Rant-Man's Notebook

By Jim "Rant-Man" MacQuarrie

Talkin' 'Bout Your G-G-Generation

I mentioned the Baby Boom last week, and it got me to thinking about the various generations and how their experiences shaped them. The Baby Boom, when a huge bunch of kids were born in a relatively short time, went from about 1945 to 1960 or so. I'm at the tail end of the Boom, 1958, but I don't consider myself to be a Baby Boomer. The Boomers were for the most part the children of World War II veterans. Their parents, whether they actually fought in the war or not, had a very unique set of experiences in their lives. The parents of the Boomers were born during the prosperous, peaceful time between WWI and the Crash of '29, were children and teens during the Depression, and young adults during World War II. They had a hard life, and tried to make an easier one for their children, an error that has reverberated for decades.

My parents, and the parents of many of my friends, were born in the middle of the Depression, were children and teens during World War II, and young adults in the prosperous Postwar years. They were the younger siblings of "the Greatest Generation." Our parents were the ones who made Elvis Presley a star; the Boomers' parents couldn't stand him. Therein lies the difference.

Some of the people my age were the younger siblings of the Boomers, but their experience was the same as mine; Boomers were the jerks who were teens when we were kids. They're still jerks. They've been hogging the spotlight since the day they were born, and we're waiting for them to get the hell off the stage and give us a minute or two to have a chance at running things. Every major problem of the last 40 years in the US can be blamed on the Boomers. Don't believe me? Let's take a look:

1950s: TV enters the home and immediately becomes an entertainment tool for children. In the early days, serious dramas were prominent. As the Boomers made the transition from infancy, TV became a kid medium. Nowadays, "the Fifties" is almost synonymous with childhood. Howdy Doody, Leave it to Beaver, The Mickey Mouse Club, Space Patrol, Lassie, the list is endless. The whole nostalgia trip is about these guys' childhoods. The so-called "oppression" of the fifties is largely the oppression that children always feel under their parents' rules. In fact, it was a dynamic and exciting time for grownups, when the biggest of the civil rights battles were waged, when the most bold and daring programming ever put on television was regularly being aired, when the most challenging and progressive music was being created. The Fifties were anything but the bland and repressed era that the Boomers have pretended they were. They've projected their protected and comfortable upbringing onto the entire society, and it's just not so. But they're the largest segment of the population, and their version is the definitive one, even if they were in diapers for a large part of it.

1960s: The era of protest and revolution. Actually the era of teenagers behaving badly. From the emergence of the Beatles to Woodstock, the '60s were all about young people asserting their independence, as if they were the first to ever do it. While the Boomers were out getting stoned and "making love, not war," the rest of the country was waiting for them to shut up and grow up. It didn't happen. The lasting legacy of Woodstock was not peace, love and understanding. It was venereal disease and drug addiction. The snotnose teens of the '60s did that. My generation was busy watching the Superman-Aquaman Hour while the Boomers were rolling in the mud and yelling in the streets. Do you know when the anti-war protests ended? No, not when the war ended; when the draft ended. As soon as their own butts weren't on the line, they all shut up about the evils and injustice of the war and went back to trying to score with that cute hippie chick. Selfish bastards, the lot of 'em.

1970s: Roller-boogie. Disco. The Boomer brats were out of college, young, single and looking to continue their party ways. My crowd was still in high school, being victimized by the dubious fashion choices of our older siblings. Leisure suits were not our fault. Blame the stinkin' Boomers again. Those of us who were under 18 in the mid-'70s were NOT listening to disco; we hated it. We were listening to David Bowie, Gordon Lightfoot, Elton John, James Taylor and Foghat and Led Zepplin and Harry Chapin and Todd Rundgren and the Eagles and Jackson Browne and Elvis Costello and Bruce Springsteen. Not disco. It wasn't our fault.

1980s: The so-called "Greed Decade." The Greed Decade is a myth. Yeah, Boomers like Ivan Boesky and Michael Milken were stealing investors blind, and the savings & loans were being looted (by Boomers, for the most part), but the young adults of that time (my generation) were carrying on the greatest decade of compassion and generosity in American history. Ever hear of USA For Africa, Band Aid, Live Aid, Hands Across America, Farm Aid? While the Boomers were snorting coke, climbing the corporate ladder, cashing in stock options, and scrambling to hide their hippie pasts, there was an awful lot of great humanitarianism going on around them. There was a heck of a lot more greed and corruption in the decade that followed.

1990s: The Boomers finally got a Boomer president, and he turned out to be just like them in every way: dishonest, selfish, immature and manipulative. The most self-absorbed generation in history produced the most self-absorbed president in history. Of course, we have another Boomer in the White House now, and he's not much better. It's not a party thing; it's a generational thing. Boomers were pampered and protected by their parents who had survived the Depression and World War II, and as a result they became soft and selfish, spoiled perpetual children.

The present day: The earliest Boomers are over 50 now and starting to fall apart. They're facing retirement without ever having had to mature, and they're freaking out about it. Buying Harleys, getting Botox injections and liposuction so they can continue to pretend to be the teenagers they envision themselves as. The only thing sadder than watching somebody age is watching them age gracelessly. It ain't pretty. And it's only going to get worse. You think the ads for prescription medicines make you want to scream? Wait until the Boomers pass 60. And wait until the largest segment of the population reaches Social Security age and starts voting themselves more benefits. You think we have trouble now? Hoo boy.

I suppose it's worth mentioning that the most recent crop of scandals, Enron and WorldCom and the others, were brought to you by Boomers. It's a perfect example of their worldview: Spoiled children who think they deserve whatever they want and have no qualms about doing whatever they have to do to get it.

I doubt that the problems can be corrected until the people born between 1955 and 1970 get a shot at running things.

Yo, Boomers! Enough already. The world has revolved around you and your interests for half a century. You defined the last five decades. You've had your ride, now shut up, sit down and let somebody else get a word in edgewise.

I'll tell you this, though: As screwed up as you Boomers are, you've raised some great kids. Now get out of their way.

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