>>507537447people don't really understand the kinda shit that two successive generations fighting megadeath industrialized wars generates. whole branches of families wiped out, men permanently traumatized and they never talked about it, and then the cold war meant a third one was expected to be fought in the next one or two generations. ptsd wasn't a recognized thing back then either (it's an over-recognized thing now, but that's neither here nor there). and remember, the generation that fought ww2 pretty much grew up during the great depression. we're talking brutal shit.
my grandfather (ww2) and great grandfathers (ww1) were vets. most 'old people' when i grew up were. they were a lot nicer to their grand kids than to their sons. i remember i was staying at a friends place and his granddad (vet) was visiting. sat at the other end of the sofa to my friend's father most of the day and they didn't say a word to each other the whole time. i wouldn't call that an uncommon scene.
boomers didn't have it exactly the way that /pol/ likes to think they did. it was prosperous compared to the great depression, but they were not sympathetically raised, the west started de-industrializing in the mid-60s and every western government treated them as a calculation for the expected ww3 and didn't pretend about it either. problem with talking to boomers now (as opposed to 30 years ago when they were middle aged) is that a lot of their recollections are clouded by end of life nostalgia. and i know this because i am gen-x and i've been talking to these people my whole life.
the 90s are looked back on fondly by a lot of people because it was basically breathing room. pic explains it quite succintly.