I am sorry if this is offensive to any elderly, but I am getting so sick of my soon-to-pension father who does nothing but complain about other people. They do everything wrong with the undertone, but never explicitly said, that he knows better than them.
Especially journalist, oh he loves complaining about them and how they are hiding the truth because they didn’t report about something that he knows is true in a short news article or clip (often the fact he mentions is true, but it is a really niche knowledge and he has always struggled with the idea that other people don’t know everything he knows).
This has gotten worse and worse as he gets older. We used to always discuss politics and what works and what doesn’t and I enjoy those conversations, but lately he is getting stuck on topics and gets very very repetitive. He is also getting sensitive about it, getting upset and raising his voice when I don’t agree with him.
have anyone else experienced this with their beloved elders? This is common stereotype for elderly, especially elderly men, but it is so true for him! I do remember my grandpa also being like this, although he never talked about politics.
Could easily be displacement of frustration and helplessness he’s feeling with other things. Is there anything else newly stressing him out since around the time you began to observe this?
Absolutely, but a lot of it is self-caused or because he doesn’t say no. He has had a lot of stress from work because they pile more work on him and he doesn’t refuse it. This mentality of just toughening things out and not try to change things is a life long thing of his that has tainted me too. You don’t talk back to superiors and tell them they are wrong, you just swallow their bullshit and keep your head down. He is the perfect corporate work slave and he thinks everyone else should be that way to, because it is more practical and productive for society… Especially now that he is at a high position in the company. Why won’t these young people stop trying to have a life outside of work? he never did, he was a good unhappy worker, so why aren’t they? Why do they have other ambitions for their lives?! A typical boomer attitude. Kill you inner-self and individuality and mold yourself after whatever society needs you to be.
So naturally he hates anything and anyone who espouses a more individualistic life style, because if they are right and more happy then he has wasted his own life working away and suppressing himself for other’s profit. Minorities should just adapt to the majority and stop asking for the right to live differently. Goes for everyone.