Ahem.  Speaking as the “Dean” (oldest surviving member) of this distinguished 
mostly geriatric community, I think respect goes both ways, or it goes nowhere. 
 So, those of us who seek to command respect must be prepared to give it, 
particularly to such memes as OK Boomer, which I think expresses quite aptly an 
impatience with anybody who asserts old knowledge just because it is old.  I, 
of course, am Pre-boomer, a Silent.  If a meme were started, “Be silent, 
Silent!” I would resist it (obviously) but I sure as hell would respect it, and 
try to mine it for its implicit content.  

 

I quite like my status as Dean, by the way.  When FRIAM is given a collective 
Nobel, I expect to lead you all into the celebratory dinner, bearing our staff 
in my crooked hand, shuffling along in my bedroom slippers, my shirt untucked 
from my honorific belt,  muttering over and over again, “Metaphor all the way 
down, you fuckers!”

 

By the way, Jon, it’s funny to see you take so stridently a “youthist” 
position, you, who have perhaps more than any other, sought to support and 
harvest value from the fading eminences grises amongst us.  Still.  Point 
taken. 

 

Oh, and, Glen: thanks for collecting the products of the firehose into puddles. 
 Otherwise I would surely have drowned. 

 

Nick 

 

Nick Thompson

[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> 

https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

 

From: Friam <[email protected]> On Behalf Of Jon Zingale
Sent: Sunday, October 31, 2021 2:23 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Unrecognized Thinkers

 

"Memes can spread as if they are amplified, for instance the stupid 'Let's Go, 
Brandon' meme or the dull 'OK Boomer' reply."

 

Well, it certainly is your thread to bend. My feeling is that corrosion and 
destruction can often arise as part of a creative process. Age demographics in 
politics in the United States, to my view, are pretty off balance. My personal 
plan is to help cultivate a different one. Nothing against old people, of 
course, but in the next elections I plan to rank choice not by party but simply 
by age.

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