Thursday, January 31, 2013

The raging grandpas

Old, well educated, financially secure males.

They are, according to recent polls and studies, the driving force behind most of the high-profile public protests in Germany in recent years.

The picture of the old guy with the bloody eye at one of the fierce clashes between police and demonstrators in Stuttgart, Germany, turns out to be representative of a larger image.

The study also finds that protests around internet freedoms, for example, ACTA, are dominated by younger people.

Those who do not like the surge of old activists have coined a derogatory compound "Wutbuerger" (enraged citizens), a term used to dismiss them as idle trouble makers.

Sociologists say these educated folks are used to getting their way, and more or less follow the same path now that they are retired or just before retirement.

We at the K-Landnews have a slightly more enlightened, we think, take on this.

There is a German workplace phrase we consider relevant: leave your conscience at the coat check when you come in, pick it up on the way home.

We prefer to see them more in the tradition of the old silverback gorillas, who, having spent many years doing the hierarchy thing, get some time to pursue a different way of life.

And, looking at all of this, we forecast a strong internet freedom movement that includes older people once the ranks of the older hacktivists become larger.

[Update 5/2015] In recent weeks, we have seen a new round of bashing Wutbuergers. This time, the daily FAZ featured them in an article The rage of the children of peace (aka.  the Boomers), and a few days later, a psychiatrist claims in the same publication that the ranks of Wutbürgers are swelling, and he blames the media and of course the Internet for fostering the trend. Unfortunately, he does not go beyond the assertion that the media and the net are bolstering the perceived trend. He does deserve sympathy, though, because he seems to be a regular target of nasty threats.

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