Dear Boomers and Golden Oldies of NZ

By
Martyn Bradbury
-
29
1433

Coronavirus presents millennials with a generational moment

Millennials may just have the opportunity to rebrand what it means to be American, as did many of their predecessors, including the “Greatest Generation,” dubbed so for their sacrifices during World War II.

Dear Boomers and Golden Oldies.

Gen Xers, Gen Y, Millennials & Gen Z are all going into lockdown with severe restrictions to our lives for YOUR health & well being.

On top of climate change, home ownership & inequality it would be lovely at the end of this you remembered that and consider it when you are voting at the election.

Electing a Government that is focused on solving those intergenerational friction points of climate change, housing affordability and inequality would be a wonderful way of saying thanks for this unprecedented sacrifice of civil rights and freedom of movement.

Most of your generation vote National and National only exacerbates those intergenerational tensions.

TDB Recommends NewzEngine.com

No guilts to the Boomers and golden oldies, it’s not your fault this virus mostly kills old people and those with chronic illness, but it would be lovely that when we are on the other side of this that you all paid this one forward by re-electing Labour as the Government.

Just saying.

Kia Kaha.

 

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29 COMMENTS

  1. Fact; Many of the Boomers have never voted Nactional …they were and are old socialists…many voted Labour and many were /are to the Left of Labour …they were born working class and brought up frugally with care and respect by their elderly who sacrificed for their children

    Jeanette Fitzsimmons was one of these Boomers who set up the Green Party …. ageism, scapegoating, and ‘boot kicking ‘ of her elders was not on her Green agenda or in her nature

    ( hints of ‘extermination’ of the elderly by virus … or happiness in their demise/ or comeuppance via virus … come mostly from those who reveal deep down that at core they are heartless self seeking, envious trendos …generally they were neglected as kids and come from privileged middle-class aspiring, status driven , money driven and racketeering backgrounds…where values of family and care were not experienced or taught to them as children)

    …respect and care for their ELDERS and all elderly New Zealanders is an old egalitarian New Zealand Socialist and Maori value and tradition

    …thank goodness there are well brought up, loved and cared for Millennials ‘and Gen Z who continue with these values ….and care deeply for their elders and are willing to sacrifice for them

    …if there is a shortage of housing dont be a wanker and a coward and blame elderly New Zealanders ( and show how sad and uncaring and inadequate you are deep down as a bully person)

    ….look at the tens of thousands of empty homes in New Zealand owned by foreigners while New Zealanders are without houses…do something about this…this is the socialist thing to do ( not the fascist thing)

    …ask yourself who has been responsible for unrestrained immigration which New Zealand’s infrastructure can not support

    • A Labour/National coalition government? Maybe?
      A Chinese style government. Everyone’s in the same party! Save a heap money, time and bullshit!

      • Why not copy China and do away with elections altogether? And we could also start our own trade in “voluntary” live organ donations from dissidents too. What a great way to earn more of those valuable export dollars that we’re always so desperate for!

    • Afreed Red buzzard, I am 75 and always voted labour and my father was a devout socialist who was standing on the picket line as a shutout auckland port workr in 1951 so all my three other sisters andbrother always voted labour too.

      Maryn is wrong here as we grew up under the dark clouds of te second world war and the korean war so we knew how our parents suffered during their time and they prepared us for a day when we needed to step up when a shock came to us as this Covid – 29 hasdone so we can cope.

      My wife is 73 and she also asan english girl remebered all those hangovers in the 1940/50s of rationing as she recallled it to me when we met 48 yrs ago in Toronto where we got married.

      Why are the millerials always beatimng up on our generation???

      Our generation rebelled; as we actually stoood up for banning the nuclear bomb and the vietnam war and we stood alongside the youth last year on 15th march during the march through Gisborne and later through Napier, so we did our bit.

      We still have a morgage on our $ 450.000 modest home in Napier, so we cant be considered rich at all.

      I am disabled – and would always vote for labour along with ‘NZ First’ who represents the older generation among us.

    • …’ Jeanette Fitzsimmons was one of these Boomers who set up the Green Party …. ageism, scapegoating, and ‘boot kicking ‘ of her elders was not on her Green agenda or in her nature ‘ …

      … ‘ respect and care for their ELDERS and all elderly New Zealanders is an old egalitarian New Zealand Socialist and Maori value and tradition ‘…

      —————————–

      Yeah good shit , Red Buzzard ,… you know I think Jeanette Fitzsimmons was universally liked , … she was one of those typical lovely older ladies oozing with grace and compassion, courage and wisdom in the face of an ugly neo liberal world , a wonderful person. And your mention of others less prominent, but that also do the right thing by their elders simply because not only were they taught those values, it is the right and proper thing to do.

      Because they too , spent many sleepless nights and then wiped our pooey bums and changed our nappies and made sure we were well nourished etc…and many did it through world wars, and economic depressions in times of severe leanness.

      Life is short. It is fragile. And at any time any one of us can be struck down with a crippling illness. Including the young and ‘ healthy’.

      So thank you for that Red Buzzard,… in fact here’s a song just for you which I find so endearing ! 🙂

      Enjoy.

      Levon Helm “Poor Old Dirt Farmer”
      https://youtu.be/cBuJB218UvU?t=14

    • Hi Red Buzzard. Many thanks for your comments regarding baby boomers/golden oldies, of which I am one at 74, having grown up in a lower working class family, post WWII, where the value of respect, kindness and generosity was learned and practised, particularly towards those less fortunate than ourselves.

      Hopefully this spirit will once again prevail in society, benefitting NZ, both during and post Covid-19.

    • 1000% Red Buzzard. As a 74 year old socialist / trade unionist who lives on nz super, and does not own my own or anybody else’s house, i am honestly starting to get a little tired of the quite regular sniping on tdb occasioned by my age. I am also a little sick of the regular Chinese bashing. How do you think it makes the many Chinese NZ’ers many who’s family’s have been here for generations ( far longer than our latest flock from Africa) feel, although most of them are probably so busy head down arse up working, that they pay no mind. Although the labour/coalition govt. is preferable to pull up the ladder after me paula and soimin, i wish they would find another name as in my opinion they are as far removed from a genuine Labour govt. as it is possible to get. Before somebody says “if you don’t like it go somewhere else” i do find agreement with many of the blogs and comments, and where else is there???

      • G.A.P.: I agree with everything you say.

        “I am also a little sick of the regular Chinese bashing. How do you think it makes the many Chinese NZ’ers many who’s family’s have been here for generations ( far longer than our latest flock from Africa) feel….”

        Exactly. And it’s worth everyone remembering that arrivals from China in recent years have been able to leave (and return to, if they wish) a country that many commenters here characterise as closed and repressive. Yet they’ve been permitted to use their money earned in China or HK to buy property here. People cannot have it both ways.

        “Although the labour/coalition govt. is preferable to pull up the ladder after me paula and soimin, i wish they would find another name as in my opinion they are as far removed from a genuine Labour govt. as it is possible to get.”

        Hear hear!

        “Before somebody says “if you don’t like it go somewhere else”…”

        In whichever sense it’s meant – either “go to another country” or “go to another blog” – doesn’t this just piss you off! It surely does me. In the case of the former, where the hell would we go at our age? Who’d have us? Besides, we were born here, in this godforsaken little country at the arse-end of nowhere; no choice in the matter, either. And if people mean the latter, how about they present countervailing arguments? And if they can’t, they themselves could always go somewhere else…

    • I back your position mostly. Many of the struggling families boomers grew out of instilled values later forgotten by the few who succumbed to the corporate lure of wealth without work or community contribution.

  2. Thanks @ Red Buzzard.
    As a boomer who has spent most of her life living in rural isolation protecting a significant natural area I find this is fucking insulting. I have been advising young people for over a month as to what’s coming. We are now fending off requests from young folks to come and hang out here. We have told them all if they pass the health test they will be expected to work as hard as we do. Not holding my breath on being invaded.

  3. “Most of your generation vote National and National only exacerbates those intergenerational tensions….”
    Most…..?
    I think some demographic facts are required here!
    I would argue if any generation is voting predominantly National, it would be Cameron Slater’s.

  4. Undoubtedly it has got tougher financially for more recent generations, and the hardest hit have been those in low income households.

    However, that is no reason to elder bash, especially not in the times of a pandemic. How about, we’re all in this together? It requires community solidarity to get through this extraordinary time. I suspect the whole neoliberal ethos will be out the window when it’s over. I hope for that, anyway.

    And I have millennial relatives who have shown the greatest kindness and support to me at this time – hats off to them.

    Yes, RB, many of us, including myself, have always voted left. Myself and many friends have been long time union members, have been on strike, joined protests, and campaigned many many times for a better society, and an end to damaging inequalities. We have been appalled are the neoliberal shift and the damages it has caused. And frustrated that it has been with us so long.

    I am one of the many boomers who have never owned property, and been a lifetime renter. Why do some assume we are all wealthy, property-owning, right wingers?

    Meanwhile, I see many middle and upper class younger people buying up property when they can. It’s more a socio-economic class than generation issue. And there’s quite a few in younger generations who support, vote for, and stand for National and ACT. (David Seymour is not a boomer or golden oldie. Neither are the Young Nats)

    The Covid-19 virus can make big hits on younger people. Many young people are also dying overseas. In a phone consultation with a GP yesterday (about my “scratchy”, most likely strep throat), I was told that the oldies being badly damaged by the virus are those with underlying health issues, which I don’t have).

    The stats show, most confirmed cases of Covid-19 in NZ are people in their 40s – my guess that is because they make up the bulk of kiwis returning home.

    There are more 20 year olds confirmed positive for the virus in NZ, than 70 year olds.

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/120503174/the-next-48-hours-what-happens-before-new-zealands-coronavirus-lockdown

    No one is invincible here. We all need to work together to stamp out the virus.

    Then I hope we can all work together to rebuild a more equitable society.

    • … ‘ Undoubtedly it has got tougher financially for more recent generations, and the hardest hit have been those in low income households.

      And I have millennial relatives who have shown the greatest kindness and support to me at this time – hats off to them ‘ ….

      ——————————–

      Excellent.

      This is a time when we all have to muck in together. And I make NO APOLOGIES whatsoever for invoking the old WW1 / WW2 catchphrases. None whatsoever,… in fact …. here’s another one :

      Keep calm and carry on !!!

      NOW ! ,… my 93 year old mother ( who until recently was still driving round Auckland doing her own shopping ) has in her wisdom given me her car. Now, cunning as she may be in the suggestion I drive around and do her shopping- which actually means we both go shopping together , – , it also includes blood sample appointments, eye appointments and the like. I hate shopping ! – its bloody boring ! And so is hanging around medical places while me mum gets her tests…

      And the point of all this is that my mum, … is being COMPLIANT to the GOVT.

      That seniors stay home on the whole and dont take any risks. She is of that generation that may not like it, but does the required thing. She comes from the Greatest Generation. And its not until you put on a few years yourself that you start to see that older wisdom. They’ve been there. They’ve lived it. They know what doing without actually means. And MUCKING IN.

      The very least I can do is see her needs taken care of and they aren’t many.

      And I’ve always been a devil may care, heavy metal band-playing vagabond type. My sons the same. But between me and my excellent brother in law / surrogate second father type, he, after travelling south east Asia and India,… has now more than ever learnt the wisdom of loving and respecting his family, esp respect for his grandparents. Of which my mum is the last. My son has always been that way. My part Maori brother in law taught him well when he lived under his roof.

      I applaud him for that and am proud of him. I tell him that. He’s 22. My mum is 93. Great family, great people. And none of us are well off, wealthy or rich. Just survivin’.

  7. Enough with the boomer bashing Martyn. It’s just silly. Besides any boomer who voted national or act wouldn’t be reading your blog anyway so all you’re doing is insulting the followers you do have.

    • roblogic: “A generation of sociopaths….”

      Spoken by someone who doesn’t know anything about US history. I note that comments are turned off. No surprises at that: wouldn’t want the facts to get in the way of a wee post-Boomer tanty, would he?

  11. Oh ffs. Many so called baby boomers are still at work and about ten years away from the pension. Many of them are nurses, doctors, key health workers, supermarket workers, food workers, care workers. Some still have kids at home, not to mention grandkids. Many of today’s activists are boomers : thinking about your rates here Bomber : John Minto, Sue Bradford and several others who comment on this post. Many of them are still in the workforce ; You are not so young yourself old friend.

  12. Better than write misguided stuff like this you write about the selfish NZers STILL limping home to “safety” and in doing so putting NZ residents at prolonged risk. Everyone has been aware of the ramifications of this virus now for more than two months. There is no excuse for such late action and we should not be holding the gate open for them to drag yet more infection into the country. Write about these people

    • Well its all happened so fast, – and I for one am not of the persuasion of leaving any of our nationals stranded. We do have the facilities with the Army opening up their bases,… I do not like the idea of our young travelers stuck in a land that’s locked down, in a place they do not speak that language, becoming sick and suffering on their own. That is horrific for both them and their family’s. There are many reasons why they have not been able to get home quicker.

      Bring em on home.

  15. Ignorant small minded article. Boomers have been led, same as all others by a system that is well rigged against us all. Understand the monetary system and usury and growth, then perhaps you will begin to understand the latest round in the battle between the lenders and the borrowers… we aint the lenders.

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