In which I alienate the Millennials, whoever they are

I suppose I could have simply noted this as a "Juxtaposition of the Day," but it happens to trigger a rant that's been building up for about two weeks, but that I have been suppressing because being direct would have involved calling out particular cartoonists, a violation of the Prime Directive, and, besides, it also involves unleashing my inner Andy Rooney, which happens often enough (i.e., all the time) despite my best efforts.

Well, as is written in the Book of Ruth, "my mind has long been gnawed by the cankering tooth of doubt. Better have it out!" 

Here's the cartoon cascade (all of which I liked) that has brought it on:

(Baby Blues)

(Loose Parts)

(Funday Morning)

I've gone through my tattoo rant recently enough that I won't repeat it here, but it is basically a combination of a Rooneyesque rant about remembering when you had to serve in the Navy or go to prison or do something in order to qualify for a tattoo, with a more serious reflection about the folly of thinking that, at 20 or so, you can nail down your permanent personna with a particular image.

It's that second part that matters.

I kind of joked about it in a column once, and I was certainly wrong about how long the fad would last. Kids born the day that column ran are now only a year and about two weeks from being old enough to (legally) get their own permanent decor. 

If you're really curious, I've uploaded the whole thing here (right click and open in new tab), but this snippet sums it up:

So, here's a rant related to that, but a helluva lot more sweeping than tattooes themselves. 

Matt Bors did a good cartoon defending the "Millennials," but, like a lot of good things, it seems to have triggered an avalanche of imitators, most of which are not so good and even more of which seem to be complaining that the Baby Boomers are saying mean things about the Millennials. There was also a complaint posted on Facebook the other day about tattoo cartoons.

One oft-repeated complaint is that Baby Boomers accuse Millennials of whining. Which, if you think of it, makes you wonder if they are attempting to refute the charge or confirm it.

I'd even say it was "ironic," but she's Gen X and I'm sure they don't want to be dragged into this.

Here's what I will say: I am not a "Baby Boomer."

"Baby Boomer" is just some bullshit media thing, brought to you by the same tone-deaf clowns who thought a "hippie" was anybody with long hair, a stupid meme they hammered into the ground until the actual hippies staged a mock funeral for the term.

Granted, there was a population boom after WWII, and demographers and economists need to figure that into things.

But the media hype is nonsense. And I say that as someone who was once dispatched by a features editor to interview "Yuppies," which first required that I find some people who fit the stereotype. I thought it was cheating, but the check didn't bounce and that sort of thing happened so often that it was routine.

I firmly believe that most features editors spent their adolescence clipping pictures out of Tiger Beat while everyone else was at the prom. 

Even if you divide it in half, as outlined here, this alleged demographic group is still bullshit. I am a "Leading Edge" boomer by that definition, born four years into the boom, and I barely remember Howdy Doody.

And all those Baby Boomers who joined the Peace Corps and then were dismayed at JFK's murder? They were too old to be boomers; the oldest boomers would not turn 18 for another two months.

And other boomers were still twinkles in their fathers' eyes that day, and their fathers hadn't been old enough to serve in WWII or Korea.

Stereotypes of "Baby Boomers" are just some media crap. If you like, compare it to the click-bait at HuffPost: You might fall for it out of boredom or some desire to see what idiotic garbage she's linking you to this time, but, if you take it seriously, you are simply a media stooge.

So much for the stereotype of Millennials as media savvy.

Fact is, the whole concept of "Millennials" as a mass of relatively same-aged people who fit into little boxes is just as much a bullshit media invention as "Baby Boomer." Matt's cartoon was pretty clear on that point. The ones that followed have not been.

If you call yourself a "Millennial," you're just buying into the hype. And, forgive me, Alanis, but, yeah, it is.

Fortunately, I know a lot of people in that generation who don't buy in.

Fact it, the mass of people go unheralded and unnoticed because they're not part of the accepted, self-fulfilling zeitgeist that features editors moon over.

That was true even "Back in the Day" (yick), when destroying the evidence of a momentary buy-in did not involve lasers but was as simple as dropping the platform shoes in a Goodwill box.

 

Comments

[Richard J. Marcej]

As someone who was born in 1961 I always bristled when told that I was part of the "Baby Boomers" Generation. IMO, to be qualified for that group, who were born in the 40's after the war, you had to have been able to "enjoy" all that entailed in the 1960's. I was 7 years old during the "Summer of Love".
I don't think I qualify.

[Bob]

Cher was on The Late Show with David Letterman Friday. She mentioned that she and Janis Joplin were two of the first female celebrities to get tattoos; she also said that she's having them removed, basically due to her age.