• UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    boomers came of age and voted to change things

    Was that what happened during the Freedom Rides of MLK era? Or at the 1968 Democratic Convention? Or the 1987 MOVE bombing? Or during the 80s/90s War on Crime and Drugs?

    I seem to remember a bunch of Boomers coming of age, getting arrested, beaten up, and shot, and then states making a historic effort to disenfranchise them in record numbers in order to control who actually gets selected to run the bureaucracy of the state.

    Might be a tinsy bit of selection bias in the “Boomers ruined everything” narrative, as a bunch of Boomers were removed from the election process long before they had any kind of control over things.

    • abbotsbury@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      I didn’t say boomers ruined everything, you’re right that the young civil rights advocates in the 60s were also boomers, but the 70s is when they grabbed political control and never let go.

      Sure it wasn’t all bad, but they wanted to change the system and did, and we are still dealing with the consequences today.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        70s is when they grabbed political control and never let go

        The 70s is when Boomers took the electoral majority. But the people actually in control - the Nixons and Rehnquists and Gettys and Waltons - were significantly older.