Why have so many baby boomers (the sex, drugs & rock generation) turned into neo-cons?

Question

"Victory" has made me realize that I shouldn't use ambiguous terms and that maybe, like her, I may not be absolutely sure what everyone means by neo-con. So I apologize and will re-word my question.

I too come from that Vietnam era, was moderate then and am moderate now. I went to a reunion and it seemed that the wildest of the old group are now the most straight-laced, uptight, conservative, liberal-hating group you could find. It just seemed so odd.

Answer 1

I've contemplated the question, since the Boomers in my family fall brazenly into the stereotype. My own idea is that it falls into these options intermixed...

1. The usual "finding God", mellowing out, and accepting of routine that occurs in nearly all people as they grow older.

2. Being in such an ambiguous and uncertain period during their youth, watching all the paradigms they were raised to accept shatter before them made them go through a period of adjustment before they began to define their own.

3. They fall into a demographic that occurs every other generation that consists of "joiners" rather than "paradigm shifters". All of the influence of the hippie generation came from the "silent generation" that preceded them. That influence, in turn, (doubts about the way we live and think), was amplified by the young Boomers when they were most influential. As their "age of aquarius" proved to be only pop cultural, they slowly merged back into the society of their parents. They had a harder time adjusting to the dull routines of the American workforce after all of that "free for all" behaviour in years prior. When the 80's came, they had adjusted, and the corporate culture of their parents (the 1950's) became the new gospel. They took corporate culture of the 1950's to new heights, and new lows. But they also retained much of their prior "have everything now" mentality, creating an amalgamy of corporations whose GDP did not meet the national debt. By the 1990's, they were well into middle age, and their brain chemistry began to reflect the aging effect, demand for predictability, routine, ritual, left-brain predominance. The medias began to pander to them, as they're the generation with the "buying power" - thus, the "new conservative" mass media is born "preaching to the chior".

That's just my take on it. For the record, most of my views favour conservatism, but, as I will disagree with my parents (and other boomers) on issues that I consider common sense, I've been called a communist and a socialist. Go figure. The only intellegent coversations I can have on my ideals has been with poeple my grandparents age.

Answer 2

I'm STILL not sure what the hell a "neo-con" is, but I'll try to give you a serious answer.

Remember when you were four or five...? Do you think the same way now that you did then? Do you still believe in the things that five-year-olds do? Of course not; you have more experience of the world, more information and a different perspective.

As you get older, you'll notice that this phenomenon doesn't stop at 20. Each year, you'll see more and learn more, and you can't help thinking about what you see and hear. It has the power to change you in fundamental ways.

Many people I know in their 40s, 50s and 60s still like rock music, and still like sex (a lot!), but our drugs now tend to be the prescription sort, to deal with things like high cholesterol.

We don't like the idea of working hard and having a governmental committee decide who gets a share of our income...and how much that share will be. We have this idiotic idea that what we earned is ours. I know it's nearly inconceivable, but we'd rather give our money to our kids than yours.

We also have this crazy notion that America is the best country on Earth (based on nothing, except visiting other countries in person and seeing how THEY wash their clothes, cook their meals and earn their livings). We also are jingoistic enough to feel that a country as good as ours should be protected.

You might be surprised to hear that most of the folks my age I know are in favor of abortion rights. We don't lke the idea of freedoms being infringed, and believe...stupidly, I'm sure!...that each American should decide for himself, as much as possible, how he should live his life.

Well, that's my position, and I hope it has been interesting to you.

Answer 3

I wish I knew.... Especially since they were the Vietnam generation.

I suppose there is some relevance to the saying "When you are young you vote democratic, being idealistic. When you get older and gain more wealth, you tend to vote your better financial interest...which appear to be republican." I totally disagree with this philosophy, however... .some people do believe in this. They falsely believe that republicans represent them.

I am 39... have become very successful out of hard work...but I will never fall victim to republican soundbites and slander. I will always work hard to make our country a better place for those less fortunate.

I hope the baby boomers get a clue and wake up to whats really going on. Then again, I hope those in their late teens and 20's wake up and stop the republican neo-cons from continuing their rein of terror and death by voting them out in November.

Answer 4

Contrary to popular opinion the sixties wasn't all hippies. I lived about fifty miles from San Francisco and hardly ever saw one. The media likes to portray the sixties in a way that doesn't remind me of the sixties. At any rate the hippie wannabes from the middle class families with the "Cocker Power" buttons became like their parents. If there was any love and peace in them they sold out for a buck,typical.Some people claim they were part of the Vietnam Generation, what does that mean? How were they affected by Vietnam? About four percent of my generation served in Vietnam at the most. I was part of that four percent, Vietnam meant something to me. It meant more than a burned draft card or a college deferment. What could it really mean to others? Nothing but something to complain about.

Answer 5

i blame it on the drugs...
That is what was the wrong part of the counter-culture. Drugs really are bad for you and bad for society but many baby boomers seem to have realized this and rejected other things along with the drugs rather than realizing that sex is still good, music is still good, exploring different ideas and experiences is still good.

They basically messed up on changing the world by making drugs part of it. Drugs ruined so many otherwise good people...

Plus they got jobs and started realizing that money matters and then again rejected the good parts instead of simply taking and using this simple truth ...I mean hey Ben & Jerry's, The Grateful Dead..these are money makers. But most gave up the good stuff for the money and security instead of balancing them.

So I don't really know.

Answer 6

I am a conservative (not neo-con) and a Christian. Yep, I was there for the drugs, booze, sex, rock and roll thing, into it big, been there, done that, bought the t-shirt. I would never go back to that for anything in the world. Life is so much better when you brain isn't messed up.

Answer 7

If you look at the leaders of the neo-cons, very few of them were into the sex, drug, and rock culture in their youth (other than perhaps a bit of experimentation). That subculture did not encompass all youths from that time period.

Answer 8

Chances are the neocons weren't so much into the sex, drugs & rock as you think. They thought Nixon was great. I'm a liberal boomer.

Answer 9

They didn't turn into neo-cons...they were opposed by neo-cons...and their presence (the opposition) is more prevalent in mainstream venues...while the more liberal faction opted out of the lime-light.

Answer 10

They got some cash and don't want to loose it? Not sure. Same thing happened to my parents, and I still can't convince my mother to not vote republican (despite the fact that they want to turn back the clock on women's rights)