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Boomer Columnists Suddenly Jaded
" We suck" says three pro-Boomer writers
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Winnipeg -- Three of the city's most popular columnists. Gordon Sinclair, Morley Walker and Lindor Reynolds, have come clean and admitted their unending pro-Baby-Boomer columns about life in the idyllic 60s and the lack of similar styles and tastes in the contemporary world, are a weak facade that holds up their own self-awareness that they are shallow, materialistic drones who cannot let go of their childhoods.
"Basically," says Walker," we suck."
For years the columnists have been writing about Baby Boomers in the modern world and the prediciments they faced.
Walker is the entertainment editor of the Free Press. His columns usually have to do with saccharine, laughable laments on the breakup of the Beatles and how Marilyn Manson couldn't hold a candle to Alice Cooper circa-1970.
Sinclair, most famous for his let's-placate-the-indians book, Cowboys and Indians, writes short, meaningless columns about the Winnipeg social scene, socialites and how the younger generation takes such things as electricity, food and water for granted.
Reynolds is an optimistic writer who often showcases comfortable, white, suburban soccer-moms who have faced some sort of tragedy that she makes feel like only they have suffered in the world and no on else. She is also famous for her melodramatic, fear-mongering expose on child pornography on the Internet, and any other universal fears that effect white, upper-class WASPs in Winnipeg.
Now, however, the truth behind these stories has emerged.
The columnists all admit that by focusing on their history as Boomers they are avoiding the fact that they are completely inept at dealing with modern problems, both external and the ones they created themselves.
Like most women of her generation, Reynolds was rasied by a cold, dispassionate mother who placed practicallity and a fear of emotions before anything else.
" I feel that I have failed as a mother, " she says, " I raised my kids to be practical and narrow-minded, to fear minorities and the unknown. To take no chances and not to rock the boat because life is too scary and bad things happen all the time no matter how nice your home is."
Sinclair agrees." The Boomers have tried to take over the world and have failed. All we are now is a demographic that advertisers aim for. It's effective because deep down inside I am a shallow, practical person who wants to be treated special because I was the son of a war vet and had to live through the Cuban Missle Crisis. I deserve to be worshipped because I saw the Beatles on Sullivan and I know exactly where I was when Kennedy was shot. Unfortunately, the world does not agree with me and I think they are right. As I get old I realize how dysfunctional and screwed-up my generation really is.
For Walker, the lack of old-fashioned politics in art is what makes him feel useless.
" When I was growing up we had Dylan plugging in for the first time and that was radical. That was a political statement. The Beatles, who are the greatest musicians in the history of the universe, were exploring Hinduism and drugs. All this was politically charged and we made a difference by listening to this music. Although now I realize that I didn't really do anything but listen to the music and get high. It wasn't like I actually changed anything. Vietnam still went on, inflation increased and Nixon lied to us all. But the music was great and we made a difference man. Nowadays, with this focus on non-political music, all this worry about just having fun and enjoying music, its so wrong. Music is meant to be a medium for change, like we did in the 60s.Not for people to play out of enjoyment."
No one knows what the future holds in store for these three columnists. As the Boomer demographic eases into retirement with the RRSP's garnered from the sweat of their children's alienated, dispossesed generation, the future is bright.
" I just want to go on living in Tuxedo," says Reynolds, " and teach my grandchildren that the time they live in is completely irrelevant because man has already walked on the moon and there will never be another Woodstock"
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