The Generational Warfare Strategies of a Greying Populace
This remix of Puritanism and the neo-liberal imaginary (obsessed with what Ericson dubs "the myth of certainty and security") is a necessary but not sufficient set of conditions for declaring this peculiar "state of emergency." [6] The remaining variable is demographic. It pits an aging, declining and reactive population (the third or fourth generation descendants of Irish, Italian, German, and English immigrants) straining to secure the slipping remnants of a mid-20th Century state-centered set of expected benefits, against a more vigorous and adaptable creative subculture within the Millennial Generation. Not surprisingly, there's been a steady outflow of educated Millennials from the Bay State to points South and West, where a younger, educated demographic is welcomed and treated with greater public courtesy.
