I wonder if boomers aren't the bridge to the Western World tradition. In many ways it was not passed on to millennials (speaking for my own experience) by boomers. For example in my high school English class in suburban Atlanta in the late 1990's, it was only myself and my boomer teacher who advocated for absolute truth in a class discussion on the nature of truth.
But boomers were also reacting against Western tradition and so much of what was passed on was critical. So what was passed on was the criticism without the tradition. This is part of why they are what is holding back the excesses of modern thought. They were the generation that both received the inheritance of Western tradition, and chose to represent something different. Without that inheritance, what do we have left to stand for in society?
From a societal sense, I am not sure what GenX received. Did they have Western tradition passed to them them to receive? Or did they primarily receive the criticism?
Re: Yet they created a world in which their own children will be turned into racial minorities.
Careful. White people (minus Hispanics many of whom really do qualify as "white") will remain the plurality of the US population as far out as it makes sense to look. The handwringing over white people becoming a minority strikes me as overwrought for this among other reasons.
It makes a lot more sense when you look at any multi-ethnic society. Keeping society together in those requires things that are very unpalatable to modern Western sensibilities; that order probably won't happen and... well, things worked out alright in the Balkans and Middle East. Right?
Why does he have to be careful about saying something that's true? Also, "Yet they created a world in which their own children will be turned into racial minorities. . . . This demographic change, whether one sees it as positive or negative, will be the determining factor of post-Boomer America." hardly strikes me as handwringing, overwrought or otherwise.
In the US we have solution: we cooperate news groups into the white castegory. I mentioned Hispanic people above. Really there are only two groups kept as outsiders: blacks and Native Americans.
As a 73-year-old Boomer, I agree with much of this, especially the part about Boomers not being able to understand how "anyone could possibly see the world differently from them."
I would have to leave it up to someone else to determine whether I fit the stereotype; but I will say that about 40 years ago, when I was a committed liberal, I started reading columns by conservative writers and I started seeing that we were grappling with the same questions, we just had different answers. But gradually, very gradually, I started seeing things with different eyes to the point where I voted for Biden in 2020 and Trump in 2024 (the trans phenomenon was my breaking point). Also, I've mellowed and I'm not as sure of my absolute rightness as I used to be, even as I argue with my liberal Boomer friends about whether a fetus is a human being.
But I'm a little perplexed at the charge that we still are living in the Boomers' world. Would you have examples?
"I’m frequently struck by how Boomers, especially from the older cohort, simply cannot understand how anyone could possibly see the world differently from them. They are honestly confused by it."
It really is an astonishing phenomena.
Last Christmas my step-dad's parents were complaining about how they didn't understand what young people were complaining about. My own family are certainly not conservative by any stretch of the imagination, but they were able to agree with the most of points I expressed - with the occasional fact check. But my step-dad's parents simply refused to accept anything that was said that was outside their worldview! Even when it was simply a brute fact and the entire rest of the room agreed.
When they said they wanted to understand, what they really meant was they wanted an explanation that fit their preconceived notions. They had absolutely zero willingness to actually hear another point of view.
It amazes me that anyone can be so ignorant of today's prices that they can say "Why can't kids just work their way through college like we did" or "We saved up a couple years for a down payment on our house when we were just married. Why don't people do that now?"
I wonder if boomers aren't the bridge to the Western World tradition. In many ways it was not passed on to millennials (speaking for my own experience) by boomers. For example in my high school English class in suburban Atlanta in the late 1990's, it was only myself and my boomer teacher who advocated for absolute truth in a class discussion on the nature of truth.
But boomers were also reacting against Western tradition and so much of what was passed on was critical. So what was passed on was the criticism without the tradition. This is part of why they are what is holding back the excesses of modern thought. They were the generation that both received the inheritance of Western tradition, and chose to represent something different. Without that inheritance, what do we have left to stand for in society?
From a societal sense, I am not sure what GenX received. Did they have Western tradition passed to them them to receive? Or did they primarily receive the criticism?
Re: Yet they created a world in which their own children will be turned into racial minorities.
Careful. White people (minus Hispanics many of whom really do qualify as "white") will remain the plurality of the US population as far out as it makes sense to look. The handwringing over white people becoming a minority strikes me as overwrought for this among other reasons.
It makes a lot more sense when you look at any multi-ethnic society. Keeping society together in those requires things that are very unpalatable to modern Western sensibilities; that order probably won't happen and... well, things worked out alright in the Balkans and Middle East. Right?
Why does he have to be careful about saying something that's true? Also, "Yet they created a world in which their own children will be turned into racial minorities. . . . This demographic change, whether one sees it as positive or negative, will be the determining factor of post-Boomer America." hardly strikes me as handwringing, overwrought or otherwise.
In the US we have solution: we cooperate news groups into the white castegory. I mentioned Hispanic people above. Really there are only two groups kept as outsiders: blacks and Native Americans.
As a 73-year-old Boomer, I agree with much of this, especially the part about Boomers not being able to understand how "anyone could possibly see the world differently from them."
I would have to leave it up to someone else to determine whether I fit the stereotype; but I will say that about 40 years ago, when I was a committed liberal, I started reading columns by conservative writers and I started seeing that we were grappling with the same questions, we just had different answers. But gradually, very gradually, I started seeing things with different eyes to the point where I voted for Biden in 2020 and Trump in 2024 (the trans phenomenon was my breaking point). Also, I've mellowed and I'm not as sure of my absolute rightness as I used to be, even as I argue with my liberal Boomer friends about whether a fetus is a human being.
But I'm a little perplexed at the charge that we still are living in the Boomers' world. Would you have examples?
"I’m frequently struck by how Boomers, especially from the older cohort, simply cannot understand how anyone could possibly see the world differently from them. They are honestly confused by it."
It really is an astonishing phenomena.
Last Christmas my step-dad's parents were complaining about how they didn't understand what young people were complaining about. My own family are certainly not conservative by any stretch of the imagination, but they were able to agree with the most of points I expressed - with the occasional fact check. But my step-dad's parents simply refused to accept anything that was said that was outside their worldview! Even when it was simply a brute fact and the entire rest of the room agreed.
When they said they wanted to understand, what they really meant was they wanted an explanation that fit their preconceived notions. They had absolutely zero willingness to actually hear another point of view.
It amazes me that anyone can be so ignorant of today's prices that they can say "Why can't kids just work their way through college like we did" or "We saved up a couple years for a down payment on our house when we were just married. Why don't people do that now?"
Exactly!