It's not exactly a misconception that the Internet is a young person's medium, but that doesn't mean there aren't a significant number of confirmed grown-ups enjoying these tubes and generally being confounded by the near-nihilistic craziness of its patterns. If the photos uploaded to the Adult Services section are any indication, there are plenty of middle-aged folks using craigslist these days. But seeing as I've already spent more time writing about Internet prostitutes than any young man really ought to, I decided to return to the discussion forums in search of any silver-haired denizens of the List. Lucky for me, the forums have an Over 50 section, ironically situated in between the Outdoor and P.O.C. (people of color) sections. Because, as we all know, all people over the age of 50 are white racists who never leave their homes for fear of shriveling up in the cruel light of the sun. Let's see what they have to offer to the world of online discourse.
It turns out that just like the rest of us, the over-the-hill set use the Internet primarily to debase themselves and attract ridicule from others. Not three posts deep into the Over 50 discussion forum I found this crusty gem.
anyone over 58 < carl9917 > 01/24 16:16:35
want to hook up with my 39 yo wife for a day while im at work
The ensuing "discussion" didn't so much devolve into an alternately sickening and cruel series of lewd remarks and flames as it naturally assumed that setup as its default position. To use the word "devolve" is to suggest that the discussion was, at one point, mature and respectful. As is the tradition whenever Internet social situations are free and anonymous, it took exactly 43 seconds for someone to accuse the OP of being gay. This, of course, set off a giddy torrent of ugly jokes, many of which included the redundant yet somehow still more disgusting term "man cum".
Ah, but it wouldn't be fair to suggest that all of the Over 50 forum consists of posts like carl9917's. Like so many middle-aged people, the folks at Over 50 spend plenty of time reinforcing stereotypes, too. Take the following post in response to a thread about Senator John Edwards separating from his wife.
party....the miracle is they actually had one who was NOT queer!
It always strikes me as both tragic and funny that the people we call The Greatest Generation managed to sire an entire generation of greedy, racist war-mongers. In fact, a slim majority of posts on the Over 50 forum are little more than anti-Democrat, liberal-bashing or just downright bigoted. This leads me to two conclusions about the users on Over 50, and they aren't mutually exclusive. First, Neo-Con bastards over the age of 50 have significantly more time on their hands than their hypocritical hippie contemporaries. Second, the Over 50 forum is a safe haven for much younger bigots on the liberal-leaning Internet.
After reading hundreds of posts on the Over 50 forum on craigslist, I literally could not find a single one that wasn't either about sex that was revolting not because it involved old people, but because it involved everything from rape to more rape, or why our country is now ruined because we have a black president. I suppose if I wanted to protect my faith in my parents' generation I shouldn't have gone snooping around in the Internet equivalent of their sock drawer. It's really too bad that the poles are melting because now we probably won't have enough ice flows on which to abandon our progenitors.
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