comment: >
  
  Conservative isn't about age its about money
context: I grew up with Sesame Street, Mr. Rogers, and Reading Rainbow. I think that is why. >
  
  Unironically true. The radical message of "Other people exist and matter." 
  For me the most frustrating part is that you're allowed to be selfish here - which is different than greedy! 
  I like to say: Yeah I do want what's best for me, and it's best for me (yes personally, yes individually) when everyone around me is intelligent and healthy and happy. Because that means I get to benefit from all kinds of cool shit when everyone is prospering. 
  I'm not even talking about a communist/socialist utopia here. I'm just saying "hey can we please just look out for each other maybe?" >
  
  Also less likely to be a victim of crime.  Most blue-collar crimes are crimes of necessity.  When people around you are happier, healthier, and more intelligent, they tend to,  you know, also commit fewer crimes.
  Things like jackasses driving like jackasses on highways/local roads going 100+mph and destroying entire families in a crash?  They tend to mellow out and go with the flow more when properly educated to care about other people.
  As it turns out, when you care about others, you also care about yourself because you're reasserting the normal behavior of people actually giving a shit.
  The reason democracy is typically the best discovered form of government is explicitly because it's a government that, theoretically, is forced to actually help its people.  Which helps boost education and health, which stamps down on rampant greed, which boosts research and innovation.
  All of which cycles back into a very healthy government.  As we can see, America is very, very unhealthy. >
  
  Because as I get older it's increasingly clear the right wing is absolutely fucking insane. >
  
  War, housing shortage, more war, recession, more war, more recession, job shortages, more war a worldwide pandemic and another recession to look forward to and it's all encompassed in the greatest information age of humanity. The lifetime of ANY millennial is why millennials are less conservative. 
  For fucks sake, we're the first generation to actively avoid having children, multiple developed nations panicking over population growth, because there's no guarantee of what we're leaving for the next generation, let alone our own. >
  
  First generation since industrialization that's worse off than our parents, because our grandparents decided to be greedy. >
  
  For millennials it’s just our parents not grandparents. Most millennials grandparents were greatest generation and they left the world much better than they found it for their kids the boomers. >
  
  They also raised the boomers to be little shits though, so there's that. >
  
  They created the very things in their kids that they hate but refuse to acknowledge their being responsible for it.
  My dad likes to talk about how Boomers failed us kids but does it in such a  condescending way that it's still insulting Millennials 🙄 >
  
  Saying stuff like: "It's my fault. I should have spanked you more." >
  
  He likes to talk about how they didn't teach and guide us enough, heavily implying that we're currently failures and useless. I forget his exact words last time. Either way you can't help but feel bad when he's talking about his generation's mistakes.
  It's like some weird narcissism where it's still somehow not their fault the world is the way it is. >
  
  It’s a generation realizing their faults. My parents worked 1 job each, didn’t buy their home (inherited), didn’t go to college, got kicked out of inherited home and inherited another one that they barely did enough maintenance to do it was considered livable. My dad used to tell me we couldn’t afford things ever. I grew up and moved out, learned he was squirreling it all away into his retirement that was over 1M and the “payments” he was making to my uncle for his half of the house inheritance were actually paused until I went to college. What the fuck my parents were doing with the money, where they were going, what they were thinking, I have no fucking clue, but knowing what I know now, I know they were very selfish and self centered individuals who put their own comfort above all else. Both born in the early 70’s.
  I rarely call them for no reason (less than 4 times per year), I don’t invite them to family gatherings, and I don’t discuss money with them. My wife and I have worked very hard since we met (I was 17) to be in a better place. My parents did little to help (there was a period of time I refused to answer their calls on weekends because they always demanded money I didn’t have for some bullshit). Now, I make over twice as much as them, live in a different city, own my own home, and haven’t asked them for a thing in over 10 years. Now, they call all the time just to be buddy buddy. I wish I could believe them but if they treated me as badly as they did as a child, why would I trust them now as a man?
  Saddest part of it all is that I had one of the better home situations amongst my friends growing up. >
  
  As a millennial myself (one of the oldest, turning 41 this year), I became an adult and started paying attention to politics right as GW Bush was elected (with a minority of the popular vote). I watched 9/11 happen (I was in a chemistry lab in college and I remember that moment with perfect clarity). I watched an increasingly-extremist GOP tear the country apart, destroy essential social services, and demonize people I cared about who happened to be gay, or black, or latino, or muslim.
  I watched them vilify and denigrate the best President in my lifetime for eight years because of the color of his skin as much as his politics, and then I watched them elect the worst President in the history of the country (again, with a minority of the popular vote) and suck his testicles as he tore down the institutions that made my country something to be proud of.
  You're goddamn right I'm not getting more rightwing. The Republican Party is a party of domestic terrorists, grifters, liars, and thieves. They will never have my vote. Not in any election, at any level. Not ever. >
  
  This is the best comment on Reddit today. If I knew how to give an award 🥇 I would. >
  
  
  There are deeper issues at play. “The most likely explanation is a cohort effect – that millennials have developed different values to previous generations, shaped by experiences unique to them, and they do not feel conservatives share these,” wrote Burn-Murdoch. To put this in my own, blunter, terms: millennials have been royally screwed by an inequitable economic system and a runaway climate crisis. Only an idiot with loads of money would be happy with the way things are.
  
  Ding, ding, ding. And if you think we're radical, just wait til you chat with the generation coming up behind us.
  I genuinely am far more pissed off by fellow millennials that I run into from time to time, as opposed to boomers, who came of age when I did and found any answers for anything within the ideology of the Right. >
  
  “And if you think we're radical, just wait til you chat with the generation coming up behind us.”
  I am an uncle to both my brothers’ 9 year old sons and I spent two years as a taxi driver driving kids to and from school. I’ve encountered so many kids who genuinely viewed ‘money’ as the core of all our problems. Heart warming. >
  
  Gen Z is the only generation where I've met multiple people who openly say they are communists, and that capitalism is the root cause of most of our country's problems. 
  I think Republicans are right to worry about the communists, but unlike Republicans Gen Z can actually state what communism is and most are against capitalism as it is implemented today >
  
  A lot of older people hear communism and think Russia, China. Communism actually has a place in the world, but obviously anything under a fascist government never goes well. >
  
  It blows Boomers mind when they cite China as "communism bad" and I tell them that China's economy hasn't been communist since the 1980s and is now state-capitalist, just like Russia's is. 
  I think Cuba is probably the only remaining "communist" country and even that's been changing slowly in recent decades. >
  
  Lmao, I have to try this one with my father. He's part of the "there's a global elite trying to kill everyone!!!!" population. >
  
  I also just remembered Vietnam is still communist as well. So there's 2 countries. Cuba and Vietnam. >
  
  I don't think you can compare the two. Vietnam has Starbucks, KFC, Gucci, Chanel. People drive Mercedes there. There's so much new money, like Crazy Rich Asians style. It's not like Cuba at all. >
  
  Gen X here and I’ve got mine in terms of most things, and yet I find myself leaning farther and farther to the Left.  This is because I want this country to be what I was told it was: “the greatest country on earth.” We have a long way to go to make that happen, and it starts with Universal Healthcare, affordable education, and the return of pensions. >
  
  Fellow gen X
  
  I want this country to be what I was told it was
  
  Probably the biggest disappointment/ disillusionment of my life was discovering just how much fiction I was raised with.
  I want the next presidential election slogan to be "freedom and justice for all" and for that to mean accountability for rich people and an end to the drug war. And full pardons for all those people on jail due to marijuana possession. (Among other things. That slogan could go far...) >
  
  For whatever it’s worth, I tell my kid “america is built on some special ideals. That everyone is equal, they everyone deserves a chance to chase their own happiness, that people should be free to live their own lives how they choose. In so so many ways we’re falling short of those ideals, and always has. Every generation there are people who don’t care about those promises and only think of them as scams. But every generation keeps trying to live up to that idea, and every one gets a little closer. I hope my time beings you closer, and I hope your time will see us get there. If not, keep trying.” >
  
  Damn, good parenting. >
  
  Thank you. It’s tough, and I’m often an idiot, but I try my best. >
  
  Take some of my energy, good parent. ♥️ >
  
  Being conservative requires having something you wish to maintain and conserve.
  We have nothing.. no money, no houses, no careers.
  Figure it out. >
  
  I’m an extremely lucky Millenial in that I have those things. 
  Still vote Liberal. Their policies make it more likely more people can have what I have. >
  
  Me too, used to be Republican when I was younger before I really paid attention (my parents still are Republicans) and I'll never vote conservative for as long as I live. I have a pretty decent life and have a house and family and stuff, but there is NO reason why those types of things can't be had by everyone. >
  
  I also used to be. And it’s more we grew up brainwashed with their garbage and we’re smart enough to sort out fact from fiction. My family scared of their own shadow if tucker or hannity or now newsmax tells them to be.
  Being the outcast of the family is a bummer cuz I’d love for my kids to spend more time with their cousins…the grownups can’t go 3 minutes without some bullshit politics coming into the conversation >
  
  Elderly parents of a friend are always so scared ... recently were talking about the guns they'd purchased. And when I talk with them, it's a constant barrage of fear-mongering wackiness that they heard on Tucker and the like. Stuff you can't even contradict to them because they are so deep down that they can't see the light. >
  
  I've learned to just not engage. The trick folks have been using for the past several years is pulling out an obscure anecdote to prove their viewpoint. And since I'm not in the crazy news ecosystem they are, I hardly ever have heard of the event they base their terrible view on. Really insulating way of blocking criticism.  If I thought there would be a meaningful discussion I'd mourn the loss of that opportunity....but this tactic is just one more way to avoid an honest conversation. >
  
  
  I've learned to just not engage.
  
  This is a sad conundrum we're in now.  We can't so much as sit and have a rational discussion because everyone is so entrenched in their views, particularly Republicans, largely because of sunk-cost fallacy, but it's absolutely necessary or else we will never be united as humans recognizing that we all have the same basic needs.  It's tragic what right-wing politics and media has done to humanity through fear and hate mongering.  
  
  The trick folks have been using for the past several years is pulling out an obscure anecdote to prove their viewpoint.   
  
  This is called a corner or an edge case/issue, and it's been a staple of right-wing politics and media forever.  Find any shred of truth in an issue, cling to it and pound away at it as if that were the biggest or only issue, when in fact, it's a negligible or marginal issue, at best.  People will believe it since that shred of truth is there and they refuse to do the math demonstrating how obscure that part of it is. >
  
  
  it's absolutely necessary or else we will never be united as humans recognizing that we all have the same basic needs
  
  Conan Obrien needs a friend had Michelle Obama on again (Dec 18 2022 episode). She touched on this really clearly, talking about once she got into the room with people then the hate and vitriol doesn't dissolve, but mostly goes away. They talk about the pandemic and how far away we are from each other and we haven't been getting the doses of interaction our human bodies need. Sure remote work is here to stay....but losing the human interaction to video calls and screens full time isn't healthy if you don't otherwise have human contact outside your home.
  Breaking into those distanced, secluded people who have terrible right wing media in their brains is a maybe impossible challenge. Why leave the bubble when they can be hateful and fearful from the comfort of their home? Not that isolationism is exclusively a right wing problem. >
  
  An additional factor that isn't mentioned: The right wing is going farther to the right. It used to be possible to be a center-leaning Democrat (it still is), or a center-leaning Republican (not so much these days). 
  In other words, the divide between left and right has gotten too big. It used to be relatively easy for moderates to jump from one party to another without making giant ideological changes to their personal beliefs. Today that really isn't possible anymore.
  It is possible to move to the right while still staying on the "left". Those who fervently supported Bernie might decide in a few years to vote for Buttigieg, but I seriously doubt they'll suddenly support DeSantis just because they've become a homeowner. >
  
  Being 13 when the GWB error started is why I'll never be rightwing. But I'm willing to see what this person thinks. >
  
  
  the GWB error
  
  Did you mean error, or era? 
  I really hope you meant error, as it's more fitting. >
  
  I always use error as a play on era 😂 >
  
  I love it. It makes me think of the line from "The Pirates of Penzance"
  When you said “orphan”, did you mean “orphan” – a person who has lost his parents, or “often”, frequently? >
  
  "Aha beg pardon, I see what you mean: frequently".
  "You said 'orphan' frequently".
  "No! Only once".
  "Exactly.  You said 'orphan' frequently only once". >
  
  We've been fed this "everyone turns conservative as they get older" bullshit for decades. What's actually meant is that boomers turned more conservative as they got older, in history's greatest ever collective expression of "I got mine and the rest of you can fuck off." 
  I'm in my 50's. All of my Gen X friends started out left wing or liberal. They've all gotten married, had kids, had careers and businesses. Not a single one of them has "turned conservative." Not one. All that's happened is that maybe they've become slightly more "moderate," or at least slightly less militant. In my experience, the people of my generation who are now conservatives were always conservatives. >
  
  I think this has been proven in studies.  For the most part, it even applies to boomers. The hippie free-love types were always a minority. >
  
  
  The hippie free-love types were always a minority.
  
  less than 5% and some studies have them at less than 1% of that generation. They just had good marketing. >
  
  And great music >
  
  I won't be happy until me and my fellow millennials/zoomers implement Fully Automated Luxury Gay Space Communism. There is no negotiation to be made with old farts scared about the big red, just a war of attrition they will eventually lose. >
  
  I’m 55.  Tell me what I can do to bring your vision of the future into reality. >
  
  Join your community association and take as much local action as possible. Outspeak the boomer cranks, scare them out of city government community outreach with facts and knowledge about your neighbors who aren't attending.
  Never back down, yell at them, study their arguments and strategize with your friends. Bring the NIMBY/Status Quo superhighway to a screeching gridlock. There's power in the mundane, it just needs to be wielded appropriately and collectively. >
  
  I do some of it, but certainly could do better.  I'll take the challenge! >
  
  Generations tend to get conservative not because they age but because they have more money. This generation doesn’t have money >
  
  This.
  I know a lot of boomers, and Gen-Xers that support LGBT causes and all of that, but vote R simply because they want to keep more of their money.
  Meanwhile, Conservatives rail against any legislation or executive action like Student Loan forgiveness that might help Millennials. >
  
  Always found deeply insulting that my parents would assume that somehow as I got older I would become racist and vote against my own interests, maybe that's something that happens when you eat lead paint chips as a child. >
  
  Lead poisoning is no joke. Virtually the entire Boomer generation and a good number of older Gen Xers had lead poisoning as children due to among other things, leaded gas.
  Lead poisoning in childhood can lead to higher rates of aggression and marginally lower IQ for the rest of that child's life. >
  
  Lead wasnt fully phased out of use in the food canning industry until 1991, it's ridiculous how much leeway the gov gives businesses. Poison 1 person=crime, poison billions=business >
  
  While this is true by the 70s we were seeing rates of lead in our blood drop dramatically. >
  
  Yes, the second leaded gasoline went away, the levels of lead in the air dropped dramatically.  This is because lead is such a heavy element and will "fall out" of the air unless continually replenished.  Really makes you wish carbon dioxide was somehow heavier. >
  
  Because we've been living under the tyranny of conservative economic policy our entire lives and it clearly isn't working.
  I wish Ronald Reagan was still alive for no other reason than I could curse him. >
  
  Absolute gold, thanks for sharing this link. >
  
  Why would I vote to fuck my self and my kid over? >
  
  Her analysis makes sense, given how popular the expanded Child Tax Credit proved to be here in the U.S., which thanks to Joe Manchin and likely others behind the scenes, did not get renewed.
  Millennials have different attitudes about family in general.  Marrying later is more common, also having fewer children, due either to economic circumstances or shift in attitudes, or some combination of the two >
  
  Social issues are very important to millennials as well. Maybe being more connected, and understanding others makes us less willing to sacrifice others well being for our own. >
  
  
  being more connected, and understanding others makes us less willing to sacrifice others well being for our own.
  
  This is the real reason right here.  We are the first generation to grow up with the internet.  We can see there is a Rodney King every day in America.  We can talk to people from communities our parents and grandparents never ever would be able to.  Our world is smaller then then the world of our parents and grandparents >
  
  Politics has become a culture war and not a battle on policy.  The GOP has been pushing the culture war to get voters but anyone paying attention knows that culture is a losing battle for them long term. >
  
  I think this is key as well. While everyone - including Dems - is giggling over this speaker of the house debacle, I don’t find it amusing. Breaking government is a conservative sport - they truly just want to watch the world burn and have no vested interest in helping people. At all. And it’s horrifying when you take time to think about what the government could be, what we the people could have. Fuck conservatives. Especially MAGA. >
  
  For me specifically, I think this has to happen, they need to be shown for precisely what they are.  I am laughing at them because they can't even manage a basic task.  20 people are literally holding 400 hostage to their ridiculous culture war demands.   I wouldn't negotiate with terrorists either.  The problem is that the rest of the Republican party is incapable of negotiations as well, the culture wars have made them absolutely incapable of compromises.   I've watched for years as Democrats gave in and "saved" them.  I'm glad they're not doing it anymore.   They enabled this bunch of idiots long enough.   MAGA is absolutely like a bunch addicts and it's time people stop enabling them.   If it takes them a month to gain a Speakership that should speak volumes and perhaps FINALLY these morons will stop winning elections.
  Government works best when everyone compromises and no one is absolutely happy about a law.   If everyone grudgingly does something but they're not 100% happy with it, then it's likely to be a good law.  If one group is ecstatic but others are furious, then it's very likely to be a bad one.   The Republican party fell when Newt Gingrich came to power and it's only gotten worse ever since.   I started out Independent and now I just can't ever imagine myself voting for a Republican again. >
  
  Because we didn't sleep through history class, specifically the 'here's how far right authoritarianism happened in Europe and lead to six million dead Jews'. We aren't stupid. >
  
  I’ve gotten waaay more left with age. And I’m not the only one. Most of the people I went to high school are hardcore leftist. 
  Seeing planes crash into buildings during first period in 6th grade and then having an economic collapse as soon as they reach adulthood kinda does that to a generation. >
  
  You'd think a tragedy like that would push things towards more nationalism (which it did, at first), but it turns out that when the cure to militant Islamist theocracy is the Orwellian Patriot Act, decades of shitty wars that accomplished net nothing, and militant Christian theocracy...it kinda has the opposite effect in most rational people. >
  
  Millennial here, the anti-intellectualism, bigotry, utter selfishness of your modern day conservative disgusts me. They are the epitome of showing how self destructive humans can be.
  I use to be a republican and I completely regret having voted for them in the past. >
  
  I used to be a Republican too. They’re crazy now. 
  I support unions , pro-choice and letting people have sex with whoever. It’s their lives. We need more happy families in America whatever that looks like who cares. I also support right to bear arms but do you really need a rocket launcher bro?
  I support freedom which I’m supposed to support as a Republican but now they are using government to tell people what they can and can’t do ? 
  I also despise greedy corporations.
  It’s all a mess. Need to push hard one way or the other and let the people choose the path. That’s how it’s supposed to work. >
  
  Is it because of the reduction of lead used in consumer products over the last 50 years >
  
  It has more to do with the lack of upward economic mobility. For a while, each generation was doing better financially than their parents. That stopped happening and we ended up with a generation of millennials who didn't get the prosperity they were promised. Millennials know that something is wrong and that keeping the status quo is not good for them. >
  
  I'm in mynkate 30's. 
  I used to be a republican up until the whole Ron Paul thing. Then I started actually paying attention and have not voted for the GOP since. 
  Zero policy, zero intent to govern. Cruel authoritarianism is their only goal. >
  
  I’ve gotten more left wing with age. I’ve seen two “once in a lifetime” recessions, a pandemic,  some high inflation, trucker convoys, stagnate wages while corporate profits hit new records, etc.
  I’ve realized that the conservative government of my province doesn’t rule for the people who elected them. They rule for themselves and their donors. I assume most governments are like that. 
  And we only ever seem to elect conservative or liberal parties that are increasingly less aware of the struggles of the people.
  Makes me think things might be better the other way. Probably not as long as accountability for politicians is only every election cycle and people have goldfish memories. >
  
  Some of the most vile people in this country are Republicans, rich people, and religious zealots. Those things tend to overlap in the Gen X and Boomer generations. The things they want to "conserve" include wealth, racism, bigotry, religion, and white privilege. 
  And yea I'm white so miss me with the bullshit. I can recognize wtf is going on and it sounds like many of my fellow Millennials can too. >
  
  I’m Gen X and most of the Gen Xers I know, including myself, are becoming lots more liberal as they age. I discussed this with a friend a few days ago and he said, “I suspect we always kinda were…” >
  
  People don't get more conservative with age, a population can get more conservative with the accumulation of wealth and power, and fear of it being threatened.
  If you're not getting wealthier at a good rate and still can't afford the basic things you were supposed to have from the start, you won't become more conservative. >
  
  Not unless the conservative party can convince you all that there's a brown person to blame which has been a long successful strategy of the GOP for attracting poor white votes. >
  
  Millennials were raised by pearl clutching, hand wringing, christian boomers who fell for the religious nonsense that took over the republican party in 1980. We were raised on lies about drugs, sex, lifestyles, and other religions. Those lies didn't hold up, and has made many millennial adults suspicious of authority and moral zealots of any kind. 
  National politics today is a mess of inconsistent ideologies trying to categorize themselves into only two political parties that simply cannot represent the diverse population of opinions and ideologies present in our society. >
  
  We saw our parents freak out because they were told Dungeons and Dragons was a literal Satan worshiping cult.  Of course, we grew up to be a bunch of sceptics. >
  
  They also told us TV (and the internet, to an extent) would "rot our brains" yet as the boomers get older, they're furiously addicted to both. >
  
  They really wanted to prove their point. >
  
  I'd assume because they became of age right around the time 9/11 happened, then they went off to college and took on predatory loans to get said degree. Once achieving said degree they couldn't find jobs since a recession happened. So they took on multiple jobs to pay off their student loans and never will be able to afford homes of their own. But they are constantly being yelled at for buying avocado toast and Starbuck coffees and not budgeting? Does that sound about right? >
  
  Born in the age of information and are generally better at filtering the facts from the bullshit. >
  
  this is a big one that gets overlooked a lot. internet bs is different from other forms and takes a different skill to pick out. my 76yo coworker is sharp as knives and really good with tech for her age, teaches herself new things and solves her own tech problems. but she's lacking the foundation of knowledge for detecting bs on the internet, she's hasn't gotten just how powerful data is or how social media sites corral us into like-minded homogeneous groups, etc. >
  
  1980's Reaganism and other such theocratic government weren't designed to thrive in a world where the young people (20-40) have endless access to more information than your local public library can hold, and in your pocket.
  I remember first getting broadband 500k as a 12 year old (I am 36). I also remember reading "history of American slavery" on Wikipedia for the first time when I was 19, I had to have spent countless hours that evening reading all of the history that had kept been kept from me (EVERYTHING IS SOURCED AT THE BOTTOM, THE LITTLE BLUE NUMBERS AT THE END OF SENTENCES HYPERLINK TO THEM, just a little pre-emptive rebuttal for those who are gonna need it).
  Ideas such as "Man, did you know slavery ended on-paper in the US just 150 years ago? And that people of color got their human rights one at a time generation by generation? That's a disadvantage that stacks up over time, man!!" occurred to me and others. 15 years later we can letterhead the idea under 'systemic racism'. 
  Dear conservatives reading: this is why you want to defund education and strong-arm entire academic disciplines, because an educated populace erodes your power and we all know it, you know it too. 
  We aren't down with hating gay and trans people, we aren't down with forcing victims of rape to give birth, we aren't down with water shortages due to climate change, we aren't down with giving corporate welfare to big-box landlords who want to buy entire subdivisions, we aren't down with keeping a foot on the neck of people of color, the idea that the earth is 10,000 years old doesn't merit any acknowledgement let alone voucher funding, we are sick of your shit. >
  
  In my group of friends in our 30s, we all have degrees, we all work respectable jobs, we all make above median income. 
  None of us have kids or own a home. These are good people who volunteer, give blood, give money to the homeless, ect.
  Compare this to my cousin who never went to college but owns a home, has kids, and no debt. Can you guess why before reading the next line below?
  You guessed it, his dad bought his house, buys his vehicles, and pays for any major expense he has. Not surprisingly, he heavily supports republican politics and thinks democrats just want "free shit." >
  
  If you want to keep what you have (or the system you have) you vote democrat which by laws passed would be closer to republicans of 30 years ago.  
  If you want the new deal policies that created the middle class to grow- you have to vote progressive- 
  If you want to see the system break and more power to go into the hands of fewer people like the governor of your state with mandates on your human rights dished out through executive  orders- vote Republican- 
  If you want to burn it to the ground vote maga >
  
  Republicans have always been the me first party and it shows in their Representatives. They only care about themselves and keeping their big donors happy. Ronald Reagan was the most vocal with his “welfare queen” and AIDS is Gods curse on homosexuals.. They are the I got mine , fuck you, party and always will be until they are wiped out and removed from politics. >
  
  The philosophy of, "Fuck you, I got mine," holds no sway over those who ain't got theirs. >
  
  People forget the reasons we used to get more conservative as we aged…
  1) We had kids and felt protective of them.
  2) We made more money and felt more attracted to tax break rhetoric.
  3) We lost touch with younger people and the cultural sources of progressive policies.
  Millennials aren’t having kids, we’re not making money, and the internet is keeping us connected to Gen Z. >
  
  Well as a genx, I can say what keeps me away from Republicans is they keep wanting to butt in my doctors office and my bedroom and destroying the public education system, which was a hallmark of the US and a priority of rhe founding fathers.Minding your business and education are conservative values. 
  So I am conservative, but I rarely voted Republican before Trump, and the day they nomimated him I vowed never to vote Republican again.
  So I would not say people are less conservatuve, but the definition of conservative has been warped by evangelicals using it to take control. >
  
  I’m progressive for a wide variety of reasons but from a big picture perspective: I’m a millennial who shares parenting duties nearly equally with my wife. We have 1 kid and would like more. The protections guaranteed by Roe were enormously important during fertility struggles. The 2020 election was between a guy who commuted to DC early in his career because he was a single dad and a guy with 5 kids who has prob never changed a diaper or gotten up at 3am to do a dream feed. There are dozens of anecdotes like this. >
  
  All of our issues as a species and society come down to conservatives being the problem and stopping the rest of us getting to Star Trek future. Conservatives aiming for Star Wars. >
  
  As a millennial I'll give massive props to Gen Z. They re-lit the fire that was starting to dim for me. Climate activism, school shooting protests, and social justice initiatives were very inspiring to see. >
  
  This is really true. >
  
  Because the idea that liberals grow up to become conservatives is fundamentally incorrect. >
  
  Always found it insulting that people assume I’ll become more conservative the older I get just because I’m Cuban. >
  
  You can’t be fiscally conservative if you don’t have any fiscals to conserve. >
  
  
  Historically, people tend to become less liberal as they age
  
  They provided no source for this claim, and I suspect it's because they pulled it out of their ass. 
  That notion is a myth. It has much more to do with the political mindset of your generation as it moves through time. 
  
  Folk wisdom has long held that people become more politically conservative as they grow older, although several empirical studies suggest political attitudes are stable across time.
  
  The resources are plentiful. 
  
  Overall, what's happening in society at large as people come of age seems to matter most in determining the starting point for their core beliefs
  
  People do not get more conservative. That's simply what happened a few decades ago (older people were more conservative), and this changes over time as different generations roll through. 
  ... 
  Arwa Mahdawi should stop assuming things.
  She does a good job of explaining why this generation is more liberal, but they are not bucking a myth based trend (more conservative as they age), because that's a myth to begin with. >
  
  
  They provided no source for this claim, and I suspect it's because they pulled it out of their ass.
  
  Yeah, the rest of the article is good, but this part threw me off as well. Plenty of studies now showing the opposite. Someone needs to talk to her about the correlation of current boomer gen's conservatism vs. causation. >
  
  Exactly. 
  It's a shame it was mentioned in the title and in the quote I posted, because it's absolute BS. It is a fine article otherwise. >
  
  I have no fiscals to conserve. >
  
  The whole "moving rightward as you age" stereotype was always overblown, and according to some studies was flat-out wrong. I'm 45, and while I know liberals and progressives of all ages, I know very, very few who shifted all that much at all, and even fewer who shifted to the right.
  Edit: I meant to say "while I know liberals and conservatives of all ages"... My bad. >
  
  My uncle told me I’d get more conservative when I started making money. I’ve started making money and I’m still plenty liberal. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that it takes both my and my partner’s salaries to barely afford a one bedroom apartment. >
  
  Because getting more right wing with age was always bullshit. It's never really been a significant pattern. The Silent Generation was conservative when they were in their 20s. In the Reagan years, 18-30 yos were fairly conservative. The Boomers were fairly conservative when they were in their 20s, despite everyone focusing on the hippies (who themselves were not all leftists, there were plenty of libertarians and people who just didn't give a fuck about politics that were hippies). 
  What happens when people age is that they MAY get slightly more conservative on taxes, although even that is questionable, and the opinions and positions they held in their youth that were considered liberal or left win start becoming the moderate or even conservative position. In the 90s being pro gay marriage was a radical position, today it's so moderate that you can espouse it and vote to protect it as a conservative without getting attacked much from the right, if at all. In the 40s being pro interracial marriage was a radical position, today it's pretty much a litmus test even for conservatives. 
  So it's less a case of people getting more conservative than it is them staying roughly the same politically while society gets more liberal or left wing. Individually people change, but overall it evens out (so yes, some do get significantly more conservative as they age, but others get significantly more liberal). What we're seeing today, though, is that even as society geta more liberal as a whole compared to where millennials are, making them comparatively more conservative relative to the mean, the GOP has gotten far more right wing, in actuality becoming a reactionary party. Normally, the conservative party would adopt the new consensus positions that it once opposed as a rule, and thus become more of an option to people who hold those positions. As a result, as an aging demographic sees society, and the left or liberal party becoming more left or liberal and thus getting further from their own positions, they also see the conservative party moving in the same direction which means it moves closer to their positions. This can trigger a party switch. The GOP's rightward shift has meant that even if a millennial sees the Democrats moving away from them towards the left, they also see the GOP moving away from them at an even more rapid pace, and so stick with the Dems. 
  Of course, millennials started out as particularly left liberal generation, so even with society and the Dems moving left and liberal, this might not actually move them further from the position of the average millennial. In fact, it might make society as a whole and the Dems as a party more aligned with them. So millennials would still be more conservative relative to the mean than they were when they were young due to the mean moving to the left, but that looks like them going from being radicals relative to the mean to them being run of the mill liberals or center left relative to the mean, so still firmly in the liberal/left camp but as the main stream rather than as outliers. >
  
  I left home a conservative around 1999, married a conservative two years later and did my little dance with libertarianism ( I know, I know). Then, around 2008, I saw the rampant unbridled rage at a black man becoming President and I gave all that stupidity up. The older I’m getting, the more liberal I’m becoming. Noam Chomsky is making more sense every minute. >
  
  You ain’t cut us a slice of the pie cuz you greedy ass obese boomers. So now we say “fuck the pie, stay lit, viva La revolucion.” >
  
  People don't become more conservative as they age. People become more conservative than average because the average becomes more liberal. >
  
  They have witnessed their parents worrying about finances and medical costs with retirement, lived through the great recession, and now, the pandemic.  Unlike boomers who saw the benefits of capitalism (actually capitalism with labor unions), millennials are seeing the results of winner take all capitalism. >
  
  I was conservative in the early 90's when I started voting. Then the conservative party became the reactionary party and the democratic party became the conservative party. So I've always stayed the same in my beliefs; it's the parties that changed around me. >
  
  I mean being conservative is pretty stupid, i want programs that we pay collectively in taxes to actually go back to us....to make our lives better then just allow wealthy people to steal our tax money >
  
  I offer; it is because we were raised with the idea of 'What the Nazis did was bad, and we should never allow similar thoughts to them' And now you have the modern Republican party, literally copy/pasting Nazi rhetoric. >
  
  Also, the internet, despite its many issues, has quickly started eroding some old biases.  The culture war over same sex marriage has swung very quickly to the left, as has taboos over marijuana.
  Also, now that we're a bit removed from WWII, the right is starting to show less shame in becoming more fascist and insane.  There's corrupt rightwing Nixon, who resigned crying on tv in disgrace; then there's W. Bush, who lied to start a war and create the largest antiwar protests in history; and then there's the jawdroppingly incompetent fat lazy dumb corrupt turd that was the last guy.  The worse they are, the more they're religiously revered too.  "Millenials" (aka regular thinking humans too young to have previous party loyalties cloud their judgement) see this and wonder wtf? >
  
  Millennials have been exploited by corporate capitalism and conservative politics (which often go hand-in-hand) basically our entire lives. We've been lied to, used for profit and in war, discarded as necessary and chained back to our stations as necessary, and all because we were fool enough to believe the promises our parents told us. And all the while, the people in charge have sought to turn us against each other.
  Millennials aren't becoming more conservative because we recognize the villainy and, having little to conserve, we have no reason to join in. >
  
  Then climate is huge I think.  
  The planet is turning hostile to human life.  It’s no surprise that young people who actually have to live here for a while longer care about that, and don’t care for the people who say “I don’t care if the planet kills you, I’m either old enough that I won’t be around, or rich enough I can live in a bunker.  So fuck you.  But… please vote for me ok?” >
  
  Am a Xennial (1977). I’m more flamingly liberal than at any other time in my life, despite having more of value than ever before. >
  
  Is it because the regessives are trying to keep their stranglehold on white and older voters by putting all the burden on the younger and lower class while simultaneously giving welfare to corporations that don't need it to the point no one my age even considered having kids until their 30s because they can't afford it, let alone any prospect of ever owning a home? >
  
  I'm really tired of seeing this stupid mantra of people growing more conservative as they age. It's not true, and is really one of those little half lies invented to justify the slide to authoritarianism on the right. It's not that people's views change, it's that society changes while the individual remains static. Yesterday, homosexualality was not widely accepted, while today, it is. On the other hand, today, trans people are facing a similar uphill battle, even being attacked by the same gay people who fought and bled just to be able to appear in public without being chased off. 
  Boomers as a cohort were far more conservative than their parents, as well as the silent generation that preceded them, even at a young age. Boomers as a cohort supported the Vietnam War because, for the most part, the people being drafted were the poor or minority. Most of the boomers who joined did so of their own volition. 
  The hippy movement was a mix of true believers that wanted a left-wing push, but most of the participants were young adults that didn't have to rush to find a life-sustaining job - they had their generationally wealthy parents to fall back on, as well as job requirements that asked for little more than a high school diploma. The counter-culture revolution fell apart once the majority of conservative members found themselves needing to find work when the 70s rolled around and stagflation started to impact their ability to live extravagantly. 
  Legislatively, it's more of the same - the Me generation prioritized their cohort at the expense of others. First, and agreeably,  they lobbied to have the voting age reduced to 18. But from there it was mostly about concentrating wealth into that generation.  Most obviously, they supported and lobbied for deregulation and lower tax rates. Remember, the 40s and 50s saw massive expansions of public services, including the fancy new highways being built. Welp, gone is the funding, which is why a lot of our roads suck. By the 90s the Boomer generation was firmly entrenched in the legislative process. Here you saw Glass Steagal being neutered, Republicans signing a pledge to never raise taxes, and trade agreements such as NAFTA. You also saw a reduction of estate taxes, which allowed for a massive transference of generational wealth as their parents died. The generation that survived the horrors of the Vietnam War decided to start their pointless war, happy to do so because they wouldn't be the ones going over. 
  Today, boomers as a cohort are doing much of the same. You've seen it in the push for cheaper medication. There have also been calls to raise the voting age back to 21, because they feel threatened that they will no longer be in power. How many among us have been told by Boomer parents that they shouldn't expect an inheritance because it'll be spent? I have. Climate change resistance is rarely about being wrong about the impact of climate catastrophe, but more about the individual cost they (might) be forced to burden. And this is all wrapped in the same rhetoric of lower taxes, lower burdens on business owners. 50 years of that same repeated mantra, all to see unions fall, healthcare costs explode, prices rise, an extreme reduction in U.S. soft power, and 3 presidents (Reagan, the Sequel, and Trump) that perfectly embodied the generation's embrace of personal excess at the expense of everyone else. >
  
  It’s almost like we grew up watching conservatives drag us through several unnecessary wars and multiple once-in-a-lifetime economic recessions >
  
  Well, the right wing, and old people, decided to mock and belittled those who aren't enjoying the same spending power as they had when they were young. They screamed avocado toast, and "I made minimum wage and had an apartment and car note, you just need to not drink craft beer!" And then boomers, you know, the generation of peace and love who fought the original civil rights wars, turned their backs on all that. "Those people, those people were resisting arrest!" The boomer hatred of LGBTQs... the same groups that boomers taught us GenXers not to hate... is a huge turn off. Boomers who 'wasted' their early lives living free and happy, who later bought in, tossed their ideals to the side. All the pain and suffering they were presented with became a right of passage for them, something to be proud of!
  The kids aren't having it.  They want the world that Star Trek and The Twilight Zone sought to create. They want the world where unions, or laws, protect workers. They want people to be judged on how they trespass against others; not who they fuck, how often, or the colour of skin. Boomer's advice: pound the pavement! Dont leave until you speak to a manager! Live within your means! Boomer math... They never kept updated on the cost of things.
  Why would young people move closer to the groups that openly hate them, and who ignorantly mocked their economic plight and spewed delusional horse shit?
  It weirds me out that so many of my generation came to embrace the ideals they hated as children. 911 did a real number of many of them. Turning live and let live kinda folks into "those people, those people were resisting arrest!" Girls who literally dated black boys to rebel against their parent's bigotry who are now overt racists.
  As a kid I promised myself I wouldn't become a grump (see star trek). I'd adapt my reality as new information came along, and that I wouldn't belittle young people, or do the things I hated when others did them to me. Others embraced that horse shit as 'this is life, that which did not kill me only makes me stronger!' People with Stockholm syndrome as far as I am concerned. Repeating the cycle of child abuse as it were. >
  
  
  Historically, people tend to become less liberal as they age: the Che Guevara posters come down and conversations about home improvements replace debates about social improvements. But millennials are bucking that trend.
  
  This is a myth, older people are more conservative because wealthy people live longer, not because people get more conservative as they age. >
  
  This is also completely ignoring the elephant in the room.  People in general don't have starkly more conservative values as they age; society moves forward and they don't move as fast, which makes them relatively more conservative.  This is the first time in a long time in American society where the right wing has continually been marching further to the right, so people will seem more left just by standing still.
  In the 60's, people were fighting to even be able to say that black people had the right to vote, and those opposed used the n-word left and right to scream at those they thought as lesser.  By the 80's, that was unacceptable.  In the 80's, AIDS was the gay plague, and gay people weren't really people, so no one cared; by the '00s, that had flipped, and you couldn't get away with that.  Now? While the left of society has continued to try to march forward, the right is trying to fight to remove the rights of gays to marry, and women the right to choose.  George Floyd was murdered in the street, and a bunch of conservatives said he should have stopped resisting and he would have been fine.  Even if the appetite for change among millennials slows as they age, society isn't reflecting how they grew up wanting it to be.  Every generation tends to try to make the world match their values, but for whatever reason the right wing has just ignored the values of Millennials, and to a greater extent Zoomers.  Republicans are panicking, and they should be. >
  
  You can’t be a “conservative” if you have nothing to conserve. Now that I think about it, they really missed the fucking boat on climate change. 
  Imagine a Republican Party that wanted conservation of the environment, they could’ve easily peeled off the Green Party constituency. >
  
  Because the right in this country is mean spirited, racist garbage? >
  
  Unbelievable they missed the chance to amke that poster say:
  AIN'T
  NOTHING'
  GOIN' UP
  EXCEPT  (instead of but the)
  RENT
  so that the initials would spell ANGER >
  
  This whole "you grow conservative as you grow old" thing is boomer specific and not based on actual history. No other generation before them did the same thing and now that we have by large removed lead from our everyday lives no generation since will suffer the same fate. >
  
  I just want to retire before I die and only one side of one party is willing to help with that and it doesn't rhyme with schme-O-P. >
  
  „Fuck you I got mine“ does not suit you well if all you got was 100k in debt and a kick in the ass. >
  
  Millennials were born into an age where good faith politics was on its deathbed and Republicans were responsible for wars, domestic spying, torture, attempting cutting all social programs, economic recessions, and everything deeply troubling being championed by repu licans during the trump years.
  I'd rather pay a reasonable amount of taxes and not live in a shithole. Others would rather not pay taxes and live in a fantasy world that their guns make them self sufficient. >
  
  Because the right fucked us over for decades and decades and now expects us to thank them for it?  Is that why?  (Checked article, basically yes)  
  What the hell do we have to conserve, man?  I don't own anything in this stupid fucking country.  Even if I was purely self-centered, what have I been offered to hold onto?  Seems like nothing.  Maybe should've thought about that before all your ardent useful idiots started aging out of being able to vote, you know?
  Too late now.  Enjoy watching your whole shitty political philosophy shuffle off into the grave, idiots. >
  
  I grew up in a conservative household in the south.
  Considering my family, full of right-wing individuals, have: blamed a 13 year old for a suicide, had police called for altercations between family members, beat a child with an extension cable, had a gay son commit suicide by cop due to being disowned, etc…
  I’m as left wing as they come. >
  
  One half is that our generation has failed to attain the status and wealth that would entice us to behave to protect it at the expense of others.
  The other half is that there has not been any meaningful conservative political proposals in my lifetime other than “more money for rich people.” Everything else is meaningless culture war grievances that don’t matter to normal humans. >
  
  Nothing says projection like boomers INSISTING that all my life Id become more conservative as I got older and made more money. 
  Yet somehow here I am 30+ and I’m not a selfish prick still. I’m still wondering at what age I’ll apparently decide the human value of others is worth less than a tax break for someone who makes way more than I ever will. >
  
  Because they aren’t stupid? >
  
  I’m an older millennial. I own a home and have a child. I’ve gone far more left as I’ve gotten older. There’s nothing conservatism offers me and I’m willing to contribute to improve the overall lives of the people of this country. >
  
  My husband, who is turning 40 this year, went to Christian school his whole life and either didn't vote or voted R because that's what his parents have done. I've been liberal, non religious, and always voted D. I've been pretty into politics and social issues since I was younger and introduced my husband to NPR and our local station KQED when we got together 10 years ago. Guess who now doesn't believe in God and is a sustaining member of public radio? Lol. My husband routinely gets pissed at conservatives and is very liberal now. I'm so glad he started paying attention. >
  
  I think the answer is simpler than that - as the first generation to broadly "grow up with the internet" millennials were and are simply exposed to a lot more information than previous generations. It is much harder - not impossible of course - to remain traditionally conservative once you know how the rest of the world lives. >
  
  You pull the ladder up behind you, leaving nothing but a middle finger for those left at the bottom, and act perplexed when the people stuck down there aren't starting to think more like you do as they grow older.
  Fucking wild what living through several once-in-a-lifetime crises will do to a generation. >
  
  The issue is that Republicans have moved so far right that they're falling off the edge of the flat earth that a lot of them still believe in.  So much so that a person could become more conservative in the classical sense but result in no additional support for the right wing and Republicans.  
  I'm fairly middle of the road politically myself but you wouldn't know it from my voting record the last decade or so.  20 years ago I'd be a swing voter that could just as easily vote for a socially liberal Republican as I could a more fiscally conservative Democrat.  Often a 3rd party candidate too (particularly in local races where they actually have a chance).  Republicans going full fascist puts me squarely in the Democrat tent even without my own political beliefs changing much. >
  
  At some point there'll be an interesting study about how a population's politics do trend right as they age, but not nearly as fast as the overton window so it looks like they're trending left.
  That's... pretty terrifying. >
  
  The internet. simple as that. being able to see and hear about other people's struggles promotes empathy and caring >
  
  As a tail-end Gen Xer, my ex mother-in-law constantly told us we would get more conservative over time.  Joke's on her, I've become more liberal over the years.  I'm happy to pay higher taxes if that money goes to help those less fortunate than me, pays for a four year degree or trade school for everyone, and provides health care to everyone. >
  
  I’m sorry I don’t have a burning hatred for those that aren’t like me. 
  I apologize for caring about the common person and wanting to find and build true meaning in my community. 
  I regrettably don’t care about owning the Libs, or anyone for that matter. >
  
  I was raised in a very conservative Christian home; homeschooled until high school to make sure I was not indoctrinated by the “liberal” public school system, all that fun stuff.
  I carried that with me for most of my twenties but started to see the light as I got older and fell away from religion; that led to a domino effect on my entire belief system and I became a self-described “moderate Republican”. I clung to that for years until Trump, when I realized that I was having a hard time admitting that I had become a liberal because of my upbringing but Trump made it easy to finally flush all that and fully convert.
  So I can see it. I’m at the very edge of what is considered a Millenial I guess (graduated high school in 1999), but I figured I’d throw my experience out there. >
  
  I’m an older millennial and I’ve become more liberal with age and life experience. I was a Republican in my youth when I bought the bullshit of limited government and fiscal responsibility. I abandoned the party when they went all-in on the social conservative nutbaggery and abandoned any pretense of limited government/fiscal responsibility. I became a liberal once I bought my home and had children. I’m in the top 5% of income earners in the United States and I barely get-by. Someone who makes less than me, I don’t even understand how they live. Housing, childcare, and student loan costs are crippling. Any kind of medical emergency within my family would bankrupt us. This is no way to run a society.