It's been suggested that we should have a new forum specifically for issues encountered by baby boomers and/or aging in general and we'd like some feedback from babblers.
Is this something that would be useful or helpful, or does Body and Soul already provide that kind of space for babblers?
Separate forum please. Issues of aging usually end up in all the other forums, difficult to search for anything specific with regards to issues of aging.
I have a different reason for being interested in a seperate forum, and others might find this useful.
I look back in this forum of Body and Soul, and there has not even been a COMMENT, let alone a new thread, anything to do with aging, since September.
Think of it as an experiment. If there is a forum titled, Aging....
will people open more threads?
and if they do, is that sustained more than a couple months?
[If yes to both, are there other forums that should be added?]
I have a sometimes idle hobby of seeing what does and does not get attention on Babble.
My general observation is that people pay attention to thread titles- that the forum location does not matter.
But does having a dedicated forum make it more likely people will initiate threads? [And then: if they do, do tohose get much traffic?]
I look back in this forum of Body and Soul, and there has not even been a COMMENT, let alone a new thread, anything to do with aging, since September.
You made my point - talking about aging is everywhere but where it should be - for example:
Mulcair Talks to CARP - a current thread about aging - in the canadian politics forum!
Are old people an unfair burden on society? - a current thread about aging - in the canadian politics forum!
...and threads on baby boomers are all over the place.
Thanks Rebecca for the suggestion.
Sounds like a plan, now if I can only remember where I put my keyboard so I can create this post. 
Articles like this could be discussed in an aging forum
Does New Brunswick have the answer to Canada's pension funding crisis?
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2013/02/21/f-shared-risk-pension-pla...
I don't really like Ageing as a forum title though. We are ageing from the moment of birth. Could anyone think of a more catchy title, neither "Zoomers" nor "toddling towards the tomb"?
"Senior Issues"
"Seniors Health Issues"
"Growing Old Gracefully"
"Retirement and Pension Issues"
"How to Keep Those Young Whippersnappers In Line"
...I can think of more if requested.
I'm not a senior yet - but I think anyone of at least 50 could be concerned. As could younger cohorts, for other reasons - though putting boomers and older people on an ice floe is not an option.
Lol. It could be called 'Ice Floe'...
Woe from the Floe
Too funny! But the name can be decided if/when a forum is actually created.
Tales from the crypt.
If you're looking for reasons against, I could see it becoming a forum dominated by boomer issues, in which case my already latent generational resentment could get worse. I would probably deal with it by avoiding that forum.
ETA: Sorry, this was an ungenerous comment, probably informed by what I see in mainstream media, which is not the kind of topics we see covered on Rabble.ca.
If you're looking for reasons against, I could see it becoming a forum dominated by boomer issues, in which case my already latent generational resentment could get worse. I would probably deal with it by avoiding that forum.
ETA: Sorry, this was an ungenerous comment, probably informed by what I see in mainstream media, which is not the kind of topics we see covered on Rabble.ca.
That's okay. I have not-so-latent generational issues. Just a different generation.
Some of us Boomers haven't hit 50 yet.
Oh... I thought it said "issues around arguing". Guess I should put my glasses on. Nevermind.
There are some CARP (and other) polls that might be interesting to discuss around senior issues, such as this one:
excerpt:
2. What do you think is the most useful step the government could take in the budget to deal with the proposal to raise the age of eligibility for OAS?
Repeal OAS age change 580 Votes 38.3 %
Fund provinces to replace OAS for all seniors 65 to 67 70 Votes 4.6 %
Fund provinces to replace OAS for seniors 65 to 67 who need it 259 Votes 17.1 %
Replace OAS for seniors 65 to 67 who need it as a federal measure and take political credit for it 268 Votes 17.7 %
OTHER 33 Votes 2.2 %
NOTHING 205 Votes 13.5 %
DON’T KNOW 98 Votes 6.5 %
Total1513 Votes
excerpt:
10. If you’re retired, do you receive CPP, OAS and/or GIS?
CPP only 230 Votes 15.2 %
CPP and OAS 963 Votes 63.6 %
CPP and GIS 15 Votes 1.0 %
CPP, OAS, GIS 92 Votes 6.1 %
None of these 71 Votes 4.7 %
NOT RETIRED 142 Votes 9.4 %
Total1513 Votes
(just one example of the many senior-related polls out there...)
Caissa, are you technically a boomer? I thought boomerdom ended at 1960, meaning all boomers would be at least 52 (and turn 53 this year).
Yes, I see that definitions vary, and obviously, so did the moment of the boom. It was usually somewhat later in countries devastated by the Second World War; moreover, a much higher percentage of men of peak reproductive age was killed in some of those (and of course, the fittest).
And of course the term originated in the US, a country that entered the War a couple of years later than Canada and most European countries.
I've heard the term "Zoomer" but I've always thought that was coined by Moses Znaimer to sell his magazine.
The reason I have heard for declaring an end to the Baby Boom before 1964 in Canada, is that the earlier broad adoption of the birth control pill and steep drop in birth rate in Quebec. Dont know if that is true, and dont know what was happening with the ROC birth rate in the early 60s.
My mother started taking the pill in early 1962 after kid #6. Prior to that, the child spacing is without exception relentless. No idea about other families.
From the Canadian Encyclopedia linked in my previous post:
Between 1940 and 1965 the annual number of births in Canada rose from 253 000 in 1940 to 479 000 in 1960, but dropped to 419 000 in 1965. Over a period of 25 years, the baby boom produced about 1.5 million more births than would otherwise have occurred (about 8.6 million), an increase of more than 18%. By 1965, however, people were marrying at a later age and were waiting longer to have children, partly because more women were entering the workforce and partly because there was general access to better methods of BIRTH CONTROL. (See WOMEN IN THE LABOUR FORCE.)
That's okay. I have not-so-latent generational issues. Just a different generation.
I was born in '65. If I'm a "boomer", where is my house, where is my pension plan, where was my job when I finished university? (For that matter, when was my Summer of Love?) Statistically you could argue I'm a baby boomer. Socially, culturally and economically, I'm not.
Douglas Coupland, born in 1961, defined the generation following the baby boomers.
I guess they stopped giving them out after '63, JAS. 
I guess I self-identify as a boomer.
According to my extensive (not) research, a Zoomer is a totally new a kind of Boomer. One who breaks retirement tradition, a ZOOMER™, according to the following criteria is:
-knows the difference between primary (inevitable) and secondary (reversible) aging
-monitors inherited health risks and practices preventive measures that reduce those risks
-performs daily exercise: aerobics for endurance, anaerobics for strength, neurobics for brain power
-calculates daily nutritional and caloric needs based on age, gender, and weight
-orchestrates a social support system of companions, close friends, and a confidante
-cultivates a spiritual life, practicing faith, and participating in organized religion
-enjoys a positive self-concept, and a passion for living life to the fullest
-achieves the resources necessary to live an adventurous life thanks to sound retirement planning
-serves as a role model for age peers via voluntary service and advocacy
Now, if that isn't enough to make you throw up in your mouth, I don't know what will.
Is there a head count of these?
Most boomers missed the Summer of Love too.
Not surprising. You needed to be born by 1950, already living in a groovy urban hot spot when you came of age, and ready to jump aboard.
One author, and professor at the University of Toronto, David Foot, divides the generation born after the baby boomers into two groups in his book Boom Bust & Echo: How to Profit from the Coming Demographic Shift:[41] Generation X, born between 1960 and 1966; and the "Bust Generation", born between 1967 and 1979.[42] In his opinion, those born between the periods of 1947-1966 were the Baby Boomers, where in Canada they were the largest boom of the industrialized world (relative to population).[43] This large boom complicated the job market for the upcoming generation, Generation X.[44] It is also common in Canada to represent Gen Xers using the date ranges 1961-1981.[45][46]....
Defining Gen X purely by demographic bulges and busts (like the Census) misses key cultural indicators that a very different set of young people has come along. Commentators who set Millennial birth boundaries starting in the late-70s often make the same assumptions using fertility rates to define birth dates rather than shared beliefs, attitudes and values. Children born in the early 1960s and after had a very different coming of age experience than those born in the late 1950s. Some of the most influential cultural definers of Gen X were born during the period between 1961 and 1964.[57]
I don't self-identify. I'm a white female aged 51 of ambiguous sexual orientation. Which says absolutely nothing about who I am. Boomer, Zoomer, Gen Xer, whatever. Those are the inventions of people selling something, not labels I would apply to myself.
For Caissa, from Stats Can:
Generation X is another term used to designate the baby busters, although this name sometimes includes more birth years than just those born from 1966 to 1971. For some authors, Generation X includes people born from the end of the baby boom (1960 to 1965) to the late 1970s. Many members of this generation, especially men, experienced difficulty entering the labour market in the 1980s and 1990s. This was due to economic recessions and to the fact that they were following the large baby boom generation.
So you can beat part of Gen x, jas, and I can be a Bommer and we both will be happy. It took me 4 years of contract work after entering the labour force in 1994 before I got a "secure" position.
I think it's important to recognize that those of us at the end of the technical baby boom did not have near the same economic opportunities as those that have culturally defined that generation. This has been documented extensively.
And it's technically possible for some of us to continue to fall through the cracks, despite the fact that the older boomers are now supposedly retiring, since it's the generation that is coming after us who are favoured for those positions, which are also now being cut back from decades of conservative economic policies.
I'm one of those 'real' baby boomers born in the 1940s after the war. 
That must mean you have real issues with aging.
Yes, indeedy, you young whippersnapper, you.
I am not a zoomer or a boomer and I have never lived in a country called ROC.
I'm looking forward to indexing.
Boomer, Zoomer, Gen Xer, whatever. Those are the inventions of people selling something, not labels I would apply to myself.
Right.
But aging is aging.
[you know, the ostensible subject]
quoting jas:
I was born in '65. If I'm a "boomer", where is my house, where is my pension plan, where was my job when I finished university? (For that matter, when was my Summer of Love?) Statistically you could argue I'm a baby boomer. Socially, culturally and economically, I'm not.
jas, while I don't state my exact age in public forums, I'm about a decade older than you, and I don't have any of those things either. Of course in my case, I was a) an artist and b) a political activist. Neither of which makes for a particularly prosperous and stable existence.
Wasn't the Summer of Love in '66? Of course I didn't head out to San Francisco as a kid, but I was deeply affected by that cultural change, and even more by the revolutionary year 1968, which wasn't only in France, but also in Vietnam (Têt offensive, turning point), in Czechoslovakia, in Mexico and many other places.
There was a definite downturn in the economy when people born after 1964 or so entered the labour market, but it is horribly reductive to assume all people slightly older had a good, stable job, a house and the rest of that stuff. Social classes and class struggle didn't disappear with the postwar boom - they even took new, different forms and put new issues of the rights of oppressed races and peoples, and of women to the fore.
I don't remember much of 68, having been born in late 64, but I've heard many good things about it. As for class struggle, I'm on the fence as to whether it even exists anymore in the way it was once thought of. As for pension plans, they represent a pact between employer, employee, and government. If today government and employers feel the situation is ripe enough to consider reneging on their part of a bargain that is supposed to represent an agreed upon return for a lifetime of use value extraction, then it is up to the people being stiffed to make their feelings known about it, in whatever way that serves as the most effective and poignant reminder.
What's the Summer of Love when you daily notice getting creakier?
And we fared as well as lagatta, despite being older, and therefore a little better positioned for the easy ride we didnt get.
A good pension would be nice, but I know it woudnt change getting creaky, and the versions of angst that replaced the earlier aged ones.
Boomer, Zoomer, Gen Xer, whatever. Those are the inventions of people selling something, not labels I would apply to myself.
Right.
But aging is aging.
[you know, the ostensible subject]
Actually, the subject is whether we should have a forum on aging or boomer issues. It's evolved into other things, which suggests there is, at least, an active interest in the issues if not in a new forum in particular. Either way, it's valuable feedback.
How women define themselves and how they are defined by society as they age is important. It's also one of many feminist issues I have an affinity for. I'm a woman, and I'm aging. If you're suggesting that this is irrelevant to the thread, may I suggest you read up on the issue. Women, Feminism and Aging by Colette Brown is a riveting read that I'm sure you'll want to run right out and buy.
Well, I'll try to find it at a library. I have a near-moratorium on buying books not directly related to my work, or for language-learning.
... Not at either BANQ (La Grande bibliothèque) or in the Montréal library system. So if I find it at an anglophone university, I'd have to read it there as I no longer have my researcher's card...
A very important issue for women ageing is poverty, not only in retirement, but also in particular for women (and all workers, but especially women)from 55 to 65 or so ... now it will be to 67... as it is very hard for workers in this age group to secure any kind of employment.
During my first year of college, my father died (of cancer) and we had a family crisis and I never got stoned, high or drunk at any point in my life onwards. I've been stone cold sober since February of 1970. 43 years.
It's not in our library system either, and I can't afford to buy books right now. I've read excerpts and seen it referenced in a great deal of literature around women and aging, and look forward to getting my hands on a copy.
I'd say this issue would work in the feminist forum, but feminism in general was late to the game when it comes to issues aging and gender so I don't entirely trust the FF to promote the ideas and issues.
I think I'll open a thread there and see what kind of response it gets.
Good idea. But we still haven't worked out where to put a new forum (if we want one) and what to call it. I still don't have a lightbulb moment...
The youth forum seems underused, except in discussion of educational issues (which is again a bit reductive, as nowadays there are many mature students).
A good friend of mine was jumping off the bumpety school bus we had hired to go to Oka in support of the Mohawk uprising, and was exulting about being "middle-aged juvenile delinquents". Ran into him at the student/red square demos last summer, seniorish juvenile delinquent, but a brace on a very arthritic knee...
I think I'm still banned from the FF.
There are a lot of issues to explore in a new seniors forum. The ones that I haven't really seen addressed include but are not limited to:
- senior housing quality programs
- gerontology - senior's health issues
- improving senior's quality of living - pension plans, OAS, and other matters
- financial shortfalls for workers who rely solely on public pension plans (increase the damned CPP/QPP already!!!)
- supplemental pension plans
- social services in general related to aging
- age discrimination
- home care and home support services (this really affects me)
- flexible tax credits for family caregivers
- issue of property taxes for those who change their homes into intergenerational care facilities
- there's a lot more issues out there on "aging" that should concern progressives of all ages. We all get old sometime.
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