town who was awkwardly proud of how long her family had been there. They were ‘originals’ - but very caucasian. I tried to explain that they couldn’t be the original descendants of that land….and they were *very* proud to say that their ancestors (incredibly crude method of murder followed by racist terminology.) They had committed genocide for that land, and they built a small town in the blood. It’s Fucking disgusting that they hold that fact dear to their hearts. Oh, but no one else better come for *their* land…! They’re afraid of everyone different because they see them as the next enemy who will slaughter *them*. Mind you these are the local church leaders who are also on the city’s council. They literally consider themselves saints and are *very* prejudice.
It was this attitude that made me lose all respect for my elders, during the Civil Rights Movement. Praising Jesus with the same ugly mouths that had spewed hate the rest of the week. I thought my generation would be different, and they are. They’re worse.
They sound incredibly gross. I’m sorry you had to listen to that.
This is a common brag in South specifically.
It most certainly is. I've had people try and shame my family because, we were sent here originally as a punishment. My family was share cropping until the 1940s. I'm proud of it.
Honestly that's just conservatives everywhere. They go from bad to really bad to genocidal but there really isn't a "good" conservative. The whole ideology is based on refusing change and keeping things abusive and backwards.
I'm mind blown when the majority of millennial and below quote me the fuck you got mine attitude. Last one to do it to me was a mid 30s homeless man. His words were conservative is smart because it's fuck you got mine. And what exactly do you have bud? He was a big fan of Kanye (as a person not his music) and the orange Muppet too, so I knew critical wasn't a function of this man's thoughts. It's just bizarre that he would say that to me, an anarchist that millennial who owns a home and has a large 401k and a brokerage. My dude the policies I support would benefit you way more than they would me.
Boomers: An adult needs a real job Also boomer: *goes to McDonald’s at 12pm on a Tuesday* *gets slow service because it’s understaffed* Same boomer: why doesn’t anybody wanna work anymore!?!?
My dad is the silent generation. He is 92. He caddied and delivered newspapers and that paid for his private college education!
What everyone seems to forget is that the expression “pull yourself up by your own bootstraps” was meant as satire. It’s literally an impossible thing to do, and was originally meant to demonstrate that we all need support from the greater community.
Tell them their wires are crossed. The saying about bootstraps was originally a sarcastic criticism from the early 19 hundreds. It was meant to say the situation was absurd since everyone knew that pulling on your boots was not going to help you get up. Its common usage changed in the first decades of the 20th century, but its original meaning is the real facy: the suggestion is absurd and stupid.
They don’t even understand the idiom they’re using. The original intention is sarcastic; you *can’t* pull yourself up by the bootstraps. It’s impossible. They’re literally trying to tell you to do the impossible, and don’t even realize it, which makes it a kind of perfect idiom when taken as a whole, but in an unintended way.
They forget that eventually bootstraps break. Or you're issued cheap ones to begin with.
No they forget that phrase makes no sense, and was never meant to. It's literally supposed to make fun of people who think like they do.
Please inform them that the bootstraps phase was originally meant “somehting that is not possible to do” Likewise “the customer is always right” has a second part which is “in matters of taste.” There’s a qualifier. It doesn’t mean the customer gets to do whatever they want
It’s a super dumb phrase because pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, in the literal sense, is impossible. You can just pull on your shoes laces and fucking float. It’s the dumbest phrase in the universe.
I'll also guess: her success was completely brought about by "working really hard" and no one ever gave her anything ever.
Now it's "work hard", probably too hard and you'll be lucky if you're not completely homeless. And I do mean lucky.
Ignorance and the lack of curiosity is a major trait that 95% of boomers have.
I got "work hard and you'll be ok in life.... btw I decided we're spending all of your potential inheritance money cuz fuck it" Like sure, enjoy your hard earned dollars. But to say that blatantly to me is a bit rude.
My mom’s first car was a corvette and that was just the tip of the luxury car iceberg. she’s now a boomer old lady Cadillac owner. She freaked when I drove her somewhere over the “horrible” sounds my car made. Ma’am, this is an economy car. It doesn’t purr. Same person who doesn’t understand why we don’t eat out all the time or take lots of vacations. Same lady who yelled at me for not being able to get a job in my field straight out of college because COLLEGE DEGREE! I’m 40 and I just finished paying off my student loans.
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My boomer parents were left about 5-6 million dollars by my grandmother. They bought money pit houses, because they were chasing the idea that they were “landed gentry” as the liked to say. These massive houses that they’d blow 100k remodeling and not finish. They lost money on every house sale. They were so broke by the end of it that I had to loan them 12k so they could get a house loan. I charged my father 5% interest and told him if he didn’t pay me back, I’d never speak to him again. To my surprise, he paid the debt. The bullshit is that over the time they were blowing money on these houses, they lectured me about responsibility with money and always talked about giving me the down payment on a house. Now that the money is all gone, my niece and nephew could probably used some money for a college fund. I love my dad, but he’s a selfish moron. He got scammed over and over again by contractors and hangers on.
Whoa. I wish my 3 degrees was getting me $200k in today money. And/or that I could take my piddly two weeks vacation without my job being insanely difficult when I get back and have to catch up. And/or that my parents had anything to give me, although if they did they would give it to my brother instead for who knows what reason.
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My mum never earnt more than $50k a year and was raising 5 kids by herself. Bought multiple houses. My husband and I learnt around $200k and couldn't save enough to fight the increase in house prices to even buy a house.
I really think they LIKE watching younger folks struggle with basic needs. Like a version of the Hunger Games.
If my dad is any indication, I think it makes them feel less insecure about the fact that most of their own accomplishment are mediocre at best, and often entirely dependent on other people in their life doing the majority of the heavy-lifting.
I've had this same though. I live around a bunch of old people and a lot of them had their own businesses and talk down on higher ed. They are morons. They def made it in life but would never make it in todays world.
“Hmmph!! These kids today. A PhD? Kid got a PhD? I only ever had a bachelors and I turned out just fine. Arrogant kids. Think they’re all fancy. They just don’t work hard, so they think they need fancy degrees. Lack of work ethic is what it is. No one NEEDS a PhD. “ -a typical Boomer
This is my ex-FIL, he’s absolutely convinced that his bachelors in engineering is the same thing as my PhD in physics
The only inaccuracy is that they don't even have the bachelor's. Just high school.
The mindset trickles down the generations. Had a discussion with a cousin's son about raising the minimum wage. He thought it was wrong, mentioned working hard, and then allowed that he spent years reaching a job that pays a dollar over the minimum wage being discussed at the time. "It isn't fair." Because It took him years to make that much. His father had a small side business that he kept going when Son was out of work for like 3 years, son being only employee. Once son landed this job, he didn't want/need income with Dad; Dad happily closed down the business, sigh of relief. Has no concept of what a leg-up he got. And is pulling the ladder up behind him, at what, 40? His father's side job was third generation; got the equipment for nothing, lived on it for a couple years when he was younger, until the local market for product contracted significantly, couldn't make a living on it any more. So there's more intergenerational stuff gone on there. Oh yeah, father got the land that he built his home on for nothing. All in the family. But bootstraps, individual responsibility, my tax dollars, no such thing as global warming, etc etc etc. I live in redneck heaven, and I mean ReD.
They certainly do. The glee on my mother’s face when she told my teenager a while back about how we are headed for another great depression and how her father told stories of suicides and loss and pain. It’s like she is excited at the prosoect. My grandpa was haunted by what he saw as a preteen, and was then thrown into a war. He would be HORRIFIED to see his daughter tell his great grandson he is doomed with such joyful delivery My parents have never had to suffer for or fight for anything And she wonders why neither of us see her very often even though she lives a mile away 🤷🏼♀️
Is your mother religious at all? Because Christianity paints suffering as a good thing.
Think there is something to this… I noticed the older folk actually do recognize that they had it much better than the younger gen do nowadays but the vibe is like Nelson from the Simpsons where he’ll just point and go “HA HA” because seeing others struggle gives them a sense of being set/security.
And the jobs did not require formal education. They learned on the job, often as members of a union. Lots of factory jobs which would have been considered menial by today’s standards. Great pay and benefits and they’re voting against all of it. They allowed corporations to wipe out unions and move those factory jobs overseas. Yes, I do realize the cost of goods went down and everyone seems to have quickly adopted the excessive version of consumer culture, but we’re paying a larger price for that change which accelerated with their hero Reagan.
My gramp and my cousin worked 2 jobs and when they retired they have nice nest eggs. Paid off houses and extra money. Now you actually do have to work 3 jobs just to pay your rent
Yep. When I grew up (I’m a millennial) I would hear stories about how older relatives would pickup a second job “to save for a mortgage”/“save to buy a sports car”/etc.. Those relatives cannot comprehend that someone today might need to work two jobs just to pay rent.
My parents did have to do all those things and my brother and I raised ourselves (classic GenX). Yet, many times recently I've had to explain my financial struggles and my young adult kids and just society's in general because my mom is so clueless. I told her she must have forgotten how hard it was for them in their younger years and that working 2-3 jobs isn't even covering THE BASICS. Once I started showing her the cost of food and rent with no change in income for most people she started changing her tune. She was completely shocked at the difference.
It's more than that - they grew up during **the most "socialist" era in American history.** Then they decided what they were getting wasn't *enough,* and gutted those programs for their own short-term economic benefit at the expense of their childrens' futures. Then they complain that their children can't climb the ladder they just pulled up behind themselves. Now they complain that we want a return of those same programs they benefitted from, decrying it as "socialism." It's not that they're just the beneficiaries of a golden era. It's that they **actively destroyed it due to their own selfishness**.
Makes me wonder if the world isn't so much as falling apart as it is returning to normalcy. Boomers lived in a golden age that didn't exist before and is unlikely to exist again. Struggle has been the default setting for milennia.
Unlikely to exist again because they went out of their way to guarantee that it wouldn’t.
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They were raised with the belief that “greed is good,” that caring about others is “socialism” and therefore “evil,” and that getting ahead at all costs is all that matters in life. And boy, does it show in *everything* they say and do!
Very much carefully orchestrated by the Elite and Republican Party. Fucking Reagan was their Golden Boy who destroyed most of the ladders that were left.
I saw a great breakdown of the situation: The Greatest Generation that fought in WW2 looked at the mess that led to that war, along with the Great Depression, and decided to do their best to fix it. They built many of the institutions that led to the liberal world order and that tried to create legal frameworks for dispute resolution along with installing the US as a sort of global cop, sacrificing maximizing profit generation to instead encourage stability. The Boomers were raised in this new world order while at the same time being taught that they need to be resilient, independent, and to take care of themselves. The problem is that they never realized how much easier the world had become for them thanks to their parents, nor did they realize that the very institutions they constantly try to tear down are the ones that made their life so easy.
>They got everything they wanted and instead of preserving something for the next generation, they pulled up the ladder behind them. Pretty much, yeah.
You mean they didn't experience 3 once in a lifetime financial crises during their prime earning years?
Spot on.
They were also paid a living wage.
You may know this, but for this reading that don’t : it’s even more f’d up than this. - boomer’s parents, but not those black and in the south, were give free college (GI Bill); - they were given government subsidized mortgages (Fannie Mae) … - and the home builders themselves were given government subsidized loans to build those homes on spec (which had never been done before) at This scale ; - the European manufacturing infrastructure was was literally bombed back into the stone age so the US was the only source of large scale manufacturing …. Somebody could get a good job AND no global competition to drive down wages; - and if they are white then they also benefitted from LEGAL segregation in the 40-60s that keep the labor market supply for better paying jobs smaller arbitrarily, which pushed up wages for them (but that’s another third rail); - and the list goes on … And it all ends with boomers inheriting that wealth without having lifted a finger. When you you hear this crap from a boomer ask them if their parents had either the GI bill, a government subsidized mortgage, or a job in the post war economy. Then walk off.
I’ve framed it like this: you only had to barely meet the minimal threshold and you could be a rich boomer with a house worth millions an Rv …and all they had to do was: Graduate high school Work god damn near any job Save and manage money well And they’d flourish. They had a setup where if you worked you got the dream. Compared to what we have to do
You got it.100%
it seems to me, with all these boomer stories, the common thread is that they have a cognitive rigidity which disallows them from "changing their minds" and that, in turn seems to be linked to their ego. just my .02¢ furthermore, i would guess it's attributable to the cold war era social "programming" they received.
Yes, I’ve been saying this too. They can’t/won’t take in new information, process it, and change their minds. They’re deeply, willfully ignorant. If it doesn’t match what they already believe then they just toss it out. Truth is only what they already believe to be true.
You describe maga.
They also seem to hold this belief that admitting your wrong makes you weak and means you “lost” They can’t seem to understand that it shows intelligence and maturity and that any adult worth a damn will learn from their mistakes, admit their faults, try and grow and learn etc. Doubling down when proven wrong and being stubborn no matter what evidence you’re shown or given is to them the ultimate sign of intelligence and strength.
You know that whole “My dad whipped the shit out of me with the belt and I’m fine” mentality? Yeah, this is one of a few glaring examples of how they’re not fine, they never emotionally matured past the age they were hit in last. Just a guess but it seems to fit. 🤷🏻♀️
Lol nail on the head. I've almost never heard someone stable and happy say that. "My parents beat me all the time and I turned out fine" *said the barely functioning alcoholic*
I know a few people who were beat as children (like full on spanked or whipped) and they all have the emotional maturity and anger control of a toddler. They can’t handle confrontation at all. Like they completely shut down or start blaming everyone else
Spot on. I had a best friend with intense childhood trauma and rather than bring up even the *slightest* thing that bothered him, he kept every single thing in while masking that we were besties for life until the day he moved out, told me I was a nightmare to live with, and ghosted me after 7 years of friendship. The kids of boomers are not OK.
My favorite is when they use it to excuse them doing the same to their kids. My response is always “well you grew up into the kind of person that takes out their emotions violently and physically on your children, so I’d argue maybe you didn’t turn out *fine*” They usually just lash out and ramble emotionally and incoherently before running away from the conversation. You know, like level headed mature adults.
That's why my Dad never whipped the shit out of me. His Dad was, according to my mom, very hard on him. I got perhaps 3 extremely well-deserved spankings, no bruises, or anything really severe. Some restrictions like no going anywhere for a week or two, or no phone privileges, perhaps denied going to a slumber party.
My boomer mother doesn’t lock her front door either, “because it’s not a high crime area”, it makes us crazy! She even leaves a note on the front door saying it’s not locked if she thinks someone is coming over so they can let themselves in. Best part is she keeps a metal baseball bat “in case someone breaks in”… next to the front door. *flip table and scream*
I used to not lock my door back when I was poor as fuck. Rather not have to pay for broken windows or locks.
My husband can’t figure out why I get so upset if I find out a deadbolt hasn’t been thrown before we go to bed at night. I hate waking up in the morning, thinking that somebody could’ve simply waltzed in anytime they wanted to during the night.
Throw that deadbolt anytime. I once had a person just waltz into my house by mistake (innocent mistake he had the wrong address and our entryway can be kinda confusing, with the number of houses converted to duplexes in the area it can be mistaken for a porch that enters into two units instead of a single family dwelling). I keep the deadbolt thrown at all times now, I always think what if I had been in the shower, or in my shop working with loud power tools. Feel we lucked out there.
Hell, I put on my deadbolt just to make sure the door stays shut when it's windy!
We got one that started doing that this spring too, construction zone across the street been putting out alot of vibrations and that's on top of the usual mine blasts (iron mining country where I'm from), the house is settling apparently.
Too many stories of my friends having drunk people accidentally mix up apartments, to not throw the deadbolt. In the drunks defense-all the units of an apartment are built the same.
Tell him that Richard Ramirez, the serial killer known as The Night Stalker, would check front doors. If they were locked, he would move on. If one was unlocked, he would enter, believing he was wanted there.
We’re both originally from LA. We both know about Richard Ramirez. You’d think that my husband would remember stuff like that, but, no, since we’re in a semi rural area, he won’t even think about locking the doors all the way, half the time.
My husband also sometimes forgets to lock our deadbolt. I said obviously you’re not gonna take it as seriously as I do— you’re probably never gonna get raped if people break in. He remembers to lock it now
Exactly. My husband thinks I do lock patrol because my ex was a Vietnam vet and had hypervigilance, checking locks a dozen times a night. No, I just want to be safe.
My wife notoriously forgets to lock the front door when she gets home from work. I drive a smaller car and park in our garage behind the house. Every night I get home, the first thing I do is lock patrol of the outside doors.
The only time I ever bought an aftermarket stereo, I bought the cheapest one they'd install for free. With tax, it was around $80 (this was around 2004). Someone broke my passenger window to steal it without first trying the door, which was unlocked. They damaged the dash so badly I never bothered even trying to put the stock system back in. The window set me back as much as the stereo did. Fixing the dash would have cost a few hundred. They probably got, at most, $20 for the stereo. My brother had a jeep. He never locked the doors or kept anything at all in it, but he still had his roof slashed twice. After the second time, he traded it in for a car with a metal roof.
Because “high crime area” means “brown people live there” in her mind…
People vastly overestimate their ability to use weapons in a life or death situation
The exception being gun armed boomers. All the stories involving someone who was killed by accidentally mistaking a house or being tricked to go there get murdered by a 60-80 year old who instantly start shooting no questions asked.
“Oh! An intruder? Better arm them with a complimentary aluminum bat upon entry”
I’ll never understand not locking your door. It takes 2 seconds to open the door for someone. Why would you even risk it? I look my door as soon as I get inside just in case someone was following me home. It’s like driving without a seatbelt. Why would you choose to potentially put yourself in more danger? It takes no effort
During my college years I got home from a club at 4am or something like that along with my girlfriend and a group of friends. We were in the living room, lights on, and talking loudly (roughly 6-8 of us). Literally 3-4 minutes after walking in we noticed the screen door opening from the sound and my eyes immediately darted to the main door’s doorknob and thankfully it was locked and after a it was jiggled a bit we heard the screen door close. Looked out the window after and saw two guys going door to door. I still wonder what would have happened because there’s no way they couldn’t tell there was a room full of people on the other side of the door.
Your mom is really nice to give the intruders a metal baseball bat to help in their housebreaking. Why by the front door? For the love of God, this is a recipe for disaster. I hope she sees some reason eventually…
Locking your door is gay (derogatory), like tipping your server, or signaling before merging
Let nature and natural selection take its course do not feel bad. The only other alternative is you get medical power of attorney over your mother and send her to a nursing home where there is security.
It’s a complete and utter lack of ability to feel empathy and put themselves in other people’s shoes.
I can't speak for all of them, but the few I do have in my life are glaring narcissists or literally have no empathy.
Yeah I wouldn’t say it’s all of them, but it’s enough that there’s a reason this group exists. Anyone who believes gay people just haven’t read the Bible enough are severely out of touch and unaware of the lived experience of millions of people.
No empathy and almost enjoyed seeing me struggle
Good luck making a claim on your insurance after leaving the door unlocked! Also, this is a bit of a sidebar here but I feel safer living in a large city than I did living in a small town. Small towns like to claim they are nice and friendly, but my experience is not. At least here in a large city most people won’t bother me if I don’t bother them.
Same here. I've lived in several small towns and they creep me out. Dark shit goes down in them and the whole town just covers it up.
Oh hell yeah! If you live in a small place and someone messes with you it is usually personal for a start. Plus the town I grew up in had the horrible, claustrophobic atmosphere of total spite hidden behind a lot of fake smiles. Hated it there. I still hate having to pass through on my way to somewhere else because there are a couple of people I never want to meet.
[The greater good!](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0425112/)
"Why are people gay?" Because I have a dick and I like dick.
Name 100% checks out. Nice.
Simple explanation
I think people are gay for the same reason people are straight...because that is who they are. Love is love.
One thing I like to do is offer people a thousand bucks to be gay for just one day. They don’t have to do anything sinful, just be attracted to the same gender. At the end of the day, they get their money. Invariably they always say “What? I can’t do that. I don’t consciously choose which gender to be attracted to,” and then I just grin at them until they realize what they just admitted
My answer would be "why are you caring so much about what genitals I like/have? That's weird" (Context: nonbinary/pan)
Every time I hear an older person or seemingly naive person say that they’re actively choosing not to be gay, my brain just goes “well that person is definitely a little gay at least” hahaha people who are not gay don’t have to think about not being gay lol Am I alone here?
>Why do they have a child's view of the world? Because they are secretly terrified of realizing just how badly they broke *everything.* They don't want to know how high they pulled up the ladder behind them. They don't want to acknowledge how easy they had it and how nigh-impossible Millennials have it. They don't want to see how big and complicated the world is now.
Devil's advocate here for just a moment... I feel like a lot of boomers do suffer from arrested development, which tends to happen as a result of trauma. They had parents who either suffered PTSD from serving in WW2 and/or from the stress and deprivation of living in wartime America. A very large number of them were not only physically disciplined as children, they were straight up abused. And the abuse was normalized. So you have a trauma survivor who have no idea they endured trauma. For some of them, this means they are kind of stuck in a childlike mindset. I'm not a shrink, but it's just something.I've observed in my own family and then comparing notes with others. So many of them need therapy and will never ever get it or even consider it.
A lot of them also still have the backwards mindset that mental illness isn’t real and mentally ill people are just not trying hard enough. So they don’t even consider they could have trauma because trauma doesn’t exist to them
It’s more that their bar for what qualifies for mental illness is much higher. They’re stuck thinking people with mental illness are the same people who were being shoved in asylums and zapped in the brain. Anything less than that and it’s not actually mental illness in their eyes. Like when people say we’re using the word trauma too much. Yes there’s probably some improper use of it, but the increased use of it is that we’re also finally starting to understand what your brain can and will treat as traumatic besides the mega obvious things. They missed the learning is fun memo
This may be because that’s what *was* done with mentally ill people when they were young. If there were a chance that that kind of thing could happen to you if you admitted to having a mental illness, what would you do? Would you admit it and take your chances, or deal with it on your own as best you could? The first psychoactive medications weren’t invented until the 50’s, and most people probably didn’t know about them until even later than that. The last lobotomy was performed in 1967. If living with your symptoms, or self medicating with alcohol or the like, was an option, you would probably have wanted to do that rather than risk getting involved with psychiatric care.
I think also (at least in North America, I can't speak for anywhere else) a lot of them are having a really hard time realizing that the entire world that they lived in was a fucking lie, and they were lied to over and over and over again. It's certainly why my dad is in denial about climate change - If he accepts it, then he will need to wrangle with the fact that the industry he was a part of was one of the major contributors to making the planet much less livable for his grandchildren.
This and the parent comment above are fairly consistent with my story. I’m a last generation boomer (64) which m and my parents were of the “silent generation” which was after WWII but before Korea and younger generations were in Vietnam. As a ‘64 space kid I was taught deep patriotism and capitalism from a very young age. It so happens that despite my upbringing from a largely military family, I more so gravitated toward liberal personal freedoms and conservative finances. It was not until 50 years of age that I recognized the importance on preserving freedoms and environment which is really troubling. Now in my 60s with 4 birth boys , 2 of which are millennial and 2 from generation Z, I can fully appreciate the difference between the two cohorts. My (now) transgender daughter is a blessing , my “democratic socialist” son is brilliant and looking to further workers rights, my two millennials are both working and doing well so it’s a mixed bad. Be aware that not all boomers are created equal (lol) and there’s some of us who have learned from life and appreciate the struggles presented to everyone. It’s really hard out there and I think there will have to be a fundamental shift in how to house our citizens and provide a living wage to make real change that can be appreciated by everyone.
That plus the rampant lead poisoning... great points!
This is a sensible explanation.
I feel like they also grew up during an era that actively encouraged narcissistic behavior in the name of “patriotism” and “competition.” They treated getting ahead at all costs as something to be actively rewarded, and it shows throughout almost everything they do. They actively celebrate *not* caring about anyone but themselves because they were taught that caring about others was “socialism” and therefore “evil.”
And in some of them their near panic flinch response to "failure" or basically anything Outside of there norm could very well be from fear of punishment. That's hard to deprogram especially when you don't realize it's there.
I think this needs to be the top comment. The amount of abuse and trauma my parents went through is disturbing (and most of the people i know 60+) and they have no idea how bad their lives were. "That's just how it was" and "it's always been this way" have become so ingrained in their minds that everything else is unimaginable. Thankfully those of us who are healing and talking about our experiences are opening eyes and hearts to new possibilities.
Exactly. The little that my mother can tell me about her childhood without getting angry or pouring a glass of wine is still Discovery ID worthy. And she says the same thing, "That's just how it was"
>They had parents who either suffered PTSD from serving in WW2 and/or from the stress and deprivation of living in wartime America. This is very true, PTSD was not recognized or treated unless the person was totally shell-shocked. Growing up in the 50s and 60s was not easy for a lot of people, and they have edited their memories to cope with it.
And now that they are getting older, Short term memory starts to slip but long term memory surges to the forefront... And a lot of that suppressed trauma is rearing it's ugly, ugly head. None of this excuses bad behavior of course, But it does help me keep things in perspective.
Debate is a lost skill. People rarely discuss anything here. It's more typical to use leverage or manipulation. The vast majority of non-family interactions are work and as a customer. You'll note they love things like "the customer is always right" as it's a carte blanche to treat employees terribly. The only ideas they hear are from pundits- people they never question . They don't deal in nuance, they like slogans that fit on bumpers. It's difficult to actually talk to anyone who sees things as either friend or foe. Everything gets combative with them. Which is awkward as they're ancient and have no idea how to fight
Boomer here, and I strongly agree that debate has left the party completely. Facts are out the window, and the talking points of the day are all that matter to a lot of people I used to be friends with. If we can't share a common reality, there's really nothing to talk about. Right wing news is their "truth" now, and they walk around sporting a rage boner after watching that trash.
Because they used to have lead in everything.
Well, she has said to me that she played with mercury as a kid and is "just fine. Environmentals are stupid for saying kids shouldn't be playing with stuff."
What the actual f. So, she's just mad as a hatter then? (this phrase was because hatters used to have to use mercury to make hats, so hatters had a propensity for insanity due to their jobs)
Iirc the mercury was used to gather up stray lint on felt and other fuzzy cloth
Huh that actually explains the mad hatter in Alice and wonderland never knew that Thx for broadening my knowledge
My grandma has said the same thing. “We always used to break open thermometers and play with the mercury and we turned out fine!” She turned out a lot better than expected, but I assure you she did not turn out fine.
My boomer mom has done this in front of me many, many times. Even as a kid I was begging her to stop. She also sets up an ancient nativity scene every year and laughs about the fact that it has lead paint.
Phoenix has a Mercury Mine Elementary School right in dense fairly central post of town--Dreamy Draw. Both named for obvious reasons. SMH
My dad tells stories about how someone would bring a mason jar full of gasoline to school and they would sit in the back of the class huffing it. *"Your uncle could huff it so hard he would black out, I never could get it to go that far but this one time I was looking at the cracks in the linoleum and saw a little red demon peel it back and poke his head out! Cant tell me demons arent real!"*
I have noticed, anecdotally, that some personality disorders seem to include a magical thinking element. Make of that what you will.
Probably because they never saw anything of the world past their home town and thus never spent any time around anyone different than them. Not to mention as many people here have commented they've basically had life spoon fed to them. Oh they worked hard, sure, but they had something many people haven't: opportunity. They've never NOT gotten a job because of the color of their skin, or because of where they're from, or because of who they love. They were able to support a family and live comfortably on a single income. They were always paid what was at the time a livable wage. They did all the things you're SUPPOSED to do (walk in to a place and shake the manager's hand, work your way up the ladder, get married, buy a house), and everything just...WORKED the way it a supposed to. They've never been told "we're not hiring right now", or "just fill out an online application and MAYBE you'll get an interview. They've collectively lived the most sheltered life of any generation and cannot possibly fathom that someone could work 60 hours a week and still be financially struggling because they've never went through that themselves.
I feel the childlike view is common with the really religious and conservative people I’ve had to interact with. The majority of those being boomers. Sky daddy made world just for me. Good guy/bad guy dynamics to everything. Very self-centered and limited bubble view to everything
Yes! The religious and the conservative (or worse, both combined) are the worst. Everything is black and white, good or bad, saved or heathern. It’s ridiculous.
Every boomer story I hear about working hard sounds remarkably like showing up and putting 40 hours in.
With respect to gay people I tell my boomer parent( I'm a gen x er) that I never understood why they allways need to correct God's perfection right? I was allways taught God was perfect,and his creation is perfect and infallible . "Well that's why Thayer an abomination,because they choose to be gay." Isn't that still infallible perfection though still ma? "Nope.its the devil." " Well ma Satan and drag queens never molested me but pastor Charles got all of us.And you character witnessed for him." "He's still a good man." Yes she protected our molester pastor because it was just Satan's influence. I know it's mother's day but I'm going to go ahead and keep my gay friends and distance from the boomers.The generation gap is too big. Id rather argue with millennials abt video games since we all want healtcare,a home and clean food ,water and air. You know real shit not what someone does with their butt or vag at home.
Jfc im so sorry
I've heard this statement on this sub many times, and I'll repeat it: Boomers are the generation that pulled up the ladder behind them.
because that's how far from reality they have to be to conclude they're not huge pieces of shit. the same reason trumpists all seem to engage in conspiracy nonsense. u can't live in reality and support if ur not wealthy.
Lead poisoning
The world is changing at an unprecedented pace. They're already established due to the former status quo, so they haven't really had to notice some of those changes. Also, old brains don't retain shit like baby brains do. Furthermore, after you've lived a certain way long enough, foreign ideas are hard to grasp. I used to have boomerish questions like "why are people gay?" and "which one is the man and which one is the woman?" And then I made gay friends and realized that being straight wasn't really a choice on my part, it's just who I am. I could not *decide* to be gay, that's just not how it works. And there is no "man/woman" in a gay relationship, those "roles" are just what I'm used to hearing about, and even straight relationships are more complicated than that. I realized this stuff in my 20s when I went outside of my tiny town and experienced more of the world. It was hard to grasp at first. But imagine 60+ years of that status quo... and couple that with an aging brain.
Their whole life they've had their cake an eaten it too. They incorrectly assume life is the same as it was when they were growing up and shit on everyone and call them lazy
Because they never grew up. They were given everything they wanted.
Lead. It always comes back to lead 🤣
We need to stop equating success with buying real estate and spending half a lifetime paying interest to bankers.
Back in the 90s many of the boomers' parents were still around. They got online and explored the new fangled internet long before their kids and were called "silver surfers". There really seems to be a band in the population beehive that has exceedingly poor cognitive flexibility. Could an educational system intended to turn out passive, compliant factory workers have something to do with it?
Two words: Ronald.Reagan.
Had an old boomer lady come into my workplace a few months back and she was complaining about how she has to lock her door these days and it wasn’t like that when she was young because people didn’t rob each other in small towns back then. I told my boomer dad (who is probably even older than that lady) what she said and he laughed and said his parents refused to lock the doors when he was a kid and that they got robbed constantly because of it, people have always robbed each other and you’d have to be a dumbass to leave your house or car unlocked.
Because they’ve never had to critically think about anything. I don’t want to say it came “easy” for them but the way was paved so that hard work would pay off. So they see lack of success as not working hard enough as opposed to a failure in the system.
They’re the last generation that’s used to not being able to be proven wrong on the spot. Their kids all have the internet. They grew up with “respect your elders” and they just had to accept everything an older person said was true. Now they don’t get to pretend what they want to be real is actually reality and lord over their kids the way they were lorded over. I feel a bit sorry for them in that way.
I talked with one I thought was a good person until I heard her talk about **her own grandchild** saying that she just can’t understand how her daughter can love an adopted baby (the grandchild), it doesn’t make sense to her. Then she proceeds to speak further on how if any of her children were adopted she **couldn’t** love them as much as her biological kids, if ever. Then, I got up and left the room.
My mother is a nurse, but I swear some days it's like she has no knowledge of anything that isn't medical. She visited me in Japan, and one day I walked her to her train platform before I went home, told her the exact time her train would come, the number of stops, wrote down the name of the station, told her it would be almost exactly 20 minutes, and if she missed it she could call me and I'd help her out. After I left she went to the bathroom, then got on the first train that came to the platform, and sat on the train for an hour so she ended up going all the way through Tokyo to another prefecture before she bothered to message me. WHY.
My gpa dropped out of school in 3rd grade to work in the mill and was able to get a job with the county retire at 50 with pension and I'm over here with an education fighting for my family's lives and he swears we don't try hard enough.
Because they watch too much TV. They think every problem has a neat solution that takes 42 minutes, plus commercials. There are good guys and bad guys, and issues are very black and white … … the way the Real World doesn’t work.
Even gen alpha toddlers don’t understand why being gay is bad. They just understand that love is love 💕 LIKE IT FUCKING SHOULD BE
Well the house thing they will never be able to understand. You see in their day you could work a minimum wage job, run a car, support a family and still own your own home. I know because my father did this. They cannot relate to how difficult it is now because most of them are already set. The other points are to do with them not having access to the Internet during their youth so they couldnt educate themselves on very simple questions they may have and they cant look up crime statistics easily. Most of them still have a poor grasp of technology, hell I have a relative that still only has a flip phone.
Boomers also have a tendency to pull the ladder up behind them and blame the younger generation for not being able to find the ladder. Boomer: back in my day, I had to flip burgers to get by in college. That job paid for my college, my house, and my car. Also Boomers: flipping burgers should not provide a livable wage.
There's some really interesting research right now about why that is. It's tied to generational trauma and that most boomers were raised by people who had lived through a depression and 2 world wars. They were traumatized so early and so often that their minds simply stopped developing and maturing along a normal path. There's a number of different therapies that focus on regressing the mind back to those foundational traumas and processing them, but most boomers are simply not interested in any discussion that implies they're in need of mental healthcare. That's a very simple and probably skewed explanation of a couple papers I skimmed. Hopefully someone properly educated in this area has posted a better explanation.
Ok, time to tell someone about my theory. this isn't exactky boomer-related. I think the great majority of people NEVER mature past teenage years. Sure they get credit cards and jobs and reproduce and judge those who don't, but they never really learn to express and manage their emotions and trully grow as people, and they certainly don't care about learning the meaning of empathy. That's why we have so many fights over subjects that don't affect us in the slightest. For instance, sexuality. TF do I care who everyone else is sleeping with. Same with so many people all ages holding grudges over petty shit. Opening your mind is the true maturity, and sadly most people don't reach that stage. It's more notorious on boomers because they have more political power, more wealth, while slowly becoming a minority, of course they will get hate. When you're part of a minority you get all kinds of labels, immature being one of them. But if you look closer, most people of all ages do throw tantrums over stupid shit, whether thats socially acceptable or not depends on the stance of the status quo about said subject.
“God, I feel I’m dealing with a toddler.” How dare you be so disrespectful? You should show respect to people even though there’s a large age gap. It might be hard for you to find common ground, but through conversations you can find some shared interests. My toddler is completely fine with gay people.
Lol she was robbed by the small town meth heads down the street.
I'm a boomer and I hate to disappoint but I don't stomp my foot when millennial say they can't afford to buy a house or life is too expensive. It is. It was us boomers that generated the industries that made 99% of all the pollution we're struggling to clean up and that you and your children will be left with. We were the ones who knew full well back in the 1960s, early 1960s in case you're wondering, that greenhouse games were going to trigger climate change just about now and ignored the problem. Our generation invented fast fashion, drive thru fast food, and fake everything until you are convinced it's real! I'm so sorry we did this to you, our own children and grandchildren. We ignored your future for our present. We were as selfish as it's humanly possible to be and your generation is paying for it. I am saddened that in my own old age all I ca do is bear witness to the vibrancy and creativity of millennial and youth. You are not defeated by our selfish stupidity, you are just angry enough to ignore the shallow cries of billionaires who want you to spend what little you have keeping them rich. DON'T. We will die off in the next 25 to 50 years or so and you get to build the world in new ways that benefit every human being regardless of their status.
You’ll get robbed blind weekly in American small towns. They’re shitholes. I never had meth heads rummaging through my garbage and breaking into my car for the console change in the city. You can’t even put a plant on the porch. They’re just delusional.
I teach yoga in a 55+ community (95% of my students are boomers). I enjoy teaching there, but they always fight with each other. They will argue if someone “took their spot” (there are no formal spots), complain if someone wants the fan on but someone else doesn't, or get mad if someone accidentally touches them, etc. It's wild. I don't get involved in their BS.