War mongering

Journalists are always trying to stoke up a supposed generation war - young people hate the old and vice versa - whereas in reality young and old may get on very well and sympathise with each other's problems.

An article in the Independent claims that "the generation wars seem worse than ever" and "the debate is becoming more toxic". Really? Where's the evidence, apart from a load of dubious anecdotes and stereotypes?

Most families include people of different ages and different generations. Are they all at loggerheads, constantly fuming and accusing each other of heinous offences? No, of course they aren't.

Some people get on well, some don't. That's all there is to it. I wasn't at war with my mother or my grandparents or my aunts and uncles. We may not have had the same opinions or attitudes but we rubbed along okay. I was estranged from my father for 20 years but that was exceptional.

Yes, some young people accuse us oldies of making their lives worse while we enjoy the fruits of much better lives. Yes, some oldies accuse young people of knowing it all despite their limited experience of the world.

Most of us take people as we find them however and don't trot out such one-sided stereotypes.

There's a natural tendency though for each generation to think they know better than any other generation - the young because they see us oldies as hopelessly out of touch with the modern world, oldies because we have so much more experience of the problems that life throws up, and the middle-aged because they're in the midst of so many situations the young haven't yet encountered and the oldies have forgotten about - like parenting or running a business.

Bu it takes more than self-righteousness to make a war.

It gets worse

There have been some huge social changes in my lifetime, one being the lowering of expect-ations from one generation to the next. Things my generation took for granted and confidently anticipated are now impossible fantasies for many young people.

When I was young, it was readily assumed that as people got older they would buy their own home, have a permanent job working reasonable hours, earn generous salaries, have enjoyable and fulfilling jobs (as long as they had a good education), belong to a trade union that constantly improved their wages and working conditions, always be solvent (except for a mortgage), and get excellent medical treatment.

Boy, has all that changed, and changed radically. All those expectations have been blown to smithereens by various political and economic twists and turns.

What do today's young people expect? Unless they have wealthy parents, or parents with good connections, or a family business, or exceptional skills or talents, or a shedload of luck, then probably the following:

• Be unable to afford their own home
• Pay an extortionate rent or still live with their parents
• Have a temporary job or zero-hours contract working at any time of the day
• Have a miserable salary
• Have a boring and impossibly demanding job
• Not be in a trade union as they're no longer so powerful
• Never be solvent and face a lifetime of debt
• Have poor medical treatment because the NHS is hopelessly overloaded

When I was young, it was assumed that every future generation would have a better life than the one before. We never dreamt they would have a worse life, with new burdens and obstacles we knew nothing of. And we never dreamt they would be blaming the older generation for the deterioration.

I worry that after the present virus emergency is over, with probably the loss of thousands of jobs, the young will have even worse prospects. It doesn't bear thinking about.

And another thing....

So it seems there's yet another advantage we baby boomers have had over the young, which we're only now coming to appreciate.

Yes, many of us have had very fortunate lives compared to younger generations who are facing any number of challenges - tuition fees, soaring rents, soaring house prices, falling salaries, welfare cuts, a crumbling NHS and all the rest. We've done very well and we're shocked at how bad things have got for the young. We always confidently assumed their lives would be even better than ours.

And now I realise that all these years we've had another benefit that we never recognised at the time but is now becoming glaringly obvious - we never for a second worried about how our behaviour might be bad for the climate.

We happily drove thousands of miles, flew thousands of miles, ate meat every day (well, not me, I'm a vegetarian), enjoyed log and coal fires, enjoyed oil and gas central heating, and bought things that had been flown across the world. We never saw anything wrong with what we were doing. We took it all for granted.

Only in the last few years has it sunk in that we're facing a massive climate breakdown and need to radically change our lifestyles to put things right.

Suddenly I have to examine everything I do and consider if it's harmless or if I'm damaging the climate. If I'm doing damage, I have to ask myself, is it really necessary or can I do without it?

No longer can I just mindlessly follow my whims without a thought for the consequences. No longer can I casually whizz around the world, or crank up the central heating. All that innocent indulgence is a thing of the past. And something forever denied the young.

It wasn't me

No, we baby boomers aren't to blame for every problem on the planet.
No, we aren't all greedy, selfish, irrespon-sible, heartless monsters.
No, we aren't deliberately kicking away the ladders we once climbed.
No, we aren't personally answerable for tuition fees, unaffordable houses, unaffordable rents, unpaid internships, static wages, awful working conditions, and all those other things the young are struggling with.

I've always wanted every new generation to be better off than the previous one.
That used to be the case right through the last century.
It greatly distresses me that things are getting worse for the young and not better.
It greatly distresses me that the young are being treated so badly.
But I'm not running the country and I'm not responsible.
Put the blame where it belongs - with politicians, estate agents, big business, landlords, and all the people who actually drove through those destructive changes and turned the clock back sixty years.
A lot of those changes weren't in manifestoes and didn't have public approval.

Personally I'd like to see an end to tuition fees, more council housing, rent controls, decent wages for all, an end to zero hours contracts, and stronger trade unions.
But there's little I can do to bring all that about.
I put crosses on ballot papers, sign petitions, attend rallies, write to my MP.
Is anyone listening? Is anyone taking any notice? Will anything change?
It doesn't seem very likely.
The politicians don't care much about the young and their problems.
The politicians are far removed from such difficulties.
Most are comfortably off, with nice houses, nice salaries, staff to look after them.
They don't know what it means to be struggling and debt-ridden.
So blame them and not the baby boomers.
Blame those who have the power to improve people's lives but prefer to make them worse.

Prim and proper

Is it really true that the young are embarr-assed by oldies who are physically affectionate to each other? Do they really think we're "too old" for that sort of thing and should be chastely conversing, keeping our hands and mouths to ourselves?

I find it hard to believe that young people, with their generally open-minded and hedonistic approach to life, are truly that intolerant of oldies who still enjoy a bit of cuddling and canoodling as much as anyone else.

I think it's more likely that oldies have fallen for this daft idea of a "dignified" old age, and decided that certain behaviour is now embarrassing and inappropriate. So they restrain their natural impulses and stick to what they think is "proper". All that's going to do is stop them having any fun.

After all, the young don't see any virtue in a "dignified" youth. They couldn't care less if what they're doing is seen as embarrassing or inappropriate. They dress in crazy clothes, get paralytically drunk, crash cars, eat unhealthy food. They kiss and fondle each other passionately in public, oblivious to other people's reactions.

So why shouldn't oldies be equally uninhibited? Why not grow old disgracefully? Or at least naturally and not trailing a long list of artificial taboos.

Canoodling isn't the only thing oldies are supposed to abandon. There's also dancing, singing, shrieking at the top of roller coasters, laughing hysterically, eating too messily, and bellowing across crowded rooms. Anything in fact that smacks of wanton enjoyment rather than the sedate and decorous self-control that's mysteriously connected with advancing years. Bollocks to that.

The popular stereotype is something like Saffy in Absolutely Fabulous*, staring aghast at the outrageous clothes her mother is about to go out in, and commenting incredulously "You're not going out like that?" Which prompts a slurred and irreverent reply from Eddie, wondering if she has anything even more outrageous to put on instead.

But I can't believe many of the young are that censorious. And even if they are, they're only jealous. We sexagenarians may be crumbling a bit but we can still rock 'n' roll with the best of them.

* TV series featuring a stern, moralistic teenager and her wild, uncontrollable mother.