When I was your age

Nearly two weeks ago the Thursday Styles section included an exploration of the apparent spate of celebrity deaths this summer: MJ, Farah Fawcett, Ed McMahon, John Hughes, Ted Kennedy, Walter Cronkite, Patrick Swayze... The fact is, the number of celebrity deaths was unremarkable, but they included several icons of the boomer set, "the legends that defined them as a tribe," wrote Sarah Kershaw*. They're observing the passing of their generation, an omen of their their own, personal mortality. Naturally, this inspires nostalgia. A remembrance of a time when celebrities were respected and respectable, when the world was a simpler place, so on and so forth.

Kershaw doesn't thoroughly examine this nostalgia, which of course depends on an ideal of the past as much as problematic identification with a United States at a particular historical juncture. One can nearly hear her representative boomers kvetching over the many imagined failings of this generation, whatever we're calling it.

So the boomers are trying to correct these failings, she says, throwing in quotes from Marc Freedman, who is writing a book about seniors pursuing philanthropy after retiring. “I think this is the first time so many have simultaneously had an awareness of death and the prospect of a whole new act,” Mr. Freedman said. According to Kershaw, the role models for this "Generation E" (E for encore, as in second act; as in, a really lame phrasing) include Bill Gates, Al Gore, and Bill Clinton. Role models, maybe, but representative? Not at all. This book sounds like baloney. I predict a weak thesis, a lazy use of stats, and a bunch of half-assed profiles of retired insurance executives and museum admins who've started after school programs teaching inner city kids to analyze ballet. (Actually, that might be a cool program. Nevertheless, the book does not sound promising.)

Anyway, Kershaw's article is baloney-esque, as well. She's cobbled together some "expert" quotes around an undeveloped idea regarding all these old important people dying. In any event, she noted that statistically speaking, the boomers should live until about 83, thanks to modern health care. Which reminds me of the suspicion with which many boomers view health care reform (after all, they've got coverage already, for the most part). I've seen plenty of their age set on the wrong side of those town meeting clips on Youtube. Nostalgia, after all, is part of the fear of cultural change that animates the tea baggers. No disrespect to the boomers, by any means; I'm just saying that a fear that the world is getting worse can inspire good works and bad.


UPDATE: Thankfully, Freedman will have to find a new term for his philanthropic retirees. NYT reporter Andrew Revkin has called dibs. For him, E means energy and the environment (possibly equity and enterprise, too, 'cause why not), which somehow binds the current group of young'ns.

*I just noticed that Ms. Kershaw is co-author of July's article about the dangers of pot (oh me oh my!), part of an uptick in ganja news coverage that I'll discuss about in an impending post.