Gen X: We Persevere  

According to a brand new New York Times/Siena Poll, every age demographic except one has shifted left over the last several years. The one age demographic that has remained solid and unwavering is my own, Gen X, those ages 45-64. In no way am I surprised that my cohort is the most consistently conservative and libertarian of any generation. At age 59, I am very much the poster boy for Gen X and proudly so. Let me try to explain what makes my generation so different.

First, and most importantly, our junior-high and high-school teachers were the New Leftist hippies of the late 1960s. In every way, they tried to teach us not truth, but ideology. We smelled their deception a mile away, and we rejected it. Unable to help themselves, they shouted about peace and love, but, when it really came down to it, all they cared about was power and control. As such, we learned from a very early age to be cynical about our “superiors” and to recognize their hypocrisy for what it was. Truly, our teachers were some of the most disgusting people I’ve ever encountered.

Second, we had a number of excellent leaders who asked us not to be like them, but to be ourselves. Ronald Reagan, Pope John Paul II, and Margaret Thatcher sought not conformity, but excellence. After all, it was Reagan, above all, who asked us in his 1981 inaugural address to be worthy of ourselves. Each of these leaders demanded that we uniquely pursue our excellences and our gifts, that we contribute to the common good not by losing ourselves, but by bettering ourselves. They were not alone. Writers such as Ray Bradbury and even rock drummers such as Neil Peart each called us to individual excellences. Each of these folks wanted us to be the best nature and God made us to be, unlike our teachers who sought and pursued a vanilla-tapioca conformity.

Third, we grew up with World War II veterans as our inspirations. Throughout the late seventies and early eighties, I had a lawnmowing business. I mowed the yards of prominent members of the community, all of whom had served in World War II, fighting the fascists of Europe and the fascists of Asia. No one questioned their loyalty or their integrity. They had been willing to give everything they had for the defense of hearth, home, liberty, and bravery. I admired them profoundly. One neighbor, Mr. Huey, loved to show us the machine gun wounds that ripped up his back. Another neighbor, Mr. Reinhard, had been stationed in Hiroshima after the dropping of the atomic bomb. The radiation gave him cancer three times, finally killing him at age 94. Another neighbor, Mr. Clouse, told me stories about how he was reprimanded in the army for speaking out against our alliance with Russia. He knew very well that Hitler and Stalin were simply flip sides of the same coin. These were real men, real Americans.

Fourth, we grew up knowing just how brutal and evil Fascism and Communism—and their effete little sister, socialism—were. We grew up on Leon Uris and knew how terrible the world (and especially the National Socialists of Germany) had treated the Jews, and we cheered for them in Israel, especially in moments like Entebbe.

Again, we knew, too, that communism was just as bad as fascism. We grew up with The Killing Fields, and we knew that communism was sure death of a people, a religion, and a culture. Given the chance, the socialists of the left and the right would wipe out every last one of us.

Again, we knew that the Soviets, given half the chance, would wipe us out with nuclear weapons. Yes, we knew that duck-and-cover wouldn’t save us, but we went through the motions anyway. We, too, had seen The Day After. Should war come, so would come the end of civilization. I know of no one my age who doesn’t still wake up from time to time from nightmares about nuclear warfare.

Fifth, even our movies spoke volumes to us. With Red Dawn, we vicariously stopped a communist invasion, knowing that in so doing, we too might have to make the ultimate sacrifice. With Ghostbusters, we vicariously challenged the bureaucracies and universities with entrepreneurial verve. With The Breakfast Club, we banded together and vicariously defeated our conformist Boomer teachers.

Sixth, look where were at in life. Not only did we grow up with Ronald Reagan and the threat of nuclear annihilation, but we’re now on the verge of being empty nesters and on the verge of grandparenthood. We’ve been paying into Social Security with no hope of any return for decades, and we’ve been paying income and property taxes, only to see most of it squandered on foreign aid and corruption. Yet, we persevere.

So, am I surprised that my generation remains the most resistant to the temptations and idiocies of the left? Not at all. After all, we’ve been quietly pushing back against our Leftist elders and warning those idealistic younger generations for what times like an eternity? Do you want to understand us? It’s easy really. Read a novel by Uris, watch a speech by Reagan, pull out the DVD of The Killing Fields and Ghostbusters and The Breakfast Club. Or, if you’re lucky enough, go see Rush on their fiftieth-anniversary tour. The great man, Neil Peart, who taught us never to sell our dreams for small desires, might well have entered eternity, but his words still resonate:

There is unrest in the forest
Trouble with the trees
For the maples want more sunlight
And the oaks ignore their pleas

The trouble with the maples
(And they’re quite convinced they’re right)
They say the oaks are just too lofty
And they grab up all the light

But the oaks can’t help their feelings
If they like the way they’re made
And they wonder why the maples
Can’t be happy in their shade

There is trouble in the forest
And the creatures all have fled
As the maples scream, “Oppression”
And the oaks just shake their heads

So the maples formed a union
And demanded equal rights
They say, “The oaks are just too greedy
We will make them give us light”

Now there’s no more oak oppression
For they passed a noble law
And the trees are all kept equal
By hatchet, axe, and saw

__________

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The featured image is “Rush press photo for Grace Under Pressure, 1984,” and is in the public domain, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. 

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