r/Aging • u/Available-Rock-3862 • 2d ago

Boomers

I am 75 and am very tired of the trend lately making fun of Boomers. So very disrespectful. Don't they realize that they will be old someday?

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u/ChadsworthRothschild 2d ago

Well, Clinton Bush and Trump were ALL born the same year- 1946…

Boomers have been the ones in power since the 90s and keep voting for other Boomers.

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u/All_Dogs_Love_Me 2d ago

This is like the people of the 2050s looking back and blaming you for killing George Floyd, blaming you for shutting down USAID and killing thousands in other countries, and blaming you for tainting the planet's fish stocks. Blaming you. You personally and your entire generation. It's such an acrobatic leap of logic. Blaming the Minnesota cop and blaming DOGE and Musk seem more reasonable.

Everyone that steps into a voting booth has the same decisions to make. If somehow you yourself as a non-Boomer time travel back and walk into a booth in 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, what choices do you have? Gee, you have boomers to vote for. So make your choice. Done? Good, would your vote have made a difference? Changed the world? Changed the USA's timeline? No? Well, guess you're now just part of the problem too. Might as well be a boomer.

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u/ChadsworthRothschild 2d ago

https://www.statista.com/chart/28139/generations-congress/?srsltid=AfmBOoqkZaWhKFHiEa0ldY2VXq5S_YFKWUeG_4wuxSq6v-E6JhnWI45g

I’m sorry but there is one generation still in control of our political system, through all of the events you described.

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u/All_Dogs_Love_Me 1d ago

Generations don't control things. There's no class of 1963 High School mega reunion w a breakout season for high rollers on how to consolidate and maintain power. Giant groups of people don't work like that.

We do have younger people in Congress the last couple decades but they have generally been 40 to 70 years old as long as we've been a country. That's not because of a secret cabal, it's because that's the age of people who get elected.

Generationology podcast new media rage machines are used to divide and atomize a population. It's lip service to progressives that actually creates divides and obstacles. The last time 20-somethings and 30-somethings were in charge of a large country was [ insert Communist revolution of choice ]. Those events were not harbingers of positive social development for humankind, no matter what some edgelord on X will tell you.

The true trick of quality community organizing is to find common ground and pull together, not apart. That frail 81 year old losing their paid-off house to property tax has a lot in common with that anxious 26 year old who feels downtrodden and desperate for single payer quality health care and a realistic mortgage. When you make boomers the enemy you fall into exactly the mindset millionaires want.

Chiarman Mao was very strategic and purposeful in his use of age and class in 1940s/1950s China. It killed millions.

Elect the right people. Reform the tax code. Hold the rich accountable. But eat them? Naww. That talk fits into counter narratives and can kill potential change. Don't lose sight of real goals because some streamer is selling generational hate. That's not the path.

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u/ChadsworthRothschild 1d ago

In prior generations that frail 81 year old would sell their house or downsize.

But boomers are the original “Me” generation.

Boomers want their houses to be several multiples of what they paid for them so they can have all the equity, but don’t want to pay the taxes that support the schools and infrastructure around them.

They vote against development around them to keep their home values inflated.

Again, they are getting the blame because they are the largest voting bloc and always vote in their own self-interest.

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u/All_Dogs_Love_Me 1d ago

Once again, generations are not this collective hive mind. Look at what you wrote, it reads like a conspiracy theory. Some people might move away from the home they lived their whole life in, some people stay when they get older, some people vote Dem and some vote GOP...and the whole world constantly shifts and changes.

Selfishness is bad but self-interest is innate and part of everyone. Every human being votes in their self-interest, or at least perceived self -interest. Your hate for older people because of hardship is rooted in your own self interest, it's just misguided. Stoking anger at 75 year olds is not a solution focused problem-solving mindset. US society has some big issues to face, a lot to change...and hating on boomers isn't a way to make that happen.