Booming? Give Me a Break!

Myths and clichés about the boomer generation (paid subscribers only after the paywall). A version of this article appeared in today's "i" paper.

Do not go gentle into that good night. The famous Dylan Thomas lines inspired by the poet’s dying father should serve as a message to every aged person in the country and encourage them to ‘Rage, rage against the dying of the light.’

Rage? You bet. In fact, I’m effing fuming daily about how the older generation are treated in this country. And a report just published by MPs is on my side, declaring that Britain suffers from a “pervasively ageist culture” in which older people are being discriminated against in the workplace, the media and in access to vital public services.

The report criticises depictions of baby boomers - those born between 1946 and 1964 and now in their 60s and 70s - as either frail or enjoying a life of luxury at the expense of their children and grandchildren.

Apparently, we “wealth-hoarding boomers” are living comfortable lives in homes we own, while the struggling younger generation can’t get on the housing ladder and are barely surviving on low incomes, bless ’em.

The truth is, they are not badly off compared to when I was young; they just want everything earlier, more easily, and, if they don’t get it, sulk into their £15 cocktails. They feel entitled to the things my generation had to work damned hard for. We expected nothing, and nothing came easily. It still doesn’t.