March 25th - The Squelcher Generation
The Squelcher Generation
In light of recent political shifts toward populism in the US, it's time to redefine the Baby Boomer generation and split it into two categories: Vietnam & Counterculture followed by Post-Vietnam Welfare Capitalists. Let's start by defining some important cultural commonalities before separating them by their characteristic distinctions.
The Baby Boomer generation is currently defined by people who were born from 1946 - 1964. This generation was originally defined by:
- Significant reforms in education
- Civil rights for minority populations
- The hippie counterculture movement
- Political instability outside the US due to Post WWII Reconstruction in Europe and Asia
- The Cold War
- An increasing middle class and overall affluence due to government subsidies in housing and education
The term "Baby Boomer" encapsulates this long period because of the population boom happening in America. Again, this was a consequence of government subsidies but was also due to an overall wage increase driven by Labor Unions and the Democratic Party's New Deal Coalition: Harry Truman (1945-1953), John F. Kennedy (1961-1963), and Lyndon B. Johnson (1963-1969). In between there, Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953-1961) was a moderate republican who didn't seek to reverse New Deal programs such as regulation of business and support for Labor Unions. He also expanded Social Security and built the interstate highway system. After Kennedy's assassination, the liberal coalition took control of Congress and launched the Great Society that would cause the rise of suburban development and the concept of "social capital," or "community networks." Labor Unions crested in size and power in the 1950s due to sweeping reforms on predatory business practices, the creation of safety standards, and greater wage considerations at every level. It can be difficult to imagine today, but during this period a factory worker or mid-tier office worker could effectively support a family on a single income, own a home and car, and do so without accruing personal debt (if they were white at least). Two more significant factors define this generation in retrospect:
- All were born after WWII and too young to be politically conscious of the Korean War (1950-1953), and
- They are the last generation to reach adulthood in a completely pre-internet/pre-cell phone age.
THE REASONS THIS GENERATION SHOULD BE SPLIT AND REDEFINED:
The first part of this generation, those born between 1946-1955, would eventually face the Vietnam War Draft. Whether they went to war, weren't called due to gender, deferment, exemption, or illegal evasion, everyone reaching the age of 18 on or before 1973 faced significant societal turmoil. Additionally, even the youngest of this group witnessed drastic cultural shifts like civil rights reforms, the birth of Rock n Roll, and the Hippy Revolution.
The second group of Boomers, those born 1956-1964, would reach maturity with those major cultural shifts either resolved politically, dissipating rapidly, broadly accepted, or generalized into the background. This subsect of the Boomers would begin their political maturity under a conservative cycle of power under Nixon, but more importantly Ford. It was Gerald Ford (1974-1977) that ultimately ended the Vietnam War and signed the Helsinki Accords to pave the way to end the Cold War. (This half of the generation was raised with the fear/anxiety of bomb drills/fallout shelters without experiencing war firsthand.) Ford also presided over the worst economy in four decades since the Great Depression, with growing inflation during a recession. While the Great Depression was countered by FDR's original New Deal big government interventions, the republican Ford eased the controls by regulatory agencies to allow businesses to operate more freely while significantly reducing corporate taxes. At economy scale, this was a success with a growing GDP, but it also created a larger wealth gap due to decreasing wages amongst all sectors of laborers (unskilled and skilled). It would be popularized under Reagan as "Trickle Down Theory," or simply "Reaganism."
The first presidential election that most of this latter Boomer subsect had the opportunity to vote for was between Ford and Carter. Ford had inherited all the bad blood Nixon started plus a recession. Additionally, Ford had never been elected as president, but had succeeded Nixon as his VP, and not even Nixon's first VP (Spiro Agnew resigned in shame for taking kickbacks plus a felony charge of tax fraud). Then there was Watergate and Ford became president and right away pardoned Nixon. With all that, he really didn't stand much of a chance in a general election against Jimmy Carter's wholesome down-home appeal. Also, the South was still strongly democrat (due to strong, albeit racist, union efforts).
Everyone loves Jimmy Carter nowadays, but he was probably the most ineffective president of the modern era. He did some good stuff like a national energy policy, but his foreign policy was a nightmare. He reignited the Cold War and imposed a grain embargo on the Soviet Union (which put the economic burden on American farmers and didn't do shit to the USSR) in response to the Iran-Contra Affair. He was a one term president in the end, and he rounded out the last two years with the Iran Hostage Crisis, the 1979 Energy Crisis, the Three Mile Island Nuclear Accident, the Nicaraguan Revolution, and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Hoo boy!
So, then we get Ronnie Fucking Reagan. These younger Boomers are starting to have families now. Have been for a few years. They're also still reaping the benefits of the social programs put in place by the generation before them, but their dollar isn't going as far. The suburbs are also the thing now, and communities are pretty homogenous, but no more so than previous periods except that they felt safer, more people had lawns to mow, and the major distinction was that they were more isolated from other groups. TV is much bigger now and more dramatic than in previous periods (TV wasn't in the majority of American homes till around 1955).
The second subsect of Boomers were the first to grow up with TV as common entertainment and news. The shows they grew up with dealt mostly with the American Dream or goofy themes. Family is at the heart of all of it with The Andy Griffith Show, My Three Sons, Leave It To Beaver, Addams Family, etc. Action shows were likewise tame and an easy respite from work and stress: Bonanza and other westerns, Lost in Space, and Star Trek debuted. The 70s continued in a nearly identical track with shows like the Brady Bunch, Chips, Dallas, Dukes of Hazzard, and Different Strokes. (Dukes of Hazzard effectively white-washed history and turned a racist flag into just some "good 'ol boys, never meaning no harm" while riding around in the General Lee). It was a little more challenging and a little less white, but still very comfortable.
But now we're in the 80s and things get a little weirder and livelier in sitcoms, but the big change was in the news. Local news began competing for viewers through a dramatic shift that has become the common format. Human interest stories and hyper localized information made more and more room for regional and national news, and the worst of it rose to the top. Crime especially attracted viewers and somewhere in there, white suburban communities began feeling an outsized feeling of threat. Again, the actor Ronnie Reagan is in office during the 2nd boomers' early adulthood. And he does everything they want. He's tough on crime, he guts social programs and gives the money directly to them in the form of little checks. They can touch this money and they're happy about that. He sells them wholesale on the Trickle-Down Theory and the renewal of the American Dream. People are making crazy money in every market - entrepreneurs are put on pedestals as examples and the stock market becomes more widely used for every individual investor, bank, and corporation. “Greed is good” becomes a thing. Rich people carry poor people on their shoulders up to economic freedom! The lie is packaged well for suburban whites and poor whites are sold on the idea that the reason they don't have money is because of immigration.
Outside of the trades, Labor Unions are dead, but whatever - there are so many jobs if you just want to work. They may not pay as well as they did for their older siblings or their parents, but now there's a ladder to climb. Reagan cuts down on crime, starts the Drug War, all the secret wars in South America, and the mass incarceration of minorities in America. The class war that has always been raging in America is effectively silenced and turned into mere snippets and crime reports (although that really started in the 70s, it's practically weaponized by the 80s). The white middle class is loving it. The working poor are jealous, but they're on the rungs of the ladder, and again, they've swallowed the pill that they're competing now with immigrants. Minorities of every color, gender, creed, and sexuality are getting royally fucked, but their voice is also minority. The Cosby Show is a positive example to black people that they can rise above systemic racism and is an example to white people that there is no systemic racism. There may not be as many great jobs, but if you're white, you can secure a loan and rent to own. It's just an investment, something to leave for the kids.
The 90s roll around and the kids get political as they do, but it's in a cynical way though they don't know why yet. It's all there in the zeitgeist and is intuitive somehow. There's so many god damn Boomers that Gen Xers will never get a chance to lead or out vote Boomer policies by this point. Gen Xers are disregarded as uninformed ingrates. Parents know best. The slacker generation gets slacking. Moderate liberals look a lot like conservatives. These kids eventually become adults and get jobs, but there's nothing left of the pie and no safety net left; it's been used up. The younger half of the Boomers took what they could from it and then sunk it to save some tax dollars. They voted down every environmental movement and repealed many others, voted for every tax break for the wealthy so that the top 1% now owns 40% of total wealth in the country and the gap is growing wider still. 60% of the nation's wealth is in the hands of millionaires and billionaires. Corporations outsourced all meaningful manufacturing jobs to cheap labor so that the Boomers could buy cheap sweatpants and electronics at Big Box stores - everything on a race to the bottom of cost. And the stock market became just an emotional thermometer of the wealthiest and has nothing to do with investment in companies. Looking good on paper is touted as an Economy.
Those whites born between 1956 and 1964 aren't just Boomers, they're the Squelcher Generation. That's the new name I'm giving them. They are the worst, most racist generation of bigots that ever begot. They had no serious hardships - only shortsighted gimme selfishness. Their legacy is environmental devastation, economic inequity, racial intolerance, lifestyle indemnification, executive tyranny, and upper-class dominance. They've broken the social contract of our global community.
They're a fear-based group, these Squelchers. They wanted to get the most with the least effort. Very human, but completely irresponsible. And that's when the Internet comes along and the Squelchers learn how to find their news on Facebook. They took to the internet without any understanding and so necessarily without wisdom. Duped so easily by those looking to make a buck from snippets and vitriol.
All that us Gen Xers and Millennials can do is to raise a socially moral new generation and wait for the Squelchers to die. Hopefully it's not too late.
Gen Z, I’m sorry that the Squelchers are also likely to use up all the money they’ve squirrelled away (and falsely inflated the GDP with) by requiring so much late-life care that it will all be gone before you ever think of starting your own families. Good luck buying a house or securing wealth for your children. My heart goes out to you…