I think it's pretty clear now (based on boomers continually voting for leaders that like to meddle in other nations) that the only reason you guys got so worked up about Vietnam was because you didn't want to be sent there. Self interest.
Then there's the civil rights movement. From experience until very recently I can't imagine that all that many of you did much at all to support equal rights for women and ethnic minorities. My suspicion is that those that did purport to support such things were only doing it to be in a broad enough coalition (now the US Democrat's and other left leaning mainstream political parties around the world) to make sure your own agenda got the push you guys thought they deserved.
But who knows? Maybe you guys did have these intentions all along (on a mass scale), and not just out of self interest. Either way, I can't see you guys having any serious positive influence on modern liberalism. In my experience older people are far too quick to think the worst of new technologies.
This is unfortunate as most young liberals today support civil liberties without feeling they have to compromise on economic liberalism. And they don't. This was the major fallacy of boomers, a generation of unionists suspicious of technology (and to this day any economic developments) as being job destroying. This, and your attitude towards real choice as consumers (consumeristic affluenza, as you call it) its what will keep you from being helpful in anything younger generations now hope to achieve in terms of political activism.
Boomers to the Barricades
I think it's pretty clear now (based on boomers continually voting for leaders that like to meddle in other nations) that the only reason you guys got so worked up about Vietnam was because you didn't want to be sent there. Self interest.
Then there's the civil rights movement. From experience until very recently I can't imagine that all that many of you did much at all to support equal rights for women and ethnic minorities. My suspicion is that those that did purport to support such things were only doing it to be in a broad enough coalition (now the US Democrat's and other left leaning mainstream political parties around the world) to make sure your own agenda got the push you guys thought they deserved.
But who knows? Maybe you guys did have these intentions all along (on a mass scale), and not just out of self interest. Either way, I can't see you guys having any serious positive influence on modern liberalism. In my experience older people are far too quick to think the worst of new technologies.
This is unfortunate as most young liberals today support civil liberties without feeling they have to compromise on economic liberalism. And they don't. This was the major fallacy of boomers, a generation of unionists suspicious of technology (and to this day any economic developments) as being job destroying. This, and your attitude towards real choice as consumers (consumeristic affluenza, as you call it) its what will keep you from being helpful in anything younger generations now hope to achieve in terms of political activism.