one thing i've noticed with people from the boomer era (And I am not picking on boomers here - I am sure this will be true through the generations) is they talk about the past and then I do the math and I realize they were 12. You were born in 1955 you did not march for civil rights.
I was born after the Civil Rights movement, yet I have some consciousness of it from great PBS series, or political figures like John Lewis and the Democratic Party, generally. Even school taught it a little. It was a credit to a still strong democratic political culture that we “remember” it.
As a boomer, I am nostalgic for 94% marginal tax rates on the ultra wealthy and corporations paying the same share of federal income taxes they did in the 50's. The rest, not as much.
remember on Old Twitter when that dude went fully THIS IS WHAT THEY TOOK FROM YOU about like, Nintendo 64 and Capri Sun
Nintendo 64 was cool but we have the Switch now and I think that’s also pretty cool!
The *weird* like Rockwell-esque painting of a kid opening an N64 for Christmas
RETVRN (to Donkey Kong Country)
I remember back then. We were so poor that if my brother hadn't gotten a deer that year, we wouldn't have had any meat all winter. It was NOT "easier times".
This seems unfair. Boomers=born1946-64. So someone born in 1946 certainly could have marched for civil rights in the early 60s. Although James Chaney, Michael Schwerner, &Andrew Goodman who were killed in MS in 1964 were born in 1938-1939, many activists, black&white, were younger.
I wonder if this aspect is a mostly American phenomenon, to the extent that it exists? Haven’t noticed it to the same extent elsewhere (obviously limited to personal experience 🤷♂️)
Probably. There were big protests in the UK and France but the U.S. feels unique in that activism and popular culture feel much more tightly fused the popular imagination, so that just going to Woodstock was a revolutionary act. This is likely due to the Vietnam War’s impact.
I believe, based on some personal experiences and bolstered by lots of reading, this kind of nostalgia also exists(ed) for some older people in the former USSR. Things were "simpler back then," etc. I think it makes sense that these two cultures would have similar types of postwar nostalgia.
True. Civil rights was almost entirely Silent Generation, as was the antiwar leadership and pretty much all the iconic 60s cultural figures. Boomers were most of the Vietnam draftees and demonstrators but participation is entirely different from, “we made that happen.”
The best we can do are the oldest boomers (my parents), my Mom was a British Invasion fan but Dad is a lifelong Kingston Trio and pre-electric Bob Dylan fan. I don't think his Mom would have let him go down to Mississippi at age 15, though.
My mom (50) went down to Mississippi at around 15 to help w voter registration but she had to run away to do it. She said she dressed a lot of head wounds. Her & her brother (54) were both arrested for throwing eggs at George Wallace when he visited St Paul. Both were well under 18. There were some💪
yah i am not saying no young people ever did anything but...
Oh I know. Your point stands 🏆
like it's all a bit "we didn't start the fire" yes you lived through all that stuff but you didn't *do it* mostly
Possibly the worst pop song ever written. Boomer nostalgia shit. They may not have “started” the fire but they definitely dumped kerosene all over it.
Funny how the song stops at "the end of history"
?? It stops then because it came out in 1989 (a couple months after the original “end of history” essay).
Yeah I know it's just wild that it just encapsulates the era between 1945-1989
and much of it was...when you were a kid or teen.
Where do you think hippies and the anti-Vietnam war movement came from? We knew about the civil rights movement. Everyone watched the news, which was not politicized as it is now. We also weren’t distracted by social media so we read newspapers and books, and listened to the radio.
It's called Kevin Arnold syndrome, so sad.
It's kinda how popular media assumes that all baby boomers were flower child hippies in the 60's and 70's and then switched over to being button-down conservatives once Reagan was elected. Less than 10% of them were hippies. Young Americans for Freedom was a huge force back then.
Same with thinking grunge GenXers all turned into Trumpers. Yeah there’s some who did that (don’t look at what Billy Corgan is up to now), but there were a ton of Young Republican types then too.
And plenty of Rush Limbaugh listeners.
Exactly. I missed Woodstock because I had a Little League game.
I think most generations long to return to childhood (when they felt most cared for and safe) and young adulthood (when they felt the most powerful) It's no surprise that the Boomers want to turn the clock back to the 50s and 80s
Generational theorist here. This is absolutely correct. It is entirely unique to Boomers. And you should pick on them when you catch them doing it.
Hey, I was ten on August 8, 1974. I was old enough to get mad because my summer sleepover in the backyard tent got cancelled because my friend's mom was pissed. I blame Nixon and Watergate to this day.
Near the same age - saw Grandpa watching Watergate coverage obsessively & even watched w him some while he explained & cussed a lot.
My mom set up her ironing board in front of our big, enormous 20 inch screen to watch. Not being able to watch cartoons after school is another thing I blame Nixon for.
Looked a whole lot like this. Was proud I got to go on the roof to help Grandpa fix the antenna
Oh, we had the fancy wood-cabinet model. And one of those motor-driven aerials.
They upgraded to something similar later. The old one moved into the Florida room (they lived in Hialeah) for us kids. Sometime later we used that TV for some kinda high tech “video game”
Hey! That was our TV!
I live on old Route 66 and the nostalgia for it is over the top. Boomers were very little kids when the interstate highway system was being built, they barely experienced the thing they are nostalgic for. And by today’s standards it was dangerous, uncomfortable and slow.
I do my best not to fall into this trap AND keep an open mind about “the kids today”. Just because I was born in the 70s doesn’t mean I was blowing coke at Club 54.
