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Reminds me of the time a forest/bush fire was raging outside and I decided to call the fire department and wet all the grass and bush around the house with a hosepipe. My dad said it was unnecessary and the fire wouldn't get close to the house.
Lo and behold half an hour later the fire is a few metres/feet from the house and I'm still there with a hosepipe waiting for the fire fighters to arrive. Eventually they do and everything was fine in the end. But my boomer dad was like "Who could've seen this coming? That was close!" Seriously the cold war propaganda and lead poisoning has destroyed boomers brains. Just waiting to see what the neoliberal propaganda and micro-plastics will do to millennials and zoomers.
People are still managing to have lots of children, or so it seems.
“Who could’ve seen this coming? That was close!”
Did he ever admit he was wrong and that you were right?
Eventually, but it had to happen in front of his own eyes for him to change his mind. Reminds me of when I was a teenager and told him he could use a debit card for online purchases/playstation store and he didn't believe me and went to my countries version of GameStop to ask them and confirm it.
Who could’ve seen this coming is like the boomer slogan. My dad literally said this after the synagogue shooting and I’m just sitting on the phone thinking jesus fuck everybody.
Ahh yes, all the crunchy teflon flakes in my scrambled eggs, just extra flavour! But seriously I've been using the cheapest stainless steel cooking set I could buy for years now, I should be fine. Entire set of pots, pans and spoons/spatulas cost 40USD in my country.
Boomers also had to deal with constant nuclear fallout until the test ban treaty. Millennials have way less radioactive ions in their bodies (still present though) although our phones probably aren't helping.
Most of the ionizing radiation people are exposed to is Radon gas and cosmic radiation, both of which are pretty much everywhere so it probably hasn't made that much of a difference. Also cell phones don't produce any ionizing radiation, so unless the components are contaminated it's fine.
I probably fucked up, I shouldn't have said ionizing radiation. I meant radioactive isotopes or whatever they're called, like that Strontium shit that's in everyones bones.
The terms are more or less interchangeable in this case; radioactive isotopes produce ionizing radiation (in the form of alpha particles, beta particles, and gamma rays) so they're the same in terms of outcome. Anyway, the radiation received from stuff that's naturally occuring in the human body is almost negligible. You get way more from eating stuff containing radioactive isotopes, like bananas or red meat (both of which contain potassium), and about 3x that in radon gas inhalation (which varies depending on various geological factors).
Nuclear detonations have had an effect on the composition of the atmosphere, but it is very small, and this radiation is basically only relevant when building extremely sensitive radiation detectors.
Yeah my country had an open pit uranium mine in one town :-\
This is the Biden stan dad right? I think I remember you telling stories before. Truly am amazing brain
I mean the dems are ghouls for sure, I just don't understand how a person is that far gone but doesn't instantly find a home in the gop instead
Also an aside, thanks for checking in back when I had the corona a few months back, that was cool of you and I dont think I ever said that
I deeply deeply relate to this op. It may just be wild speculation, but I believe that boomers truly think that doing work is what gives you worth as a person. My father is semi retired but he literally cannot sit down and relax. He's always doing some project around the house, or just rearranging things or doing dishes, etc. On top of that, since I'm out of work right now, he takes every chance he gets to remind me that I dont have a job and how he cant fathom not having a job etc etc. I can't help but think it's just the result of many years of indoctrination in this workaholic society and they just cant see it any other way.
Maybe it's just my dad tho he's kinda OCD and German lol
Very frustrating. And when I try to broach the idea that we should have shorter work weeks or more vacation time, of course I am just the lazy millennial communist. :angry-hex:
To distract from the vast and yawning abyss, utterly devoid of objective meaning, one must keep the hands busy and do what the mind says is useful. People enjoy the feeling of being productive; to feel useful and needed and tell themselves that they're making the lives of others better and easier by existing. Work is, in this manner, productive! So this feeling of value and goodness becomes inextricably linked with the idea of work itself, and not the products thereof. It's not necessarily wrong, though, either -- after all helping people necessarily involves effort and work.
Building things, cleaning, making measurable, observable changes in their environment -- these are the kinds of things that allow people to tell themselves that there is meaning in life. They are building something; leaving something that will last into the future.
Us enlightened types? We can read and laugh and whittle away the hours with our hobbies that make us happy while we wait for the end to come. Helping people should only done optimally, rationally, and without obfuscating feelings of anxiety or a need to prove self-worth -- an outlook and ideology that very few people on this planet share.
These are products of endless self-awareness and ironic reflection cultivated through countless hours of obsession over ideas and expression. Posting is a convenient medium to create the self-image that allows us to look down on the rubes who waste their time in pointless, displeasurable toil. After all, wasting time pleasurably is by far the superior option.
My folks are going to be able to retire in a year, but for the most part they don't really do anything but go to work and do home maintenance/improvement stuff. They've literally never had a hobby. They really only watch Nascar as far as entertainment goes. Once they have free time I'm not sure they'll know what to do with it. They just don't have it in them to relax
labor should be this meaningful but alienation and ideology obviously exist. all day in a sweat shop cannot be considered meaningful or fulfilling by any sane person. my father thinks the same way, despite not having a job in 15 years he constantly does trivial housework and tells us about it every time and feels extremely proud of his 'hard work' and ensuing authority. i think both my parents are kind of sick but how cliche is that
When I was a young lad, I was laboring on a construction job. We went through days where we could not remove the snow long enough to snap a chalk line. ( takes like 10 seconds).
That did not stop my boss from making us try for a 4-6 hours a day. I literally spent 4-6 hours a day for a week straight sweeping away the same 2'x12' line of snow. Obviously throwing up a tarp would solve this problem in about 5 minutes. NOPE keep on sweeping.
Now that I have moved up in job titles several times, I still try to figure out how that old boss got to the position he was in. I figure the options from that generation just don't often get much better then him.
I definitely know a few people like this. IMO it's the end result of a lifetime spent worshipping the concept of work for work's own sake. Doing things a single time later, instead of multiple times earlier, is viewed as "lazy" despite being smarter and more efficient. Just a toxic fucking mindset from start to finish
Quite literally, because they led the most comfortable lives of any generation of American ever, and maybe even across world history. (Would be curious if that take is correct)
Imagine being a middle-upperclass citizen at the height of the Roman Empire, now imagine having that level of safety and stability as well as modern science, medicine, and technology. If you can see how much economic prosperity they inherited, they basically had to try to fail. They fell into affordable housing, cheap college, cushy jobs. Some of these people won't even spend most of their lives working. Some are already retired in their 50's, and not because they were some clever genius with managing money, its because they were born at the right time.
They are the first ones to tell you they "worked hard" because they worked at all. They are babies that never had to grow up. As far as they are concerned, nothing needs to change because look at how good their life is. Any change that could possibly happen would be a negative or uncertainty in their eyes. The moment something is uncomfortable in their lives, it is someone else's fault. Yours.
The truth is I understand why they think this way. It would only be natural if that is the life you have lived. In a sense they are just blind to the problems of others because they never needed to develop the eyes to see. Obviously not everyone in the age group is the same, but it is stunning to see how many of them follow the same patterns of thinking. Its like everyone's Dad is an asshole conservative.
the good boomers are dead. this isn't "the only good boomer is a dead boomer" it's "COINTELPRO, HIV, or a lifetime of experimenting with drugs has killed off all the good boomers by now, and all that's left is the worst of the worst"
As someone who goes through probably 15ish feet of snow a year, multiple shovel sessions are better than one large one. During a snow storm you should try and get out there a few times. The difference between just pushing the snow around vs having to lift it constantly is huge.
Yeah, I'm all for laughing at overly-angry Dads, but this is the right take.
I think the synthesis of it all is to do the multiple shovelling sessions, but also laugh at how unnecessarily angry the dad is.
Reading the Tao te ching (amongst trying other things) has really helped me unlearn a lot of those same tendencies from my own overly-angry Dad, and it is really amazing to have a new appreciation for previously shitty tasks.
Lol my dad does this exact thing I thought it was only him. I actually think it makes sense, since it is easier to shovel when there is less snow less snow than when it all builds up and there is a ton of snow. However if you're going to do that you need to realize that the driveway is just going to get covered up again and again. But without fail my dad will look outside and throw a fit going "oh goddamnit! it looks like I haven't done anything!" Like yeah dad you shoveled in the middle of a snowstorm what did you expect.
because they never learned critical thinking or had anyone seriously challenge their views+emotions, and literally don't know how to deal with it, plus large peer groups and insulate them from dissent.
add to this that they were the first generation truly inundated with mass media marketing at a high level from basically birth, with zero criticism or cynicism on the subject. so they've had 60+ years of mind control brain rot corporate propaganda, to the point it's basically their entire identities.
they're basically not self aware, and can't accept that their feelings might be bullshit or based on problematic shit literally ever.
they're like animals, but less cute and sympathetic, and more "I destroyed the world so get up by your fucking bootstraps and serve me until the day I die on my throne of gold you ungrateful little shit"
