35 Things That Are Classic Baby Boomer Stereotypes

There seems to be this weird, ongoing intergenerational war between Baby Boomers and the Millennial generation. Honestly, I think it’s because Boomers are having a huge temper tantrum.

I’m going to explain, but some background is needed to help my theory make sense. Baby Boomers, or Boomers for short, is a term used to describe the generation of people born between 1946 and 1964, which means folks who are currently between 76 and 58 years old.

Until fairly recently, Boomers made up a considerable portion of the world's population, especially in the United States and other developed nations. According to the 2020 Census Data, Boomers accounted for about 71 million people in the population and were slightly surpassed by Millennials, who made up nearly 73 million people.

Since Boomers have been around significantly longer (as they make up the majority of those who are parents to Millennials, though there are always exceptions), they became accustomed to the world being literally catered to them. This is due to their high population numbers and the overall prosperity of the economy during their careers (the cost of living, even before the pandemic and supply chain shortages, was already skyrocketing).

Boomers were, and still are, as many are just a few years from retirement, an economically influential generation. They became the focus of marketing campaigns and business plans because they were largely the ones making and spending money for a long time. 

Then came the Millennial Generation (I’m not purposefully ignoring you, Gen X’ers, I promise! You’ve been lovely; little to no complaints here). Millennials grew up in an incredible time when technology exploded and rapidly advanced.

We’re the generation that grew up with landline phones, beepers/pagers, desktop computers, Nokia brick phones, and T-9 texting. As we grew, so did technology.

Millennials were learning brand new technology as it was released, and naturally, some things evolved outside of having Boomers as the main focus. Faced with the natural progression of change and evolution that was taking Boomers out of the spotlight, mixed with rapidly developing technology that may have been confusing or overwhelming, Boomers began to criticize Millennials for taking away their comfort in a world that was solely focused on them.

Boomers widely used tactics of infantilizing (for reference, Millennials are roughly between 26 and 41 years old) and mocking Millennials for not achieving the same things as them (going to college/graduating without debt, purchasing homes, getting married, having children) and for enjoying small luxuries (like avocado toast, lattes, or other “fancy” coffees). All while purposefully ignoring (it’s also possible that they’re so myopic that they just never noticed) that it is largely because of the Boomer generation that things like going to college without overwhelming debt, purchasing a home, or starting a family are largely unattainable.

So, fed up with the state of the world and the negative attitude directed at Millennials by Boomers, some have taken a page from the Boomer playbook and have started to poke fun at some of the more Boomer-centric habits. Keep scrolling to see what stereotypical Boomer habits some Twitter users have pointed out.

1. Mowing their lawn at ungodly hours

scarletskyguy

2. Overusing thumbs-up emojis

AnnabellaJonas

3. Using their Bitmoji with the megaphone

4. Knowing which route you took

stmchugh

5. Putting their phone calls on speaker and shouting at them

spleeborg_

6. Watching TV news or church broadcasts 24/7

SixSecondRide

7. Zooming in on pictures on your phone

craigwatson_16

8. Drinking from the hose and talking about how they did

Addison_Peacock

9. Collecting Coca-Cola memorabilia

renamamiyas

10. Overusing ellipses

MakATK

11. Talking about their deceased friends

Ohsuh_Ossa

12. Wearing jeans to the gym

Torgrude45

13. Calling cannabis 'pot'

pyroxiumn

14. Participating in weird Facebook chain posts

madison_nieder

15. Overly complicated universal remotes

barahsanks

16. Sending random links

MeghanHughes

17. Paying with exact change

ayeeesarah

18. Mustard

catherinepio17

19. Turning on all the lights in the room you're in

dridsteph

20. Taking videos with their iPads

PachZowers

21. Nautical-themed bathrooms

rshllcnsk

22. Taking terrible selfies

ravemomcon

23. Talking about what TV was like in their time

emwalrus

24. Using the cry-laugh emoji

cnrw8mn

25. Wanting to ban cellphones from concerts

stupiddlamb

26. Telling you the time they're leaving the voicemail as if your phone doesn't already do that

speakingsarcasm

27. Criticizing younger generations for buying lattes

MrsHoover11

28. Those 'Despicable Me' Minions

jessikea__

29. Nuts

AlllzzzL

30. Outdated skills like cursive

oatmilkliv

31. Sitting in booths

saintofubitches

32. Talking excessively about their ailments

1519worldpeace

33. Voice-to-text

makenamerri

34. Gross cough drops

uhlysser

35. Pot pies, according to this guy

_marcusmoorexx

Now, before you come at me with the 'Not All Boomers,' OF COURSE it's not all Boomers. It's a broad, sweeping generalization about the stereotype of Baby Boomers as a whole for entertainment.

As an older Millennial now, there were definitely some tweets that felt like an attack too, like my overuse of the cry-laughing emoji or talking about my poor, failing body. Did you have a favorite tweet on our list?

Let us know your thoughts in the comment section below, and be sure to share!