“Young people always think they know everything!” Well, sometimes older people do too. And while it’s nice to receive some sage wisdom from Grandma or Grandpa, times are constantly changing, and they don’t always realize what a different world young people live in today.
Below, you’ll find a list of tweets that people from younger generations have shared, noting the least helpful advice they’ve ever gotten from Baby Boomers. Don’t get me wrong, I love my parents and grandparents with all of my heart, but I would rather ask them for gardening and baking advice than career advice… Enjoy scrolling through these tweets, and keep reading to find a conversation with Jean and Laura of the OK Boomer podcast!
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My Gen X parents said this all the time when I was being tormented by a boy in middle school. I cringe looking back on how many times they told me he probably liked me, or joked that I wasn't allowed to date him. I was a socially inept tween and he was a minor bully who found an easy target. I didn't need dating advice, I needed the jerk to not be sitting directly next to me in multiple classes.
Yeah, this would be indicative of a problem with that person today
Baby Boomers are the generation born between 1946 and 1964. They came along when the birth rate spiked following World War II and are now between 59-77 years old. As the longest-living generation in history thus far, Baby Boomers have been able to secure quite the legacy. They continue to hold substantial economic and political power, even as they age, and there’s no question that their life experience has allowed them to amass wisdom that can be beneficial for youths.
However, just because Baby Boomers know about many things doesn’t mean they know about everything. The world has changed drastically since they were born, and it can be difficult to keep up with rapidly changing technology and an ever-changing world as we grow older. Baby Boomers have been deemed the “gloomiest generation” by a Pew Research Center poll, and have been known to emphasize the importance of being goal oriented and having a strong work ethic. However, for some, this means maintaining the “American Dream,” which many younger adults have realized is much different today than it was 40 years ago.
I understand what this is saying, but can everyone just agree that living is hard and no one generation ever truly “had it easy”? We could just start working together now to try and fix it
While you might view the Baby Boomer generation fondly, if you, your parents or your grandparents are part of it, there are some people out there who aren’t the biggest fans of this older generation. We’ve all heard the “OK, Boomer” phrase, which punctuated social media during 2020 and 2021, often in response to older generations sharing conservative political views online. “In essence, the meme emerged as a shorthand for Gen Z to push back against accusations of being a ‘fragile’ generation unable to deal with hardship,” Crystal Abidin and Jing Zeng explain in a piece for the Conversation.
“‘OK Boomer’ is a consequence of existing intergenerational discord, not its cause,” Abidin and Zeng went on to explain. “Gen Z faces growing threats such as climate change, political unrest, and generational economic hardship. Memes like ‘OK Boomer’ are ways to express intergenerational everyday politics to consolidate a shared awareness of the perceived failure of the Boomers.”
I'm 60, ex-marine-engineer and I still sometimes buy Lego. It's therapy.
If you’re part of a younger generation, you may not be a fan of unsolicited advice from Boomers who don’t know what it’s like to be freshly out of university seeking a job nowadays. But of course, there are plenty of Boomers out there who aren’t out of touch. So to gain more insight on this topic, we reached out to a couple of our favorites: Jean Mader and Laura Bettinger of the award-winning OK Boomer podcast.
This was a problem for me many years ago for a short time when I was on unemployment. UE office has you fill out a form for each job application you place. You have to list who you spoke to and stuff like that. In other words - they assumed you are applying in person. But my field of work was in IT and IT type companies were early adaptors with the "apply online" stuff. I would like to think in 2023 they have caught up with the idea of online applications since it is so common now.
Jean and Laura created their show as a response to the famous phrase “OK Boomer,” which has become a dismissive act of ignoring a comment a Boomer says. “Instead of feeling upset or put off by eye rolls, we are here to gently remind Millennials and Boomers we are all OK! Let’s laugh and lean in together,” the hosts explain.
Every generation thinks the next generation is lazy. It’s a part of being human, apparently.
When asked about the topic of unwanted or toxic advice Boomers tend to give, Jean and Laura had a sense of humor. “You don’t want advice from the 1960’s? Really?” the hosts asked. “You get what you get, and you don’t get upset. Life is hard, get a helmet.”
“We’re just trying to help,” Jean and Laura noted. But if you don’t want their advice and simply want older generations to listen, the hosts are open to that too. “We can respect that!”
My father (76) insists that his method of getting a mortgage would work for us kids. He got his mortgage in 1970, for a $10,000 loan which was about 4 times his annual income by borrowing the deposit from his dad. That home is now worth about 20 times MY annual income and no bank in the land would loan on that. But sure, dad.
The amount of times my mother told me to work through my problems with my alcoholic now ex makes me want to vomit.
When it comes to what Jean and Laura want younger generations to understand about Boomers before dismissing or making fun of them, they told Bored Panda, “Give us grace with all of our tech traumas, challenges with the grocery store self-checkouts, and attempts to order DoorDash on a small phone with tiny print."
"Thank you for fixing our Wi-Fi and letting us share cute photos of you on Facebook," they added.
I work 2 jobs (maybe 60-65hrs a week) and my 78 YO grandpa told me I’m doing something wrong if I still can’t afford a new car and house with “two sources of income.” Love him to death but also told him to shut the truck up. This is how I afford to rent an apartment, drive a beater car, afford to house and spoil 2 cats and enjoy my life in small ways like Sunday morning waffles and camping trips and occasional treats like new towels or a nice new winter coat every 3-4 years.
That article that suggested lentils were a great alternative to meat to save money… (edit: I am definitely not knocking lentils, they are delicious. I am knocking the article, which was called, “ Inflation Stings Most If You Earn Less Than $300K. Here's How to Deal.” That is an enormous portion of the population, and their advice is just to switch to lentils and things like that lol)
“That’s how men are.” No, that’s how you allow them to be.
We also asked the Boomer ladies if they expect younger generations to adopt some of the behaviors and views that they often make fun of once they get older. “We can only hope… Just wait! What if your kids hate vegan? What if they come to your house for dinner and want a big juicy steak?” the hosts asked with a laugh. “See how you feel when your kids roll their eyes when they hear you reminisce about TikTok! And Threads and ChatGPT! And just wait until some snarks, ‘OK, Millennial!’ at you!”
Is she encouraging silently putting up with domestic abuse...? If so, that's messed up. Or is she referring to a toxic work environment? Even so, that's still messed up. O_O
But despite the resentment that some younger people hold towards Baby Boomers, Jean and Laura maintain a positive attitude. “We are all OK! Let’s lean in and laugh together,” they told Bored Panda.
If you’d like to hear more wise words from these ladies and hear some advice from Boomers that you actually will appreciate, be sure to listen to the OK Boomer podcast!
The 1970s was when Americans learned about things like serial killers. Stalking a coed just doesn't work as well in a world with Ted Bundy in the public consciousness.
I honestly question (privately) why my mother's parents got married. My grandmother has always complained about my grandfather - he was selfish, he expected her to do everything, he never helped with anything around the house even when she was sick... Looking back on it, she was from a desperately poor and dysfunctional family with a bunch of kids, an alcoholic father and a mother who supported all the children and his drinking habit as a waitress. My grandfather's family wasn't rich or anything, but they had a farm big enough to feed themselves from the garden and raise a few steer for meat, which they handed over to my grandparents when they retired to a smaller house. He worked at the local steel mill most of his life, in what was then a very good union job. It's hard not to wonder if she married him more for stability than love.
I love the Boomers in my life with all of my heart, but I know exactly which topics to avoid bringing up with my parents to ensure that our relationship remains healthy. We hope you’re enjoying these tweets, pandas, and be sure to upvote all of the ones you can relate to. Let us know in the comments what the best advice you’ve ever received from a Boomer was, and then if you want to check out a Bored Panda article discussing things Boomers are right about, look no further than right here!
When my grandparents bought their current car, they had to put my grandmother on the title for the first time ever, because she has a credit history and he's never used a credit card in his life. Don't know what they would've done if she hadn't embraced online shopping and needed the card. My grandfather's sole use for computers is playing Solitaire.
My aunts was - “ if you want to be rich and successful like me, finish school” . I told my mum when I got home and she laughed her a*s off cos that Aunty married an ‘old money’ guy she met in Fiji 😂
Hmm worst house in Beverly Hills…let’s just see what that comes in at… Oooo quite a lot actually
You know, I don’t have kids, but when I was younger, I guess I just assumed that all women just absolutely did not drink or smoke during pregnancy. I was very naïve, but the boomer generation probably knew significantly less than we do now about the impacts of this, so I am sure it was more prevalent (edit: reworded for clarity)
Not all Boomers are ignorant and unsympathetic. I feel very bad that so many younger people struggle so hard to find and pay for homes (it was no picnic in my day, either, but it's a lot tougher now). You know who's really to blame? The real estate industry: a bunch or race-track touts/urgers, who've been constantly pressing prices upwards for decades so as to maximise their commissions on sales.
“Obvious solution that solves nothing” = “Just throw a garage sale potluck rent-a-horse macramé party and you’ll be able to afford a new house in no time.”
Absolutely no! Nope, not correct... "You are not the only one..." isn't just a thing boomers say. It's universal. It's a thing said by many but has to be said properly - and heard properly too. Just saying, "You are not the only one..." isn't enough. It's only the introduction, it's the headline. "You are not the only one..." should be followed by relevant advice or guidance to a helpful source. Such as, "You are not the only one..." this has happened so much that they brought in a law change... this has happened so much that people have formed help groups and posted info on line; and so on.. But to hear this properly you can't just hear, "You are not the only one..." and then assume you've heard it all, you know what's coming next, and don't need to listen anymore. Instead either listen for the rest of what's being said, or ask them: "Ok so I'm not the only one. How did the others deal with this and what was their outcome?"
Eeehhh, I'm gonna agree a little with the "boomers" on this one. It's generally daily exercise that's recommended and it's not a cure-all but it definitely is helpful. It's not like it does nothing...
Not really. I have a pretty useless English degree from majoring in what I loved... Should have just got to massage therapy school from the get go. On one hand I had a lot of experiences I wouldn't have otherwise had, on the other I'm still paying loans my younger more naive self took out thinking of get a great job editing books right out the gate. Instead I ended up going back to become a massage therapist, which it turns out I'm pretty good at too. So yeah, not bad advice to be realistic about your major if you're going to school anyway.
Agreed, I gave up and just came down here to voice my frustration on the boomer bashing articles... again. Starting to find it almost offensive.
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This has to be one of the most spiteful articles I have read on BP. This isn't advice that's a bit weird, this is a bunch of people from a younger generation throwing venom at an older generation. I really didn't find anything positive or amusing about this, just an article full of hate. Pointless.
Well, people older than me have spouted this ineffective advice to me since birth. And still do. That I always followed that advice only to have the results go sideways? Yeah, a little pissy. Watched everything I was taught to do now can actually be a liability? FFS. About 8 years ago I was looking for a (3rd) job and went in and patiently waited for the manager to be free to enquire politely about an advertised job. Excoriated for wasting their time. Resume not even acknowledged even though I had 3 years direct experience.
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Most of this is not actual advice anyone has ever given, it's just idiots ranting and trying to blame someone else for their own incompetence and stupidity.
Agreed, I gave up and just came down here to voice my frustration on the boomer bashing articles... again. Starting to find it almost offensive.
Load More Replies... This has to be one of the most spiteful articles I have read on BP. This isn't advice that's a bit weird, this is a bunch of people from a younger generation throwing venom at an older generation. I really didn't find anything positive or amusing about this, just an article full of hate. Pointless.
Well, people older than me have spouted this ineffective advice to me since birth. And still do. That I always followed that advice only to have the results go sideways? Yeah, a little pissy. Watched everything I was taught to do now can actually be a liability? FFS. About 8 years ago I was looking for a (3rd) job and went in and patiently waited for the manager to be free to enquire politely about an advertised job. Excoriated for wasting their time. Resume not even acknowledged even though I had 3 years direct experience.
Load More Replies... Most of this is not actual advice anyone has ever given, it's just idiots ranting and trying to blame someone else for their own incompetence and stupidity.
