We are sick of you

Attention, baby boomers: We are sick of you.

We are sick of hearing about how much fun the '60s were. You got to sway naked in a field while listening to acid rock. Good for you. We'd love to hang out naked in a field smoking pot, but, unfortunately, the economy has been in the crapper for a long time and we have to go to work.

We are sick of you telling us how apathetic and apolitical we are. Again, it's really great that you all had the time to march around, stick flowers in guns and fight the power. Believe me, we young 'uns have our political views, we just don't see what holding up a poorly constructed placard is going to do (besides get us maced by an increasingly violent police culture). Plus, all that protesting didn't seem to do anything for you guys.

Sidebar: You were raised on Kennedy. We got Reagan (the man who was busy fighting Legionnaire's Disease while thousands of people were dying of an as yet unidentified disease known as AIDS). Cut us some slack if we seem a little uninterested in the political.

Next, pul-lease quit talking about all you did for the environment. If you drive anything larger than a Toyota Echo, leave us alone. If I see one more "Save the Earth" or "Visualize World Peace" bumper sticker on a Ford Expedition or a Jeep Cherokee, I'm going to scream. (I know, I know, you need those big SUVs to take your kids to therapy and haul people to the WTO protests.)

Oh yeah, and we are really sick of you talking about free love. You don't think we want to have healthy, enjoyable, more casual sex lives? You did it, you enjoyed it and you lived. For us, one wrong move, one bad night, or one random condom with a pinprick and we die (and not from Legionnaire's Disease). We've been trained to fear sex since grade school. Most of us learned how to wrap a banana in a condom by the age of 8, just in case.

We are also sick of hearing about how our music sucks. Believe it or not, some influential musical influences began creating well after 1969. Baby boomers, I'd like you to meet Public Enemy and Dr. Dre. (On the other hand, if you are a 45-year-old woman and you are dressing like Shakira in public and it is not Halloween, please stop. You are pathetic. Baby Boomer Men, I likewise beg you, if you are listening to the White Stripes in an ear wax-colored Pontiac Bonneville, realize that those young girls next to you at the stoplight aren't smiling at you, they are laughing at you ... hard.)

One last complaint: If I hear one more baby boomer start a sentence with, "One time, at Studio 54...." I'm gonna hurt someone.

Now, of course, not all baby boomers tick us off. But if you start your sentences with "You know, kids, back in the '60s ... " more than twice a day, you may have a problem.

To quote Homer Simpson, "Shut up or we'll put you in that crooked nursing home we saw on '60 Minutes.'"

-- Liz

The lost generation

I grew up a member of the '80s generation. I graduated from high school at its conclusion, 1989. I grew up in a typical town in a typical state. I grew up around parents who grew up during the '60s.

I grew up in a time when AIDS was a new thing -- when medical science was just learning about this new disease. Transmission mechanisms were uncertain. Could you get it from kissing? Who knew -- which is why my first girlfriend and I never kissed in the two weeks we dated. Not once. Sex education was neither sexy nor educating. Radical changes were pushed through the system by the more liberal-minded of our parents, but they were restricted from really educating by the more conservative. Mostly I learned that you can't fail sex education, even if you mark "C" for every answer on every test.

I grew up in and around divorce. While my parents avoided the plague, everyone around me fell like flies. Parents longing for the freedom of their youth came and left like so many callers at a child's wake. Some talked to my friends about it, some didn't. None stayed for very long. All claimed needing to "experience life." The effects are still being shown to this day -- all of my friends either stay in relationships no matter what the cost or leave them no matter what the benefits.

I grew up around conflicting philosophies of life. I once caught a ride home from a dad of a friend. We talked during the ride as I often did with parents or step-parents of friends. We talked about what it was like during his youth. We talked about the ideals and the changes he wanted to make when he was not much older than I was. We talked about the free love and the love of issues and the love of life. And the music played all along: "You say you want a revolution ... " He dropped me off half a block from my house because my road was a dead end and it was notoriously difficult to turn around. He didn't want to risk denting his new Beamer -- with factory-installed CD player and leather seats that stuck to my thighs when I got out.

I grew up being told to "just say no." I remember finding a stash of pot in my friend's dad's bachelor pad. I remember lighting a joint, inhaling and nearly choking so hard I almost threw up. I remember two years later when I couldn't go out with my friend because he was in trouble for being arrested for possession.

I grew up asking the question, "What the hell is FICA?" when I got my first paycheck on my first job. Social Security, they said. What's that? It's so you have some money when you retire. Oh. Cool. Then I went to college and learned a thing or two (I hope). Apparently an aging population puts special pressures on society. President Clinton tells us Social Security will be bankrupt by the time I'm 50? Where the hell is my money?? I want it back!

I grew up being told all good music had been made already. Lennon was an icon for a generation (not mine). Hendrix was a god (but Eddie Van Halen, apparently, was a hack). The Ramones reflected the anger and discontent of a generation (while the haughty disdain of the Police was pretentious). Music is the voice of a cause of the people (Farm Aid, We Are the World, Free Mandela and I Won't Play Sun City are the causes of bored teens, it would seem).

I grew up during two major economic booms. Unfortunately, I was both too young and too old to take part in either of them. And the future isn't all that bright either -- apparently the '60s generation like their jobs. Who would you hire, a young buck with a few years' experience or a retired person who can do the job without benefits and brings a lifetime of experience to the job?

I share little with the '60s generation. Youth culture passed me by. Want to know where I turn for inspiration? The Lost Generation. Those who came of age in the '20s and '30s. Too young to enjoy the heyday of World War I and the boom of the '20s, too old to be "the greatest generation." That's where I sit.

Hope that helps.

-- Frank LaFone