This probably isn’t that new of a thought to most of you all, but another post made me think to share it.
About a year ago my wife and I (both millennials) were taking a long walk and reflecting on some stuff. It occurred to us both that from our early to mid 20s forward it was hard getting good advice from our parents (both Boomers) on life matters. Sure, there’s the usual “they don’t know what the housing market is” stuff, but it seemed like more than that. That’s when we both had the glass shattering conclusion that we have experienced more life than our parents.
We didn’t mean travel. We honestly meant global changes and conflict. Sure, our parents had the Cold War and threats of nuclear annihilation, but it felt like the traumas of the last generation weren’t as frequent, global, and of personal impact. Economic meltdowns, global warming (with local weather events impacting us), 911, COVID… I don’t need to keep going.
So, we came to the conclusion that even though Boomers like to fall back to the “pick yourself up by your bootstraps” mantra, it turns out that they went through their adult lives with relatively little global/national trauma. This obviously can’t stand as a generalization for personal trauma, but on a macrochasm scale Boomers are Summer Children (matured during a time of plenty and ease).
I don’t disagree on the overall conclusion, but it’s unfair to say that they didn’t live through a lot of crises.
In regards to the environment, they had a hole in the ozone layer and Chernobyl in the 80s along smog issues throughout their entire youth and several oil spills.
In regards to wars, they had Vietnam, Ireland, Falklands, Yoguslavia, Iran-Irak, Lebanon, and many more.
In regards to pandemic diseases, they had Asian flu, Hong Kong flu, Russian flu, AIDS, SARS, small pox, cholera, salmonella outbreaks, mad cow disease and a whole lot of smaller outbreaks of all kinds of nasty shit.
They also had an energy crisis in the 70s, economical recession in the 80s and a stock market crash in 1987.
So they didn’t actually live like in a world like "the wonder years"tv-show.
The question is rather: Didn’t they learn anything from all this?
And just one thing: during the Vietnam war Americans were conscripted into the war effort. That’s just about as big a violation of personal rights as you can get.