The Tribune

“WHAT makes you go,I’m with the boomers on this one?”

That was the question posed by a Twitter user on Saturday, getting more than 1,000 replies and more than 13,000 quote tweets. Almost 48 million people viewed the tweet up to close of business on Tuesday.

The question is based on the assumption that baby boomers — people in the generation between the Silent Generation and Generation X, born between 1946 and 1964 — do not adapt well to change. They define themselves by their professional achievements. They believe in being self-sufficient and promote personal independence. They, in short, believe in hard work. Further, they believe that people can change their own circumstances through that hard work. These are the common assumptions made about baby boomers, often referred to as “boomers”.

The reference tweet also builds on the “OK, boomer” meme. This catchphrase is used as a dismissive response to people — who are either baby boomers or being compared to them —whose assertions are in line with outdated ways of thinking. “OK, boomer” could be the response to the frequently referenced suggestion that if millennials would just stop buying coffee every day, they could afford to buy houses. It is a short, mocking retort to a statement that is considered to have no validity while being tied to the values of a generation is not necessarily paying attention to the changes over the past few decades that have made and continue to make the goals, possibility, and everyday lives of younger generations different from their own.

The question about what makes Twitter users agree with baby boomers calls on people to look at the other side, or to look in the mirror and both find and reveal the ways that they refuse to adapt. Many of the responses were about things like headphone jacks no longer being on electronic devices, music taste, preferring phone calls to text messaging, and the volume of music in restaurants. Quite a large number of people referenced QR code menus, stating strong preferences for printed menus. Some of the responses were common quotes like “Put a hat on that baby’s head,” and “We got food at home.” There is nostalgia, humour, and cultural criticism in the replies to the question. Almost all of them could be a critical essay, delving into issues from personal values to political positions.

A Bahamian responded, “People complain too much.” The tweet went on to acknowledge that mental health is important, but people need to, essentially, grow up and push through whatever obstacles they are facing to get where they need to be. Some people strongly agreed, one even saying that millennials and/or Zillennials (also know as zennials) are coddled and want to have achievements without working for them.

Another Twitter user pointed out that complaints are typically viewed negatively rather than an expression of suffering or dissatisfaction regarding a circumstance that can and needs to change. Complaints are also an indication that a person or group of people have the awareness that conditions can be improved. It is also important to note that complaining is not at odds with working or “pushing through”. It is possible to do both. In fact, many people are doing both. We are pushing through, recognising that the push is not directly correlated to how far we get, and choosing not to be silent about it.

Neoliberalism is often considered to be an ideology held by baby boomers who believe that hard work produces commensurate benefits and continue to hold that belief today when it is demonstrably untrue at worst and inconsistent at best. There is still a prevailing idea that people need to take full responsibility for themselves and all of their needs, and there need not be state-intervention. The assumption is that the individual will and actions are more powerful than the economic, political, and social conditions. It ignores the significant inequalities that constrain most of us while benefitting one small group of people.

There is danger in the generalised criticism of people who complain. We need to know that the timing of a traffic light is incorrect and only two cars can go before the light turns red. We need to know that there is a mold in a school building. We know, all too well, that we need to know the location of potholes. We need to know when the printers are not working at the passport office. We need to know which streets flood after 15 minutes of rain. We need to know which grocery stores have expired products on their shelves. The need to know is often satisfied by complaints.

There are people calling for the criminalisation of marital rape. There are people demanding that Marco’s Law be implemented properly with an alert system that reaches everyone and contains all of the correct and necessary information. There is a call for local government. The government is actively seeking climate financing. Complaints have led to people finding potential solutions and components of new, effective systems to reduce and/or eventually eradicate longstanding problems.

Complaints are often an indication of a problem rather than a problem themselves. The people making complaints could be in any of a wide range of situations. For some, all they can do is complain as they carry the burden of working multiple jobs to barely make ends meet.  Other complain in order to inform other people. Many people complain as a way of finding other people facing the same issue, whether to commiserate or to find out if others have found a solution or a way to avoid the same issue in the future. Some complain in hopes that someone in a position of power will step up and offer a solution or, even better, implement a solution so that the problem is resolved for everyone.

It is sometimes possible to push through. People can repair their tyres over and over again. People can spend far too much time on one traffic light, watching it change over and over again while barely moving. People can waste gas and time, driving around the island to find a working ATM after scores of people have done the same thing without sharing the experience.  People can work minimum wage jobs and send their children to school without breakfast. People can push through. People can also be no better off for the effort.

It is easy to dismiss complaints, and just as easy to dismiss people who complain. People often see complaints as synonymous with laziness. There is often the question, “What are you going to do about it?” The expectation is that everyone has the capacity to take action, and many people believe that only people who are able and willing to act deserve to speak up. Sometimes people are even blamed for their experiences. They are asked why they went there in the first place, why they did not already know that was the case, and where were they when a particular change was made. Many people truly believe that every single person is supposed to have endless information, time to do research, energy to take action, and/or enough shame at their ignorance, whether or not it is their fault to keep quiet.

We need to look at what we, as a collective, have that has led us to a place where so many people are convinced that the hard work of the individual will make everything better and that complaints are both baseless and of no use. We have a lack of care, particularly for people in less favorable circumstances than ours. We have unreasonable expectations of everyone around us. We have a desire to pretend, and have everyone else pretend, that everything is fine and that everything we have is earned and deserved. We have an unwillingness to acknowledge the gap between what we do and what we have. We have disinterest in looking at the systems of oppression and inequality that contribute to the challenges many of us face on a daily basis.

It is easier to put the blame on the person. On the people. Thousands of them. If we really value hard work, we should abandon the easy route. People are being harmed by systems, and their complaints point to those systems. It is not that the people need to work harder within violent, oppressive systems; people with the time, knowledge, and energy need to work together to dismantle those systems and build new, effective systems that allow us to work, to rest, to care, and to have our needs met, regardless of our ability  — and we must remember that we cannot all participate in the same ways — to work (hard).

RECOMMENDATIONS

1. What Happened to My Ambition? With Rainesford Stauffer.

This episode of Work Appropriate — a podcast about “the wild world of work” hosted by Anne Helen Peterson — focuses on work, ambition, and how ambition can exist and be useful outside of work.

2. Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto by Tricia Hersey.

This book calls on people to push back against grind culture, find justice, and take care of themselves. It is written by the founder of the The Nap Ministry which quickly grew in popularity and following on social media, encouraging people, especially Black people, to find rest. Casey Gerald called the book “one of the most vital interventions of our time”.