She should have said “we’re the ones who actually vote.”
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And a reminder of why older people tend to be disproportionately right wing (on average, #NotAllBoomers, yadda yadda yadda):
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I’ll bet that not just a few users of (and apologists for) the term “OK Boomer”, are motivated by “ageism”. Just my opinion.
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But that’s also the same as it ever was; from Plato to Abby Hoffman, there have been those who disparage their elders for nothing other than age. Likewise, there have always been older people who dismiss the young.
Young people, if they’re lucky, get to be old enough to become those they ridiculed and dismiss those who are walking in their (discarded) shoes.
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Ok Boingers
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I’m amazed “Not All Boomers” isn’t its own meme yet, for the people frantically mansplaining why it’s not acceptable to say “OK Boomer” because, well, see first clause.
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That’s not what “mansplaining” means, and you should know better.
Anyway, it’s interesting how many Boingers are ready to shit upon Boomers as a whole, yet get angry about the “Millennials are killing X” stuff. It’s the same stupid generation-war bullshit, and you can’t blame people for when they were born. It’s an intellectually dishonest but emotionally satisfying way of dismissing people.
Now, I’m not saying that all the people of the Baby Boomer generation are innocent, far from it. But it’s class issues and politics that’s to blame for the present-day problems, and you should focus on the actual roots and causes of the issues you want to fix.
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You know what? I agree, and thanks for calling me on it. I disagree with everything else you wrote. I could go on at equal length but in the end I don’t think it would amount to a lot more than what’s packed up inside “Not All Boomers”. Either you get it, or you don’t.
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This argument is similar to the one poor white people use when pushing back against the idea of white privilege. It is also similar to the one people make when they say “All lives matter” when confronted with “Black lives matter”
You’re arguing semantics, ‘OK boomer’ is a thing now and it is a response to arguments that are shortsighted made by people who are too wrapped up in their own world view to have any sympathy for people who are facing problems they will never have to face themselves. It is a useful response to tired arguments that rely on what could be called talking points but that I would more aptly describe as memes, the idea that millennial are entitled, that they’re not hard workers and in general that their concerns are misguided.
There are no perfect names for things, we must endeavor to engage with the substance of arguments instead of their semantic origins.
Edit: Gen X and I left my pop corn at home.
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Oh, nonsense. Racism is a thing. Inequality between Boomers and Millennials is not. The OK Boomer rhetorical structure is based upon a foundation of shifting sands.
If you’re going to use a generational demographic epithet, at least base it on accurate demographics, or you look like a fool.
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Say what you will about gen x, we know how to conjure some very fine imaginary food. Your choices have my mouth watering.
Looks in the basket, grabs a baked brie (drizzled with locally sourced honey) and some Madeira. Cheers!
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This is arguable, but still not the point. It’s really about the mindset not the demo, the demo is just a handy signifier for people who have already been segregated into a demo, i.e. Millenials. The distinction is drawn from the point of view of people who matured along with meme culture.
I don’t know if you would be classified as a boomer but you’ve made no arguments that would potentially be dismissed with an “OK boomer”, that others have does not mean you, should you be part of that demo, or anybody else either would be on the receiving end of that specific dismissal.
You argue that it paints boomers with too broad a stroke, maybe it does, the generation with which it resonated does see some truth in it, and I must confess, I do too. That doesn’t mean that it is deployed literally, this is the generation for which people lamented that they do not use “literally” literally, the divide is real.
My understanding of it is that it is:
a) A dismissal, not an argument.
b) Idiomatic, not literal. (Let’s not forget that post “buffy speak” it can be verbed into it’s literal sense, but that’s a feature of language not of the phrase itself)
c) Part of meme culture and must be understood in this context.
Schrodingers fool: Depends on who’s looking.*
I did not call you a fool, I do not think you are one.
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You’re making a large part of my point for me. Thank you. 
If being a “Boomer” is an attitude, not a demographic (and you’re not the first person to assert this), then find a better epithet. Otherwise you’re missing your target and hurting innocents.
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I remain convinced that we, out of all the living generations, have the best tastes.
I feel what you’re saying, but if “Boomer” actually hurts anyone’s feelings, then they must not be very resilient in the first place, IMO.
Judging anyone by any superficial differences is petty, counterproductive and antisocial; full stop.
Nevertheless, not all persecution and shitty treatment of other people is “equal.”
I still resent whatever hypersensitive asshole it was that tried to say ‘OK Boomer’ is somehow “the equivalent of the n-word,” for older people… as if “boomer” somehow started out as a pejorative meant to strip away a person’s humanity, and which still carries the negative connotations of hundreds of years worth of hatred and oppression, when it absolutely does NOT.
Long story short; the sooner people stop freaking out about being derisively called boomer, the sooner the fad will fade out, unlike the aforementioned racial slur which seems to persist no matter how much time passes.
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Words have meaning. A poor choice of words is a recoverable error.
Good point, but I don’t feel like I would be helping by telling them to “get over it.”
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None of us are helping; we all seem to be in a perpetual state of poking one another.
I’ve been saying it for years:
You wanna bitch and complain about how ‘the younger generations’ turned out, then take a good long, hard look at who raised those generations; that’s your own failing at work.
And for the younger people, be careful how you treat old people - that’s exactly how you’ll end up one day… unless you just happen to die young, which is NOT the better alternative.
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Exactly! If the other generations would stop fighting long enough to see that the gen x nostalgia is the best nostalgia, everyone would be better off. /S
I’ve watched a few video recently on memory and learning and nostalgia and about the effects of novel experiences on memory versus the effects of the daily grind. It’s interesting stuff and at the foundation of each generation feeling like they experienced something special that no other generation will ever truly comprehend.
ETA: Every generation, at every stage of life, have unique experiences and perspectives that others can learn and grow from if they chose to.
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Do you have any evidence of this, or do you just like poking a little fun at those lazy uninformed apolitical Millennials who were 25% of the vote in the last Presidential election?
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