The Boomer Revolution and Its Consequences

The infantilized mentality of our times is an echo of the adolescent revolt of a half-century ago that produced it.

Matthew Boose August 30th, 2019

The Wall Street Journal this week published the results of a survey that found Americans’ values are shifting drastically, and not in a good way.

The poll, conducted with NBC News, found that Americans care less about patriotism, family, and faith than they did 20 years ago. The percentage of Americans who regard family as very important dropped 16 points, to a mere 43 percent. The importance of religion dropped 12 points, to 48 percent; and patriotism fell 9 points, to 61 percent.

The trend was most pronounced among Millennials and older members of Gen Z—or Zoomers, as they are sometimes known, who consistently rated these values lower than older Americans: 79 percent of Americans 55 and older valued patriotism, compared with 42 percent of younger Americans; nearly two-thirds of older Americans say they value religion highly, compared with less than one-third of younger Americans.

Taken together, the statistics tell a neat story of moral decline. So young people really are a bunch of godless egoists who think brunch and having pets instead of children is the summum bonum! It’s not quite wrong, but it isn’t quite fair, either.

Young people get a lot of grief from Boomers, but their confusion wasn’t formed in a vacuum. Sure, university, mass culture, and public schooling all have played a role in bringing about these changes, but Millennials are the products of the Boomers, the first true “Me Generation” in American history.

The shifts in core values reflect the ascendance of a culture of selfishness and mindless consumption, but that culture didn’t come from the Millennials or the Zoomers. Before today’s “Me Generation” came into being, there were the hedonist faux-ascetics of the 1960s who melted their brains with hallucinogens while dabbling in Eastern religions of self-denial to stick it to their uptight suburban parents.

The law of the Self has left Americans lost and confused. How could it fail to, when it stifles the deepest human yearnings, for love, family, community, justice, and belonging? ...........To Read More.....