The “In-Between Generation” — What is Its Legacy?

Philip Marchand argues that the generation born between between the G.I. Generation and the Baby Boomers set the stage for the rebellions of the 1960s and the great social transformations of the 1970s. Writing in The Toronto Sun, Marchand argues that the “In-Between Generation” — born in the 1930s and early 1940s — prepared the way for the Baby Boomers:

The generation born in the ’30s and early ’40s was at the forefront of this campaign to destroy old taboos, to eradicate the fears and restraints. For a while, it seemed an epic struggle — taboos and fears and restraints die hard. An aura of heroism, of great projects of liberation, clung to their efforts. And those efforts did take courage and conviction.

But by the early ’70s, the battle had been won. The taboos were gone. And all we had left were “lifestyles,” the religion of the baby boomers, with their extended egos. Whatever else this religion is, it is not a formula for greatness.