I think of it as the “Anyone can succeed” attitude, which I actually had before I got so mind-numbingly old. I always imagine that the “It’s not fair that someone has more money than I do” attitude skews young.
Personally I was far more liberal in my early 20s, since then I have become far more conservative and libertarian. Ive also become far more cynical about government and politicians as ive gotten older and learned more.
Nah, I’m forty-one, and I still think you’re old as fuck.
LK, what is your definition of “old as fuck?” You brought it up. I think it’s fair to ask you.
– old as fuck poster who remembers playing Intellivision
P.S. And how old are you?
JM1
1586
Completely useless? No way. If someone is 20 then their view of the world is going to be necessarily different to that of a 40 year old, because of the world they’ll have grown up with and the limited time with which to experience life. It also tends to inform the manner in which people argue.
That’s not intended to dismiss people in their 20s, but it doesn’t mean that age is completely useless.
Lorini
1587
I’m 53. I am grateful to still be alive at 53 because a lot of people don’t make it this far. If that invalidates my opinions, excuse me, but I still plan on having them.
Erik_J
1588
This doesn’t mean anything. I’m 30 and I remember playing Intellivision.
And given average life expectancy you have another 25-30 years to go. Look at it like you’re in your 30’s now :)
Haha, well let’s not let an opportunity go by for us all to defend how old we are!
Anyway, I’m not sure why anyone’s interpreting L_K’s original post as somehow even implying opinions become less valid as we age. It was clear to me he wasn’t talking about the specific opinions Andy has so much as his apparent grasp of the issues, and the amount of nuance (or lack of) in his posts.
Pff. Lorini clearly just picked her “age” from the page number we’re on in the thread.
Pretty sure she’s Keyser Soze and we’re about to get served.
Pogo
1592
And yet it still tells me absolutely nothing about the individual.
Several people commented that they expected him to be young.
They expected.
Expected.
JM1
1594
Their ages tells you nothing about them? Come on - this is P&R, surely if you know someone lived through the Cuban Missile Crisis they’ll have a different view of world politics than someone who was barely alive when 9/11 happened…
I agree that “I expected you to be some kid who loves xyz” is a dumb thing to say, but that’s no reason to ignore age when we’re talking about politics.
Pogo
1595
Yeah, you can make generalizations about age and political affiliation, prime example being FOX News 65+ viewership and religious affiliation or social conservatism.
But when discussing an individual, or talking to an individual, there’s no reason to lump someone into a pre-conceived model. I’ve talked to too many old people who are socially progressive or not Christian conservative, so when seeing a senior citizen it’s probably best not to assume an affiliation or make up your mind about what they think based on their age. The same goes for young conservatives, which were certainly a bit of a minority at my college, but they were certainly there voicing opinions that you would think should come from senior citizens.
So your example about the Cuban Missile Crisis is pretty silly. An 18 year old might have read about the history from the same viewpoint as the person who was alive and watching/reading news at the time. 9/11 is a great example of how “someone who was there” does not make them an authority on what actually happened, the same goes with Cuba. We live in an information age and there are dozens of accounts of 9/11 that don’t make sense when taken individually.
Yep. Because we were wrong about Andy’s age, there is no reason to ever make assumptions based on age again. What other theories can we disabuse ourselves of based on an single mistaken observation? Let’s clean some fucking house already.
Lorini
1597
I have no idea what age has to do with much of anything once you get past 25 or so. Anyone can become as knowledgeable or more knowledgeable about any given event in history, even if they didn’t experience it. Geezus, are you saying that since no one alive has experienced the Civil War (for example) no one can have an opinion that’s valuable?
Knowledge will trump age any time. Experiencing something has very little to do with being able to discuss it, and people who try to argue with “well I was there!” will be met by a “so what” by many educated people.
I have no idea where you are extracting any of these comments from anything people (or I) said in this thread, unless your goal is to somehow prove by sheer volume of folly just how easily age and knowledge can part ways. All I said, and all anyone has really gotten out of it (apart from the AARP contingent presuming that I’ve besmirched the honor of the nearly dead) is that it’s surprising to me when people who’ve lived for a while talk like they were born yesterday.
Agree, disagree, whatever, there’s no honest way to derive either an argument for or against age per se from that. I can’t even parse what the hell Pogo’s white knighting at the moment but I’m sure it’s equally magnificent.
Lorini
1599
What? Andy Bates talks like he was born yesterday? What?
You aren’t the only one who can’t figure out what the yelling is about.
We’re in an information age, apparently, so the sky’s the limit.
