The phrase. That awful phrase. “OK Boomer.”

It’s a two-word monument to ignorance. It’s not an argument. An argument is dialogue. An argument is: “I think this,” and “No, you’re wrong because of that.” It’s a meeting. A collision. A chance to find out you didn’t know everything. An argument can be built on if you each approach with an open mind.

But “OK Boomer”? That’s not a collision. It’s a dismissal. A declaration. It’s the kid saying: “I don’t need to listen. You have nothing to teach me.”

And the old man who has lived through wars, built businesses, and navigated recessions is reduced to a cartoon. The old woman who has raised families, bought and sold houses, and made mistakes? She’s just… noise. She’s reduced to… a label.

OK Boomer.

What’s left? What’s left for the kid? You’ve cut off the line of wisdom. You’ve clipped the wire that runs from yesterday to today. You think you can invent the world from scratch? You think you can build a house without a foundation?

You can’t.

You’re a kid without a father. Without a mother. Not literally, maybe. But figuratively. You’ve made your own elders irrelevant. Their triumphs, their compromises, their failures. They’re instantly just background noise. “OK Boomer.”

So what do you aspire to? What do you want to become? Who do you want to become? If the generation that built the roads, that fought the wars, that signed the checks, that held the world together is nothing, then what are you?

You’re a kid with a phrase. And a dead future. A future without teachers. A future without models. A future where the mistakes of the past are doomed to be repeated because you’ve decided you’re too smart to learn. It’s not a death sentence for them. It’s a death sentence for you.

Where did they get these ideas? The Boomers. Yeah. They’re the ones who’ve entrenched themselves in power in academia, the media, and politics and everywhere else there’s a grip which to hold and move the world. And they labeled it all shit. They said this is all built on racism, homophobia, Islamaphobia, patriarchal structures, and evil Christianity.

And this is what they taught the young. We bequeath you an evil, racist patriarchy that needs to be upended, remodeled, and yes, destroyed. So when that is their inheritance, how else should they respond when bequeathed such an inheritance?

This is Rousseau’s fever dream come to life. The belief that we are born innocent and civilization corrupts. So, in this world the old aspire to be young and the young remain ignorant of the world. Yeah, that’s a pretty good description of today.