If you’ve spent any amount of time on social media in the last month, then it’s effectively guaranteed that you’ve heard the phrase “Ok, boomer.”
The word “boomer” here refers to baby boomers who were born between 1946 and 1964. While it is perhaps unfair to judge an entire generation based on stereotypes, many of these generational stereotypes exist for a reason.
These stereotypes about boomers largely stem from the massive numbers of boomers who acid-tripped their way through the peace and love days of the 1960s. Then, in the 1980s, took full advantage of the massive financial growth and either ardently embraced former president Ronald Reagan’s neoconservatism or became militant neoliberals in the style of former president Jimmy Carter.
The stereotype about boomers — wherever they may fall on the political spectrum — is that they are stingy, opinionated, greedy, entitled and right about absolutely everything. Furthermore, they don’t know how to use social media. They talk about how great things were back in their day without stopping. They make fun of millennials for being lazy socialists who want everything handed to them. They think jokes about avocado toast are uproariously funny. They spend every last penny that they could pass onto their children. They will go nuclear if they don’t get their way when in a store or restaurant.
The fact of the matter is that baby boomers did, in fact, enjoy an extended period of unprecedented growth. There was a lot of money made in the 1980s. The baby boomers, much like some of the previous generations and the subsequent generations, were formed by the cultural, social and political forces of the era in which they came of age.
The ‘boomer meme’ as we know it today is a product of various influences. As memes grow and spread, they take on a life of their own. However, the origins of the boomer meme appear to come from a series of satirical essays written by author, lecturer and YouTuber Jay Dyer and a friend of his.
In a recent video posted to IGTV, Dyer said that around 2008 he had been having humorous yet heated debates with his father — who he described as the “sort of quintessential boomer type of guy” — about topics such as banking, foreign policy and politics. Dyer said that he and a friend penned the essays the following year.
According to Dyer, the articles were shared among alternative media outlets and thus began the trend of boomer-posting. Dyer went on to say that as the boomer meme began picking up steam, he began “hamming it up” with the boomer-posting which he described as “part of a schtick.” He said that the boomer-posting caught on with YouTube comedians and internet message boards and from there took on a life of its own.
While the boomer-posting and dismissing out-of-touch opinions with ‘ok, boomer’ can be humorous, the recent rise of this retort has exposed a new level of animosity, much of which is fueled by the culture that exists on social media.
As the United States has become hopelessly divided along political lines and the overwhelming majority of discourse on political and social issues takes place on social media, the long-standing tradition of debating issues and hearing the other side out has disintegrated. As political issues become more closely intertwined with specific generations, ‘ok, boomer’ has become a way to brush off and invalidate the opinions of people who have views on today’s issues that aren’t in line with the mainstream way of thinking.
Generational conflict is not a new phenomenon. Divisions and strife between older and younger people have existed since the dawn of time. It is part of the human experience. But the discourse surrounding ‘ok, boomer’ has taken a harsher turn.
Ageism is often seen as discrimination against older people, but to view it only in that light ignores the vitriol that older generations employ against younger people. Senior Vice President and Editorial Director at AARP Myrna Blyth recently came under fire for saying “OK millennials. But we’re the people that actually have the money.” AARP disavowed the comment.
While Blyth’s comment was uncalled for, she does have a point. The average boomer has far more wealth than the average millennial. Since the last of the baby boomers graduated from college, the cost of living has skyrocketed while wages have stagnated. Jobs that pay a living wage have become increasingly more difficult to come by, partially because many boomers are still in the workforce and have not retired which would make room for millennials to move into those jobs. Many boomers own condos and homes in the suburbs that are far outside the price range for most millennials. The boomers have benefitted from the state of the economy but they did not directly cause it and now the prosperity they enjoyed is being used as a cudgel to beat down younger people who are struggling to make ends meet.
While humorous banter between generations is a time-honored tradition, what the boomer meme has morphed into is a distraction from the real causes of the issues that have arisen between the boomers and millennials and generation Z.
