8 ms·

<BabyBoomerRant> I love this post and I'll tell you why... I understand that my age puts me in the minority here at Hacker News, but anyone who has ever follo

by edw519 15y ago

<BabyBoomerRant> I love this post and I'll tell you why... I understand that my age puts me in the minority here at Hacker News, but anyone who has ever followed anything I've said here knows that I really believe that's just a detail, not a real issue...I don't care as much about who you are as what you do and how you treat others. I grew up in the U.S. in the 1960's and it was a very different time for all kinds of reasons. The biggest difference of all had little to do with money, technology, or superficial lifestyle; it had to do with state of mind. Like all young generations, we were confused and didn't understand why things were the way they were. So, with lots of energy and spare time, we took action... We protested, we marched, we did whatever we thought it took to affect change. We took the side of the oppressed: blacks, women, gays, the poor and homeless, the environment, and most of all, we protested an illegal and immoral war. We ended the war and we changed the world. It's great to see that some things haven't changed: young people still find a way to channel their resources to try to make things better, but here's the problem: All I see with this worldwide Occupy movement is people complaining, "Where's mine?" It seems like it's all about "me", not "us". That's why these SOPA protests are so refreshing to me. It's the first thing I've noticed in years that reminds me of my youth, not so much in action, but in spirit. People have taken a few minutes to stop worrying about themselves to do something about the greater good for all of us. But the spirit of modern times prevents us from doing enough. We will take action so long as it doesn't cost us too much. Where is the sacrifice? Where is the "put your money where your mouth is"? I love the way OP points this out. I'm proud of Wikipedia. Craigslist came close, forcing its users to work to get to their local pages. But too many, like Google, just wimped out. All their black banner said was, "We care, but not that much." Listen to OP! For just a few minutes, fuck the "stake holders", the "money managers", the "players", the "metrics", the "ROI", and the "bottom line". Can't we just once pretend that it's 1968, and stop giving a shit about ourselves long enough to realize that a couple of extra bucks today will soon be worthless in a world going to shit if we don't do something about it? Only when we demonstrate the passion that comes from true sacrifice will the "normals" really take notice. </BabyBoomerRant, TimeForMaalox>

mkr-hn 15y ago
The Occupy movement is about exactly the opposite of "me." It is primarily about the growing disparity in wealth and power, and how that disparity hurts everyone (including the 1%). A little disparity is fine. It gives us something to aspire to. Occupy's message is that the balance of wealth and power has shifted too far away from the reach of aspirations.
- dantheman 15y ago
  The occupy movement could of been about corruption & bailouts and how the government picks winners and losers that hurts everyone not directly involved (those picked as winners) (i.e. you and me). Instead Occupy turned into where's my bailout. They could've taken a principled position, but didn't wealth disparity is a good thing - as long as it's achieved in the appropriate ways (voluntary interaction).
  - mkr-hn 15y ago
    We must be following different Occupy movements.
    - phillmv 15y ago
      There is an actually valid concern that instead of guaranteeing credit default swaps in a handful of institutions, you could've spent the same amount of money propping up some of these underwater mortgages. Same outcome - a bunch of public money goes towards restoring confidence in the system - but with significantly less significant social costs/moral hazards.
  - jbooth 15y ago
    It was about the bailouts and corruption. In fact, anti-corruption is probably the single biggest message of the occupy movement. That sign saying "where's my bailout" was complaining about "where's our bailout". It's pointing out that only the banks got taken care of, while the rest of us seem to matter increasingly less. It's not asking for a handout, it's pointing to the discrepancy. Also, if you're against corruption, massive and increasing wealth disparity is not a good thing. Put all the financial power in the hands of a few and every single time they'll wind up with all the political power as well. If you want an example of correlation between money and political power, you could look at SOPA.
batista 15y ago
It's true that the 60's was a free-er time. But it is wrong to say that you "ended the war and changed the world". The "war" ended in 1975, long after all the protesting has slowed to a crawl. And the ending of the war mainly had to do with an exhaustion of resources amidst an economic and oil crisis, and, well, actually losing the damn thing. There is such a thing as a lost war. Furthermore, people mainly protested not because the war was "illegal and immoral", but primarily because of the draft and how it affected them (or people they knew). Lesson learned: the government used only pro soldiers for their wars from them on, and no protests of that scale and that extend occurred again. The baby-boomer, sixties "rebellion" was in all, a failure. It didn't "stop the war", and it didn't "change the world". It ended itself in the conformism and consumerism of the seventies and in a drug and "self-discovery" haze. If the world has indeed changed since the 60s, it's for the worst, in the political sense, concerning society, freedom, public and international policy (technology and science have of course improved, but those two always do, since the dawn of time, and exponentially since around 1600). Now, how about the societal change regarding the treatment of blacks? Well, that was due to their organized protests and political action (from the action around Rosa Parks to the Alabama march). And, to return to the point of Maddox, this is what the other sixties movements lacked (since SDS dissolved into irrelevance), and what we lack today. If baby-boomers' sixties was a self-absorbed failure, there was indeed a time when Americans fought and won very significant rights. It was when they were actually organized, agitated, and fought (often to death), to gain their labour rights, regarding working conditions, eight hour day, etc. Here's an example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_Massacre http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_Massacre Without political action and determination, you cannot have change. Blacking out a webpage is idiotic. "But it spreads awareness". So? What is the viewer of your webpage supposed to do with this new found awareness? Until you can answer that, it's all in vain. And writing to your congressman is idiotic. What makes him "your" congressman? Even a boycott is silly, if it's just about individuals making a choice, instead of being the co-ordinated action of some group with a minimum program and coherency.
- ricree 15y ago
  >Blacking out a webpage is idiotic. "But it spreads awareness". So? What is the viewer of your webpage supposed to do with this new found awareness? Most of the websites I saw participating in the blackout urged people to contact local congresspeople. Wikipedia, for example, featured a form that would show contact information given a zip code. While not at the level of mass protests, it's certainly doing something. Further, awareness does matter. In my local paper, the blackouts made the front page. That exposes the issue to a wide range of people that would never have been aware anything was happening. Are there other actions people could have taken to protest SOPA/PIPA? Sure, and some are probably more optimal than the blackout. Even so, I would disagree that the blackout was ineffective, much less "idiotic".
barrkel 15y ago
Occupy movement at its heart is a fight to wrest control of the world from baby-boomers, who are now old and selfishly willing to burn everyone else to protect their benefits.
- nerdfiles 15y ago
  Exactly. I've run into more jaded baby boomers than anything else. And they justify it by "well, now I have a job" or "I'm too old now" or "The Internet is over my head." Their pie is the 401(k), come what may.
  - burgerbrain 15y ago
    "The Internet is over my head." This one is rather important I think. More so than other generations, the baby boomers seem to embrace ignorance of all things new as a virtue. My grandparents used to go out of their way to not admit they were confused by technology. My parents and their friends? They embrace the notion.
jdietrich 15y ago
The baby boomers didn't change a damned thing. In Britain, liberalism was architected primarily by people who were part of our very old establishment. The decriminalisation of homosexuality was achieved largely by the work of Lord Wolfenden, Lord Pakenham and Arthur Gore (8th Earl of Arran). The same goes for most of the political changes we associate with modernity and progress - with the notable exception of Bevan and his peers, the people turning the wheels were mainly minor aristocrats in dusty tweed. A great many of the most significant changes were made contrary to public opinion, the most obvious being the abolition of the death penalty - a policy which most Britons still oppose. The boomers credit themselves with having changed the world when they were young, broke and essentially powerless, but deny any credit to the generation that constituted the establishment at the time. Conversely, now that they control the majority of capital, make up the biggest electoral demographic and holds most of the elected offices, they deny responsibility. The most destructive act of the baby boomers was creating a culture in which the individual is seen as having supremacy over the institution. The consequences are obvious and stark - a political system with single-digit approval ratings, where nobody feels represented and nobody feels responsible. A political culture defined not by fundamental ideological allegiance and difference, but by special pleading. There's no such thing as a socialist anymore, no such thing as a conservative or a trade unionist, just people with opinions. America always pretended to be classless but Britain has gone the same way, preferring the egoistic fantasy of an egalitarian society over the reality of one where power and wealth and privilege are still very much in force. We're trapped in a solipsistic nightmare, where conspiracy theories have replaced an understanding of social power. Until the people who are in charge actually admit that they are in charge, we're fucked.
- hessenwolf 15y ago
  Also, it's easy to go out and protest and be unwashed when you have absolutely nothing to lose. The unfortunate youth of today are not as unfortunate as in 1968.
  - mattmiller 15y ago
    I don't understand why. Youth in 68 had everything that the youth has now.
geogra4 15y ago
Maybe this is a little bit OT, but I think the biggest problem with the baby boomers is that, 12 years after '68, Reagan is elected and the whole generation basically turned their back on their youthful idealism and proceeded to create the mess we are in now.
brudgers 15y ago
A Boomer rant and it's all about the "me" generation. Film at 11.
king_jester 15y ago
> We protested, we marched, we did whatever we thought it took to affect change. We took the side of the oppressed: blacks, women, gays, the poor and homeless, the environment, and most of all, we protested an illegal and immoral war. If by "we" you mean some of the baby boom generation, then you are right. But let's not pretend that a huge group of people like the baby boomers have a unified approach to injustice and oppression. After all, many of the baby boom generation and have and continue to support oppression in their communities and as official state policy, but that doesn't mean that every baby boomer supports those things. Also, the struggle against oppression in the US has a much longer and deeper history than prior to the late 60s, so don't pretend that the baby boomers were the saving grace to these movements as that erases the hard work and suffering that many people had to go through.
mcantelon 15y ago
This societal passiveness isn't accidental: it has been deliberately engineered in North America. The documentary "The Century of the Self" breaks this down better than anything else I've seen/read. There is also, within activist circles, the belief in a mythical version of history in which pacifism, isolated from militance, is what catalyzed change in the past. Regarding the self-interest of the young, it's a rational thing. If young people today weren't saying "where's mine" then they'd be stupid. During the baby boom there were decent jobs because globalization hadn't happened yet and corporations still had to rely on domestic labor. Reliance on domestic labor also means the elite values having decent public institutions, which strengthen the labor force. Now not only do we have globalization but also systematic looting. Young people get to look forward to having it significantly worse economic prospects than their parents.
- geogra4 15y ago
  The century of self http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyPzGUsYyKM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyPzGUsYyKM It's just fantastic and very eye opening. Thanks for reminding me of it.
RyanMcGreal 15y ago
I was in downtown Toronto on February 15, 2003, freezing my ass off in a protest march of nearly 100,000 people who were, in turn, part of a global march of between 10 and 20 million people protesting the invasion of Iraq. It was the single biggest protest in history, and it was against a war that hadn't even started yet. Popular protest against the Vietnam War didn't take off until the war had been grinding for several years.
- thebigshane 15y ago
  Sorry if this is rubbing salt in a wound... but, that protest really didn't have any effect. Did it? I agree with Maddox here that both protests (while impressively sizable and passionate) were equally ineffective.
  - RyanMcGreal 15y ago
    It's an open (and probably unanswerable) question whether the invasion would have gone differently if not for all the popular global protest (though I can imagine that the US would have been less restrained if they knew the world wasn't watching). I was responding to the OP's contention that the Boomer generation was more committed to protesting in support of social justice than people are these days.
- unreal37 15y ago
  Yes I remember that massive worldwide protest against the impending invasion of Iraq. But the US was still able to get 20+ countries to go with them into war. Based on the "get off your ass and actually do something" theory of the OP, why didn't this have any effect?
- mindslight 15y ago
  I remember that date, being in New York myself. Seeing the police embrace their militaristic fantasy of being under attack; seeing the futility of organized dissent when it came to changing the course of an autonomous government. That was my last protest. "Cypherpunks write code".
ArbitraryLimits 15y ago
> It seems like it's all about "me", not "us". You really don't see the connection between the baby boomers's rebellions and the fact that their grandkids have this attitude?
phillmv 15y ago
> All I see with this worldwide Occupy movement is people complaining, "Where's mine?" It seems like it's all about "me", not "us". A lot of the anger stems from being denied opportunities that were afforded to the boomers. The American Dream was available to you in ways that our generation will never know. We've been sold on this notion of security and prosperity that no longer exists. Yet, we're still supposed to support the preceding generation as they retire and draw benefits that won't exist for us.
numeromancer 15y ago
In short: "In my day, our protest marches were up hill, both ways!"
j_baker 15y ago
"If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen." - Samuel Adams

by edw519 15y ago

mkr-hn 15y ago

The Occupy movement is about exactly the opposite of "me." It is primarily about the growing disparity in wealth and power, and how that disparity hurts everyone (including the 1%). A little disparity is fine. It gives us something to aspire to. Occupy's message is that the balance of wealth and power has shifted too far away from the reach of aspirations.

dantheman 15y ago
The occupy movement could of been about corruption & bailouts and how the government picks winners and losers that hurts everyone not directly involved (those picked as winners) (i.e. you and me). Instead Occupy turned into where's my bailout. They could've taken a principled position, but didn't wealth disparity is a good thing - as long as it's achieved in the appropriate ways (voluntary interaction).
- mkr-hn 15y ago
  We must be following different Occupy movements.
  - phillmv 15y ago
    There is an actually valid concern that instead of guaranteeing credit default swaps in a handful of institutions, you could've spent the same amount of money propping up some of these underwater mortgages. Same outcome - a bunch of public money goes towards restoring confidence in the system - but with significantly less significant social costs/moral hazards.
- jbooth 15y ago
  It was about the bailouts and corruption. In fact, anti-corruption is probably the single biggest message of the occupy movement. That sign saying "where's my bailout" was complaining about "where's our bailout". It's pointing out that only the banks got taken care of, while the rest of us seem to matter increasingly less. It's not asking for a handout, it's pointing to the discrepancy. Also, if you're against corruption, massive and increasing wealth disparity is not a good thing. Put all the financial power in the hands of a few and every single time they'll wind up with all the political power as well. If you want an example of correlation between money and political power, you could look at SOPA.

batista 15y ago

It's true that the 60's was a free-er time. But it is wrong to say that you "ended the war and changed the world". The "war" ended in 1975, long after all the protesting has slowed to a crawl. And the ending of the war mainly had to do with an exhaustion of resources amidst an economic and oil crisis, and, well, actually losing the damn thing. There is such a thing as a lost war. Furthermore, people mainly protested not because the war was "illegal and immoral", but primarily because of the draft and how it affected them (or people they knew). Lesson learned: the government used only pro soldiers for their wars from them on, and no protests of that scale and that extend occurred again. The baby-boomer, sixties "rebellion" was in all, a failure. It didn't "stop the war", and it didn't "change the world". It ended itself in the conformism and consumerism of the seventies and in a drug and "self-discovery" haze. If the world has indeed changed since the 60s, it's for the worst, in the political sense, concerning society, freedom, public and international policy (technology and science have of course improved, but those two always do, since the dawn of time, and exponentially since around 1600). Now, how about the societal change regarding the treatment of blacks? Well, that was due to their organized protests and political action (from the action around Rosa Parks to the Alabama march). And, to return to the point of Maddox, this is what the other sixties movements lacked (since SDS dissolved into irrelevance), and what we lack today. If baby-boomers' sixties was a self-absorbed failure, there was indeed a time when Americans fought and won very significant rights. It was when they were actually organized, agitated, and fought (often to death), to gain their labour rights, regarding working conditions, eight hour day, etc. Here's an example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_Massacre http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_Massacre Without political action and determination, you cannot have change. Blacking out a webpage is idiotic. "But it spreads awareness". So? What is the viewer of your webpage supposed to do with this new found awareness? Until you can answer that, it's all in vain. And writing to your congressman is idiotic. What makes him "your" congressman? Even a boycott is silly, if it's just about individuals making a choice, instead of being the co-ordinated action of some group with a minimum program and coherency.

ricree 15y ago
>Blacking out a webpage is idiotic. "But it spreads awareness". So? What is the viewer of your webpage supposed to do with this new found awareness? Most of the websites I saw participating in the blackout urged people to contact local congresspeople. Wikipedia, for example, featured a form that would show contact information given a zip code. While not at the level of mass protests, it's certainly doing something. Further, awareness does matter. In my local paper, the blackouts made the front page. That exposes the issue to a wide range of people that would never have been aware anything was happening. Are there other actions people could have taken to protest SOPA/PIPA? Sure, and some are probably more optimal than the blackout. Even so, I would disagree that the blackout was ineffective, much less "idiotic".

barrkel 15y ago

Occupy movement at its heart is a fight to wrest control of the world from baby-boomers, who are now old and selfishly willing to burn everyone else to protect their benefits.

nerdfiles 15y ago
Exactly. I've run into more jaded baby boomers than anything else. And they justify it by "well, now I have a job" or "I'm too old now" or "The Internet is over my head." Their pie is the 401(k), come what may.
- burgerbrain 15y ago
  "The Internet is over my head." This one is rather important I think. More so than other generations, the baby boomers seem to embrace ignorance of all things new as a virtue. My grandparents used to go out of their way to not admit they were confused by technology. My parents and their friends? They embrace the notion.

jdietrich 15y ago

The baby boomers didn't change a damned thing. In Britain, liberalism was architected primarily by people who were part of our very old establishment. The decriminalisation of homosexuality was achieved largely by the work of Lord Wolfenden, Lord Pakenham and Arthur Gore (8th Earl of Arran). The same goes for most of the political changes we associate with modernity and progress - with the notable exception of Bevan and his peers, the people turning the wheels were mainly minor aristocrats in dusty tweed. A great many of the most significant changes were made contrary to public opinion, the most obvious being the abolition of the death penalty - a policy which most Britons still oppose. The boomers credit themselves with having changed the world when they were young, broke and essentially powerless, but deny any credit to the generation that constituted the establishment at the time. Conversely, now that they control the majority of capital, make up the biggest electoral demographic and holds most of the elected offices, they deny responsibility. The most destructive act of the baby boomers was creating a culture in which the individual is seen as having supremacy over the institution. The consequences are obvious and stark - a political system with single-digit approval ratings, where nobody feels represented and nobody feels responsible. A political culture defined not by fundamental ideological allegiance and difference, but by special pleading. There's no such thing as a socialist anymore, no such thing as a conservative or a trade unionist, just people with opinions. America always pretended to be classless but Britain has gone the same way, preferring the egoistic fantasy of an egalitarian society over the reality of one where power and wealth and privilege are still very much in force. We're trapped in a solipsistic nightmare, where conspiracy theories have replaced an understanding of social power. Until the people who are in charge actually admit that they are in charge, we're fucked.

hessenwolf 15y ago
Also, it's easy to go out and protest and be unwashed when you have absolutely nothing to lose. The unfortunate youth of today are not as unfortunate as in 1968.
- mattmiller 15y ago
  I don't understand why. Youth in 68 had everything that the youth has now.

geogra4 15y ago

Maybe this is a little bit OT, but I think the biggest problem with the baby boomers is that, 12 years after '68, Reagan is elected and the whole generation basically turned their back on their youthful idealism and proceeded to create the mess we are in now.

brudgers 15y ago

A Boomer rant and it's all about the "me" generation. Film at 11.

king_jester 15y ago

> We protested, we marched, we did whatever we thought it took to affect change. We took the side of the oppressed: blacks, women, gays, the poor and homeless, the environment, and most of all, we protested an illegal and immoral war. If by "we" you mean some of the baby boom generation, then you are right. But let's not pretend that a huge group of people like the baby boomers have a unified approach to injustice and oppression. After all, many of the baby boom generation and have and continue to support oppression in their communities and as official state policy, but that doesn't mean that every baby boomer supports those things. Also, the struggle against oppression in the US has a much longer and deeper history than prior to the late 60s, so don't pretend that the baby boomers were the saving grace to these movements as that erases the hard work and suffering that many people had to go through.

mcantelon 15y ago

This societal passiveness isn't accidental: it has been deliberately engineered in North America. The documentary "The Century of the Self" breaks this down better than anything else I've seen/read. There is also, within activist circles, the belief in a mythical version of history in which pacifism, isolated from militance, is what catalyzed change in the past. Regarding the self-interest of the young, it's a rational thing. If young people today weren't saying "where's mine" then they'd be stupid. During the baby boom there were decent jobs because globalization hadn't happened yet and corporations still had to rely on domestic labor. Reliance on domestic labor also means the elite values having decent public institutions, which strengthen the labor force. Now not only do we have globalization but also systematic looting. Young people get to look forward to having it significantly worse economic prospects than their parents.

geogra4 15y ago
The century of self http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyPzGUsYyKM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyPzGUsYyKM It's just fantastic and very eye opening. Thanks for reminding me of it.

RyanMcGreal 15y ago

I was in downtown Toronto on February 15, 2003, freezing my ass off in a protest march of nearly 100,000 people who were, in turn, part of a global march of between 10 and 20 million people protesting the invasion of Iraq. It was the single biggest protest in history, and it was against a war that hadn't even started yet. Popular protest against the Vietnam War didn't take off until the war had been grinding for several years.

thebigshane 15y ago
Sorry if this is rubbing salt in a wound... but, that protest really didn't have any effect. Did it? I agree with Maddox here that both protests (while impressively sizable and passionate) were equally ineffective.
- RyanMcGreal 15y ago
  It's an open (and probably unanswerable) question whether the invasion would have gone differently if not for all the popular global protest (though I can imagine that the US would have been less restrained if they knew the world wasn't watching). I was responding to the OP's contention that the Boomer generation was more committed to protesting in support of social justice than people are these days.
unreal37 15y ago
Yes I remember that massive worldwide protest against the impending invasion of Iraq. But the US was still able to get 20+ countries to go with them into war. Based on the "get off your ass and actually do something" theory of the OP, why didn't this have any effect?
mindslight 15y ago
I remember that date, being in New York myself. Seeing the police embrace their militaristic fantasy of being under attack; seeing the futility of organized dissent when it came to changing the course of an autonomous government. That was my last protest. "Cypherpunks write code".

ArbitraryLimits 15y ago

> It seems like it's all about "me", not "us". You really don't see the connection between the baby boomers's rebellions and the fact that their grandkids have this attitude?

phillmv 15y ago

> All I see with this worldwide Occupy movement is people complaining, "Where's mine?" It seems like it's all about "me", not "us". A lot of the anger stems from being denied opportunities that were afforded to the boomers. The American Dream was available to you in ways that our generation will never know. We've been sold on this notion of security and prosperity that no longer exists. Yet, we're still supposed to support the preceding generation as they retire and draw benefits that won't exist for us.

numeromancer 15y ago

In short: "In my day, our protest marches were up hill, both ways!"

j_baker 15y ago

"If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen." - Samuel Adams