Tuesday, April 7, 2015

"There will never be a generation as powerful the baby boomers"

     Easter Sunday, as I was on my way home from the ever-so-rural town of Whiting, NJ with my mother and grandmother, a conversation about respect emerged.  My grandmother asked me if I believed in the classical "Respect Your Elders" way of thinking.  Being the stubborn, thick headed, can't let it go cynic that I am, I had to tell her the truth; I absolutely do not.
     My grandmother is a traditional Italian woman fully equipped with gravy recipes, mopinas, and mafia-esque respect ideals. Naturally, this started a pretty heated debate during the two hour long drive back to the forward thinking (laughs uncontrollably) borough of Staten Island, a dump I call home.  As I am talking about my personal philosophies on life my mother decides she should probably get involved so she can make sure to make matters worse.  Her argument was that her generation- the Baby Boomers- was the coolest, most radical and powerful generation there will ever be.  I lost my damn mind.
      I informed my mother, politely of course, that she had no idea what the hell she was talking about.  True, the radical movements the Baby Boomers have initiated caused major changes in the sociology of our country, but we are involved in just as radical of a movement- the digital revolution.
      My generation is just as radical as the Baby Boomers.  The only difference is the platform with which we protest, gather, and share ideas.  Where as the Baby Boomers had a few hundred people gather in different locations for peaceful protests, we had a couple million people black out their profile pictures on Facebook as a protest of SOPA and PIPA. The Baby Boomers relied on media coverage to get their message heard around the world.  My generation owns the media and can get there message across the country as soon as they complete the last sentence.
     I think that we have a lot of work to do to make as much of an impact as the Baby Boomers did. However, I still think my mother was wrong.  There are more of us with higher education and exponentially more platforms to express our ideas.  We can, and I believe we will, be the most powerful generation. Sorry mom.

1 comment:

  1. Wow that is a really cool way of looking at and comparing the generations! I can't wait to see what we do with the future and how future generations will change the world too!

    I remember a few years back when the Arab Spring was happening and it was all because of social media websites like Facebook where people can share their ideas. Even the Occupy Wallstreet movement had Facebook and other social media coverage.

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