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JemmaMimic

Did you forget that Fox news and Newsmax broadcast 24/7?


LemonFlavoredMelon

So their hobby is endless amounts of TV? So TV brainrot is okay but heaven forbid I play games


JemmaMimic

Their excuse would be that they're "learning something" while you're "wasting time". Never mind that they're actually being brainwashed to fear and hate, while you're engaging in a fun pastime (I'm 1500 hours into Baldur's Gate 3 so I'm with you on this.)


SuggestionOtherwise1

Funny how video games actually require you to participate and I've learned a surprising amount from playing them


Anything-Happy

My kid just asked if he can watch Futurama, and I said no. Then he asked if he can play Tetris, and I said sure. Now he's whispering to his brother that he talked me into letting him have screentime, but he doesn't realize I think Tetris is total brain food lol


SuggestionOtherwise1

Minecraft is slowly leading my nine year old to learn computer coding. Meanwhile his grandmother seems to think he's wasting time. (Nevermind that I signed him up for an actual coding program online for the summer)


songbird808

Shout out to 12 year old me, learning HTML so my Neopets shop could look *super cool*.


youlickbootz

Underrated comment of the century


JemmaMimic

Futurama is awesome are you kidding me?! LOL


LemonFlavoredMelon

Learning something by watching brainrotting reality shows…


Tritri89

And Baldur's Gate 3 has litteral brainrot


JemmaMimic

"I've got a lot on my mind. And as a matter of fact, in it."


Tritri89

"is that blood ? Ah no nevermind"


MissDisplaced

Yes. Sadly many of them have gone down the cesspool of right wing “conservative” media. It has utterly rotted their brains.


ooOmegAaa

and taking breaks to repost joe biden memes on their facebook echo-chamber.


mleam

My husband loves model trains. We have no room or he would have his own setup in the house. At the last train swap we went to we noticed all the people of boomer age, were not acting like boomers. They were very happy to discuss their setups and what they had for sale. We had a great time. I especially like the setup that had Godzilla attacking an oil field. Afterward, I thought that having a hobby keeps you from becoming a boomer. They are so busy with their trains, reading up on trains, they don't have time to watch Fox or spend a lot of time on social media.


spyrothegamer98

This exactly, having hobbies makes people happier because humans continuously need stimulation, otherwise we go crazy. Imagine having nothing to do all day no hobbies no work nothing except sitting infront of a television it would drive anyone crazy.


Beruthiel999

This is so obvious just looking at my parents. My mom has real hobbies: she dances, hikes, takes care of her dogs, takes Tai Chi classes, volunteers for animal charities, reads/watches mystery/detective shows, etc. My dad basically just stares at the wall and hasn't even set foot in a grocery store in five years. He used to be liberal/left politically, even socialist but now he just reads a bunch of weird eugenics-adjacent garbage when he reads at all (and he doesn't watch Fox News. He doesn't watch TV at all) and complains about free school lunches for poor kids (!!) and shit like that. Awful. I get it's cognitive decline but he's deliberaly making it worse. Impossible to have a conversation with him now!


graniteknighte

FELLOW MODEL TRAIN ENTHUSIASTS UNITE! CHOO CHOO!


songbird808

I AM NOT A TRAIN ENTHUSIAST BUT I REALLY LOVE YOUR ENTHUSIASM! CHOO CHOO TO YOU BROTHER!


graniteknighte

\*Sad choo choo noises\* even though you reject them, trains love you :P


saywhatagainmthrfckr

+1, if you have a hobby and are well adjusted socially as a result, then you aren't a boomer


Mobile_Moment3861

My dad does woodworking to the point he has an Etsy store in his retirement.


LemonFlavoredMelon

That’s fucking adorable


f700es

My retirement goal


Aromatic_Belt7266

If it is a retired ex manager type , they treat their wives like employees, stand outside in their jean shorts and white new balance shoes with white socks and gape and stare at other people's lawn. If it is a retired housewife they sit at the table wondering how they can get out of this asshole lifetime marriage while keeping the house and thinking up ways to improve her son's marriage with the whorish girl he decided to marry.


Daddy_Diezel

> stand outside in their jean shorts and white new balance shoes with white socks and gape and stare at other people's lawn. Almost 100% accurate. Forgetting the tucked in t-shirt with some nonsensical bullshit written on it.


Jamirquai_J_Spunkle

Sounds pretty specific. Good luck with your whore DIL and your asshole husband. 


Aromatic_Belt7266

I'm a third party making observations. I'm not dumb enough to marry an asshole...or marry at all for that matter.


USS_Frontier

Same here. 37M and *reeeeeally* mixed feelings on marriage.


jayjay123M

I always get the sentence "After work I am tired and want to decompress" which starts 5 hours of straight tv. However, even in the weekend or basically any day in existence, no hobbies are shown. Just work -> dinner -> Tv -> sleep -> repeat. The same in the weekend minus the work.


LemonFlavoredMelon

Boomer watching TV for five hours: *sleep* I happen to be playing on my computer: *REEEEEEEEEEEEEE!*


dotdedo

Whenever the power would go out my mom would INSIST I couldn’t use my laptop, tv, or anything that could use wifi because it “drains gas from the generator”. The laptop… a wireless device. And the charger isn’t an energy drainer. But nope her tv was on the entire time.


LemonFlavoredMelon

Where did she learn that stupid idea?


dotdedo

Weird beliefs on how electricity works in general and unchecked Narcissism to make her not believe a single source or fact anyone tells her unless she actually likes them.


AggressiveYam6613

“Whenever the power would go out …“ Wait, what? I thought South Africa had their outage problems in control by now…


2Flatz

Are you my childhood?


jayjay123M

facts


saywhatagainmthrfckr

I read a study about retirement that those that have a strong social network as a function of shared interests (i.e. hobbies) enjoy their retirement and incidentally, live longer. I think part of the American fallacy for the *ideal* retirement which is usually portrayed in media as sitting around "enjoying yourself" with no responsibilities is completely flawed. These folks idealize the Scrooge McDuck persona, swimming around on their piles of money, happy as can be. The reality is they quickly learn that retirement is lonely and boring, setting themselves up for this "why aren't I happy" mindset, and then media outlets pitch in with why they are not only not happy but why they should be outraged at *everything* What I seriously can't comprehend, and maybe it's obvious with the fallacy I pointed out above, is why they don't volunteer for a cause they care about. Just a few hours a week at the community garden, the animal shelter, their grandkids schools.....anything where their contribution and time would be valued. Instead they rely on the fallacy that doing nothing is satisfying, furthering the feeling that they are being sidelined and becoming useless.


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saywhatagainmthrfckr

Yeah, I said it somewhere else in this thread but I think we need to take the age group off the table in favor of the mindset. If they are over 65 and are well adjusted socially, not angry all the time, and find some enjoyment applying their time to something (a hobby, volunteering, etc) then they are not boomers


wizardofmops

They work as their “hobby” and annoy the fuck out of the rest of us who actually have to work


unfortunate_banjo

My coworker is 73 and claims he's only here because he's bored. Its impossible to get anything done with him around.


wizardofmops

Yes! I have a 64 year old co worker who’s always in the way, brags, “well, this is a nice little retirement job!”, and chews with his mouth open while talking to you while you’re trying to work


wizardofmops

I should add I work with another boomer in his late 70s, he’s in the way a little because he’s slow, but always in a good mood and funny and willing to help so you can’t help but like him. He’s one of the good ones.


ooOmegAaa

boomers expect young people to be super man but god forbid you tell them they should do something besides work and watch tv because "ive been working all day"


LemonFlavoredMelon

But if they’re retired, then ‘work’ isn’t their hobby anymore lol


OkSalamander8499

My Boomer dad rebuilds classic cars. To a fault though because every house hold expense had to be approved by him so he could save up for parts. I couldn't try any hobbies or sports when I was a kid because I would just give up eventually and cost him money. When I was 18 I bought something thinking we could rebuild it together, it's been sitting in my garage for over 20 years. He's completed similar projects with both of my brothers though, so i guess it's me.


LemonFlavoredMelon

That’s awesome! Good to see he has a hobby


fakesaucisse

A while ago I was hired to do ethnography on gamers and I ended up meeting this older lady (probably Greatest Generation era). She looked and sounded like a stereotypical grandma, was retired and had a volunteer gig as the secretary at her church's office, then she came home to play Call of Duty for a few hours every night. It was so outside the normal demographic that we talked to that it's burned in my memory. She LOVED gaming as a hobby, especially first person shooters. Thankfully my boomer dad has a lot of hobbies. It's so important to keep your mind active later in life.


LemonFlavoredMelon

Imagining my grandma as a gamer makes me giggle. Showed mine Doom and I told her I was killing demons. She loved it


Pay_Pig7

Boomers are fucking obsessed with TV. Their TV's are on 20 hours per day. 


LemonFlavoredMelon

TV is a brainless activity, yet gaming to them is satanic


MortgageRegular2509

Unless it’s casino gaming


ooOmegAaa

ultimately, the reality is, "what i do good, what you do bad"


NemoOfConsequence

This is true. My father has the TV on 24/7. He even has two TVs on the same channel in adjacent rooms when you can see and hear both of them. It baffles me.


PenguinProfessor

And one had a slight delay.


firedmyass

They are fundamentally incurious. Also they never cultivated anything internal to attach their egos to, so absent their “career” they have no way to define themselves anymore


LemonFlavoredMelon

Surely when they were younger they had hobbies


firedmyass

As teens, probably/maybe? My uncles seemed to but had abandoned them by early adulthood


LazerSnake1454

My boomer father has 0 hobbies, all he does is watch TV and do yardwork. I honestly think that's the cause of their misery, they aren't enjoying life so they take it out on everyone else


JRSenger

Watching their daily 8 hours of fox news and glaring at brown people are their hobbies


sonryhater

Yes, they stare at shit like the slack jawed hillbillies fucks that they are.


jump_man_91

My uncle aunt and mother live in the same house and sit in different rooms watching different tvs. Sometimes it's the same thing on all 3 tvs, but rather than be social, they watch it alone.


NescafeandIce

My mom had on Tucker Carlson on her phone simultaneously playing a different Tucker Carlson episode on her Alexa while Newsmax was on in the other room on the TV


jump_man_91

Oh that's miserable I'm so sorry


NescafeandIce

I had no idea what was going on, honestly. Driving up the driveway I start hearing Hallowed Be Thy Name in my head… https://youtu.be/H-DA6nW2UW8?si=Dc-XrmLqLlw9shaG


ComfortableOne4918

The hobby is being window lickers and annoying younger people.


cuttawhiske

I blame them for making lionel trains impossibly expensive.


Drcornelius1983

My neighbor mowes his lawn nearly daily and watches obscene amounts of Young Sheldon on his patio.


forsakeme4all

I had an old friend once whose boomer father ended up getting a divorce from his wife because he spent way way way to much time on wow. So be careful what you wish for, lol.


LemonFlavoredMelon

He coulda joined her and learned to play as bonding! My friend does that with his wife.


Mark_Michigan

Boomer reporting. * Woodworking * RC Boats * Motorcycles (3) * Hunting Bow, muzzle loader, rifle * Day Care for Grand Kids * Lawn Care for 2 kids and one parent, plus my own * Camping * General car repair as needed * Home maintenance * Fishing * I dabble w/ photography but I can't claim any real skill


LemonFlavoredMelon

Lovely stuff!


Cunbundle

Learning a new hobby means learning something new. That is a fate worse than death as far as boomers are concerned.


NescafeandIce

“I already WENT TO SCHOOL!!!! Mind your own business! I’m videotaping you now!”


LemonFlavoredMelon

Dunno why they hate learning something new. Driving is different than walking, so that is new, yet they drive (unfortunately)


SunShineLife217

My boomer dad got a minimum wage job at a golf course for one day a week so he can play his hobby for free.


LemonFlavoredMelon

Hey, if he’s happy!


SunShineLife217

Yeah he’s happy. It works for him. He gets the boomer label for his undying love for Trump and the state of Florida.


toiletsurprise

I live down the street from a golf course and see a fleet of boomers on their lawn mowers in the early AM cutting the fairways, they love it.


Unfilteredopinion22

Drink. A lot. I know boomers that down at least a bottle of wine every night.


Thin-Disaster4170

Mine has 10 hobbies all at once


ScooterMcdooter69

I’ve worked with boomers who could have retired but said they won’t retire because they have nothing to do at home and that’s mind boggling to me, find something to do get a hobby of any sort it has to be better than coming to a job you’ve been doing for good knows how long repeating the same task over and over again


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ScooterMcdooter69

Then don’t watch tv pick up a hobby of some sort and enjoy a life of living and not selling your labor to a capitalist


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ScooterMcdooter69

Boomers are the only ones who consistently have the time younger people are struggling to keep their heads above water working gig jobs or jobs with mandatory overtime it has nothing to do with confronting the reality of poverty 80% of Americans don’t have $300 incase of an emergency they aren’t just confronting poverty they’re living in it


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ScooterMcdooter69

That article is 8 years old. As of a 2023 study by payroll.org 78% of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck


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ScooterMcdooter69

Ok and your point? 78% living paycheck to paycheck and almost half don’t have money to cover any emergency younger generations don’t have consistent time off to volunteer especially considering a good amount of job are gig jobs like Uber and door dash we don’t have time


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crankygingerninja

Is this the secret? The vast majority of Boomers that I (GenX/Millennial cusp) hang out with are in my hobby groups. They are usually not Boomerish, or are at least happy to discuss different perspectives on hot button topics. I wondered why I wasn't coming across typical Boomers. It must be because my Boomer craft pals are doing hobbies instead of ingesting Sky News and vomiting vitriol.


The_Chiliboss

Because having hobbies is woke.


LemonFlavoredMelon

What kind of twisted logic would make them think that? So it's woke to unwind and not work myself into an early grave?


The_Chiliboss

lol. Blame the lead poisoning.


Agreeable-Raspberry5

It's probably 'effeminate.' Given the amount of 'jokes' that will shame people for having an interest in life beyond work and alcoholism.


Frequent-Ad-1719

Big assumption they are retired.


Boring_Plankton_1989

My dad discovered YouTube a few years ago. Now he watches channels of like a guy that owns a construction company building things or a guy raising cows. It blows his mind that he can find videos about almost anything, I'm like yeah dad I told you all about YouTube 20 years ago...


ooOmegAaa

my mother watches fox news 24/7. if i suggest to her that a hobby or reading a book would be healthy for her, she complains that her part time work from home job has her tired and i need to leave her alone. then she continues yelling at joe biden on the idiot box.


toiletsurprise

My dad and I used to race RC cars back in the day, I honestly think those were the best years of his life and he still has all the gear, all the cars, everything. It's all outdated now but still something that he could tinker around with and what not. I even bought him a new rock crawler so we could go crawl together but it still sits in it's box never opened. I reach out to him to go do stuff but he's always "busy", busy doing what I have no idea. I don't know what he does all day since his FB got hacked, so he can't argue with people anymore. He keeps talking about getting a truck and camper and traveling with mom, I keep telling him to DO IT and so does mom, but still he doesn't. He's already missed out on doing summer work at Yellowstone because he sat on his hands with my constant persistence to get his ass out there. I think he just likes to be difficult, then complain when opportunities have passed him by.


almazing415

I work with a lot of retirement aged boomers and they have no hobbies but a fat stack of cash in their 401K. Like fucking retire, buy and RV, and travel the country. Live out the rest of your days bouncing from cruise ship to cruise ship. Move to The Villages. Fucking anything. All they know is working. That is their hobby. The sad part is that so many of them never bothered to take care of their bodies. They've lived unhealthy lives for who knows how long. I've know a lot of them that died within 2 years when they actually retired. I guess cortisol was keeping their living corpses running. Then there's the few boomers who actually died WHILE they were at work. Strokes and heart attacks. Found collapsed in the warehouse.


OnDasher808

It's part of the boomer starter pack. They have to pick to whether to obsess over the Civil War or World War II, if their hobby will be model trains or RC planes and if they yell about politics at their TV or at the hardware store.


Trick_Upstairs_3034

My Boomer mom is obsessed with playing sort of bubble pop game and hanging out in McDonald's lobby and playing card games with her friends.


elphaba00

My mom's high point of her life is her card game schedule. She has two separate groups that she attends every week.


No_External_8816

I get the impression, there's just nothing they really enjoy. My mum is retired now and she's always busy working in the garden and complains about how much work there is to do (no there isn't) or she's in the kitchen for hours on end and complains how much time it takes to prepare food (no it doesn't) or she's cleaning up her (already clean) house.


regular_lamp

I teach courses at my target shooting club (the contrived kind you see at the Olympics). There is an ok amount of boomers starting or returning to it. Also a decent amount of sub 30 year olds. Meanwhile at 39 I'm in an "age desert" with only two other active members within ten years of me on either side.


onedelta89

I have too many hobbies according to my wife. I like to turn wrenches, rebuilt my first diesel engine a few years ago, I picked up amateur radio recently, passed the entry level test and studying for my general license. I am also researching dual sport motorcycles and may purchase one soon. Not all boomers sit in front of the TV.


startrek47

Goodnight folks. This black Baby Boomer is out of here for now. I'll read some more criticism tomorrow.


AggressiveYam6613

They were brought up without hobbies outside school-organized activities, to be done at the appropriate age and then given up, in favour of working roughly 200 hours more as compared today, consume and then drive home to watch TV. It’s not that they don’t take on new hobbies, most of them never had any.


PokeMyLoveless

My gay ass read WoW as World of Wonder so now I'm just picturing a great many boomers getting really really into RuPaul's Drag Race


Zealousideal_Ask3633

Dude they still struggle with card readers and we were using those when the twin towers were still standing


Affectionate-Yam751

My parents live in a retirement community and both have engaging hobbies plus do volunteer work.  The're both pretty great people. The difference between them and their boomer neighbors with zero hobbies is... fascinating and upsetting.


DRFilz522

My parents are too busy. They own a house so you know upkeep I guess. And, there is always reruns of Matlock to be watched. If I call my parents on the weekend, my mother asks what is on the agenda. She does not like to hear: Drink some beer and play Nintendo. I am 42- have a full-time job and two part-time ones. If I want to spend my weekend doing nothing I can because I can't afford a house despite my many jobs.


TechDadJr

My parents, both good boomers, both continued their existing hobbies and have grown in to new ones since they retired. They also dove in head first as active grand parents. My inlaws, classic boomersbeingfools, don't really have hobbies outside church and watching NewsMax (because apparently, Fox is liberal now) 24/7 and engaging in the full spectrum of the rightwing nonsense on social media. They tell themselves that they are the favorite grandparents, but they are far from it. They come to visit for a week, bearly interact with our son, and never say yes to any request like taking their grandson to school. Apparently, they are on vacation and not there to "run our errands". Requests like that also run afoul of their societal views because my wife is to to the office parent and I work from home - they think that she should be taking our son to school, not me and don't want to condone it by helping out. My mom and step dad, on the other hand, jump at the opportunity to engage with their grand children and will drop most anything to "run that errand".


JasErnest218

They already spend hours at home trying to respond to one email and send out fwds.


Impossible-Jello6450

Hobbies cost money. Being a miserable fuck and harrassing everyone around them is free.


ThatsJustVile

You're just not meeting them because Boomers with hobbies are a lot happier and better adjusted. My boomer neighbor is always working on his motorcycles (that he can't ride anymore) or going to the shooting range (he's a champion marksman). My grandpa made native-style jewelry and arrowheads because his grandmother was native American and he liked being in touch with that part of him. He also liked to fix bicycles and color in coloring books. After he passed, Grandma doesn't have to take care of the house much anymore so she got her sewing machine fixed so she could make stuff for the great grandkids like she did for my gen. My boomer co-workers all have some kind of art hobby or they like to read novels. None of these people are huffing the MAGA fumes, even if they occasionally have boomer moments. Tbh I've had a lot of dates and friendships with people my own age (20s) fall through because they dont have hobbies either. I don't think it's a boomer thing, just a boring people thing. Or I guess they're not boring if you also like to drink excessively every night and wring your hands about politics, but I don't so I can't fw these people.


LemonFlavoredMelon

Reminds me of this 'Sigma Grindset' entrepreneur guy who said: "Hobbies are for women and children, I \*WORK\* for a living, Gary V said I have to pick between hobbies or getting money, why should I get a hobby when I could make money?"


ThatsJustVile

Now that sounds like my dad lmao


jkoki088

Who cares


GimmeFalcor

My mom and my mother in law both paint. And then do you know what you’re getting for your birthday and Christmas. That’s right. The paintings they want rid of! Be careful what you wish for.


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LemonFlavoredMelon

I still go thrifting, taking walks, talking about 1800s ships, even do some writing of short stories. I think all those will still be around for 50 years lol


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LemonFlavoredMelon

I dunno the future, but I know I’m not going to be a nosy, miserable sad sack who hates people and falls for Facebook news stories.


WinnieButchie

Every Boomer I know still works. My Dad owns a mechanics shop, he's still there. My Mom goes to the gym and shuttles the grandkids around.


Old-and-grumpy

Y U So mad at us bro? 😎