They're not and never were all but helpless victims of indoctrination.
Nobody shuttered them from the truth, they rejected it -- over, and over, and over again. They rejected it and continue to do so out of hedonism, out of false pride, selfishness, and a cowardly refusal to consider the possibility that they have been in the wrong.
Do we hold children responsible the way we do adults? No, but there comes a time in adolescence when people become responsible for themselves and for their behavior. That's the entire point of the legal distinction between adults and juveniles: adults are fully responsible for themselves and their actions, juveniles less so. Stop treating the Boomers like juveniles who aren't responsible for themselves, because that is nothing but a liability shield for the wicked ways and adamantly unrepentant stance they've chosen.
The issue we have now is to move on. Just like a man who was raised by lousy parents, he still needs to find a way to live a good life that goes beyond resentment of the deck he was given. There needs to be understanding of what made his parents the way they were, not to exonerate their actions, but to ensure we don't make the same mistakes.
You're right that we have to move on productively no matter the past, but that is as much a fact of human life as the fact that *choices* are what ultimately make individuals who they are.
Boomers aren't the wicked generation they are because of their parents being alcoholics or the CIA seeking to pervert and corrupt everyone. Gen X and millenials experienced *worse* in both regards, and yet are not the selfish, unrepentant parasites that the Boomers are.
Inheriting the sins of our fathers is more than just bearing the burden of what our fathers did: it's about breaking the cycle, righting wrongs, not committing the same sins. Nobody is condemned to follow in their earthly father's footsteps, nor is anyone ever reduced to being a mere product of familial or societal circumstances, nor is anyone forced to go with the crowd or ride the wave. The battle of good and evil here on earth is as old as man and will be with man to the end; nobody who reaches adulthood is excused from spiritual warfare, from choosing good or choosing evil.
Boomers were not made or molded into unrepentant parasites; they've bought in and continue to double down on being unrepentant parasites. All of the choices they were offered were very obviously and expressly in opposition to Christian moral values going back to the first century AD. They chose evil and called it good.
If we want to ensure we won't make the same mistakes, the only thing we have to focus on is choosing and doing good and teaching our children to do the same. Looking for excuses for the unrepentant evil of the Boomers does nothing but open up potential excuses for ourselves and future generations.
Destroys the housing market through ubiquitously taking out mortgage and living beyond their means tenfold. Aborts 1/3 of Gen X in the name of selfishness and hedonism. First generation in human history to be so neglectful of their kids a new term was coined for their children, "latchkey kids" and the 10 PM news literally had to air a nightly reminder, "It's 10 PM, do you know where your kids are?"
Proceed to be the first generation in human history to shut their parents away in nursing homes. Import a ton of foreigners whom they can pay less, taking away jobs from their children and their neighbors in order to save a buck. Refuse to babysit grandkids because they "did their time!" Now they take out reverse mortgages and spend their children and grandchildren's inheritance as fast as they can. Meanwhile, they're now calling their kids up and saying "I need you to come and take care of me!" because they fear being locked away in nursing homes the way they did to their own parents.
...and any time someone calls out their generation for their wickedness, it's supposedly everyone else who's unhinged.
Don't be a fucking retard and pretend like your generation is being victimized; your generation has literally sold out their parents, their children, and their grandchildren.
No, you identify as and with the most wicked generation in history and are unwilling to acknowledge the immense evil they've done.
Nothing I said is untrue; all of it is historical fact and widely witnessed cultural phenomena. Boomer denial of the truth does not render those who see it and acknowledge it "insane."
Sure, but we also need to acknowledge that moving on means giving up on them. Their interests are not only not ours, but are opposed to ours, that we not only owe them nothing, but that all they have is rightly ours, not only all they have but all they gave away, sqandered or spoiled. Though they can't repay all they owe, or rather because, it is only just to forclose on them, take all that they have and turn them out in the streets as they have done to so many of us. Let no fellow-feeling remain, reject their gelding programming to forgive what must never be forgiven, as well as the idea that they are entitled to the protection of law or custom, yet also realize that they will soon die naturally and their suffering punishment beyond total forfeiture and outlawry benefits us little.
I do worry about the effects their aging might bankrupt the nation and their heirs. They're unhealthy and will require decades of skilled care, draining the medical system perhaps destroying it. They do not care about taking from their children and grandchildren, they feel a long life is owed to them, even if only enabled by expensive medical procedures and drugs. They will not care that there's nothing left when the last one finally dies.
The generations behind mine are even more unhealthy. I've never seen so many fat young people. Not their fault though. They've been injected over and over with immunity killing vaccines. It would've been better if they'd been allowed to get chickenpox and measles like I did as a child. My immune system is strong! It's so easy to lay blame on a generation you know little about. So buckle up buttercup, your generation is going to be way sicker and more of a drain on resources than mine. It already is.
Well they didn't do it out of malice! They unfortunately trusted too much in authority and "the science". So do younger generations. I'm still seeing people of all age groups wearing face diapers.
I do not expect there to be a health system the way there is now. It is unsustainable. My 83 yo mother has cost the tax payer over $1M the last year. Am I glad she's alive? On some level, yes. But what is alive now? I see this as a moral challenge never given to any generation before. You can now live as long as you want. Unless you're too far from the hospital, they will save you. My 93 yo aunt who can no longer walk due to a fractured spine and has several other major issues and needs skilled nursing to get through the day has a massive heart attack and of course she has surgery, triple bypass I think, and while she's even less capable now she needs more care post surgery, she's alive. I'm 53 and between doing the math and realizing our system isn't designed for this plus the fact that my generation and the ones following didn't have enough kids to pay into it plus the fact that also means there won't be enough surgeons and health care professionals, I assume the system won't be there for me. I will die younger. So I eat well, watch my weight, exercise, stretch, sleep, avoid processed foods, lift weights and hope I can go into that stage healthier. But much else I can do about it. Many people my age also discuss DNR and ACDs to take the burden from our children. I've decided that if I already need care and can't live alone without help, then I'll sign a DNR and live out the rest of my time as God gives me. The first time I need lifesaving medical help, I'd take it. But over and over while others clean me and struggle to provide for my care? No. So yes, your generation is the one setting the stage for elder care in the age of modern medicine because you are faced with choices your parents didn't have. Many in Gen X are caring for you and realizing we don't want to do that to our children, and besides, the system will not be there for us anyway. Most of us won't even get social security.
I’m hoping AI will help with some of the drudgery of day to day care. I also have a mother who’s 89 and has dementia but I do want her to stay as long as she wishes. We are headed for a lot of unforeseen consequences of not perpetuating our stable and secure societies. Our recent generations have dropped the ball on a lot of things and we will deserve the derision of those having to live with it downstream.
My maternal grandfather began exhibiting signs of dementia in his 60's. My mother, his only child who was also a trained nurse, took care of him as best she could for long as she could, until the situation was beyond her ability. Being a family of very limited means, she finally had to relinquish him to state care. I was just a teen at the time. I remember visiting once, and the conditions were deplorable. This was in the 70's. My mother almost lost it when her father contracted a serious respiratory illness and the doctors at the facility wanted to go to extraordinary lengths to save his "life". The poor man had no life! His mind was gone. So, what we have here is a society with a pathological fear of death, and we need to get over it and find some sort of sane balance.
Madeline: I think that robots equipped with AGI will wipe our aging butts give us our daily shots and prepare our food thanks to Elon. As populations decline the young will face less competition for jobs so wages will rise at the same time that lack of demand for housing lowers that cost. Generally the future can be very bright.
This is the most optimistic thing I’ve ever heard, and assumes all extant frontier technologies will be used for Utopianism rather than war, pillage, and the enslavement of all mankind.
Truth is in this article but the comments are full of blame. Must be nice to have a handy scapegoat. I’m a boomer awakened to the fact that a psy op has been perpetrated on my generation since before I was born. I don’t watch TV so I’m free of it. Now I participate in groups with other boomers defending freedom but the younger generations have been too busy with whatever to join us. Most are just overwhelmed with raising families in a hostile society, but also there is porn, sports, and Netflix. Until recently. Now, suddenly, there are high school and college age males joining forces with us, and we could not be more delighted. We need their energy and they need our money. My generation is very generous to causes and people we believe in. But people of all ages are susceptible to fear porn when they are dependent. Many boomers bought the lie that social security would take care of them. Now the fear of losing SS is an existential crises to them, and the Democrats cruelly exploit that. I make it my mission to help people in my generation learn about Substack and Rumble and X. Your boomer neighbor is probably hungry for information they don’t know how to access. Instead of complaining about them, teach them. Once we understand the betrayal of our government, we have the time to dog a congressman into submission. The Warroom posse is largely boomers. We all mock the Karens as much as you do. They are a loud and annoying minority. Having your soul broken by Marxism is not limited to one generation, however, it just manifests differently, for example, anti-fa and trans kids. On a side note, boomer blame and Marxism are leading to a new generation of children who will not know their grandparents. It is trendy for adult children to “divorce” their parents. It is rampant, and we are not talking about “abusive” people, just regular folks. One of our more common topics of conversation is what it is doing to kids to lose the roots of their family history, and the unhurried and unconditional love that grandparents provide. Besides the deep hurt of being rejected by the people we sacrificed everything for, there is the abiding fear of what will happen to our rudderless grandkids. Today’s parents are struggling to raise families in a society hostile to children. They don’t have to be doing it alone, their hubris is causing them to reject the extended family that would support them. Our high trust society, where loved ones and strangers were given the benefit of the doubt, is being intentionally fractured. We boomers fear our grandchildren will never experience it. There is plenty of blame to go around. So, before some of these commenters go wishing for the death of my generation, maybe they should look in the mirror.
Thank you for all your efforts. My generation (Millennial) is screwing up plenty, but I'm going to work to create a better world for my kids to my dying breath.
It is a silly stereotype that all Boomers are clueless leftists. And it’s even less true of the men. While the exceptions make a lot of noise, my sense is that most men of that generation have a well grounded common sense.
While true it was probably half the media was dominated by leftists and that is mostly what people see who weren’t actually there. The ‘rural purge’ in television programming at the time is evidence of this.
Boomers were pumped full of sex, drugs, rock and roll and sent off to Vietnam. Some woke up, most thought they did (hippies) but they actually didn’t. They canceled our culture. They drank away our inheritance. They encouraged our conquest. We younger generations don’t hate the boomers, but we hate their sins. And they don’t seem to be capable of repentance. Some adult anger is in order, and taking on of responsibility for choices made would be good to help us move on after you’re gone.
That is a lot of stereotyping in one small paragraph. One thing we learn with wisdom is that everyone gets their turn at aging and being blamed for how things turned out. Your turn will come. The repentance you seek will not come from people falsely accused. What you are describing is a tiny minority, amplified by the nightly news, and most likely part of the psy op. The vast majority of us stayed married, raised a family, worked at the same job for decades, volunteered in our community, socialized with our neighbors, and had a passbook savings account. We had Walter Cronkite to tell us what to think, that's it. The only change with cable news was the propaganda was 24/7. It is hard for people today with unlimited sources of information to imagine having only one. Even when cable news channels diversified it was still the same message. There was NO ONE who questioned the Iraq war, and that was only 20 years ago. The boomers are not your enemy, the politicians are a different story. They all said they wanted small government. They all lied. We didn't know how badly they were fleecing us because the nightly news hid it.
Mistakes are what we learn from, and are a part of the human experience. Everyone has made them, and that is where wisdom comes from. The point I made earlier is that your elders have valuable experience and have a lot to teach you. Because of the pace of technology, you also have a lot to teach us. (Although, recently I introduced a young man to Substack and Rumble, so we aren't all hopeless.) Jettisoning us from your life only hurts you and your children. Recriminations are a waste of energy. Those of us who know we are in an information war need to support each other, because none of us are getting out of this alive. We are fighting for our progeny.
Also, I should be more clear: the liberal boomers were psy op-ed into their unrealistic beliefs. Millennials as well. Doesn’t change the fact that they need to escape that. The trouble is when we try to help them think differently and see things differently they have an allergic reaction, and the conversation stops. I witnessed my own boomer parents try to wake up their liberal peers. It was impossible.
I agree with that. It frustrates me also. Almost all the boomers I know are based, but I live in rural Nebraska. It’s the younger people who are brainwashed here, mostly the college grads. I think there are a lot more of us sane old folks than the media would have you believe. The Democrats are deliberately scaring the bejesus out of people who depend on Social Security. They are convinced Elon will take it. Fear takes away peoples’ agency and the Dems are evil for exploiting it.
Thanks for fighting for us however you do. In this you seem like a minority in your generation, sorry to say it. I guess I should be more specific with the label: the trouble is with liberal boomers, and what they continue to believe (which is far from reality) and do (which is destructive to their own people). They also raised liberal millennials who are even worse. It’s a generalization, so of course it doesn’t apply to you, but like I said you’re in the minority, I think.
So your generation is flawless and without sin? Really? Each generation is responsible for itself. So get off your pity potty and do something worthwhile!
You are so right. I'm afraid that all those kids who rejected their parents over trivial matters will only realize their tragic mistake when it's too late.
Imagine having your family and livelihood pulled away from you by boomers, then come back to this. Every day, I struggle to love and forgive the older people in my family. I try to be good to them, but they are burning the house down as they die.
Stop being weak. I know you guys were tricked. But if you won't help me, then shut up
As a Millennial, I don’t focus on hating boomers it’s unproductive, 50% will be living paycheck to paycheck as they don’t have assets. We need to make best with what we can given the mess we are in , there is also is an interesting challenge. If The current right wing wants to continue to win, they should go focus on the younger demographics under 40, who all lean right. This really gives boomers a choice on whether they want to align with a new demographic or stay with their boat and vote to preserve themselves. For the latter, we can ignore them learn how to not be, and the former work with them to get the country put of the mess we are in
We are not a homogeneous group. Politics is more a function of where you live than how old you are. And definitely it depends on where you get your info. The biggest problem with boomers is the TV remote. Turn them on to Epoch times, Substack, Rumble and Gettr. (Gettr is much easier to use than X). Epoch Times is a physical paper so it is familiar. Older people don’t think differently than you, they just have access to less info. Almost all the woke idiots I know are under 40.
Well written, I think that looking forward is our best option here. The way that AI systems will be used to slim down managerial bloat is worth looking into. I'm not sure what the next few decades will look like... but I propose that on an institutional level, the US will more begin resembling an Empire of small conglomerate groups instead of the republic we now know.
Each generation does the best it can with the circumstances it inherits from previous generations. I'm a boomer who was indoctrinated through the media and the school system. I didn't start to "get it" until I was in my 50's, thanks to the internet and social media and an inquisitive mind. The social conditioning of the 60's and 70's was devastating to my generation, and it has only gone downhill from there. It's hard to see it when you're young and just trying to make your way and fit in. We are only human after all. So I hope the younger generations will cut us some slack. They have their own issues to work through, and they are also less than perfect. They will likely realize this by the time they reach their 50's like I did.
I’m at the very tail end of the boomers but my eyes have been opened years ago to the crap education I received as well as the psyop I was part of. Reading classical literature, early church fathers and great works of antiquity, along with CS Lewis, Tolkien and Chesterton have reignited my desire for beauty and truth. I’m passing on all this to the young men in my group.
I have never been comfortable with these generation labels created by marketing types to sell us stuff, which then get turned into yet another form of identity politics to divide us - weaken us - in yet more ways.
It’s more useful to look at the damaging social changes and identify the political forces pushing those changes. Because (as the article says) those destructive forces have been active continuously across multiple generations, and remain active today.
A lot of great lines in this and captures what was lost.
A personal anecdote strikes home for me. Explained to boomers my dwindling prospects (well for people my age in their words may have ‘caught the last chopper out of Nam’), active discrimination in hiring/college acceptance toward whites, and increasing lawlessness and violence. They agreed on every point.
Their biggest concern? That it may cause people to be racist…
I didn’t read the whole thing but I’ve believed for over 12 years that we have to enter into a pluralism of communities (enclaves, or whatever you said), rather than individuals. So I think you’re extremely insightful to see that as the future. Something to aspire to, I guess…
Concretely, legally, we probably need to revive freedom of association and undo/rebalance the Supreme Court decisions sacrificing it for freedoms of the individual (eg, destroying male only associations so they are required to admit women, which just leads to the end of the organization.)
Thought provoking and well-written. I am not going to re-litigate parts of the argument (others are doing that elsewhere in the comments) but I do want to make one criticism as it is an example of something I see too often, and that is in the use of the graphs.
The text presents two statements that we all "know" are true: (1) divorce exploded in the 1960s and (2) religious faith has collapsed in america, and two graphs with eye-catching slopes are presented as evidence. Except, the graphs show no such thing...or rather they do show an increase in divorces and a decline in religious faith, but not to the extent that would warrant the emotive language that this article (and many others) use.
Take divorces, per the graph they were 2.0 per 1,000 in 1943 and peaked at 5.3 per 1,000 in 1981. That's an increase of 165% - divorce exploded! Except, the rate of divorce as a percentage of all marriages (using the same numbers in the graph) was 0.2% in 1943 and 0.53% in 1981...that's a very, very minor increase.
As for religiosity, the slope on the graph is steep, but looking at the left-axis, we see that the decline is from 80% in 1962 to a bit under 70% by 2013. A decline, sure, but almost 70% of americans are still religious in 2013...
Overall, I am in agreement with the thesis presented in this article but the use of these graphs is weak, adds nothing to bolster the argument to anyone who knows how to read a graph, and smacks of a lack of conviction in the author that the rhetoric will be sufficient to convince the reader.
This article was goated. What a great read ! Appreciate this ! Ps. I’m Canadian but a lot of the same sentiments register. The multi cultural project of Canada has really deepened distrust. Thanks for this.
The children born after WWII and raised in the United States are not categorically a neat fit, nor are those who went to war, their fathers' generation, into another.
Certainly, my own experience and those of people I knew well in both suppositional groups were entirely absent of the qualities and ideas you designate as key to inclusion.
And yet, much of what you have written is incontrovertible: the 60s made widespread the destruction of the best America had to offer in every aspect of life, which had begun in the 20s among a small group of malcontents.
There was, in the 1960s, a spirit in the air of willful idol smashing, the oft-mentioned and never explained "generation gap.". But most importantly, the loathsome ideas taught to young men and women in the prestigious academies, where they had dispensed with Truth. These children could believe in nothing true, because any false narrative was as good as any other.
That is the salient difference between the two generations. Your "silents" may have been agnostics, but they knew there was Truth. Their children, however, were undermined by the men to whom they had entrusted their children's education.
Those of us you would call Boomers who never bought in, but were brainwashed to believe our faith in the discovery of Truth was a flaw, now see, and more and more do every day, that we were, in fact, entirely in the right.
That is my purpose in writing on Substack, to demonstrate there are, in fact, many of us -- I see new ones every day -- in this country who never sucked at the teat of bastard Leftist ideation - nihilism - and who instead possess the diamond at the center of Truth.
"There is so much tribal knowledge in every domain that relies on an old guy remembering what happened thirty years ago to make a certain decision. It’s going to be painful to relearn those lessons and recreate that sort of expertise."
Companies really do need to develop out of mission statements into company historicisms. It'd properly fix a lot of stuff there.
That being said, I think the experience of ww2 vets in the uk and Europe about Germany are a bit more negative constituting generations of prejudice. Also, I don't think boomers were really all that obsessed with social justice. They interpreted social justice as an extension of egoism. You can watch the first talkies and get a grasp for how their behaviors were back to the greatest generation, some lost and then the preceding is interesting. Up until the 50s, there was no consciousness of sex in the same way (the Goldbergs is an interesting case). The first talkie is not even a decade from women's suffrage. Women aren't present in the same way and the male actors can seem sorta grimy. Fifties movies remind me of young, shy teenagers discovering s--, but they're middle aged adults. Still there was no self-consciousness and, to me, that's what exemplifies boomerism. 50s to 60s TV and talk shows are goofy awkward about sex, but those same actors become heavily self-conscious and self-centered by the 70s.
Anyways, I don't think it's really a generational thing so much as unfolding, or development, of the same values. The only thing that filled the (social, by that time) gaps was the old aristocratic values which ceased to be governmentally important or socially completely important with Napoleon and the 19th century. The self-consciousness is definitely a huge development though.
Edit: I forgot: I wanted to mention that in Texas we still do, or did a decade ago, wear nice clothes to any interview and only had to work hard to get along fine. Every state I've worked in after has absolutely not operated in that same way. They care way more about social cohesion. Wearing nice clothes to a dishwasher interview only looked like I was trying to show off. It was such a nightmare adjusting.
This is all highly overgeneralized notion of generational identity is disturbing. It smacks of dividing by racial/ethnic identity.
The only real divide is between the haves and have nots.
In famous Clintontonian terms, it's about class dummy.
Certainly the less well off of us have some very similar challenges, and gripes about how all of this was allowed to occur.
Healthcare, housing, groceries and transportation costs are eating us alive. No matter what age, sex, religion or race you are, high inflation and higher interest rates are things that impact the less financially set more so.
The way the "system" uses us as fodder is disgusting, again for all of us "unwealthies".
This is a revolution of the great unwashed who's population in the US has swelled post globalism in many different ways.
The pandemic showed the "essential workers" their sacrificial position in society. Did you think this wouldn't have a lasting backlash?
Racial/ethnic identities divide themselves, that is literally the point. They are distinct tribes, the ‘division’ is genetically baked in.
No, the real divide is, and always has been, tribal. To think otherwise is beyond naive, and proof of just how comfortable and servile you Americans still are.
During Yugoslavia’s financial crisis, why didn’t the multi-ethnic proletariat rise up against their oppressors? Isn’t it strange how they instead chose to immediately declare independence along ethno-religious borders, deporting those who didn’t belong amongst them?
To anyone with more than a handful of brain cells, this is an entirely predictable outcome of a multi-ethnic society experiencing chronic economic meltdown. Humans are tribal before they are class-conscious, although I suppose fools like you will —and deserve— to learn the hard way: at the end of a rifle.
"Tribes in the US are far less established than elsewhere"
I would take issue with that. On the Washington Mall you have the new Museum of African American History and Culture. It's in an upside-down ziggurat. There will soon be a new Women's Museum. And I suspect in the not too distant future an Hispanc-American Museum of History and Culture; and there already is a Museum of Indian, both Amnerican and Asian, Culture. There is the Holodaust Museum, of course. The National Gallery has been accused of being racist and is now managed by a hard-core feminist. There are also many Gay Pride venues.
I think tribal identity in the US is growing stronger by the day, they are just later in development than other parts of the world for the obvious reason that the US is in a very early stage of development.
I’m describing the real world. Nothing to do with elite propaganda. Monuments are a reflection of the culture as a whole. My point was you are engaging in wishful thinking while the various tribes are toppling European-American symbols of power and erecting their own.
They're not and never were all but helpless victims of indoctrination.
Nobody shuttered them from the truth, they rejected it -- over, and over, and over again. They rejected it and continue to do so out of hedonism, out of false pride, selfishness, and a cowardly refusal to consider the possibility that they have been in the wrong.
Do we hold children responsible the way we do adults? No, but there comes a time in adolescence when people become responsible for themselves and for their behavior. That's the entire point of the legal distinction between adults and juveniles: adults are fully responsible for themselves and their actions, juveniles less so. Stop treating the Boomers like juveniles who aren't responsible for themselves, because that is nothing but a liability shield for the wicked ways and adamantly unrepentant stance they've chosen.
You're definitely not wrong.
The issue we have now is to move on. Just like a man who was raised by lousy parents, he still needs to find a way to live a good life that goes beyond resentment of the deck he was given. There needs to be understanding of what made his parents the way they were, not to exonerate their actions, but to ensure we don't make the same mistakes.
You're right that we have to move on productively no matter the past, but that is as much a fact of human life as the fact that *choices* are what ultimately make individuals who they are.
Boomers aren't the wicked generation they are because of their parents being alcoholics or the CIA seeking to pervert and corrupt everyone. Gen X and millenials experienced *worse* in both regards, and yet are not the selfish, unrepentant parasites that the Boomers are.
Inheriting the sins of our fathers is more than just bearing the burden of what our fathers did: it's about breaking the cycle, righting wrongs, not committing the same sins. Nobody is condemned to follow in their earthly father's footsteps, nor is anyone ever reduced to being a mere product of familial or societal circumstances, nor is anyone forced to go with the crowd or ride the wave. The battle of good and evil here on earth is as old as man and will be with man to the end; nobody who reaches adulthood is excused from spiritual warfare, from choosing good or choosing evil.
Boomers were not made or molded into unrepentant parasites; they've bought in and continue to double down on being unrepentant parasites. All of the choices they were offered were very obviously and expressly in opposition to Christian moral values going back to the first century AD. They chose evil and called it good.
If we want to ensure we won't make the same mistakes, the only thing we have to focus on is choosing and doing good and teaching our children to do the same. Looking for excuses for the unrepentant evil of the Boomers does nothing but open up potential excuses for ourselves and future generations.
Unrepentant evil.
Destroys the housing market through ubiquitously taking out mortgage and living beyond their means tenfold. Aborts 1/3 of Gen X in the name of selfishness and hedonism. First generation in human history to be so neglectful of their kids a new term was coined for their children, "latchkey kids" and the 10 PM news literally had to air a nightly reminder, "It's 10 PM, do you know where your kids are?"
Proceed to be the first generation in human history to shut their parents away in nursing homes. Import a ton of foreigners whom they can pay less, taking away jobs from their children and their neighbors in order to save a buck. Refuse to babysit grandkids because they "did their time!" Now they take out reverse mortgages and spend their children and grandchildren's inheritance as fast as they can. Meanwhile, they're now calling their kids up and saying "I need you to come and take care of me!" because they fear being locked away in nursing homes the way they did to their own parents.
...and any time someone calls out their generation for their wickedness, it's supposedly everyone else who's unhinged.
Don't be a fucking retard and pretend like your generation is being victimized; your generation has literally sold out their parents, their children, and their grandchildren.
Christmas celebrations were canceled by a Boomer for whom it was more important to buy and drive a Lexus for a few years.
Christmas gifts cost money you know, and "It's a pagan holiday anyway! Jesus was born in the Spring!"
Spoiler alert: there was no Christmas celebration in the Spring, either.
No, you identify as and with the most wicked generation in history and are unwilling to acknowledge the immense evil they've done.
Nothing I said is untrue; all of it is historical fact and widely witnessed cultural phenomena. Boomer denial of the truth does not render those who see it and acknowledge it "insane."
Sure, but we also need to acknowledge that moving on means giving up on them. Their interests are not only not ours, but are opposed to ours, that we not only owe them nothing, but that all they have is rightly ours, not only all they have but all they gave away, sqandered or spoiled. Though they can't repay all they owe, or rather because, it is only just to forclose on them, take all that they have and turn them out in the streets as they have done to so many of us. Let no fellow-feeling remain, reject their gelding programming to forgive what must never be forgiven, as well as the idea that they are entitled to the protection of law or custom, yet also realize that they will soon die naturally and their suffering punishment beyond total forfeiture and outlawry benefits us little.
I do worry about the effects their aging might bankrupt the nation and their heirs. They're unhealthy and will require decades of skilled care, draining the medical system perhaps destroying it. They do not care about taking from their children and grandchildren, they feel a long life is owed to them, even if only enabled by expensive medical procedures and drugs. They will not care that there's nothing left when the last one finally dies.
The generations behind mine are even more unhealthy. I've never seen so many fat young people. Not their fault though. They've been injected over and over with immunity killing vaccines. It would've been better if they'd been allowed to get chickenpox and measles like I did as a child. My immune system is strong! It's so easy to lay blame on a generation you know little about. So buckle up buttercup, your generation is going to be way sicker and more of a drain on resources than mine. It already is.
The boomers were the ones who started forcing the dangerous injections in their children. And the boomers who enforced and created the lockdowns.
Well they didn't do it out of malice! They unfortunately trusted too much in authority and "the science". So do younger generations. I'm still seeing people of all age groups wearing face diapers.
Me stupid
I do not expect there to be a health system the way there is now. It is unsustainable. My 83 yo mother has cost the tax payer over $1M the last year. Am I glad she's alive? On some level, yes. But what is alive now? I see this as a moral challenge never given to any generation before. You can now live as long as you want. Unless you're too far from the hospital, they will save you. My 93 yo aunt who can no longer walk due to a fractured spine and has several other major issues and needs skilled nursing to get through the day has a massive heart attack and of course she has surgery, triple bypass I think, and while she's even less capable now she needs more care post surgery, she's alive. I'm 53 and between doing the math and realizing our system isn't designed for this plus the fact that my generation and the ones following didn't have enough kids to pay into it plus the fact that also means there won't be enough surgeons and health care professionals, I assume the system won't be there for me. I will die younger. So I eat well, watch my weight, exercise, stretch, sleep, avoid processed foods, lift weights and hope I can go into that stage healthier. But much else I can do about it. Many people my age also discuss DNR and ACDs to take the burden from our children. I've decided that if I already need care and can't live alone without help, then I'll sign a DNR and live out the rest of my time as God gives me. The first time I need lifesaving medical help, I'd take it. But over and over while others clean me and struggle to provide for my care? No. So yes, your generation is the one setting the stage for elder care in the age of modern medicine because you are faced with choices your parents didn't have. Many in Gen X are caring for you and realizing we don't want to do that to our children, and besides, the system will not be there for us anyway. Most of us won't even get social security.
I’m hoping AI will help with some of the drudgery of day to day care. I also have a mother who’s 89 and has dementia but I do want her to stay as long as she wishes. We are headed for a lot of unforeseen consequences of not perpetuating our stable and secure societies. Our recent generations have dropped the ball on a lot of things and we will deserve the derision of those having to live with it downstream.
My maternal grandfather began exhibiting signs of dementia in his 60's. My mother, his only child who was also a trained nurse, took care of him as best she could for long as she could, until the situation was beyond her ability. Being a family of very limited means, she finally had to relinquish him to state care. I was just a teen at the time. I remember visiting once, and the conditions were deplorable. This was in the 70's. My mother almost lost it when her father contracted a serious respiratory illness and the doctors at the facility wanted to go to extraordinary lengths to save his "life". The poor man had no life! His mind was gone. So, what we have here is a society with a pathological fear of death, and we need to get over it and find some sort of sane balance.
Exactly.
“Draining the medical system.”
What nonsense.
The reality is that they are supporting that system.
Ever hear the expression “Time the Avenger?”
Your turn will come. And you won’t be alone in your disappointment when the next generation resolves to wipe you out.
Of course my turn will come. Death is a part of life. See my response above if you care to see what's really in my heart.
Madeline: I think that robots equipped with AGI will wipe our aging butts give us our daily shots and prepare our food thanks to Elon. As populations decline the young will face less competition for jobs so wages will rise at the same time that lack of demand for housing lowers that cost. Generally the future can be very bright.
A bit OT but his tiny home designs are a marvel to see. If people age healthier these are an excellent retirement solution.
I live in a 325 SF house and I love it. Less stuff less space to clean, great on the environment. It's wonderful.
This is the most optimistic thing I’ve ever heard, and assumes all extant frontier technologies will be used for Utopianism rather than war, pillage, and the enslavement of all mankind.
Everyone ages and almost all become ill at some point.
Yes. See my comment above.
Their kids won’t be able to afford to take care of them.
Truth is in this article but the comments are full of blame. Must be nice to have a handy scapegoat. I’m a boomer awakened to the fact that a psy op has been perpetrated on my generation since before I was born. I don’t watch TV so I’m free of it. Now I participate in groups with other boomers defending freedom but the younger generations have been too busy with whatever to join us. Most are just overwhelmed with raising families in a hostile society, but also there is porn, sports, and Netflix. Until recently. Now, suddenly, there are high school and college age males joining forces with us, and we could not be more delighted. We need their energy and they need our money. My generation is very generous to causes and people we believe in. But people of all ages are susceptible to fear porn when they are dependent. Many boomers bought the lie that social security would take care of them. Now the fear of losing SS is an existential crises to them, and the Democrats cruelly exploit that. I make it my mission to help people in my generation learn about Substack and Rumble and X. Your boomer neighbor is probably hungry for information they don’t know how to access. Instead of complaining about them, teach them. Once we understand the betrayal of our government, we have the time to dog a congressman into submission. The Warroom posse is largely boomers. We all mock the Karens as much as you do. They are a loud and annoying minority. Having your soul broken by Marxism is not limited to one generation, however, it just manifests differently, for example, anti-fa and trans kids. On a side note, boomer blame and Marxism are leading to a new generation of children who will not know their grandparents. It is trendy for adult children to “divorce” their parents. It is rampant, and we are not talking about “abusive” people, just regular folks. One of our more common topics of conversation is what it is doing to kids to lose the roots of their family history, and the unhurried and unconditional love that grandparents provide. Besides the deep hurt of being rejected by the people we sacrificed everything for, there is the abiding fear of what will happen to our rudderless grandkids. Today’s parents are struggling to raise families in a society hostile to children. They don’t have to be doing it alone, their hubris is causing them to reject the extended family that would support them. Our high trust society, where loved ones and strangers were given the benefit of the doubt, is being intentionally fractured. We boomers fear our grandchildren will never experience it. There is plenty of blame to go around. So, before some of these commenters go wishing for the death of my generation, maybe they should look in the mirror.
Thank you for all your efforts. My generation (Millennial) is screwing up plenty, but I'm going to work to create a better world for my kids to my dying breath.
Me too, even when they hate me for it.
Thank you sir.
It is a silly stereotype that all Boomers are clueless leftists. And it’s even less true of the men. While the exceptions make a lot of noise, my sense is that most men of that generation have a well grounded common sense.
While true it was probably half the media was dominated by leftists and that is mostly what people see who weren’t actually there. The ‘rural purge’ in television programming at the time is evidence of this.
Boomers were pumped full of sex, drugs, rock and roll and sent off to Vietnam. Some woke up, most thought they did (hippies) but they actually didn’t. They canceled our culture. They drank away our inheritance. They encouraged our conquest. We younger generations don’t hate the boomers, but we hate their sins. And they don’t seem to be capable of repentance. Some adult anger is in order, and taking on of responsibility for choices made would be good to help us move on after you’re gone.
That is a lot of stereotyping in one small paragraph. One thing we learn with wisdom is that everyone gets their turn at aging and being blamed for how things turned out. Your turn will come. The repentance you seek will not come from people falsely accused. What you are describing is a tiny minority, amplified by the nightly news, and most likely part of the psy op. The vast majority of us stayed married, raised a family, worked at the same job for decades, volunteered in our community, socialized with our neighbors, and had a passbook savings account. We had Walter Cronkite to tell us what to think, that's it. The only change with cable news was the propaganda was 24/7. It is hard for people today with unlimited sources of information to imagine having only one. Even when cable news channels diversified it was still the same message. There was NO ONE who questioned the Iraq war, and that was only 20 years ago. The boomers are not your enemy, the politicians are a different story. They all said they wanted small government. They all lied. We didn't know how badly they were fleecing us because the nightly news hid it.
Mistakes are what we learn from, and are a part of the human experience. Everyone has made them, and that is where wisdom comes from. The point I made earlier is that your elders have valuable experience and have a lot to teach you. Because of the pace of technology, you also have a lot to teach us. (Although, recently I introduced a young man to Substack and Rumble, so we aren't all hopeless.) Jettisoning us from your life only hurts you and your children. Recriminations are a waste of energy. Those of us who know we are in an information war need to support each other, because none of us are getting out of this alive. We are fighting for our progeny.
Also, I should be more clear: the liberal boomers were psy op-ed into their unrealistic beliefs. Millennials as well. Doesn’t change the fact that they need to escape that. The trouble is when we try to help them think differently and see things differently they have an allergic reaction, and the conversation stops. I witnessed my own boomer parents try to wake up their liberal peers. It was impossible.
I agree with that. It frustrates me also. Almost all the boomers I know are based, but I live in rural Nebraska. It’s the younger people who are brainwashed here, mostly the college grads. I think there are a lot more of us sane old folks than the media would have you believe. The Democrats are deliberately scaring the bejesus out of people who depend on Social Security. They are convinced Elon will take it. Fear takes away peoples’ agency and the Dems are evil for exploiting it.
Thanks for fighting for us however you do. In this you seem like a minority in your generation, sorry to say it. I guess I should be more specific with the label: the trouble is with liberal boomers, and what they continue to believe (which is far from reality) and do (which is destructive to their own people). They also raised liberal millennials who are even worse. It’s a generalization, so of course it doesn’t apply to you, but like I said you’re in the minority, I think.
Over a million of us protested the Iraq war in London in 2003. Made no difference of course.
So your generation is flawless and without sin? Really? Each generation is responsible for itself. So get off your pity potty and do something worthwhile!
You are so right. I'm afraid that all those kids who rejected their parents over trivial matters will only realize their tragic mistake when it's too late.
Imagine having your family and livelihood pulled away from you by boomers, then come back to this. Every day, I struggle to love and forgive the older people in my family. I try to be good to them, but they are burning the house down as they die.
Stop being weak. I know you guys were tricked. But if you won't help me, then shut up
Can you be more specific as to how you wish to be helped?
Not by you, but by my patriarchs, they should stop helping foreigners and themselves so much and focus on the future of their family.
As a Millennial, I don’t focus on hating boomers it’s unproductive, 50% will be living paycheck to paycheck as they don’t have assets. We need to make best with what we can given the mess we are in , there is also is an interesting challenge. If The current right wing wants to continue to win, they should go focus on the younger demographics under 40, who all lean right. This really gives boomers a choice on whether they want to align with a new demographic or stay with their boat and vote to preserve themselves. For the latter, we can ignore them learn how to not be, and the former work with them to get the country put of the mess we are in
We are not a homogeneous group. Politics is more a function of where you live than how old you are. And definitely it depends on where you get your info. The biggest problem with boomers is the TV remote. Turn them on to Epoch times, Substack, Rumble and Gettr. (Gettr is much easier to use than X). Epoch Times is a physical paper so it is familiar. Older people don’t think differently than you, they just have access to less info. Almost all the woke idiots I know are under 40.
Well written, I think that looking forward is our best option here. The way that AI systems will be used to slim down managerial bloat is worth looking into. I'm not sure what the next few decades will look like... but I propose that on an institutional level, the US will more begin resembling an Empire of small conglomerate groups instead of the republic we now know.
Each generation does the best it can with the circumstances it inherits from previous generations. I'm a boomer who was indoctrinated through the media and the school system. I didn't start to "get it" until I was in my 50's, thanks to the internet and social media and an inquisitive mind. The social conditioning of the 60's and 70's was devastating to my generation, and it has only gone downhill from there. It's hard to see it when you're young and just trying to make your way and fit in. We are only human after all. So I hope the younger generations will cut us some slack. They have their own issues to work through, and they are also less than perfect. They will likely realize this by the time they reach their 50's like I did.
False stereotypes? We weren't born yesterday; we fucking remember being latchkey kids. We hear the selfishness coming out of your mouths *today*!
You're children who never grew up, who never even matured to the point of owning one's misdeeds. This is pure "Deny, deny, deny, deny."
I’m at the very tail end of the boomers but my eyes have been opened years ago to the crap education I received as well as the psyop I was part of. Reading classical literature, early church fathers and great works of antiquity, along with CS Lewis, Tolkien and Chesterton have reignited my desire for beauty and truth. I’m passing on all this to the young men in my group.
Your pursuit of discovery will result in your finding what you have posited.
I have never been comfortable with these generation labels created by marketing types to sell us stuff, which then get turned into yet another form of identity politics to divide us - weaken us - in yet more ways.
It’s more useful to look at the damaging social changes and identify the political forces pushing those changes. Because (as the article says) those destructive forces have been active continuously across multiple generations, and remain active today.
A lot of great lines in this and captures what was lost.
A personal anecdote strikes home for me. Explained to boomers my dwindling prospects (well for people my age in their words may have ‘caught the last chopper out of Nam’), active discrimination in hiring/college acceptance toward whites, and increasing lawlessness and violence. They agreed on every point.
Their biggest concern? That it may cause people to be racist…
I didn’t read the whole thing but I’ve believed for over 12 years that we have to enter into a pluralism of communities (enclaves, or whatever you said), rather than individuals. So I think you’re extremely insightful to see that as the future. Something to aspire to, I guess…
Concretely, legally, we probably need to revive freedom of association and undo/rebalance the Supreme Court decisions sacrificing it for freedoms of the individual (eg, destroying male only associations so they are required to admit women, which just leads to the end of the organization.)
Thought provoking and well-written. I am not going to re-litigate parts of the argument (others are doing that elsewhere in the comments) but I do want to make one criticism as it is an example of something I see too often, and that is in the use of the graphs.
The text presents two statements that we all "know" are true: (1) divorce exploded in the 1960s and (2) religious faith has collapsed in america, and two graphs with eye-catching slopes are presented as evidence. Except, the graphs show no such thing...or rather they do show an increase in divorces and a decline in religious faith, but not to the extent that would warrant the emotive language that this article (and many others) use.
Take divorces, per the graph they were 2.0 per 1,000 in 1943 and peaked at 5.3 per 1,000 in 1981. That's an increase of 165% - divorce exploded! Except, the rate of divorce as a percentage of all marriages (using the same numbers in the graph) was 0.2% in 1943 and 0.53% in 1981...that's a very, very minor increase.
As for religiosity, the slope on the graph is steep, but looking at the left-axis, we see that the decline is from 80% in 1962 to a bit under 70% by 2013. A decline, sure, but almost 70% of americans are still religious in 2013...
Overall, I am in agreement with the thesis presented in this article but the use of these graphs is weak, adds nothing to bolster the argument to anyone who knows how to read a graph, and smacks of a lack of conviction in the author that the rhetoric will be sufficient to convince the reader.
This article was goated. What a great read ! Appreciate this ! Ps. I’m Canadian but a lot of the same sentiments register. The multi cultural project of Canada has really deepened distrust. Thanks for this.
The children born after WWII and raised in the United States are not categorically a neat fit, nor are those who went to war, their fathers' generation, into another.
Certainly, my own experience and those of people I knew well in both suppositional groups were entirely absent of the qualities and ideas you designate as key to inclusion.
And yet, much of what you have written is incontrovertible: the 60s made widespread the destruction of the best America had to offer in every aspect of life, which had begun in the 20s among a small group of malcontents.
There was, in the 1960s, a spirit in the air of willful idol smashing, the oft-mentioned and never explained "generation gap.". But most importantly, the loathsome ideas taught to young men and women in the prestigious academies, where they had dispensed with Truth. These children could believe in nothing true, because any false narrative was as good as any other.
That is the salient difference between the two generations. Your "silents" may have been agnostics, but they knew there was Truth. Their children, however, were undermined by the men to whom they had entrusted their children's education.
Those of us you would call Boomers who never bought in, but were brainwashed to believe our faith in the discovery of Truth was a flaw, now see, and more and more do every day, that we were, in fact, entirely in the right.
That is my purpose in writing on Substack, to demonstrate there are, in fact, many of us -- I see new ones every day -- in this country who never sucked at the teat of bastard Leftist ideation - nihilism - and who instead possess the diamond at the center of Truth.
"There is so much tribal knowledge in every domain that relies on an old guy remembering what happened thirty years ago to make a certain decision. It’s going to be painful to relearn those lessons and recreate that sort of expertise."
Companies really do need to develop out of mission statements into company historicisms. It'd properly fix a lot of stuff there.
That being said, I think the experience of ww2 vets in the uk and Europe about Germany are a bit more negative constituting generations of prejudice. Also, I don't think boomers were really all that obsessed with social justice. They interpreted social justice as an extension of egoism. You can watch the first talkies and get a grasp for how their behaviors were back to the greatest generation, some lost and then the preceding is interesting. Up until the 50s, there was no consciousness of sex in the same way (the Goldbergs is an interesting case). The first talkie is not even a decade from women's suffrage. Women aren't present in the same way and the male actors can seem sorta grimy. Fifties movies remind me of young, shy teenagers discovering s--, but they're middle aged adults. Still there was no self-consciousness and, to me, that's what exemplifies boomerism. 50s to 60s TV and talk shows are goofy awkward about sex, but those same actors become heavily self-conscious and self-centered by the 70s.
Anyways, I don't think it's really a generational thing so much as unfolding, or development, of the same values. The only thing that filled the (social, by that time) gaps was the old aristocratic values which ceased to be governmentally important or socially completely important with Napoleon and the 19th century. The self-consciousness is definitely a huge development though.
Edit: I forgot: I wanted to mention that in Texas we still do, or did a decade ago, wear nice clothes to any interview and only had to work hard to get along fine. Every state I've worked in after has absolutely not operated in that same way. They care way more about social cohesion. Wearing nice clothes to a dishwasher interview only looked like I was trying to show off. It was such a nightmare adjusting.
This is all highly overgeneralized notion of generational identity is disturbing. It smacks of dividing by racial/ethnic identity.
The only real divide is between the haves and have nots.
In famous Clintontonian terms, it's about class dummy.
Certainly the less well off of us have some very similar challenges, and gripes about how all of this was allowed to occur.
Healthcare, housing, groceries and transportation costs are eating us alive. No matter what age, sex, religion or race you are, high inflation and higher interest rates are things that impact the less financially set more so.
The way the "system" uses us as fodder is disgusting, again for all of us "unwealthies".
This is a revolution of the great unwashed who's population in the US has swelled post globalism in many different ways.
The pandemic showed the "essential workers" their sacrificial position in society. Did you think this wouldn't have a lasting backlash?
Racial/ethnic identities divide themselves, that is literally the point. They are distinct tribes, the ‘division’ is genetically baked in.
No, the real divide is, and always has been, tribal. To think otherwise is beyond naive, and proof of just how comfortable and servile you Americans still are.
During Yugoslavia’s financial crisis, why didn’t the multi-ethnic proletariat rise up against their oppressors? Isn’t it strange how they instead chose to immediately declare independence along ethno-religious borders, deporting those who didn’t belong amongst them?
To anyone with more than a handful of brain cells, this is an entirely predictable outcome of a multi-ethnic society experiencing chronic economic meltdown. Humans are tribal before they are class-conscious, although I suppose fools like you will —and deserve— to learn the hard way: at the end of a rifle.
Tribes in the US are far less established than elsewhere. If you count tribes as part of ephemeral pop culture, then I think it's kinda loose.
"Tribes in the US are far less established than elsewhere"
I would take issue with that. On the Washington Mall you have the new Museum of African American History and Culture. It's in an upside-down ziggurat. There will soon be a new Women's Museum. And I suspect in the not too distant future an Hispanc-American Museum of History and Culture; and there already is a Museum of Indian, both Amnerican and Asian, Culture. There is the Holodaust Museum, of course. The National Gallery has been accused of being racist and is now managed by a hard-core feminist. There are also many Gay Pride venues.
I think tribal identity in the US is growing stronger by the day, they are just later in development than other parts of the world for the obvious reason that the US is in a very early stage of development.
Well if you believe the elites, that's your folly.
Votes for Trump increased in many of the Tribes you describe.
So there's that.
I’m describing the real world. Nothing to do with elite propaganda. Monuments are a reflection of the culture as a whole. My point was you are engaging in wishful thinking while the various tribes are toppling European-American symbols of power and erecting their own.
Still, you can't deny that many voted against their tribal affiliation and that this US trend has increased thu the last few elections.
Look, I'm not saying that tribal influence isn't real, but I'm giving class a higher influence.
You're an imbecile. This reads like you dictated it with a bong in one hand and your dick in the other.
'Their main enemy was external, in the form of Nazi Germany and Japan, supplanted immediately after the war with the Soviet Union, our once ally.'
Heh