A generational war is raging between Boomers and Millennials. The fighting has spilled out into the streets and the dinner tables. Both sides smugly gaze across the battlefield thinking of their enemy “If only you were more like me, then all would be right in the world.”

But in this total war of attrition there are no heroes.

On the one side are these insufferable Millennials. From an early age they have been hyper-educated in human psychology, constantly probing their feelings and emotions. They won’t stop spouting their self-absorbed thoughts for all the internet to see. They’re out here hustling to convert their entire life into content and possibly even monetize it. Everyone’s an influencer. They’ve got a podcast, a YouTube following, or worst of all a dumb blog.

They’re so sensitive they think if you don’t write “Lol” at the end of every text you’re mad at them and the friendship is over.

I, for one, prefer Baby Boomers. They are far more tolerable than our generation. Boomers do what they say they’re going to do. For instance, if you plan a BBQ, they will sign up three months ahead of time, bring a dish to pass, be fifteen minutes early and leave when it’s time to go. They’re not so flaky and weak like us.

Not at all my friends! No, we have so many excuses for not following through or bailing out at the last moment, they could put them on a wheel. The Wheel of Excuses, a dubiously legitimate reason for every occasion! And by the way, don’t dare call us to task for not showing up, we Millennials have a name for that kind of behavior!

One might be tempted to think that Boomers are good and Millennials are bad. But I am sad to say there are no good guys in this ongoing war of attrition. For the pandemic brought out the worst in Boomers as well:

Would it kill you to update your internet service? I’m pretty sure no one sends out group forwards from AOL.com any longer. And how is the WiFi always broken when the cable signal for FOX news still seems to work?

It’s troubling times. We have become the de-facto on-call IT service department for the nation. You’ve got to figure it out Boomers, millions of people around the world lost their lives so you could learn to mute yourself when signing into a Zoom meeting.

Don’t ask us directions to the restaurant. The address is www.google.com

What I’m trying to say is if you’ve got one of those detached spherical webcams clipped to the top of your monitor, I’m sorry but we’re done here. The train bound for the information age has left the station and you were not abroad.

But again, there are no heroes and there are no villains.

Baby boomers will read this post, and they’ll see something they do, and they’ll laugh at themselves and move on. If anyone is offended, I promise you it will be one of my dreaded millennials.

That’s because Boomers are last semi-sane generation before Zuckerberg’s folly came along and made us socially inept (Hey Drew you still use Facebook!? Ok, BOOMER!) They remember a world where people of differing opinions interacted in public spaces, where one could experience not just conflict, but also resolution. And having a different opinion didn’t make you a terrible human being.

We can see that Boomers were right in that there’s value in keeping your mouth shut and your head down while you keep chipping away at the mountain life’s given you. That everything doesn’t need to be shouted from the rooftops and though life may not be ideal, you still show up at the same time tomorrow and put a hard day’s work in because that’s what makes life meaningful.

And maybe they could see that we’re all grown up now. We moved out of the basement and hardly ever play Xbox anymore. We’re hitting middle age and have kids of our own. We do jobs that are strange and nebulous, not everyone does a ten hour shift down on the factory line these days.

And that we welcome an age where people are more mindful of how they speak and more compassionate in their actions towards others. It’s okay to be soft, and inclusive, and open.

Rather than each side lamenting that the other is so out of touch, we got to see the good in one another.

Only a fool doesn’t honor the ones who came before them, and only a despot refuses to change with the times. If we could all meet in the middle, perhaps we could find a way to broker a cease fire.

Brokering a Cease Fire Between Boomers and Millennials