Boomer Infantilization

Boomers are some of the most constant and aggressively misinformed people on the face of the earth, only second to none-other than Elon Musk fans. The two go hand in hand, but this isn't a post about him, this is something that I've been seeing, and I'm not sure how to feel about it.

When I was younger, I remember being wrong all the time, beyond just being gaslit into believing certain things aren't real, or are, and it's because I actually was just wrong about things. My parents and other adults would tell me "well, it's because you haven't learned about X, or been around politics long enough", or to the effect of something like that, so I went out and learned history, politics, key events and the economic vibe of the last 50-75 years, just so I could join in on the conversation. Now I feel incredibly far too equip to do anything with it all.

I go into a conversation now, and those same people I saw as super well read, informed, in on the corporate conspiracies that divide us and 'fuck the power', are now the morons who I'm having to keep in reality. They go off on these wild tangents, using nothing but jargon and Fox News talking points that they don't understand, defaulting to either the political right or God as the "and that's why" factor of anything. They will look you in the face and tell you the sky is pink for the sake of winning an argument, even if it doesn't win them the argument. They'll die on whatever hill they climb, like a mold spore trying to reach the highest point to reproduce. It doesn't matter what they're trampling to get on top, so long as they win, and whatever is beneath them is rotted beyond repair.

But that's just it. A very large portion of them who haven't lost their minds legitimately, and actually just are that evil and stupid, are doing this on purpose. They know the tactics of being bullies and getting away with it, because their generations didn't invent the practice, but perfected it by gaining more and more generational power and never facing the music for it. They're too old now, and get defended by younger people giving them the benefit of the doubt, saying "Oh they're old, they say things like that, but they don't mean it." Trust me, they mean it.

So when I look at the internet and see everybody diagnosing boomers with dementia, Alzheimer's disease and whatever other kinds of degenerative mental conditions, it feels like we're trying to pretend it's not happening to not hate grandma and grandpa. We're giving them an out that they don't have to learn anything with, and will simply fall on it as an excuse. "I'm old, what are you gonna do about it?" is more or less unironically the law of the land because we let it happen. That's basically "favorite child" treatment, because anybody else gets arrested, fined or imprisoned for half of the things that an elderly person can, and does get away with on a regular basis.

Would you reach for a police officer's weapon? Of course not. Would you swerve your car at somebody looking for an accident so that you can have something happen that day? Hopefully not. Would you support a fascist state that you were alive long enough to watch be destroyed for the betterment of the world? They would. And overwhelmingly do. We can't just blame old age for this, this is way deeper than that. They're showing who they actually are, with the confidence that they will never see justice or recourse for their actions and words. This is a generational stranglehold.

By allowing this kind of behavior and giving in to their bullshit excuses for why their brain doesn't work right anymore, we're opening the door for this to be a forever cycle. Gen X is right there with them, nearing and reaching retirement age, and will 100% be the next group to pull this. In my honest opinion, the only way to stop this is to not allow the political input of those with degenerative cognitive diseases, such as dementia and senile dementia, and watch how fast that stops being an excuse for older fucks in that age bracket.