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You Are Old, Father William

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Re: You Are Old, Father William

#31

Post by apocalypstyx »

isoskeles wrote: post #29
OliverJones wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeh, I'm one of those boomers. It was our generation who cooked up the whole "taxation is theft" trope. That has made a terrible mess. We were born before the invention (1959-1960) of pharma birth control, and were teenagers when it took hold in society. It was the biggest change in human history (I'm not exaggerating). We, generalizing, did an awful job of starting to sort out the moral / ethical / social changes bi…

> It was our generation who cooked up the whole "taxation is theft" trope. I'm sorry but considering the US hasn't existed for very long, and income taxes in the US haven't existed for very long, I don't see what your point is other than to knock down something you dislike. The idea of taxation being "theft" wasn't an invention of Boomers nor is it a particularly unnatural (or original) thought for any individual to…

>The idea of taxation being "theft" wasn't an invention of Boomers nor is it a particularly unnatural (or original) thought for any individual to have when encountered with collectivism.

While true, there seems to me to be some merit to the argument that there was a subtle change in the nature of such discourse during this period and (mainly) among a large section of the members of this generation (that many members of subsequent generations have accepted as de facto and default) and that is integration of taxation/government with market-based thinking, that is, that paying taxes is something the individual does to get an individual return, in the same way a person walks in McDonalds and expects to put money on the counter and get their happy meal and not, instead, that the homeless guy in the corner gets a happy meal.

Re: You Are Old, Father William

#32

Post by goodcanadian »

antidesitter wrote: post #30
goodcanadian wrote: post #13

I'm trying to avoid the "middle brow dismissal," but I'm not sure the point of this article. OK, you are sick of your generation being painted with an overly broad and negative brush. Well, right back at you. I think, perhaps, we could call a truce on the generational warfare.

Your comment is a hasty generalization combined with a red herring. You don’t know that the author painted your generation with an overly broad and negative brush. And even if he had done so, it wouldn’t render the article “pointless”.

Your comment is a hasty generalization combined with a red herring.

As is the article. In my opinion, of course. That was sort of my point.

Re: You Are Old, Father William

#33

Post by dctoedt »

OliverJones wrote: post #23
ebiester wrote: post #18

My primary critique of this article is that it sets up a strawman in the first sentence to tear down. > Everyone who writes about aging “Boomers”—how “they” have ruined “our” society, and so on, ad nauseum—should be required to memorize Lewis Carroll’s “You Are Old, Father William” (from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland) and recite it aloud before an audience of men and women age seventy or older. There are proper ar…

Yeh, I'm one of those boomers. It was our generation who cooked up the whole "taxation is theft" trope. That has made a terrible mess. We were born before the invention (1959-1960) of pharma birth control, and were teenagers when it took hold in society. It was the biggest change in human history (I'm not exaggerating). We, generalizing, did an awful job of starting to sort out the moral / ethical / social changes bi…

> We made it to the moon.

"Late Leading-Edge Boomer" here, with a nit: We weren't the ones who got humankind to the moon in 1969-72. The Baby Boom is considered to have started in 1946. All three astronauts who flew the first lunar-landing mission (Apollo 11, in July 1969) were born in 1930. Flight director Gene Kranz: 1924. Guidance officer Steve Bales, who could have aborted the landing after a computer alarm: 1942. Junior computer specialist Jack Garman, who urged disregarding the alarm and continuing the landing: 1944.

(Source: Wikipedia articles.)

Re: You Are Old, Father William

#34

Post by svat »

I created the Wikipedia article on “You Are Old, Father William”, about a decade ago. One of my strokes of good fortune is that I had read the original by Southey before reading Lewis Carroll's parody in Alice, so I was able to appreciate it more and found it hilarious!

Original: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Old_Man%27s_Comforts_and_...

Parody: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_Are_Old,_Father_William (current version of article: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=You_Are_Old,_Fath...)

A quote I scoured for the article then (the line about the “idiot questioner”) is also in this article. The author of this article may have come across this quote independently rather than via Wikipedia, but this sort of thing has happened often enough that I've come to realize writing for Wikipedia has surprisingly large impact.

---

As an aside, the article is about changing perceptions of old age: from the “sententious piety about old age” current at the time of Southey/Carroll, to their “invisibility” today. (A general paucity of works featuring old people at their centre, with a few examples collected in this article: I'd add films too, like Pixar's Up, or these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Films_about_old_age.) It ends with “I would like to see more of this salutary belligerence among my fellow oldsters.” In short, it's about old age in general, and today's “cult of youth”.

But many comments here so far are about taxes, the economy, “Boomers”, social security,… none of which is touched on by the article at all, beyond the first clause of the first sentence. I wonder whether there may be a cultural component here; is it the case that people who don't grow up with experiences of highly valuable conversations with them in childhood and youth, are inclined to think of them primarily in economic terms? Or is it that any discussion of “old people” in general is impossible without reference to the entire generation of “old people” one happens to know?

Anyway, here's another “old writer” the article didn't mention: a wonderful interview with P. G. Wodehouse at 91 (and a half): https://web.archive.org/web/20150814120619/http://www.thepar...

Re: You Are Old, Father William

#35

Post by kodz4 »

OliverJones wrote: post #23
ebiester wrote: post #18

My primary critique of this article is that it sets up a strawman in the first sentence to tear down. > Everyone who writes about aging “Boomers”—how “they” have ruined “our” society, and so on, ad nauseum—should be required to memorize Lewis Carroll’s “You Are Old, Father William” (from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland) and recite it aloud before an audience of men and women age seventy or older. There are proper ar…

Yeh, I'm one of those boomers. It was our generation who cooked up the whole "taxation is theft" trope. That has made a terrible mess. We were born before the invention (1959-1960) of pharma birth control, and were teenagers when it took hold in society. It was the biggest change in human history (I'm not exaggerating). We, generalizing, did an awful job of starting to sort out the moral / ethical / social changes bi…

'Whenever we start playing the "who is right" game everyone loses'

Re: You Are Old, Father William

#36

Post by icebraining »

brundolf wrote: post #14

It's true that our culture overvalues youth. There have been articles on HN about people over forty struggling to get a programming job. In central Austin it's rare to see anyone over fifty, even at the grocery store. It was jarring when I moved further out and realized how much diversity hadn't existed where I was before. The politicians and business leaders of that generation may have caused lots of problems, but I…

> In central Austin it's rare to see anyone over fifty, even at the grocery store. It was jarring when I moved further out and realized how much diversity hadn't existed where I was before.

I don't see how the preference of older people for the suburbs has anything to do with our culture overvaluing youth.

As for the politicians and business leaders, they are older. The average age of CEOs is 50. In Congress, it's almost 60 - that's 20 years older than the people they represent. Young people may have the attention, but Boomers (and some X'ers) have the Power.

Re: You Are Old, Father William

#37

Post by isoskeles »

apocalypstyx wrote: post #31
isoskeles wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It was our generation who cooked up the whole "taxation is theft" trope. I'm sorry but considering the US hasn't existed for very long, and income taxes in the US haven't existed for very long, I don't see what your point is other than to knock down something you dislike. The idea of taxation being "theft" wasn't an invention of Boomers nor is it a particularly unnatural (or original) thought for any individual to…

>The idea of taxation being "theft" wasn't an invention of Boomers nor is it a particularly unnatural (or original) thought for any individual to have when encountered with collectivism. While true, there seems to me to be some merit to the argument that there was a subtle change in the nature of such discourse during this period and (mainly) among a large section of the members of this generation (that many members…

Evidence for this (as a generational phenomenon) could include the reduction in the top income tax rate as boomers came of age. So in that sense I agree that they, generationally, may have disliked taxes in comparison to what immediately preceded them.

As far as I know, the Federal income tax (in the US) started out as a way to finance war. So it would be more like going into McDonald's and paying to have someone stand there with a gun and threaten/kill anyone who tried to take your (or anyone else's) Big Mac. There was no homeless, hungry guy in the corner suffering if not for the forced generosity of a third party. My only point here is to say that, in an abstract way, the current income tax was formed on an idea of protection as a transaction, not on being generous towards down-on-their-luck people. I believe that context is important when we talk about generations later rejecting taxation because they don't see what's in it for them.

(But I'll also admit / point out that, in the context of when the current Federal income tax started, young men were being drafted to fight in WWI, which I think is way worse than any tax in terms of the individual vs. collective. As in, there's no clearer way to say that the state owns you than it being able to send you to war potentially against your will.)

Re: You Are Old, Father William

#38

Post by golemotron »

icebraining wrote: post #36
brundolf wrote: post #14

It's true that our culture overvalues youth. There have been articles on HN about people over forty struggling to get a programming job. In central Austin it's rare to see anyone over fifty, even at the grocery store. It was jarring when I moved further out and realized how much diversity hadn't existed where I was before. The politicians and business leaders of that generation may have caused lots of problems, but I…

> In central Austin it's rare to see anyone over fifty, even at the grocery store. It was jarring when I moved further out and realized how much diversity hadn't existed where I was before. I don't see how the preference of older people for the suburbs has anything to do with our culture overvaluing youth. As for the politicians and business leaders, they are older. The average age of CEOs is 50. In Congress, it's al…

In a way, cities eat the young and spit them back into the suburbs as they approach middle age to produce more. It's a cycle. It might not be bad.

Re: You Are Old, Father William

#39

Post by coldtea »

archgoon wrote: post #20
coldtea wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because most people who want to write will have done so before 70, and a large chunk of them just want to watch TV (or rather, have nothing better to do in their minds, which is sad). Still doesn't answer the question. Just means those that do want to write over 70 are fewer (and they could be writing for decades before too, it's not about writing only after 70, but about becoming a new published writer after 70, o…

If they've been writing for decades they aren't 'hot new writers' over 70.

The emphasis is not on the "new" but on the "hot new". You can hone your skills for decades, and even publish, but only become "hot" (based on some nicely selling or award winning work) later in life. You still deserve to be in a list.

Re: You Are Old, Father William

#40

Post by antidesitter »

goodcanadian wrote: post #32
antidesitter wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comment is a hasty generalization combined with a red herring. You don’t know that the author painted your generation with an overly broad and negative brush. And even if he had done so, it wouldn’t render the article “pointless”.

Your comment is a hasty generalization combined with a red herring. As is the article. In my opinion, of course. That was sort of my point.

Where does the article engage in hasty generalization?
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