By the time we retire, we may regret our example of selfishness.
When the moon is in the
Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Mars
Peace will guide the planets and
Love will guide the stars.
Bollocks. The baby boomers believed it at the time, but look what happened.
Sure, in the '60s they pranced around in loose clothing, preaching peace, love and tolerance (of themselves if nothing else). They regarded society as a bleak conspiracy of warmongers, carnivores and Tony Bennett fans.
The time had come to reject possessions and adopt spiritualism. The new generation was rebellious, creative, full of hope and self-certainty. They held a sexual, musical, social revolution simply because they could. They took the Ghandi doctrine of non-violent protest to new heights and helped stop an ugly war. Which is where it all fell over.
When Vietnam came to its grisly end, the boomers lost their raison d'etre. The clever ones became barristers. The stupid ones became, uh, barristers. The creative ones made a bundle in advertising. The ugly ones competed in game shows and the pretty ones hosted them. The rich ones took up daddy's seat on the board and the poor ones polished it for him. The needy ones joined the Labor Party, the greedy ones joined the Liberals. The ones with no fashion sense joined the Country Party.
The whole gang began rebelling against itself, building nest-eggs that would allow an early retirement and a return to that simple life they cherished in their youth: a vegie garden, a futon and a guitar collection, all housed in an eight-bedroom, architect-designed shack on 20 uncleared hectares.
The '80s was the golden hour of the boomers, their turn at the reins of power. It would be unfair to say they betrayed everything they had stood for in their youth, but let's say it anyway. Greed was good, the bomb was gooder and Lionel Richie was the singer of choice. The demands of survival capitalist economy overruled any lingering longing for a non-materialist paradise. Hell, reasoned the boomers, we might as well get a piece of the action before our children want some too.
The thing the boomers forgot was that, while this was happening, their children, Gen-X, were watching. We learnt that whatever you say as a teenager can be discarded in later life without qualms or consequence. So we said a whole bunch of stuff about nuclear bombs and Wall Street and trees, knowing one day we'd be selling uranium shares from Daintree apartment blocks. We confidently proclaimed there was No Future, safe in the knowledge we'd be repeating the past shortly. We bonked in the hallways at parties, knowing that it was just sex and not a revolutionary tool. We could say society was screwed, knowing that it would soon be our turn to screw it.
No illusions about changing the world clouded our sleeping ambition. We had learnt well.
When the Gulf War got under way, Gen-X tut-tutted at the cynicism of the slaughter but figured the boomers would finish it quickly, squeamish as they are. And we were right. "Do it, just do it quick" was their command to Bush. Bang! went the boomers and 100,000 Iraqi fathers and sons fell down dead. The war was over before it had time to weigh upon the ex-hippie conscience. It was declared a success. No one is still quite sure why.
From 1990, Gen-X galloped into the workplace. Men and women, working side by side, rarely looked up from the trough to ask if there was, well, something else to life. Like children, for example. The Gen-X slogan is Make Love, Not Babies. And if you get babies, get someone else (preferably a government-sanctioned child-care outfit) to raise them.
And now Australia is confronted with statistics showing that as more of us work, fewer of us breed. As the economy grows, so will it shrink from lack of taxpayers. The inherited ethic of selfishness is soon to reap its ghastly harvest. In 25 years, say the statisticians, ours will be a land of old people. So intent are boomers and Gen-X on their e-careers that they have postponed breeding until an age when they require medical assistance to do it.
In 2025, if we keep going as we are, the Land on Oz will be a flat plain strewn with retirement villages. Pensions will be a forgotten dream and those without super will be getting letters of invitation to the annual Soylent Green Sausage Sizzle. When asked if they remember the war, the old timers will say, "Yes, I had CNN." They'll sit by the piano singing feeble versions of Purple Haze while exuberant ladies in track suits urge them to clap along, dears, clap along.
And on Sundays, no one will visit.
At the risk of sounding naive, there must be something more to life than career and money. Slow down. Have some children. If you're gay, adopt some. Raise some taxpayers of the future and be an example of non-materialistic humanity to them. It's OK, you can do it selfishly. Think of it as a retirement plan.
If we don't teach the next generation well, their greed may well be good. But their apathy will be murder.
