I'm at the age that Boomers were when their mid-life crises were so aggressively loud and obnoxious that they weren't just everywhere in public (leisure suits worn and convertibles driven by newly-divorced dads that just contemplated mortality for roughly the first time, often cruising to creep on people half their age), but were everywhere in media as well. TV shows, movies, stand-up comedians, comic strips, and much more from the 80s to the 90s were all there to either wail with anguish at the onset of middle age, or were there to provide Woody Allenesque creep-treats that constantly assured the Boomers that teenagers totally wanted to have sex with them. As one random example, City Slickers aged like milk doing that, where a central plot point is that one of the middle-aged protagonists impregnated a 20-year-old and the narrative presents his wife being upset about that as a neurotic, irrationally angry, and overall bad person. The standard Boomer "joke" about how they get older and their dates get younger escalates to the punchline "soon you'll be dating sperm!" :libertarian-alert:
Not all of it was sexual pathology, either. Some of the films made during that time were insufferably self-absorbed about Boomer identity, such as the "Thirtysomething" TV series, and some of the seeds of their chuddery can be seen all the way back then, such as the cognitive dissonance of its two main messages: "be yourself, you are the most important person in the world, all that matters is what pleases you" and "people that don't live exactly like affluent cliquish white people are worthy of contempt." :maybe-later-kiddo: :grillman:
Sure, most Millennials don't really have the means to purchase convertibles and creep on teenagers even if they wanted to, but I still commend most of the aging folks around me for handling the onset of middle age a lot better than our predecessors in the 80s and 90s. :stalin-approval:
The media also decided to ignore us after a relatively short pandering phase, where after that the nostalgia treats got decoupled from the kids that actually knew about them when they were new. Maybe that helped. I don't know. :shrug-outta-hecks:
In child abuse psychological terminology, I think they call it "adultification," and I think it did happen to a lot of Millennials, and the name is deceptive because it's not a good thing for young people to go through, especially when Boomers were so very eager to infantilize Millennials (and later, Zoomers) and blame them for everything while kicking the ladders down.
trying to retreat into our childhood
Go to Las Vegas and see how many sad depressing glorified rest home activity centers called "casinos" have Gilligan's Island, Flipper, and hippie-themed slot touch-screens.
How many Boomers were researching minimalism and tiny homes in their 20s and 30s?
How did we go from living in a van down by the river to living in a van down by the river in the space of 30 years?
my midlife crisis is wearing flip flops, taking my blood pressure medication, and blushing nervously when people in their 20s flirt with me at the grocery store.
the thing some have said about reduced expectations rang true for me. i have a lot of genX acquaintances with plenty of material security and big incomes that are so much more bitter and angry than I am. I stepped off the careerist treadmill in my mid-20s to pursue my passion, which doesn't pay shit. I've managed to claw my way into not being broke, which is awesome, but it fucked my earning potential compared to my slightly older peers. but they all have weird, toxic relationships with their careers and seem stuck while I feel like I could walk away and start again despite having way less savings/equity.
boomers are just out of control at this point. consuming an endless treat filled summer, truly believing that another vacation or dinner out will be the thing that returns some spark of happiness they haven't felt since the return of Coke Classic. who cares if the nukes fly, so long as they have a mouthful of treats when the air around them reaches 10,000°C
meanwhile, my dream of retirement is sitting on a breezy porch after some light gardening in the morning, exchanging glances with an old dog, smelling the slow cooker going, and being able to afford my BP meds.
is sitting on a breezy porch after some light gardening in the morning, exchanging glances with an old dog, smelling the slow cooker going, and being able to afford my BP meds.
You sound like my spiritual liege. :solidarity:
Most millennials were taught to be self-loathing at a young age, god forbid we steal the spotlight from parents.
that's because a. millenials don't have enough money to blow on a porsche and b. millenials realized that life was shitty sooner than boomers did. boomers by and large could fuck around for a while before their "is that all there is" moment, millenials were stuck working shitty jobs straight out of college
I blew money on a Porsche, it wasn’t worth it :deeper-sadness:
(TBF it cost about as much as a normal used car)
no shade on young parents but my mum was a mum at my age and that scares me
Based on the new Top Gun, it seems like Boomers are still having their midlife crises pandered to by the media.
"Of course a 65-year-old pilot can outmanuever a drone!! Of course we don't have to pass on the reigns to the next generation!! We're still cool! We're still cool!!"
I'm not sure if it's my complete detachment from nostalgia and fond memories of the past (mine are blank pages thanks to trauma 🤪), but I find it very easy to not be so caught up with the treats of the early 2000s and that era in general. Being very online, I usually see what's trending and I don't consider the media I grew up with as sacred either. I think it's pretty easy to age gracefully and engage with the present
I don't understand people who long for the 90s and early 2000s at all. As a :flag-lesbian-pride: I'll gladly stay in the present where it's not as hard to exist. If anything, I wish I was born a decade later so I could have had a better time in school
If anything, I wish I was born a decade later so I could have had a better time in school
What do you mean you don't have fond memories of the state indoctrination and trauma factory??
Me going to religious school in the 2000s and realizing I'm gay: :this-is-fine:
Also just to add to it - I probably still would have been made to go to religious school, but if I had just had ANY queer person to look up to or any friends online (discord would have been nice back then), I would have just been open about it. But I didn't want to fight it alone, so I quietly kept it to myself
That is a sad thing to think back to 😢
I managed to avoid the religious angle, but even going through normie school was rough. Being aware of being gender nonconforming but with literally nothing other than drag as an even remotely positive example, at that time it's no wonder a lot of people ended up keeping to themselves.
Going to a relatively conservative college was a bad choice in hindsight, too :agony-soviet:
Yeah, it wasn't easy anywhere. I didn't go to a conservative college, but I did find it hard learning how to be me while also returning home and being more reserved and hiding myself again. Learning how to be a person in your 20s is hard. I can't imagine why anyone would want to be born in the 90s lol
I hope things have gotten better for you now and those shitty memories are far in the past
I'm doing really well now! Don't wanna dox myself but I ended up having a pretty successful career, good coping skills and a family that are supportive help a lot.
I'm also having a much better 30's than my 20's but coming out as trans a couple years ago might be a major component of that.
Good for you. I'm 42 and its probably the first time in my life where I've felt happy
I’m in my mid-30’s and every year feels better, at least mentally.
Physically, I'm doing quite well. I've had a number of health problems clear up over time due to better diet and lifestyle changes.
Getting older sucks overall, but at a personal level, it isn't that bad so far. The world's on fire and there's no perceivable way out that world-on-fire problem yet, but that's another issue.
except maybe become a chud and :frothingfash: all over the internet
For millennial chuds, the "dae remember being a subversively le funnay edgelord and posting ironic nazi shit on the internet" nostalgia does seem to drive them quite a bit. Sure, the irony mask dropped away over time, but that's the fault of the woke SJWs. Surely.
I used to say some slurs "jokingly" myself. I suppose the difference was that I was told that it was hurting people and consequently stopped, and :frothingfash: was so caught up in "I AM THE EPIC HERO IN MY OWN STORY" exceptionalism that any talk of changing their attitude or behavior had to be THE BAD GUYS.
There must be quite a temptation to performatively put tape across one's mouth that says "CENSORED" on a selfie image then make bank with the chud entertainment circuit.
I’m at the age that Boomers were when their mid-life crises were so aggressively loud and obnoxious that they weren’t just everywhere in public
I'm too poor to have a mid-life crisis, best I can do is drink more
"I'm handling my midlife crisis well" or "I'm not having a midlife crisis" are just subgenres of midlife crisis.
Some subgenres are generally better places to be than others, even if that was the case.
We're not far out enough of the 2010s to figure out what the mainstream was yet. If I were to guess at it, it's hipster fashion and athleisure, slim fit suits (some of the suits they used to wear look hilarious today), no more rock influence in pop its more electronic and rap I guess, smartphones took over pretty early into it when they weren't a thing, there was way more cultural emphasis on dystopias like the Purge series or any popular YA series.
None of that feels all that different from today cause we haven't been separated long enough, you'll probably realize there was a difference in like 2026. At least that's when I was finally able to articulate the difference between 2000s and 2010s. Even in the early 00s it was hard to tell what "the 90s" were because that was still just the way everything was. Like the only HUGE thing is covid19 and how that warped everything, thatll clearly be the dividing line like 9/11 was for 90s to 00s.
Good post, comrade. I figure we're roughly the same age, and I've had similar thoughts. It's funny, I remember just how pervasive the jokes/plotlines involving a "mid-life crisis" was back in the 90s. Getting old sucks. Sometimes it feels weird being around here knowing I'm on the older end of the curve. But I'm honestly pretty happy with my life. Sometimes I think there's a lot that I'd do different (like not be a cringe libertarian reading von Mises and Bastiat in college), but then again the path I took brought me to where I am (including being a commie, which is pretty rad) so I can't complain.
I do think people our age deal with this with maybe a somewhat unhealthy amount of nostalgia. Like, I often think about staying up late at night playing N64 in my friend's basement in the late 90s, and it makes me pretty. But that's a totally different ballgame from how the boomers dealt with it.
Also, this is entirely anecdotal so not really worth anything... but I know a few gen-Xers, and I've known them for a long time. None of them are really downwardly mobile or have a whole lot to complain about in life. But jfc, do they all seem a lot more angry and bitter all the time. Over the years they've just become very difficult to be around. Don't know what that's about.
staying up late at night playing N64 in my friend’s basement in the late 90s, and it makes me pretty.
Did you crack the code? :screm-pretty:
Lol now I can't correct it to "pretty happy".
Eh, I like it how it is anyway.
This thread's all about acceptance anyway. :screm-pretty:
Well, mostly. :screm-a:
Getting old does suck. Yes, I did have a mid-life crisis, and I had it early. The feeling of dread about how many paths were not taken and how many doors closed forever behind me was haunting. That said, I and those my age that I know (those slightly older than me that I know are in full Gen-X Junior Boomer "I got mine, but also woe is me" perpetual angst, but that's a different story) seem to know that, accept that, and don't ask for and don't want endless media serenading that pain. We just... are.
There's also the types that call Ready Player One their favorite novel, have walls of Funko Pops, and put thousands of dollars into Star Citizen, but those tend to be Xers (pre-1980s birth) in my experience. "Generation Meh" by and large turned into Junior Boomers. There might also possibly be something about leaded gasoline not really being phased out yet around the time of their birth and most crucial formative years.
I still play N64 sometimes tho :bottom-speak: don't judge me I like retro games
I mean, I own a console and have a bunch of games, I'd play more if I had the time.
Manufacturing consent happened to the boomers. The idea that the media was created to pander to a desire for sports cars and young mistresses, and not to create the desire, seems a little backwards and anti materialist to me.
The millennial version of what you are talking about is :reddit-logo:
The idea that the media was created to pander to a desire for sports cars and young mistresses, and not to create the desire, seems a little backwards and anti materialist to me.
That idea had legs. We even see variants of it with the many versions of "my entertainment has zero effect on me, literally everything in society would happen exactly the same way with or without the endless propaganda in the entertainment, let people enjoy things, touch grass touch grass touch grass" seen across the internet, including here.
Maybe, but it isn't a choice. It's all there is, "there is no alternative." Its a feedback loop for sure, but our ideology is determined by our relationship to production. To think otherwise is probably idealistic
Maybe, but calling out the "if you don't have sports car and aren't creeping on people half your age, you're not normal" propaganda is better than not calling it out. To think otherwise is defeatist and fatalistic.
Yeah you're right about that, def call out bullshit in media. It is fatalistic to just accept it. But that's bourgeois media, it doesn't have anything to do with boomers. It sucks because they were the last generation where like original content was mainstream and lots was bad but a lot of it was pretty good too. Buy yeah, now pop culture is just remaking all the shit that the boomers made, every 20 years or whatever.
Anyway this is a place for venting so I get where you're coming from.Millennials received some original content of their own that is now being rebooted and reimagined like all the rest.
According to the fucking boomers themselves it basically started at 30 and crests at 40. "Never trust anyone over 30" they even said as a pre-meme meme.
