I am so sick of us boomers getting blamed

[blues90]

Was it our idea to create WWII , was it our idea for our parents to re-produce after this war ? Is it our fault that now we are close to digging into the SS funds that we worked hard to pay into and is it our fault that now after the industrial revolution that now we are in need of health benefits .

We played no hand it this problem , we had no choice to be born .

We were feed the food grown with DTT and no one new about birth control or even cared .

It was not our idea to begin Vietnam or WWII and it was not our idea to outsource or open box stores as a generation , such many boomers went that route but then most of them that did were products of the bad influence of their profit making mega parents .

So back off on the boomers , as a group we did our best to ward off all of these foreseen horrors that are here today .

[jpgray]

1. Your generation includes Bush, voted him and Reagan in, etc.

Your parents presided over the greatest expansion of the middle class in history, while you are presiding over one of the greatest polarizations of rich and poor. Not like it's all Joe Boomer's fault, but you guys are still ostensibly running the show by numbers alone.

[jaysunb]

8. Wrong !

our parents are responsible for Reagan. ....not mine, but those in their age group.

[TahitiNut]

22. I think you're correct. Those born before 1945 were 35 years old and older ...

... when Reagan/Bush ran the first time in 1980. Boomers were all younger than 35. That "older generation" (of which I'm a part) went for Reagan far more than voters younger than 35.

As always, I must do penance for the worst vote I ever cast: Reagan/Bush in 1980. (My second worst vote was Nixon/Agnew in 1968.) In both cases, I wised up when they ran the next time - too late. (sigh) Reagan/Bush in 1980 is the last time I voted Republican for President.

[jaysunb]

37. Since we're confessing...

I actually worked for CREEP in 72. A group of 4 were known as " Black Democrats For Nixon ." We didn't do anything except show up at photo ops and fundraisers. I voted for McGovern, but always felt bad for taking the money. ( Good old C. Arnholt Smith, Daddy Warbucks of US National Bank recruited and financed us before and after the election.) What an eye opener!I still haven't gotten over my taste for the best of everything. LOL!

[Breeze54]

150. You are about the only one I will forgive for Reagan!

;)

I didn't vote for Nixon (my first election vote ever at 18 yrs. old!!)

and I have NEVER voted Repuke ever in my voting life!!

I never will vote rethug....ever...... EVER!!!!!!!!

That's just the way it is...I know a bad melon when I see one!

I don't trust and have never trusted Rethugs ever.

They always bring war, job loss, higher prices and homelessness!

FUCK THEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And fuck the assholes attacking Baby Boomers!!! Get a grip!!!!

I'm sick of it too blues90 and I blame Obama for the newest onslaught of attacks.

[WinkyDink]

43. Hello! Reagan was elected in 1980; "Reagan Democrats" came from "the Greatest Generation."

MINE called him "Ray-gun" .

NOW I'm 57; but "Generation Y" is in their 30's---how are THEY voting, these Republican punks, like the ones who over-ran the Miami recount?

No, sorry; not taking this blame AT ALL.

[Alexander]

47. Wrong. "Reagan Democrats" were hippies turning into yuppies.

I should know; my own mother was one of them.

The "Reagan Democrats" were almost exclusively Baby Boomers; former hippies and radicals who were cleaning up and selling out. People from the "Greatest Generation" remember FDR fondly and tend to vote Democratic.

[jaysunb]

51. Wrong !

it was the "greatest generation" that made up most of the so called Reagan democrats.

[TahitiNut]

63. Here are the FACTS!

The 1980 election voter demographics were:

The "Baby Boom Generation"
18–21 years old (born 1959-1962) ...... 44% for Carter, 43% for Reagan, 11% for Anderson
22–29 years old (born 1951-1958) ...... 43% for Carter, 43% for Reagan, 11% for Anderson

30–44 years old (born 1936-1950) ...... 37% for Carter, 54% for Reagan, 7% for Anderson

The "Greatest Generation"
45–59 years old (born 1921-1935) ...... 39% for Carter, 55% for Reagan, 6% for Anderson
60 years or older (born before 1921) .. 40% for Carter, 54% for Reagan, 4% for Anderson


As anyone with a modicum of math literacy can clearly see, the "Greatest Generation" went for Reagan. The "Boomers" split ... with a majority voting for a Liberal (Carter or Anderson). Probably the best that could be said is that a majority of people with children voted for Reagan.

I don't recall anyone attacking the Anderson voters like Nader voters have been attacked. Funny about that.

:shrug:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election%2C_1980#Voter_demographics

[Alexander]

80. How does that refute what I said?

22–29 years old (born 1951-1958) ...... 43% for Carter, 43% for Reagan, 11% for Anderson

30–44 years old (born 1936-1950) ...... 37% for Carter, 54% for Reagan, 7% for Anderson

The boomers are really 1945-1960, approximately. Looks like I'm still right.

:eyes:

[Name removed]

83. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Greyhound]

129. As usual you've posted the facts, one question though.

Does your source have any of the numbers of voters from those demographics? The boomer's strength and culpability in much that has gone wrong here, is simply their sheer numbers (45 million IIRC).

It probably was Anderson that made the difference.

[TahitiNut]

138. Yes, I included the link which shows the percentages. Just as significant, however ...

... is that the seminal study of "Reagan Democrats" focused on Macomb County, Michigan. They were characterized as people who voted for JFK in 1960 and Reagan in 1980. Clearly, not a single 'boomer' was old enough to vote for JFK in 1960.

As I said in a post that was collateral damage in a deleted subthread, I am and have been intimately familiar with the Macomb County demographics next door to me and the "Reagan Democrat" phenomenon. I grew up here. I went to college here. Part of the delusion/confusion among people who weren't even a gleam in their mother's eye at the time. Too many people today labor under the misapprehension that the terms "Democrat" and "liberal" were as synonymous in the 60s as in 1980 or today. Nothing - absolutely nothing - could be further from the truth. There were almost no people more hostile to the "flower children" and baby boomers than the blue collar "Reagan Democrats." I have relatives in my extended family who were "Reagan Democrats." They're NOT boomers. (Nor am I, for that matter.)

Anderson was a "Goldwater Republican" ... a moderate, actually, in the context of the times. Today, he'd be a Democrat very much like Murtha or even Landrieu. He'd be appalled at Chimpy and he detested Reagan.

What was rather remarkable about the Macomb County demographic is the predominance of people who migrated from the south - Kentucky, southern Ohio, southewestern Pennsylvania and West Virginia - in search of jobs in the auto industry. Dixiecrats-lite. They were not 'boomers.' Today, however, the county is heavily boomer. (Of course.) Michigan has 'exported' its college-educated younger generations in search of jobs and sunshine.

[Breeze54]

153. Can we all say 'YUPPIE' ???????????????

There were and are different factions that surfaced from the Baby Boomers.

YUPPIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

They were and still ARE the turncoats!!!! :grr:

At least in my book!

[WinkyDink]

67. No way. I was there. I'm a boomer. I watched my Adlai S. father turn for RR.

And I don't consider anyone born 15 years after WWII ended a "Baby Boomer". Anyone born in 1955, e.g., is a KOREAN CONFLICT Baby (post-1953).

[Alexander]

81. You define "baby boomer" differently than most...

Wikipedia:

"A baby boomer is someone who was born during a period of increased birth rates, or baby boom, and the term is particularly applied to those born during the post-World War II period of increased birth rates. In the United States, the term is iconic and more properly capitalized as Baby Boomers. The term is commonly applied to people with birth years after World War II (WW II) and before the Vietnam War, thus possibly comprising more than one generation. The terms "baby boomer" and "baby boom" along with others (i.e., "boomies"), are widely used even in countries with demographics that did not mirror the sustained growth in American families over the same interval.<1> Although the term "boomer" has expanded into global use, the generation is also known in Europe as the Generation of 1968."

[tlsmith1963]

87. No, They Are Boomers

I heard that the Boomers cut off at 1964, so that makes me a Boomer too (born in 1963). But the "second wavers" like me get next to no attention. It's a strange thing that has always bothered me. The older ones were shaped by the '60s. We were shaped by things like Punk Rock. But whenever people talk about Boomers they always act like *all* Boomers experienced the '60s as adults or older teens. Wrong!

[TahitiNut]

94. "Generation Jones" (1954-1965)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_Jones

[piesRsquare]

104. Correction

Generation X is in their 30's.

[ComerPerro]

2. oh, I agree. Its not the boomers who completely sold out in the 1980s with "greed is good"

oh wait. Yes it was. My bad.

[hfojvt]

15. No it wasn't

In the 1980s, Generation Xers like myself and my siblings were coming of age. All this talk about the Boomers ignores the fact that there are more people in Generation X than there are in the baby boom generation. Alot of Boomers though, did not pay the high social security taxes for a larger part of their working careers. The taxes jumped up in the mid 1980s when Boomers were in their late to early 30s, already a decade into their careers.

[dysfunctional press]

146. in the mid 80's, a lot of boomers were still in their 20's.

and hardly "a decade into their careers".

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

3. I'm not to worried about WWII or Vietnam.

Iraq, on the other hand...

[BlooInBloo]

4. Especially when the boomers' kids are the ONLY bracket that think Iraq wasn't a mistake...

http://www.galluppoll.com/content/?ci=27562

Did the United States make a mistake in sending troops to Iraq?
by age


Age:

18-29 Yes - 56% No - 41%
30-39 Yes - 48% No - 50%
40-49 Yes - 52% No - 47%
50-59 Yes - 61% No - 38%
60-69 Yes - 62% No - 37%
70-79 Yes - 70% No - 28%
80+ Yes - 69% No - 26%

[LSparkle]

9. These stats are very interesting ...

The elders (who learned CRITICAL THINKING when U.S. public schools still TAUGHT THAT) recognize that this war was a mistake. And the very young are probably looking at the economic climate and job market in this country and realizing they've REALLY been sold out ...

[BlooInBloo]

11. Um, and the fact that they, their friends, and their classmates are the ones fighting the war.

[LSparkle]

13. D'oh ... OF COURSE ... I can't believe I missed that ...

[BlooInBloo]

19. :)

[TahitiNut]

17. The 30-somethings are nearing the peak of their earning power ...

... and don't yet have the perspective to comprehend that the increase in their affluence is not a result of good governance. It's an age when folks still haven't spent the majority of their lives as adults ... when they're still feeling their oats, driving SUVs, and enjoying their toys.

"Don't trust anyone over 30." ... was, in no small part, due to this same phenomenon - an "I got mine" attitude that infects his decade more than others. (Been there; done that.)

[Javaman]

5. Sure, the boomers aren't to blame and everything exists in a vacuum.

:eyes:

[BOSSHOG]

6. I'm a boomer

When we are dead and gone future generations will be blaming each other for whatever is going on at the time. Usually the younger generation blaming the older generation proving the old adage - YOUTH IS WASTED ON THE YOUNG. I'm a boomer now and not too long ago I was a "youth."

[dflprincess]

12. We were called baby boomers when we were young

now we're the "aging baby boomers". Before too long we will be the "aged baby boomers".

[blues90]

23. well that's true

As a boomer I was not in agreement with my parents but the world when I was a teen was not so very different than theirs . There were still the same types of jobs and careers and classes .

We were the ones brainwashed with the idea of the american dream , many of us never really looked for or found that dream and many did .

I still feel the boomers are two separate groups or schools of thought .

The 80's came along but i did not vote for reagan , never voted for the republican party even though my parents did .

If you ask me the few boomers who advanced and now hold all the wealth are the ones who bought into the reaganomics and brought this filth into the lives of their off spring . Think of the tv shows about business minded youth Micheal J Fox and such .

The suddenly we were off to the new world of computers which to me was a turning point for the worst , the electronic age was not the invention of the boomers , some where involved but I won;t say they were more than backers of the idea .


I will say for what it's worth I was not part of this new world order or the neocon empire , this was the work of the young republican think tanks which certainly were not in my group of friends , I went the music route and art route not the control group .

Those who blame the boomers look at your own parents and grand parents and ask them why they sold out .

[Orrex]

7. Tell you what

Fix all of the things that went wrong during your generation's heyday, instead of leaving it behind for your children and grandchildren, and we'll consider the matter settled.

[BOSSHOG]

27. Interesting

So nobody in your generation will do anything wrong in any endeavor. Damn, wish we had thought of that.

[Orrex]

45. Did I say that?

Of course I didn't, as you're aware. Instead, I called for your generation to clean up the messes it makes and has made, rather than complaining about how my generation blames you for everything.

I recall hearing from teachers in the early 1980's about how this or that disaster would be up to my generation to fix, and I recall thinking "I'm eleven; why the hell don't the people in charge now do something?" Granted, a boomer born in 1963 wasn't in much of a position to do anything about it, but one born in 1947 had a lot more leverage than I did, and the teachers in question were part of that bracket. Apparently, the buck stops.... where, again?

Incidentally, it's a mistake for you to equate "blaming the boomers" with "blaming BOSSHOG," and it risks trivializing the actual issue. I don't hold you personally responsible for any of the disasters that have occurred on your generation's watch, but that doesn't mean that the generation as a whole can't be taken to task for a few of them.

[BOSSHOG]

46. I'm not complaining

at all. I just find it amusing that you will soon have this same conversation with someone younger then you; who will share with you everything that is wrong with your generation. I must be rather sheltered because I haven't heard much of boomers getting blamed for everything. Its similar to the neighbor who wants everybody's yards mowed just so, while not tending to his own.

[TahitiNut]

10. The "boomers" are TWO distinct groups ... pre-1954 and post-1954.

They are HUGELY differing 'generations' imho. As a 'war baby' who has been in the position of seeing the differences, I just cannot view these two distinct groups as a single 'generation' in terms of outlook and values. Not at all ... not even with the broadest of brushes.

That said, there was also a schism in the pre-1954 boomers that lasts until today. It was a schism wrought by the Viet Nam War ... and it's between those who were affluent enough to escape the draft without taking refuge in Canada or becoming teachers (and social workers and other deferred occupations) and those who weren't - the ones who sucked it up and did what they had to do.

[Virginia Dare]

18. I'm at the very tail end of the boomers...

it sucks getting the sloppy lasts of everything...:* On the other hand, by the time I get "up there" maybe the crisis will have ebbed and we'll have figured out what to do with all of us.

[itsrobert]

49. Me too

I'm tired of being lumped in with the Boomers, I was born in Dec 1963.

[Sapphocrat]

55. Another one here.

1961. And I have about as much in common with the Boomers as I do with my parents' Depression-Era/WWII generation.

We're Baby Busters, btw.

I don't resent the Boomers for much (except dropping the ball on the peace-and-love movement) -- but we Busters sure did, and still do, get "sloppy seconds" all right, especially when it came/comes to jobs. It's not the Boomers' fault their parents wouldn't stop popping out kids; it just sucks to know that from the day you're born until the day you die, you will always be in the shadow of the Boomers -- and always be sandwiched in between the Boomers and the fabled Generation X.

[Virginia Dare]

68. It didn't help that we graduated right into the face of the..

Reagan/Bush years either. My first full-time "real" job I made 11k a year--with a college degree. I think that was considered below poverty level. I tried to make it on my own for a year, and then had to move back with the 'rents for another year to get my feet on the ground. Come to think of it, I didn't start making "real" money until the Clinton years, coincidence?

[Sapphocrat]

75. If it is, it's a pretty huge coincidence. :)

Same here: Minimum wage up to the time I was 22 (1984) -- and then I still had to take crap jobs (and choose between paying the rent on time or buying food most months) because there just were no decent tech jobs (I was doing data entry when I was really a whiz-bang programmer). Things began to look up only into Clinton's first term, turned fantastic for me (six figures by the late 1990s) -- and ended abruptly just after the 2000 sElection.

[Virginia Dare]

77. We were definitely sold down the river..

remember when they told us, just get a computer tech degree and you're set for life. Those jobs have all been outsourced. ;( I guess I've lucked out, I'm still making decent money working for liberal causes, in D.C. where the money always seems to flow :)

I'll keep my fingers crossed for things to look up for you in 2008! :hi:

[Sapphocrat]

116. You nailed it.

It wasn't bad advice, getting into high tech -- the timing was just all wrong. We got stuck somewhere between the mythical dawn of the Space Age, and the time when babies started coming out of the delivery room demanding a broadband hookup in the nursery.

As I see it, three things tripped up us tech-types:

1. The New Math. Little did we (or our parents, or even our teachers) realize why they were filling our heads with number lines and supersets, and drilling us until we could count in base 16 in our sleep. Of course, we know now that we were being groomed for engineering and computer science -- but it was a grand failure of an experiment, and produced far too many math-o-phobes who can barely balance a checkbook.

This, I think, had the effect of making education seem irrelevant to too many children of the 1960s; perhaps it's just my impression, but I have a feeling our generation "boasts" the greatest number of underachievers to come out of the twentieth century.

2. Not only did we not grow up with computers (do you remember how awed you were by the idea of a telephone that wasn't connected to a wall, or the way you coveted that first LED Texas Instruments calculator that sold for a mere $300, and didn't you scoff at the idea of paying money to watch this silly "cable television" thing you'd heard about?), but computers were totally un-cool when we were kids. Only the geeky, smelly, socially inept president of the high school science fiction club had any idea of just how cool they were. As a result, we had a lot of catching-up to do, but fast.

(Those of us who finally perceived even an inkling of what computers could do were on our own. I was "online" {if you can call it that} by the early 1980s, long before there was a public World Wide Web. What preceded the Web was a gloriously exciting, virus-free, wild frontier -- but I didn't know what the hell to do with it. And many years passed before I ever made the connection between that pointless New Math and my newfound understanding of bits and bytes.)

3. There was a very small window of opportunity to make it big in high tech, and when we did, we were gullible enough -- and eager enough, and young enough -- to buy into the lie that there was no limit; it was always going to be that way. We were the the future of America, and we thought America believed in us just as much as we believed in America. We didn't know how expendable we were; if I wanted to resume my chosen career today, I'd have to move to Bangladesh.

Just Sapph's take. :)

I'm glad you've been able to withstand the cold winds of trendy, fickle America, V. Perhaps providence takes care of those who devote their lives to something worthy. :)

And thanks for the good wishes and crossed fingers. Truth be told, I know I'll never work in IT again; I'm too old, and have been out of the market too long. I've been forced to switch careers (to graphics design, mainly), and I have a few other irons in the fire.

The funny thing is, my attitude is good. It's scary, not knowing from day to day what the future holds, but it's a good kind of scary. It's another wild frontier. :)

[Coyote_Bandit]

110. Me Too

1961.

I'm convinced our generation got some of the worst career advice in history: Go to college, work hard, get grades and when you graduate you can get a good job. Problem is that by the time us baby busters got out of college all those good jobs were filled by folks not much older than us - and they have largely remined in those top tier positions. There wasn't a place for us at the table. Meanwhile, we have had parents and family members infer that we just weren't trying or we likewise could have done just as well as the folks just 5 or 10 years older than us. We should have been the craftsmen and tradesmen and skilled workers. Instead, we have all pursued multiple careers trying to recoup that educational investment. Now that the boomers are starting to leave the workforce we find we are too old for business to invest in us and we are passed over in favor of younger gen xers. It sucks being sandwich filling.

[Sapphocrat]

117. Oh, are you ever speaking my language.

"Go to college, work hard, get grades and when you graduate you can get a good job" worked fine for our parents and our older siblings -- which makes it next to impossible for our parents and older siblings to understand why it never worked for us.

While my parents were more than forgiving (although stymied) by my stuggle, I heard "You're just not trying" from almost every other adult in a position of authority, ad nauseam.

"Now that the boomers are starting to leave the workforce we find we are too old for business to invest in us and we are passed over in favor of younger gen xers": Bingo. The Boomers won't get out of our way until they're good and ready (and why should they?), and the Xers (and what, the "Y-ers" and "Z-ers"?) are too many and too willing to do the job for a fraction of the pay -- and they out-educate us. We can't compete with that, any more than we are able to compete with our "elders."

To add injury to insult, the Boomers are going to suck Social Security dry long before you and I reach retirement in 20 short years. (That, IMO, is not the fault of the Boomers, but the fault of the fed, which keeps draining SS dry.)

Rather than "Baby Busters," perhaps it's time we claim the title, "The New Lost Generation."

[Coyote_Bandit]

123. Now that I'm 40 something

I have completely given up. I've determined that there is simply no longer a place in the traditional workforce for me. I'm learning the trade/craft I should have learned 25 years ago with hopes of starting my own small little business. Plan to work for myself - and largely by myself. No reason to assume responsibility for someone else's livlihood. As soon as I turn a profit I plan to burn all my diplomas. Ten years of college, three graduate and professional degrees, two professional licenses - and the single worst investment I will ever make. The value of education is highly overrated. I graduated in a recession, had difficulty initially securing employment and have lost a job and been forced to change careers in every recession that has followed. That makes me broadly and uniquely educdated and experienced. It also makes prospective employers ask why I've never decided what I wanted to do. I feel like I realy did sacrifice the best years of my life for somebody else's interests and prosperity. No more. I have a younger sibling born in 1966 who has had similar experience.

[Indy_Dem_Defender]

159. Your in the same boat as me

Only I'm labeled generation X, My mom falls under the late 50's early 60's Baby busters like you.

I was born in 1980 graduated High School in 1999, I was on end of Xer years, but way to old to considered generation Y (or what ever the hell kids are called today). Why the older Xer's experienced a wealth of opportunity with the internet boom of the mid-late 90's, the early 2000's dot com bubble burst along with the bush economy severely hurt the tail end of Xers who were in college on career advancement.

[TahitiNut]

71. "Generation Jones" (1954-1965)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_Jones

It seems that I'm far from being the only person who sees a very distinct perspective adopted by the post-1954 and pre-1954 'boomers.'

Born in 1943, and along with all those born in 1942-1944, I'm not a part of any 'generation' as commonly defined. Us "war babies" in the U.S. grew up seeing the preparations for the 'boomers' - new schools, toys that we never had, and all the marketing.

[Virginia Dare]

78. I prefer the "lost generation"...n/t

[tlsmith1963]

95. Me, Too

We're different, aren't we? I went through Punk Rock & only remember the hippie thing from when I was very young.

[bling bling]

25. I think I understand what you mean. But maybe not.

My dad was born in 1946 AND he also went to Vietnam. He's always lived modestly and has never had anything to prove. No pretense whatsoever. I don't believe he was even registered to vote until shrub came along. He went and registered because he didn't want someone like Bush being the leader of this country. I've heard him more or less go off on the boomers too, LONG before this ever became part of the mainstream discussion. He's always wondered out loud what kind of world his resource gobbling generation is going to leave for future generations.

However, my dad's brother was born less than two years later, but he did NOT go to Vietnam. That's the only difference between the two. Both graduated from college, same parents, etc. But my dad's brother is a die-hard Republican sheep. He handles money for rich people, mostly Republicans. Maybe that's why he's a Republican too. Anyway, he's the gross McMansion-buying, pretentious, excess consumption type.

[BOSSHOG]

26. Okay Tahiti

I was born in 1954 (in the middle of 1954) should I be psychotic or schizoprehenic? I obey the law, pay taxes and mow my lawn to a fault. I'm bald but handsome and can fuck like a porn star and cook like Paula. I have no desire to feel guilty about anything future generations might whine about because when we die off, the little fuckers who aren't born yet will be whining about how past generations fucked them (just like we did 30 years ago.) My advice to people younger then me - seek out good jobs and keep them to ensure my social security last until I die. I'm doing that for older generations now, so fairs fair.

[teriyaki jones]

136. Will you marry me?

Your assertion that you "can fuck like a porn star and cook like Paula" sounds good to me! :P

tj

[in_cog_ni_to]

30. So that must make me chopped liver.

:cry::cry: I was born in 1955 and have always considered myself a Baby Boomer.....The Baby Boom of 1946 to 1964 :)

[TahitiNut]

35. I neither condemned nor canonized either 'half' of the "Boomer" generation.

All I did was comment that I saw two very distinct groups based on the general attitudes I've observed. I'm of the opinion that the differences involve a couple of significant factors, not the least of which is approaching high school graduation and having to regard the draft as a BIG factor in post-graduation plans, whether those plans were college or work. The other factors I think exist are the "duck and cover" drills and 'Red Scare' of the 50s and going to school prior to Brown v. Board of Education. Some of us older folks remember when the first TV was bought in the neighborhood and when we 'discovered' sex WITHOUT the pill. I think we tend to forget how immensely the Pill, the Draft, the Bomb, and TV factored into "growing up" years. The early boomers formed their perceptions of one kind of 'world' and the late boomers saw another kind of 'world.'

I've formed my perceptions based on knowing lots and lots of people (my 'peers') personally (even intimately) born during those years. As a guy born during WW2, I tended to mate/date females YOUNGER than me. As a social retard ('late bloomer'?) who never had kids and hung with the younger crowd who were more active and 'out-going' (literally going out more often) and as one of the first 'kids' in my family (my cousins, half-sister, and step-siblings are almost all younger), I've noticed the differences (based on how I 'RELATE' to them) for decades now. My first job was as a high school math teacher, so I got to know kids less than 10 years my junior.

CLEARLY, I believe, the broad differences in those formative years also varies based on what part of the country one was raised ... but since I've lived all over the country, I've gotten some sense of that as well. (Detroit, for example, was clearly 'slow' in going through "The Sixties" - not even starting until about 1969.)

Nonetheless, I think the broad brush we use in dealing with 'generations' has to be ESPECIALLY broad when dealing with 'boomers' ... and the common habit of speaking of 'boomers' as some group with common attributes is particularly flawed - more flawed than just basically flawed like all broad brushes are.

Does that help?
:shrug:

[tlsmith1963]

90. Thry Are Different

I was born in '63. By the time I was old enough to try & change anything, the whole Sixties thing was long over. I spent years thinking I was robbed, because I wanted to protest, too! We had all the idealism of the older Boomers, but no big cause to protest. So we ended up being more cynical (hence the influence of things like Punk Rock on my age group) than the older Boomers. But now that I'm going through this era, I realize that protesting Vietnam probably wasn't this wonderful thing I thought it was when I was a kid. It must have been frustrating a lot, & hard work.

[TahitiNut]

97. Yep. That's what I've heard several close friends and relatives born then say.

There's so much about "generations" that has to do with their formative common experiences (which means national/cultural events and attitudes), that I can't see how people born in the late 50's and later have the same context in growing up. I think a "boomer" has to be old enough to have developed their own sense of loss and shock at JFK's assassination but young enough that they weren't really aware of McCarthyism.

Too many focus on WHO conceived the 'boomers' (GIs, after returning home or getting out of college on the GI Bill and starting a family) without paying attention to the series of formative socio-political events during the time they grew up. (We don't seem to make the same error in focus in regarding other generations.)

I've also found it somewhat remarkable that so much emphasis is placed on a birthrate that really wasn't all that unusual in the larger scheme of things. After all, it rapidly became somewhat unusual in the post WW2 years for couples to have more than 2-3 children while larger families were far more common on the late 19th century and early 20th century when families with 5-6 children was common, even if infant mortality took its toll. My mother was one of five and my father was one of twelve (his 3 + her 4 + their 5) but only one of those seventeen people born before 1935 had more than two kids themselves. That's a huge drop in the birthrate in my family, at least. (I tend to think of it as being at least partly due to Social Security.)

[kineneb]

98. 1958

old enough to remember JFK, too young to do anything...age 10 in 1968, graduated high school in 1976... the last generation to go through the California public schools when they were one of the nation's best...

Jethro Tull: "too old to rock and roll, and too young to die"

[sinkingfeeling]

14. OK, and where the hell were all the Gen X,Y, and whatevers at the impeachment rally last month?

When you all have paid into Social Security and Medicare about one half of what I have since age 16, then you can talk to me. When you're ready to discuss such issues as zero population, global warming, and corruption, talk to me. So far, we're encouraging more and more births in this country; the student parking lots are full of gas-guzzling SUVs, pickup trucks, and about 100 Hummers; latest polls I've seen, show the 'younger' people have the ethics of the corrupt Bush administration, lying on resumes and cheating on tests because 'they have to to compete'.

[nini]

16. Since there are always a couple generations in charge at any given time

There's lots of blame to go around.


Last I heard the voting age was 18 and over. That means people 18, 38, 48, 58, 68, 78, 88 etc.. can also vote. Lots of generations represented there.



The generation wars are as old as humans themselves. This is nothing new.

[Straight Shooter]

20. Broad-brush criticisms of any age group are nonproductive.

I'm a boomer, non-materialistic, I've been conservation-oriented since Carter (and I was in my teens then), never voted for a Repub for president, try to save money, avoid materialism as much as possible, hate war except as completely last resort for self-defense or defense of allies. I've been working since I was 7 years old and helping my brothers on their paper routes. I'm saving as much money on my pitiful earnings as I can, but I'm a socialist at heart and believe in helping all generations. Many baby boomers have actually given up a lot in order to help the next generation, either through volunteer work or taking crappy jobs like teaching and nursing when they could have been the next "masters of the universe" in business. Many baby boomers are caring for their aging parents and teen-agers, too. That's hardly being selfish.

I could sit here and say all youths are lazy and self-absorbed and care more about the latest music to download onto their iPod, that they're politically obtuse and unmindful of the destruction to the environment in their own brand-new HUGE pickups, but I won't do that, because it wouldn't be true.

"Every generation blames the one before." (song by Mike and the Mechanics)

[blondeatlast]

21. Another convenient invented war from the media.

Labels don't belong on people. Period.

don't play their mindless game.

[1776Forever]

24. 1970s low economic growth, high inflation and interest rates, and high gas prices - Added up

Let's get a history lesson from Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._presidential_election,_1980

Through the 1970s, the United States were experiencing a wrenching episode of low economic growth, high inflation and interest rates, and intermittent energy crises, added to a sense of malaise that in both foreign and domestic affairs the nation was headed downward. By the beginning of the election season, the prolonged Iran hostage crisis sharpened public perceptions of a crisis.

Carter was blamed for most of the nation's woes, especially the Iran hostage crisis, which proved humiliating. Many Americans saw Carter as having failed to have dealt with any of these situations either decisively or effectively. Carter, after defeating Ted Kennedy for the nomination, attacked Reagan as a dangerous radical. For his part Reagan, the charismatic ex-Governor of California, repeatedly ridiculed Carter's ineffectiveness, and won a landslide victory that carried the United States Senate for the first time in 28 years.

****************************************************************************************

Now from a personal viewpoint: In 1976 the optimism was HUGE for Jimmy Carter to come into the Presidency and become a force for ethical government after Nixon. Unfortunately it became apparent as his days went on in the White House that with the gas prices, high inflation and interest rate hikes, it was not going to be easy for him to overcome these issues - And then came the Iran crisis.

I voted for President Carter both times he ran and thought if he had been given another 4 years we may have had a good energy program to get us into the 80's and beyond, but that was not meant to be. For me and my family of 7 Reagan coming into power meant that my totally disabled husband who was on SS Disability lost this due to Reagan's "handlers", and many others did also with some commiting suicide over it. I really believe this is when the Rebup machine started to form and it is now going full blast! So look at history and not the generation. I have always and will always vote Democrat. I do not believe anyone that doesn't have a million dollars in the bank should vote Republican ever!!:headbang:

[SoCalDem]

28. The people making the real decisions in most cases are 65-70+ yr olds

in govertment. No one really thinks that Bush or Clinton really made all that many decisions, do they?

Clinton & Bush may be "boomers", but they answered to the "old-folks" who run things behind the curtains of power.. still do..

[BlooInBloo]

29. Ok, that's 200-2000 old folks. What about the other 10,000,000?

See also the age breakdown of Iraq: mistake? Polling, somewhere above.

[SoCalDem]

31. A few people in high places is all it takes n/t

[Rex]

32. It's all yalls dam fault! Take responsibility for your generations actions!

Hehe, gotcha! :evilgrin:

[KoKo]

36. ROFL! You got it! The "Meme" that's going around ..passed by RW! n/t

[Rex]

38. Hi KoKo01!

I've locked onto their brain frequency! Ugh, I need a shower! :evilgrin:

[KoKo]

39. LOL's....I know what you mean! n/t

[blues90]

33. All I know is here I am again at 57

Looking at another damn war an illegal one at that , I had enough dead during Vietnam and then the damn gulf war . Not to mention the Iran contra deal .

As a boomer , hell just as a human I wish I could have missed this time around completely .

I look at this insane disaster which I had nothing to do with at all nore did the Iraqis and have to wonder whether it's even worth the trouble to attempt to hault global warming . If people can't learn that war is the wrong way to go then there will be more wars for resouces or land or just simple hate . If so what will they learn once the planet melts down around them . Death is death and man is responsible for all of it .

It is a damn insane macabre of a joke .

[WinkyDink]

44. 57 here, also. I can only hope that history keeps on keepin' on, unto RESIGNATIONS

and PRISON TERMS.

[KoKo]

34. Boomers are an easy TARGET for those after who were SPINELESS! n/t

[porphyrian]

40. I'm sick of boomers talking about themselves.

It isn't all about you.

[blues90]

52. No kidding , we don;t make it about us

however we are blamed for the situation that the country faces now . Tell me what you would have done if you were alive back then .

If you were old enough to vote in 2000 or your parents voted repug it was your prime chance to make a change .

What is yourb generation ding about this mad man in the whitehouse ? I did'nt put him there .

I would rather people forget all about the boomers and deal with what is at hand right now however I will stand my ground as a boomer whenever we get bashed and blamed we were at least willing to take a risk even if it meant beatings of jail . And we fought against all odds for years .

Boomers were not popular then , so we have heard it all years ago .

we had songs and a vast following who listened to the message these songs brought out , they did not include hate and killing . They were about a conscience and awareness not money and fame .

[porphyrian]

61. Alright, a few things...

First of all, yes, boomers do talk about themselves all the time. If you're a boomer, you may not be aware of it, but the rest of us are.

I was old enough to vote in 2000, and I did. And I voted in 2002, 2004, and 2006. My dad used to vote republicant, but he died before these assholes stole our country, so it's not his fault. And my mom votes Democratic. It's not my parents' fault.

I was born in late 1969, so I'm called a Generation X'er. I'm not surprised that boomers don't know what we've done, because, in my experience, they can't stop talking about themselves long enough to see.

Boomers are not the only ones getting bashed - everyone is pointing the finger at everyone else. Again, I'm not surprised that a boomer doesn't realize this, being mostly unable to recognize anything external to themselves.

Boomers are, and have been, if you'll be honest about it, very popular with themselves as long as they have recognized themselves as a generation. Being blamed simply allows boomers to continue to talk about themselves and unite in their "persecution." Whatever.

My generation, and every one since, has also had messages about consciousness and awareness, in song and otherwise, that boomers haven't noticed for the most part, again due to their general self-obsession I guess. Popular music isn't chosen by us, it's engineered by the music industry that boomers control today. So don't give me that shit. Point your finger at yourself. Go on, you know you want to.

[blues90]

66. So your general position is boomers are unaware ?

This is all you have to say . I listened to 80's music and some in the 90's and some had political messages as well as social messages . You were old enough by then to know what was going on .

No I don't have any desire to be self obsessed and I am not .

Why not go back and read my original post . If you think I came on here with this topic to draw attention you are the one who is un-aware and self obsessed .

And we had no control over the music industry at all , not in our day and still don't as far as out old time artists are concerned .

You still don't get it do you , the ones in control of every damn thing are the ones with the money and they are controlling my generation and yours . It matters not what generation they came from and I don;t have a list of the owners and age groups who control it .

The key players in this government are not boomers , they are from the boomers parents generation . Bush is a front clown as well as being born with the silver spoone and I can bet you if bush was the president in the 60's we would have been just as much against him as we are now .

Instead of displaying your hate of the boomers without any real knowledge of them why not instead get off your rear and do something because we are all stuck of this ball .

I don;t see boomers out there waving their freak flags these days , no they are out there trying to end this war and out this freakish admin .

And for crips sake , show me in anyone of my posts where I pointed a finger at your generation or compared it in anyway .

I don't get the impression that you do not have much to say other than to flame without cause .

Give me some proof the boomers are talking about themselves . I don't see it . I am fully aware of every generation since the boomers and before . If you were born in 69 then your parents are boomers , so I suppose this is your full knowledge of the boomer generation ?

[porphyrian]

76. I didn't say unaware, I said self-obsessed. This entire thread is supporting evidence.

"This is all you have to say . I listened to 80's music and some in the 90's and some had political messages as well as social messages . You were old enough by then to know what was going on ."
Huh? No, that isn't all I have to say. I was simply responding to your first response to my assertion. I've got plenty to say, but I don't feel like typing it all, and none of it is about boomers, so you probably wouldn't be interested anyway.

"No I don't have any desire to be self obsessed and I am not ."
Oh? Then why are we still talking about you and your generation?

"Why not go back and read my original post . If you think I came on here with this topic to draw attention you are the one who is un-aware and self obsessed ."
Uh-huh, you might want to rethink that and maybe edit this sentence to not prove my point.

"And we had no control over the music industry at all , not in our day and still don't as far as out old time artists are concerned ."
Someone is clueless, and it ain't me.

"You still don't get it do you , the ones in control of every damn thing are the ones with the money and they are controlling my generation and yours . It matters not what generation they came from and I don;t have a list of the owners and age groups who control it ."
Then how do you know who does or doesn't control the music industry, for example? If it doesn't matter what generation "they" came from, why are you continuously talking about generation? Why start this thread in the first place? You don't even realize you're doing it, do you?

"The key players in this government are not boomers , they are from the boomers parents generation . Bush is a front clown as well as being born with the silver spoone and I can bet you if bush was the president in the 60's we would have been just as much against him as we are now . "
The Clintons aren't boomers? Gore's not a boomer? There are no boomers in government? And what does government have to do with this self-obsessed thread about boomers anyway? That's all I was pointing out, and you've sufficiently proved my point.

"Instead of displaying your hate of the boomers without any real knowledge of them why not instead get off your rear and do something because we are all stuck of this ball ."
If you think I'm displaying hate, you haven't seen it, pal. My use of the word "hate," if I used it at all, was in the fashion of your original post, and directed at boomer self-obsession, not any particular person or group of people. I also hate when children scream in movie theaters. That doesn't mean I hate children. And you have no idea how off my rear I am, so cram it unless you're looking for a real argument. Besides, I don't have to qualify to you or any other random fuck with an opinion.

"I don;t see boomers out there waving their freak flags these days , no they are out there trying to end this war and out this freakish admin ."
I don't see generations at all, unless people are wearing their age on their shirts or are obviously very old or very young. I don't think in generations. That's a boomer obsession, and boomers have named every one since. I don't give a fuck, because people can be stupid assholes at any age.

"And for crips sake , show me in anyone of my posts where I pointed a finger at your generation or compared it in anyway ."
OK, read this slowly so you get it: I DIDN'T SAY YOU WERE POINTING A FINGER AT MY GENERATION. I SAID BOOMERS ARE SELF-OBSESSED. YOU HAVE HELPED TO PROVE ME RIGHT. THANK YOU.

"I don't get the impression that you do not have much to say other than to flame without cause ."
Well, you're wrong, but I don't require your understanding or acceptance.

"Give me some proof the boomers are talking about themselves . I don't see it . I am fully aware of every generation since the boomers and before . If you were born in 69 then your parents are boomers , so I suppose this is your full knowledge of the boomer generation ?"
Ha! That's the funniest fucking thing you've said.

[blues90]

84. What you have said it you have one huge

Thorn stuck in your ass about boomers , this is all you have said .

Doesn't bother me , doesn't change my position or my views , all it does is place you in the self obsessive hate group without an open mind or a clue about generations . You are judgemental to the extreme and assume I either am not interested or obsessed .

Your anger and blind hate is obvious in your replies .

All you had to see was the word boomer and your fuse was lite .

[porphyrian]

85. Keep trying, man. - n/t

[Malikshah]

41. Uh...it's the whole self-referential schtick that sticks in my craw.

That and the narcissism masquerading as introspection among some.

Snap out of it.

When we bring back the ice floes, then you can complain.

[blues90]

53. Narcissism are you nuts ?

It was about idealology , we cared about all people and race and tried to bring this ideal to the publics mindset . We certainly were not looking and admiring our reflection in the pool , we were in fact far from that . Who have you been listening to , Dennis Prager ?

[Malikshah]

58. It's group-think narcissism... the whole "we cared" "we did this" "we did that"

As if an entire generation walked in lockstep for some cause, however glorious. Shared the same music, shared the same ideals, shared the same taste.

Now, it's not entirely the fault of those who latch on to these ideas--those that do have had it drilled into them by the media.

There is safety in numbers no doubt; a sense of security when one feels one is part of a group. But hubris, arrogance, and a false sense of grandeur can come from this group think.

One can talk of the past and point to the rose-colored past with some conviction, but to dwell on it, to bask in it, to wallow in it...that's narcissism

BTW-- who's the "we" in "we cared" every last one of those born between 1946 and 1964? Oh, ok.

Be an individual and eschew the generationl claptrap.

There is a BIG difference between taking what one does seriously and taking *oneself* seriously.

Alas, some self-proclaimed "boomers" are and have been doing the latter for so very long.

[blues90]

62. Isn't this the same with every generation?

I never said nore do I agree that all boomers share the same lock step train of thought or ideals , many were placed into this mod generation which was strickly a commercial spin on the reality . This I felt is what gave us a bad name . I am against any boomer who sold out to corporate greed . It seems to me it is much easier for the youth of today to fall into greed due to the vast world of advertizing and online shopping waved about .

Like it of not it is going to take the youth the end this war and to find a path out of this hell , we as boomers tried the best we could and we did see what was happening , I did not know anyone in my age group who were unaware of the wars and wrong political path we were on . As I said the generation before us handed us the Vietnam war , we fought to end it and did . and it took the troops to push it through too .

You don;t have the support of the media these days and this is one front to fight against since the youth are the purchasing power these days . Join ranks and stop buying , kill the corps in anyway you can .

I have stayed faithful to my ideals , never sold out and still to this day know many who feel the same as I do , at least the ones who were not blown to bits in Vietnam .

[Malikshah]

72. Actually, no, it isn't. The media made much of the "Baby Boom" generation

But my parent's generation (born ~38/39) and mine (born ~65-beyond) don't have movies made about them (i.e. Big Chill, etc.), are courted non-stop regarding getting married, having babies, preparing for retirement, etc.

Go back and look at the Time covers over the last few years as the "boomers" head toward retirement...

This is the only generation that has had such lionizing treatment. Brokaw's tried like the damndest to do so for "the greatest generation," but it's a quixotic battle.

[Virginia Dare]

79. The Korean War vets...

don't/didn't get near the attention that the WWII and the Vietam vets got/get. My father was part of that generation, to young for WWII (just slightly), too old for Vietnam.

On edit: except for M.A.S.H. of course! :-)

[blues90]

86. They have made many movies about the depression

and they have made many about your generation and their will be more if the earth survives long enough to portray the Iraq attack .

Movies like the big chill are not reflective really of most boomers who were true to their beliefs , they were fluff .

[Malikshah]

96. The Depression was a world-wide event, as was the Korean war

The "Baby Boomers" was not a world-wide event.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

108. Yes it was

There were "youth revolts" all over the world in the late 1960s.

[Malikshah]

111. There were revolutions in 1848 and the late 18th century

Boomers?

A generation = an event.

Nope.

[Odin2005]

127. Which, according to a book I read, were equivalent to the 60's.

http://www.amazon.com/Fourth-Turning-William-Strauss/dp/0767900464/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/102-2575448-8976957?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1179171686&sr=8-1

[Malikshah]

139. From the amazon blurb on said book....

If millennial fever takes hold, The Fourth Turning may be only the first of an impending wave of pseudo-scholarly tracts prognosticating future (but imminent!) doom as we collectively close the books on this millennium. Those expecting a serious or dry tome might be put off by the authors' taste for bulleted text and catchy phrasings, but can you blame these guys for wanting to make impending peril as exciting as possible? After all, they think we are headed toward "events on par with the Revolution, the Civil War, or World War II" in the next 20 years. Mixing solid understanding of present generational divisions, with some fairly broad generalizations, Strauss and Howe promise to move from history to prophecy.

Again-- my point is backed up... pseudo-scholarly tracts...fairly broad generalizations.

It's great to ponder the big things, but to then attempt to catch the ephemeral in one's hands? Not so easy.

[Odin2005]

151. This author's predictions on us Gen-Yers made 15 years ago turned out to be correct

So I generally trust his research.

[blues90]

137. Yes the media did their part

They have to have something to write about when there is not war going on so pick on the boomers and this is just what they did .

The reality is nothing like the media portrayed .

As I have said in my original post the boomers worked with what they had at the time . We tried even though there were not millions of us out there promoting change just like there are not millions of the next two generations out there now .

We will die off one or ten each day and then perhaps one day some will look back on what we had to offer as far as chance for change and adopt these ideas .

We tried communes and we tried to grow our own food and make our own furnature and arts and crafts to sell or barter , we tried to travel in groups instead of one per car and we tried to end violence and promote peace . I don;t see the harm in any of this , it was an attempt .

I am well aware that all boomers were not cut from the same cloth and many went with the programs set in stone by our parents generation .

The US was not ready for a change or to try to go back to basics , however it it were then just perhaps we would be in a much better place right now .

Progress is not always a good thing , it defines constant change and constant growth in a world that has a limit of resources and now we have reached the limit and beyond .

Capitalistic ideals are not a plan perfect and we have all sorts of evidence of this now days .

You really have to ask yourself , are you happy the way things have turned out to find your own personal answers .

I for one am not happy about how things have become , we have isolation and self worth as a position now , we have the most corrupt government in history , we still have wars to take resources and mass murder justified as the end result called collateral damage .

We have jobs with meaningless ends , we build nothing and promote not peace but instead war for oil .

In my view we have taken the worst path possible and it is fueled by hate and greed , these issues have always been here but not to the accepted degree we have got now . Instead of moving ahead with the peoples best interest we have allowed and if fact made it possible to be slaves to our country and the huge corporations , this is one of the ideas that the hippies tried to warn and change , we failed . Sure maybe having long hair and odd clothes was our failure but then not all of us did this , the ones who did got the stoplight . Who is perfect , we had to get the message out somehow and this seemed to be the way at the time .

The youth of today must weigh the possibilities and judge for themselves where change and efforts should be directed to do the most good for the most people ,we are so very far from this now , the youth today really has their work cut out for them , compare it to plugging a hole in a dam ready to burst .

Look around , do you feel this mass of traffic is the best way to move about , is oil the way to do this , is destroying wetlands a good idea . Should you trust the industrial complex to provide the path to a better future . Is outsourcing in your best interest .

Do you want to build a better country or bring it down to the level of third world countries where we can no longer help them out or ourselves .

[Malikshah]

160. All valiant goals-- but not tied to any one generation.

The hubris, the self-awareness is what I've harped on since I was an adolescent.

Of course, I've never wanted to be part of any club that would have me as its member to begin with-- I detest "group think"--

Kudos to those who desire to change the world and fie on those who do not.

And a big wet raspberry to those who think that due to their being born in a certain "generation" be it Boomer, "Greatest," X, Y, Z, etc. they are somehow connected with millions of others as a monolithic unit. The line for the lemmings is back that way.

Keep up the good work as an individual who is a key component of a much larger complex machine

[WinkyDink]

69. 1964 isn't "Boomer", I don't care WHAT or WHO says it's so. If you weren't

at least in sixth grade for the JFK assassination/Beatles, you are NOT a Baby Boomer!
THOSE were absolutely defining moments for my g-g-g-generation.

[Malikshah]

73. Oh, OK. I rest my case.

;)

[tlsmith1963]

91. The Baby Boom Was Still Going in '64

So they are Boomers. It ended after that year. I was born in '63 & relate to Boomers more than Xers, although I am willing to admit we Boomers made mistakes. Maybe if so many hadn't gone the Yuppie route in the '80s we wouldn't be in the mess we are in today.

[doni_georgia]

114. Yep 1964 here

My sister was born in 67 and there is a real difference between us that can only be explained by us being of two different generations. I remember the assassination of MLK and RFK - I was young, but I remember. Vietnam on the nightly news had a huge impact on who I turned out to be. GenXers don't remember Vietnam. I think that is the real defining moment. I am sure there are many born in 64 who relate more to the Gen Xers than Baby Boomers, but I am not one of them.

[Odin2005]

120. The Boomers who cared where a small minority of political activists

Most boomers were self-centered brats who only cared about drugs, promiscuous sex, and New Age woo woo before they turned into yuppies.

[TahitiNut]

74. Sounds like a Generation X lament to me.

:nopity: "It can't be about them when it's about ME!"

Generation X is generally marked by its lack of optimism for the future, nihilism, cynicism, skepticism, alienation and mistrust in traditional values. Following the publication of Coupland's book (and the subsequent popularity of grunge music) the term stretched to include more people, being appropriated as the generation that succeeded the Baby Boomers, and used by the media and the general public to denote people who were in their twenties. During the early 1990s, the media portrayed Generation X as a group of flannel-wearing, alienated, overeducated, underachieving slackers with body piercings, who drank franchise-store coffee and had to work at McJobs, concepts that had some truth to them but were in many cases stereotypes.

Gen-X thinking has significant overtones of cynicism against things held dear to the previous generation, mainly the Baby Boomers who "ruined everything."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_X

[bling bling]

100. That's a really disturbing and insulting description of Generation X.

I don't mean this towards you, but I have to wonder about who exactly wrote that drivel about Generation X. Maybe it was a baby boomer?

Sometimes I think some Baby Boomers just have a general disdain towards anyone younger than them and descriptions like that one of GenX just reinforce that belief.

[Odin2005]

122. The Boomers are trying to push insulting BS on us Gen-Yers as well.

:grr:

[omega minimo]

42. No. You didn't

"as a group we did our best to ward off all of these foreseen horrors that are here today ."




"as a group" ya went to sleep and ignored the "foreseen horrors" and LIHOP and some here on DU are at least honest enough to acknowledge that.

[blues90]

50. with all due respect , what do you know about it ?

Were you alive then or do you judge by what the tv shows spew out ?

[Alexander]

48. I'm sick of us Generation Y kids getting blamed

For just about every problem wrong with the world today.

I see threads like these at DU all the time, blaming people my age (I'm 23) for things like cell phones, failing schools, rudeness, Bush, obesity and lousy entertainment.

Despite the fact that we are more politically aware, active and liberal than nearly every generation before us, we still get blamed by the older folks who can't accept the fact that Father Time made them really cranky and close-minded.

[blues90]

54. well I have not blamed you age group

From what I've seen in the working world many at your age from questions I have asked know nothing about what's going on today and have no interest . This is not to say all of you are but I am amazed how may have no clue but they sure know all about the lastest high tech electronics or cars .

[sodenoue]

59. Surprising? Not in the least...

I think we are all to blame for our misgivings...We are a society, so for better or worse, we are all in this sh8t together. The boomers were coddled and wooed by repeated airings of the mantra that "USA is number 1" and this same old anthem of "We are #1" blinded most to the fact that the world is a complicated place and its intricacies can only be understood by a continued process of examination and introspection. This leads to the argument that "We did the best we could." There is no reason to blame the boomers for all our problems. We must accept our problems and move forward in resolving these issues. The fundamental change must be a shift in conventional wisdom for Americans; whereas in the past we have been content to 'let someone else handle it' this method will only lead us into certain oblivion. We must learn and lead for ourselves. Look where our 'blind faith' in our leaders is taking us...PS I know plenty of 23 year olds who know about politics and the latest high tech trends, because we are socially and culturally aware, not only of ourselves but of our obligations as world citizens as well; a development made possible by the greatest tool for social change ever conceived or implemented, the internet...A tool whose reference has served the generations who will continue to fund SS (make an untouchable trust funded by the estate tax ) for you boomers well into the future.

[blues90]

One part puzzles me here

Where is it said the boomers claimed we were number one . I must have missed this part somewhere . We wanted this country to be number one in terms of a workable and fair society for all races but we never claimed we were number one . We only tried to stop the greed and hate and wars and social unrest .

Blind faith in this criminal government is brought about by all generations who are alive today .

I am a boomer but this does in no way imply I agree with all boomers , there are criminals in every generation with greed in mind as well as ignorence .

If anyone is to blame it is the corporate world and the military industrial complex and the medical industrial complex and all those who work with and for them . Including the oil industry of course .

When the population finds the will and the guts to do everything they can to stave these beasts then things may change . Consumer excess must end .

[Alexander]

82. I have found just as many ignorant baby boomers.

And most people I know my age at least know what's going on, even if they aren't political junkies like me.

Anecdotal evidence is completely meaningless.

[slipslidingaway]

56. The boomers paid extra SS taxes to ensure there would be a

large surplus in the SS trust fund when it came time to retire. That surplus has been used and almost all members of congress have remained silent on this issue.

Under Bush 2 alone there has been almost 1 trillion in excess revenue collected which was to be used to offset the baby boomer's needs from SS. Maybe there was more than one reason Bush needed to be elected?

You can see the trust fund data at the SS site and see how the rate of excess revenues skyrocketed under Bush 2. Should our government honor it's debt to their citizens or the governments of Japan and China who also hold our treasury notes??? Citizens are told by this administration that the notes are just pieces of paper, have they told this to foreign governments as well?

http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/ProgData/funds.html


Must read link on SS IMO.

http://www.allenwsmith.com/id5.html

snip>>

"Every cent generated by the 1983 Social Security tax increase-money ostensibly earmarked and saved for the retirement of the baby-boom generation-is gone, spent by our government. But most Americans are ignorant of the crime. The emptying of the Social Security Trust Fund is the greatest fraud ever perpetrated on the American public, and acclaimed author and economist Allen W. Smith reveals how George W. Bush and Congress are pulling it off. While George W. Bush has repeatedly condemned "corporate wrongdoers," he is guilty of fiscal mismanagement and outright deception that makes Enron and WorldCom pale in comparison. Smith explains the history of Social Security from its inception in 1935 to the present, including the enactment of the 1983 Social Security tax increase. Then, step by appalling step, he details how the government's promise to the American people-a pledge to never spend the Social Security funds-was broken by every succeeding administration. Sadly, The Looting of Social Security quite simply reveals how George W. Bush and his predecessors have stolen approximately $1.5 trillion of Social Security money. President Bush has used the surplus money mostly to fund tax cuts for wealthy Americans while robbing many of their hard earned money and their rights."


"speech made on the Senate floor by South Carolina Senator Ernest “Fritz”Hollings on October 13, 1989:

“We arrive at that fanciful…projection only by indulging in enough fraud and larceny and malfeasance to land an ordinary citizen in the penitentiary. Of course, the most reprehensible fraud in this great jambalaya of frauds is the systematic and total ransacking of the Social Security trust fund in order to mask the true size of the deficit. As we all know, the Social Security payroll tax has become a money machine for the U.S. Treasury, generating fantastic revenue surpluses in excess of the costs of the Social Security program. Excess Social Security tax revenues will be $65 billion in 1990 alone—boosted by yet another rise in the Social Security tax rate, slated to kick in January 1. By 1993, the annual Social Security surplus will soar to $99 billion.


The public fully supported enactment of hefty new Social Security taxes in 1983 to ensure the retirement program’s long-term solvency and credibility. The promise was that today’s huge surpluses would be set safely aside in a trust fund to provide for baby-boomer retirees in the next century. Well, look again. The Treasury is siphoning off every dollar of the Social Security surplus to meet current operating expenses of the Government. By thus reducing the deficit, we mask the true enormity of the Federal budget crisis while creating the illusion that Congress and the administration are actually doing something about deficits.


Mr. President, our proposed amendment, which we intend to attach to the debt-ceiling bill, would put Social Security surpluses off budget for purposes of calculating the Federal budget deficit beginning October 1, the first day of fiscal 1990. Those IOU’s are a charming bookkeeping nicety, but the sheriff who tries to collect on them is truly going to have his work cut out for him."

[sodenoue]

60. Where does the money come from?

The greatest fraud is not where the money went, it is where did it come from?

The FED makes money out of thin air, lender of last resort, master illusionist.

[slipslidingaway]

99. Where does it come from? The printing press!

"But the U.S. government has a technology, called a printing press (or, today, its electronic equivalent), that allows it to produce as many U.S. dollars as it wishes at essentially no cost.'

Fed Governor Bernanke

[slipslidingaway]

57. Once again our government has succeeded in generating

division among it's citizens so we will not notice what they are doing.

[greatauntoftriplets]

64. I am 57 and have NEVER voted for a repuke for president...

Sadly, I cannot say the same for my Generation X nieces and nephews.

Great post, BTW.

[camero]

65. I used to think it was the boomers

Mostly because of observing thier actions in my childhood. But I came to realize that the real schism is economic and class based. The hype about the boomers then and now I believe is just another tactic by the upper class to divide and conquer through generational conflict.

It doesn't matter what you use, race gender, sexual orientation, "moral" values, etc, it all comes to the same end. To keep us fighting so that we don't look at the ones with thier hand in the cookie jar stealing the cookies.

The boomers have worked a good portion of thier lives in order to get at least some semblance of a retirement and we owe them that. Just because the wealthy elites have stolen and want to steal some more through privitization doesn't change that simple fact.

[tlsmith1963]

93. Yes, Because Some of Us Aren't Rich

I'm not one of those Boomers who are rich & greedy. I'm just a regular person. I should get my retirement pay.

[earth mom]

70. When I hear asinine songs like "Waiting for the World to Change"...I want to blame

all the generations AFTER the boomers-but I won't because it's up to ALL of us to quit pointing fingers and BE THE CHANGE.

[WritingIsMyReligion]

89. No shit. I hate that John Mayer POS song.

"Waiting" my ass.

Sometimes I wish I were a 'boomer just so I could know that I wouldn't have to deal with this Republican shit. Unfortunately, my whole life is gonna be cleaning up after this mofo chimp in the White House.

[tlsmith1963]

92. I Hate That Song!

The world won't change if you wait for it to change.

[WritingIsMyReligion]

88. Well, 'Boomers are in charge now.

:shrug:

There're a few hold-outs from "The Greatest Generation" (:puke:), but y'all ain't the young rebels protesting 'Nam anymore.

That said, I generally like Boomers, especially the old hippies and the tailends of the Beats. I like 'Boomer music better than music now, I like what you tried to do when you were young. Some Boomers are just full of shit, however.

"The young do not know enough to be prudent, and so they attempt the impossible--and achieve it, generation after generation."--Pearl Buck

What can I say? You're not those fire-eyed young'un rebels anymore.

[IronScorpio5]

106. Exactly.

.

[bling bling]

101. Here's what I blame the boomers the most for:

They didn't teach their children well.

They sung about it and all but didn't do much in the way of teaching their children ***about anything at all***.

I think the current generation of parents needs to learn from this lesson. Don't just sing about teaching your children. Sit down with your kids and TEACH YOUR CHILDREN. Teach them what the world is like and explain to them what would make the world better. Consumerism, IMO, ought to be on the priority list of conversations about what needs to be fixed in this country. Teach them how to fail and get back up and try again. Teach them how to stand up for themselves against the hurd mentality. Teach them to take responsibility for their own well-being in life. And most importantly, prepare them for a world where they may not have the access to resources that we do now.

Just my opinion. Not that anyone asked.

[legerdemain]

102. Boomers need to be more open to Social Security Reform

So their children can have some of the same benefits they enjoyed.

[earth mom]

103. Social Security is NOT broken-it's a lie * Co has fed everyone so they can sell it off to Wall St.

Don't buy into it. Google more info on the subject or search the DU archives.

[Vinca]

105. Do I smell a Tommy Thompsonite?

He says seniors won't mind giving up some social security benefits for the sake of the next generation. Right. Grandma gets $800 a month. Subsidized rent is $300. Health-related expenses are $200. Utilities are $100. Transportation costs are $100. Grandma gets to spend $25 a week on food and never buys clothing, a book or a potted plant. Give me a break.

[TahitiNut]

112. Yep.

The right-wing appetite for what they see as a vast pot of money is boundless. It's beyond any kind of reason or sanity, no matter how frequently this bullshit is debunked.

Social Security is funded by taxes on payrolls and as the workers on payrolls are fucked over and their compensation has lagged behind the growth in the economy, it can be no surprise that FICA suffers as a secondary effect of workers being screwed. Just raising the federal minimum wage itself has an ENORMOUS benefit to FICA ... because that's where the payroll dollars are.

Social Security is like a canary in a mineshaft - it WARNS us that the lower 90% of payroll workers are being starved. Almost nothing can be clearer.

[sinkingfeeling]

107. I'll make you a deal. The SSA can just cut be a check in 3 years for the entiret

$302,816 my employers and I have paid into SS since I was 16... that's with absolutely no interest included, and then they can 'reform' Social Security any way they like.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

109. If you think there's a pot of "your" $302,816 sitting around, then

you don't know how Social Security works.

Your contributions have been maintaining the current generation of seniors. Because of inflation, you will get more than you put in, assuming that the Republicanites and their DLC enablers don't siphon the SS trust fund off to their friends on Wall Street.

[sinkingfeeling]

113. Oh I know how it works. But I'm a little tired of being told that us 'boomers' are

the cause of all the problems in this country. We've paid all the social security that has been paid out and all the Medicare costs through the deductions of our wages. Now maybe, we won't collect anything from those programs because the money has been spent by the crooks in Washington.

I'm just an average 59 yr. old, who's paid over $1,000,000 to my federal government in taxes, SS, and Medicare. I believe in the 'New Deal' and that all Americans should pay their fair share to support the society for all people.

I live in a 150 yr. old house in the center of what used to be 'downtown'. Not encouraging the destruction of over 2 million acres of 'vacant' American land to build brand new houses in gated 'sub divisions' nor big box stores on every corner. I respect the environment, have been an activist since my 20's, vote Democratic, and don't think I need an Ipod, cell phone, PDA, or a plasma TV.

Yet according to some in this thread, all of us 'boomers' are the source of all the nation's problems and we are just 'greedy' when it comes to Social Security and health care.

P.S. According to the latest info I got from Social Security, I would have to live well into my 80's to recoop the $302,000. Don't think for a minute that that will happen. I've had to many friends pass on at the ages of 60 to 75.

[Matsubara]

115. Generalizations against groups (generations, genders, races) is never right, BUT...

If we are going to compare generations, and be very honest, I think the Baby Boom has certainly earned its share of criticism.

You guys were the first generation to grow up with the vast majority enjoying creature comforts their parents never had. You had TV's, air conditioning, time to play, didn't have to work in the factory or fields like kids in the previous generations. You stood up and made a ruckus and stopped an immoral war - and that was great, you even brought down a scumbag president, but it seems in retrospect that a lot of you were mostly just along for the ride to get the free sex and drugs, because as you entered the workforce, you went for the money. You voted for Reagan & "greed is good", and politicians whose policies drove up the twin deficits - trade and budget - that have come to threaten the very fabric of the nation today. You sat on the corporate boards that voted time and again to outsource and offshore labor, to constantly drive down labor costs no matter how it crushed the little guy. Those repug & corpo-dem politicians whose free-market softsoap tales were so appealing to you, even gave those corporations TAX BREAKS to help destroy the manufacturing base that was once the backbone of this country.

Your generation (my generation's parents) pampered yourselves like no other generation ever had. Where the previous generation always stayed home and lived frugally, you got a sitter and left the kids at home while you went out for fun. Because of those repukes you voted for, millions of Moms wgo had previously been able to live on their husbands' income alone were forced to go to work & make ends meet, making MY generation the first generation of "latchkey kids", who came home to an empty house and a TV dinner to microwave. Your generation, too self-centered and spoiled to show the forbearance of the depression-era folks, divorced at the drop of a hat. In my neighborhood, almost EVERYONE's parents were divorced - mine were the last, when I was 18. I just read that divorces were at a 37-year low. I guess we have learned to be less demanding.

But of course we are. Not that we are any less self-absorbed and spoiled than you are - after all, you RAISED us, but unlike you, WE were the first generation who grew up KNOWING that we would eventually be worse off than our parents. Even in the 80s, I knew that my parents' generation, via Reagan, were creating a phony prosperity by putting it on the national credit card so that they could live it up. Despite the fact that Reagan enacted HUGE hikes in Social Security taxes, which should have made the fund solvent throughout the baby boomers' retirement, Reagan, Bush Sr, Clinton & Bush 2 continued to dip into the fund in order to make their deficits looks smaller, and because of this, they're now carping about SS going "insolvent" again in a number of decades. How about paying back all that dough you borrowed from the fund, WITH INTEREST? Problem solved.

And so, the boomers, with their loot from the golden age they inherited, now saunter off into their luxurious twilight years, leaving US, Generation X, with worse job prospects, outlandishly expensive housing options, stagnant pay, and a selection of careers that keeps getting whittled away by the global trade in offshoring for SCABS.

Don't give me this nonsense that you tried your best to ward off horrors. More than ANY other generation, yours is responsible for the mess we are in right now, and more than any other, my generation, and my kids' generation, will be the ones who have to suffer diminished expectations, a degraded environment, and mountains of debt because of it.


Luckily for you, blues90, culpability for these societal sea changes cannot be charged to a "generation". And it's not my usual MO to go ragging on the boomers for this sort of thing. I'm well aware that many boomers did try to fight what was happening. But it just wasnt' enough. For every Abbie Hoffman there were two Gordon Geckos.

Please don't act like the Boomers haven't been in charge for the last 25 years. That insults all of our intelligence.

[JVS]

118. No. You talk a big talk with few results to show

U R TEH 5UXXORZ

[blues90]

130. Talk the big talk ?

What the hell are you talking about .

You know what , if the boomers or hippies children would have opened their ears and minds instead of being blinded by crap like star wars movies perhaps you would have learned something besides illusion and thought past how much money you could make with the least amount of effort .

Odd thing is the boomers grandchildren have more insight and more open minds since they are like the boomers did , are facing a war and hard times . They use the computer to gain knowledge rather than to go shopping online .

Since so many generation X people out there seem to think boomers screwed it all up then tell me just what you people have done to right the wrongs the boomers are blamed for since you did have plenty of time to fill us in and did absolutely nothing but "party " and live at home until you were 30 something .

[JVS]

132. *immitates old man* "If you would have listened.. In my day...uphill both ways...we changed things..

but we're not responsible for what happened after 1973...freedom rock, turn it UP, man!"

[blues90]

141. just what I expected

You see , this is why america is so screwed up , there is no respect for the olders people who just may have some info to offer to help .

I am as guilty as the next one , but this is the problem in this country and this is why when you get old you too will be defending your generation and your failures .

I am trying to admit mine .

As far as 1973 , what has this to do with anything , if you are of the age of reason then you are every bit as responsible for the way this country is right at this moment . Bringing the past into it will not change a thing , everyone on earth would love to go back and do things over but there is no chance of this .

I will never understand why the boomers are the target for all the damage or why we were expected to fix the damn country , we were handed what we were handed just like you and we are not here blaming our parents for what they left us , no instead we tried to find a better way and tried to change this path .

We were born in the industrial age , not our doing and the people your age just continues on that same insane course . And we were forced to fight their insane Vietnam war , we did not have the luxury of avoiding this , you do unless you have a friend or family member involved in this madness .

Remember bush started this madness , being a boomer does not in any way make him part of our desires . I didn't vote for the fool and I did not support his wars .

As I said , one day if the planet still exists you will look back and find many things you wish you had done differently and if not then you will be a fool . Don't listen to me , find out for yourself .

[JVS]

142. LOL! This is sooo fucking rich. We must respect our elders, just like the boomers didn't

:rofl:

73 has to do with you guys stopping the draft. Kudos. But then to categorically deny having an influence in the next 20 years (Or should it be 30 years, are you still powerless?) seems lame. If you guys were able to get shit done in 1973, then why not 1980, 84, 88? If you're going to flex your we stopped vietnam muscle, people are going to wonder where it disappeared to.

[blues90]

148. Who are the "you guys " you refer to.?

What are you trying to say really , are we supposed to take care of all the ill's of this country simply because we are the largest generation ? If you read my reply you will see I did say my generation made the same mistakes by NOT listening to the elders .

Who gives a shit where our efforts went , no one gives a damn now .

All I have seen so far from all here that hate boomers is just that , hate . So hate , be fucking happy , won't change a thing and no one gives a shit , they really don't . That is your problem to over come and if not then take your hate and blame and apply it in Iraq .

Are you advising we should start a draft , if so fine , sweat it out as we had to .

Give just one example or our influence over the last 20 years , and don't be an idiot and include the corporate powers or the Bush admin , you have the wrong people there , they are not of the same mindset of any boomer I knew .

You act as if you have no part in any of what's going on today. What's your part , do you have anything at stake or are you just a freeper and if so depart .

[JVS]

154. We are this deep into a thread and you are unable to figure out who "you guys" are?

You're not sticking to topic. You're just thrashing out with accusations.

If you guys are so wonderful why haven't you either made things better, or if you have been kept from reaching power please explain how? Either your generation is ineffective or not as good as you like to think it is.

[blues90]

155. I asked you a question

You have yet to answer . You have nothing to offer other than to generalize or lump all together into one group . I owe YOU absolutely NOTHING . Have a good life .

[JVS]

157. I owe you no answer. You've lumped a bunch of people together all thread, so fucking deal with it.

In fact, it was your decision to frame the entire thread in terms of generations. And you sound very old with the whole "America's going to hell because young people don't respect their elders" crap. If we learned one thing from your generation, it is to recognize bullshit like that.

[Ishoutandscream2]

140. Exactly. We should be fucking thanked

Stopping a war, bringing down a president, fighting for civil rights, making the environment an issue (earth day started in 1970. Yep, boomers). And goddamnit, we had the best fucking music. Thank God for the Beatles!

Oh, and that little thing called the draft. Got rid of that, too. All those who are younger should get down on the damned knees and thank the real greatest generation -- the Baby Boomers.

[Odin2005]

119. My sick of Boomers calling my generation a bunch of narcissists when...

...YOU were the original preachy, self-centered narcissists. I'm sick of my generation being the victim of Boomer projection.

Oh, and the Generation that preceded yours', the "Silent" or "Beat" Generation of MLK jr., RFK, Gloria Steinem, etc., was just as, if not more, important in curbing the excesses of the GI Generation as you Boomers were.

[TahitiNut]

121. It seems you agree with Robert Bork in his book "Slouching Towards Gomorrah"

:eyes: Be afraid. :scared:

[Odin2005]

124. Whatever

:eyes:

[OnionPatch]

125. They can blame the boomers all they want, but

unless my aging boomer brain is malfunctioning, it was the Gen X bunch that decided that capitalism and "climbing the ladder to financial success" was IN and hippies and caring about the Earth was OUT. I distinctly remember my Boomer friends and I watching with horror.

[Name removed]

126. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[OnionPatch]

133. That's your version of history

That's not what I remember at all. (And I'm 47 years old, FYI. My brain isn't malfunctioning yet.) All of the Gen X people that I knew, seemed to want rebel against the values of the prior "hippy" generation.

What is behind this need to blame a certain generation, anyway? There are conservatives and liberals in all generations in varying percentages. I think it's pretty stupid to attack an entire age-group. All I do is defend the boomers when someone decides it's all our fault.

[Odin2005]

149. Later Boomers are the most conservative living generational demographic

late Xers and us Gen-Yers are the most liberal. A generation's average political preferences generally doesn't change.

[JVS]

156. I'd believe that. My parents were older than most of the kids my age.

Both born during the war. My friends' parents were from the 50's. Total yuppies!

[AngryAmish]

128. Get used to it

You broke it. The motto of your generation is "gimmie mine". As a group they are probably the worst thng that happened to the world (including the gulag, et al.)

[SiobhanClancy]

131. I don't know whether to laugh or cry...

The "worst thing that happened to the world"? Including the gulag,et al?? Into hyperbole much,are you? I don't know when I've read such unadulterated BS in my life. You are,of course,entitled to your opinion,however poorly conceived it may be. Intergenerational sniping and blame doesn't really accomplish much,so I will leave you with this....YOU need to get used to the fact that there are quite a few of us "boomers" and we are going to be around a long time. In fact,I think I'm going to plan on living to 100 just for sheer spite.

[TahitiNut]

158. It's ageism ... a particularly virulent kind of bigotry.

:shrug:

[stillcool]

134. I think blaming others..

is a feel-good, and much easier than finding your own truth...or at least something you can make sense of. There are two books that have gone a long way in explaining for me the road that brought us here. "The Rich and the Super-rich" by Ferdinand Lundberg is available at an on-line library http://www.soilandhealth.org/03sov/0303critic/0303socialcriticism.html
and the "Power Elite" by C.Wright Mills. Much more constructive than placing blame.

[july302001]

135. pshaw

It's the law of mass action.

Shrub *is* a boomer.

The "environmental movement" among the Boomers protested the WRONG things. They should have done something about air pollution and greedy land developers who are paving over everything. Instead, the Baby Boomers marched on Seabrook.

Too many d*mn symbols. Not enough substance.

Baby boomers. Pshaw.

[Matsubara]

143. Another problem, with many boomers, "activism"= NIMBY

My cousin who lives in the Bay Area in California claims to be a "community activist", but last time we got together with her, I found out that all she's pushing for is so that her town, which is still semi-rural with large lots and farms, will heavily restrict new development and keep housing density as it is. So in other words, the droves of new people coming into the region should move elsewhere. No wonder housing in California is to outrageously high! With selfish snobs like this insisting on keeping their towns' "rural flavor", now wonder the sprawl is so boundless! Oh yeah, and of course, she's a boomer. Their selfishness knows no bounds. Remember when boomer David Geffen did not want to allow the public access to his stretch of Malibu beach?

WTF-ever.

[Sapere aude]

144. Dude, we have septic tanks in rural CA. There is no sewer. We cannot build like it was a suburb.

I live in rural CA. We have wells. no city services, no police, no cable, no cell phones. No DSL. We have open range. Lots are kept at 20 acres and we are zoned agriculture. We cannot have all the people move here and many people don't want to live here because of the drive.

From a boomer rural Californian.

[Matsubara]

145. Yeah, sewers can't be built, uh-huh.

Those new people, especially the slant-eyed ones and the brown ones should find an apartment in East Palo Alto or Oakland. I've seen lots of nice apartments while driving through.

Just don't try to mess up MY little slice of heaven!

I've heard it all before, bub.

In her case, she is on the edges of the burgeoning San Jose area. Whether she likes it or not her area is transitioning from rural to exurb, and will eventually be a suburb. If it means leaving virgin land alone, I'm all for higher density in "rural" areas like this which have few remaining working farms. This is about snobbery and selfishness, not logistics.

[Sapere aude]

147. There is a rural life style that many people live. They are decedents from people who never lived

in a urban area. They are friendly and warm people. Many are conservative church goers but we don't need to lock our doors, we have pot lucks when someone needs an operation, we wave at each other as we pass on the road, we have many animals. It is not snobbishness to want to live that way.

[Matsubara]

152. For you, maybe, but it's unrealistic and selfish.

I can understand clinging to the luxury of living in a facsimile of a past that no longer exists for most of us. My family were poultry ranchers in Texas, and until the 1960s had one of the largest ranches in the country, but economics, and new, less humane corporate farms caused that business to decline, and many of my family had to move on to new jobs and new lives in other cities and towns, but there are still a few of them living around the old ranch, now an overgrown ruin, but they still cling to the past and refuse to sell.

The population of this country is growing, and those people have to live somewhere, and new housing will generally displace virgin nature, or existing housing. I'd much rather increase the density in existing communities than destroy more forests or prairie.

I understand your affection for that bucolic lifestyle, but it's an untoward luxury, and will increasingly be seen as such in the future. It ain't 1950 anymore.

I don't understand why so many people think that they're entitled to live far away and insulated from the society and problems the rest of us have to deal with every day.

[HEyHEY]

161. You guys elected Reagan.

And used a shitload of gas on big ass muscle cars.

[Breeze54]

162. I didn't and

I resent you grouping m with the Yuppies.

I am not one.

[HEyHEY]

163. Well, are we talking about YOU or baby boomers - cause the OP was about boomers

[JVS]

165. DUH!

[JVS]

164. I bet they made Dan Quayle the Vice President as well.

[PVnRT]

166. As soon as you guys back off our generation, we'll be happy too

Until then, when all we hear is about how "lazy" and "apathetic" we are, and how degraded our culture is compared to yours, suck it up and deal with it.