Apparently this is a thing now.
I'm a Boomer. Born in 1955. Last October 30th, I turned 64, thanks awfully for remembering. A month before that, my sister turned 65 which means that there were either two REALLY nasty Montana winters right in a row or my old man was dynamite in the sack.
But I guess both could be true.
A while back, I decided to let my basically all-gray beard grow out, partly because I finally decided to embrace my inner old man (hell, I am old) and partly because of a bad fall I had at the apartment which pretty much cost me much of the use of my right arm for a while (one of the reasons why shaving was out and why this site went dark for as long as it did).
It's not all the way back. I still can't raise it all the way and I have all kinds of trouble writing things. Printing things, for that matter. So I'm going to say this as gently as I possibly can.
THERE IS NO WORD OR PHRASE IN THE ENGLISH OR ANY OTHER LANGUAGE THAT IS THE "EQUIVALENT OF THE N-WORD."
AND THERE NEVER WILL BE.
IDIOT.
I'm a Boomer. Born in 1955. Last October 30th, I turned 64, thanks awfully for remembering. A month before that, my sister turned 65 which means that there were either two REALLY nasty Montana winters right in a row or my old man was dynamite in the sack.
But I guess both could be true.
A while back, I decided to let my basically all-gray beard grow out, partly because I finally decided to embrace my inner old man (hell, I am old) and partly because of a bad fall I had at the apartment which pretty much cost me much of the use of my right arm for a while (one of the reasons why shaving was out and why this site went dark for as long as it did).
It's not all the way back. I still can't raise it all the way and I have all kinds of trouble writing things. Printing things, for that matter. So I'm going to say this as gently as I possibly can.
THERE IS NO WORD OR PHRASE IN THE ENGLISH OR ANY OTHER LANGUAGE THAT IS THE "EQUIVALENT OF THE N-WORD."
AND THERE NEVER WILL BE.
IDIOT.
8 comments:
Yours truly is a War Baby, born before either VE Day or VJ Day. We war babies find boomers to be irritatingly spoilt young punks. But, in their defense, I do not see many snowflakes amongst them.
Early Boomer here (1949). I don't think the "Okay, Boomer" line is offensive. I think it's stupid.
IMO, systematic cohort-specific variations in behavior and biography can be fairly stark if you're comparing people born prior to about 1938 with people born after. Distinctions among those coarse sets are more challenging to discern, and more class-delimited. (Much of the 'generation' talk about people born during the years running from 1939 to about 1957 concerned dispositions and behaviors pretty unusual outside the ranks of the children of the bourgeoisie). There was a sudden odd shift in political dispositions 'twixt those born in the late 1970s and those born in the late 1980s. There's also been an implosion in the propensity of people to marry increasingly manifest among those born after about 1974.
As a graduate of the University of Texas, I find Boomer Sooners a little offensive. Does that count?
By the most commonly accepted definition of "Baby Boom" as having lasted from 1946 to 1964, I got in just under the wire in January of '64. However I remember little or nothing of most of the seminal Boomer events such as the JFK assassination, Woodstock, Vietnam, the moon landing (I watched some of the later ones but for some reason, have no personal memory of Apollo 11... just wasn't something my 5 year old self was interested in), etc. I do remember the Vietnam War ending and the POWs coming home, and most all the other major news events from 1973 onward, but never quite grasped all the Sixties nostalgia and frankly find it irritating.
Sixties (and Seventies) nostalgia is perverse as well as irritating. I was there (nee 1950) and tell any kid in tie-die I can how awful those times were. Call me Boomer and you'll get a most un-mellow reaction. Old Lady, Granny, Grey Mare, fine. Boomer and I'm ready to rumble.
Nostalgia for the Sixties? Weather Underground, major riots, assassinations. No, thanks. Been there, seen that. It's one of the reasons I'm very worried about the street violence we're seeing now.
I was on a flight returning from Viet Nam by way of Okinawa when we received the news that RFK had been assassinated. This hard on the heels of MLK's assassination. We, all of us Marines, requested the plane return to Okinawa. None of us were anxious to get home. Yes, you can keep the Sixties.
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