16 November 2019
The meme is sweeping the internet, but where did it originate?
Ok Boomer is a dismissive reply by a young person directed at a Baby Boomer. It is rather disrespectful of their elders, but after years of being blamed for not getting “real” jobs when the only available ones are at Starbucks or driving for Uber, being blamed for not buying houses while being saddled with crippling, student-loan debt, being blamed for the demise of various and sundry industries because they spend what little money they have on avocado toast, for being selfish and self-absorbed while dying on foreign battlefields in the longest wars in America’s history, which were, incidentally, started by Baby Boomers, can one really fault Millennials for being dismissive? In two words, OK Boomer sums up the sentiment that Boomers have been a privileged and coddled generation who never faced tough times like today’s younger generations are facing and are thus out of touch and not worth listening to.
(Full disclosure: I’m a Boomer. But having been born in 1963, at the tail-end of the generation, I identify more with Gen Xers.)
Like most such memes and slang, finding the exact origin is impossible. The earliest usage I’ve been able to find, however, is from 5 Sep 2019 on a gaming discussion board:
“Ok Boomer”
Whatever you say :D
*Next time though, there’s a “Reply” button in the bottom right corner on a forum post, for example, this one. Use it so we know for sure who you’re talking to! (Unless for some reason you can’t click on a simple button but act so big on a forum post)*
Undoubtedly, someone used OK Boomer before this date, but we’ll never know who or exactly when.
Sources:
Davies, Mark. Corpus of News on the Web (NOW), 2019.
Sammymom. ”Woop Woop.” Hypixel, 5 September 2019.
Urban Dictionary, 17 September 2019.