#BoomerRemover: COVID-19 and the intertextual politics of internet memes

This article analyzes ‘Boomer Remover’ the controversial term for COVID-19 popularized on social media in early 2020. It mobilizes digital media theory and discourse analysis to ask what makes Boomer Remover acceptable for its users. It conceptualizes Boomer Remover as an internet meme and argues that memes use intertextuality (the way new texts build upon older texts) as a core mechanism of meaning making. This allows the meme form to communicate a high-level of complexity and depth in an easily consumed format, however, it also bifurcates audiences as a meme is understood differently depending on the audience member’s familiarity with reference points. This article analyzes these divergent understandings through a framework of ‘discourse communities’. It unpacks how for a discourse community familiar with internet memes the term has come to be connected with progressive politics, and contrasts this with readings of Boomer Remover as ageist attack for those unfamiliar with the memetic contexts. Rather than privilege one reading of the Boomer Remover meme as correct, this article shows that in order to understand the social impact of memes, we must recognize their inherent polysemic nature.


Introduction
In early 2020, as the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated around the globe, a new term for the virus emerged on social media: Boomer Remover.Seemingly referencing the increased vulnerability of older generations, specifically baby boomers, to COVID-19, this term, and its accompanying Twitter, Instagram, and Tik Tok hashtag (#BoomerRemover), sparked outrage and disbelief amongst media commentators, and ordinary internet users alike.Many Twitter users condemned it as 'ageist', 'dumb,' 'vile,' 'mean,' 'wrong', and 'genocidal rhetoric' (Sipocz, Freeman & Elton, 2020).Opinion pieces questioned how the term became popular at a time where so many were dying (Hoffower, 2020;Schmich, 2020;Whalen, 2020).Explanations given ranged from millennial indifference and entitlement, to the extreme nature of internet humor.Unsurprisingly, the term was widely condemned as simplistic and dangerous.
This article seeks to re-evaluate the narratives and discourses that circulate around Boomer Remover.It builds upon the concept of 'discourse communities' which can be broadly understood as groups of people using a shared set of practices, understandings, and mechanics of communication (Swales, 1990: 22).I argue that the term Boomer Remover is best understood, not simply as a product of intergenerational tension, but as a clash between two different discourse communities: one that sees the term as embodying ageist rhetoric, and one that sees it as a progressive pushback in the face of environmental and social crises.As we shall see these two discourse communities are demarcated and built not simply around age and generational differences, but also around divergences in political beliefs, and in familiarity and engagement with internet culture.The intergenerational tension that exists here is part of a bigger cultural battle occurring.To explore this, I unpack the discursive construction of Boomer Remover within these discourse communities highlighting the narratives, shifts, and mutations that have come to define the use and understanding of the term within both sides of the debate.I explore how this term seemingly so unacceptable in a time of unprecedented crisis came to be popularized, and what meaning it conveys for those who use it.To do so, I frame it in context of internet meme culture and the layered use of intertextuality mobilized in internet memes that give memes their meaning.I argue that while the meme form is known for its simplicity and brevity, it is through intertextuality that complex meaning and nuance is invoked and conveyed.I show, however, that as intertextual reference points are not shared across discourse communities the nuance of this meaning for one community is absent or vastly different for another.Memes, I argue, with their dependence on intertextuality can be a profoundly bifurcating medium contributing to a polarization of political discourse.In this article, I seek not to resolve this tension, I argue there is no singular correct reading of Boomer Remover, rather I emphasize the polysemic nature of memes, they can simultaneously convey different meanings for different audiences, and I argue that this polyseme must be recognized when analyzing memetic content.

Theoretical framing
This article offers a discursive analysis of Boomer Remover through a combination of critical discourse analysis and internet meme theory.Critical discourse analysis techniques and frameworks are used here in order to analyze the function and operation of discourses: their formation, their conventions and limits, and the power relations they embody and reinforce.In particular, I build on critical discourse analysis in three primary ways: in the use of the concept of discourse communities, in a use of Fairclough's (1995) three-part framework (text, discursive practices, and socioeconomic practices) to analyze the contexts and impacts of the discursive construction of Boomer Remover, and in the methodology of critical discourse genealogy (Anaïs, 2013).
Framing my analysis here is the concept of discourse communities.There is a long and complex history of scholarship surrounding discourse communities; its definition has been both refined (see for example: (Swales, 2014: 217) and contested (Killingsworth, 1992: 110).For this article, however discourse community can be understood as Swales' aforementioned definition of a group using a common set of practices, understandings, and mechanics of communication (1990: 22) or more precisely through James Porter's characterization of it as 'a group of individuals bound by a common interest who communicate through approved channels and whose discourse is regulated' (Porter, 1986: 38).Examples include a group of hobbyists who communicate through a newsletter, or an academic discipline with its terminologies, expectations and modes of inquiry.In this piece we will be looking at communities whose 'approved channels' can be seen to span both traditional media (news media, academic publications) and social media, and where the regulation of discourse occurs through processes of ingroup gatekeeping and demarcation.The clash between discourse communities which I analyze here can more precisely be thought of as the tensions that arise because of the different regulatory practices and values in different discourse communities.
The major significance of Porter for this article comes not in his definitional work however, but in the emphasis he places on the formative role of intertextuality in discourse communities.Porter argues that all discourse communities are defined by, and are defining of, intertextual relations.All texts exist within an intertextual framework that gives meaning and legitimacy (Porter, 1986: 34) and discourse communities have established 'intertexts' (the texts that are explicitly or implicitly invoked by the new text) that define or reinforce specific discursive practices.Discourse communities are not static but constantly evolving as 'every text admitted into a discourse community changes the constitution of the community' (Porter, 1986: 41).Different discourse communities have different intertextual frames, as such each produce meaning and knowledge differently.For this article I look at two broad discourse communities with their own set of intertexts: those who see Boomer Remover as an ageist attack and those who see it as the legitimate expression of social and political frustration.Other discourse communities undoubtedly exist and have their own constructions of Boomer Remover, but these two are the ones we see most prominently reflected in journalistic and academic accounts.The 'ageist attack' discourse community is a broad group, reflective as it is of a fairly popular reading of Boomer Remover, but it can still be usefully analyzed as a discourse community because we see a certain set of shared intertexts and discursive reference points.The community that constructs Boomer Remover as an expression of social and political frustration however is perhaps the less familiar, more impenetrable, and less analyzed of the two.This discourse community is defined by a knowledge of, and participation in, internet meme culture and its reference points.It is this discourse community and the intertextual evolution of its politics that I will primarily analyze in order to answer the question of how the term Boomer Remover came to be acceptable for its users.
For my analysis of internet culture I situate Boomer Remover as an 'internet meme'.I draw on the commonalities between meme theory and discourse theory.Like discourse theory, meme theory emphasizes the matrices of intertextuality that shape and give meaning.In this context memes are understood as part of a memetic system where meaning is determined through reference to other memes and cultural artefacts; memes and meme cultures are constantly building upon and mutating what has come before to construct layers of meaning, humor, and politics.As the meaning of memes is generated intertextually then to understand Boomer Remover as a meme it must be contextualized within a history of memes and the culture of their production.At a methodological level then, context as much as content, becomes key to the analytic process.

A bifurcated discourse
First used online in late February 2020 the term Boomer Remover quickly spread through social media to become 'trending' by mid-March (Elliott, 2022: 82).Soon news media sources picked up on this term's online popularity and the controversy it generated.Articles with condemnatory titles such as 'Morbid "Boomer Remover" Coronavirus Meme Only Makes Millennials Seem More Awful' (Sparks, 2020), and 'A Certain Horrible Subset of The Internet Is Calling the Coronavirus "Boomer Remover"' (Hoffower, 2020) framed Boomer Remover as a callous celebration by younger people of the vulnerability of the post WWII generation.These articles built on a discourse that argued generational entitlement and self-centeredness as the cause: 'This is the #Boo-merRemover crowd in a nutshell: spoiled children who were never told "NO" and never taught empathy or responsibility.No one else matters.' (Sparks, 2020).
Another discourse also emerged however, with a small number of articles that were more sympathetic to the use of the term (Godfrey, 2020;Sood, 2020).These articles, while avoiding endorsing use of Boomer Remover, outline the social, economic and environmental tensions underpinning the term's usage: 'Boomers have handed younger generations a broken economy, an ailing planet, and nuclear weaponsbut won't stop with the lectures' (Sood, 2020).These accounts also sought to situate Boomer Remover within a context of memes, specifically those memes that focus on environmental destruction and reprisal (Godfrey, 2020) and the political 'posturing' and short-sightedness of older generations (Sood, 2020).We see then in this media response two very different discourses: Boomer Remover as ageist rhetoric, and Boomer Remover as representative of the political, social and environmental frustrations of young people.
Academic accounts of Boomer Remover echo this discursive bifurcation.Accounts positioning Boomer Remover as ageism are often coming out of (or informed by) the disciplines of geriatrics and gerontology, and frame Boomer Remover within a broader cultural context where the rights and voices of older people are dismissed and diminished, and they are targets of online and real-world abuse.One of the first academic accounts of Boomer Remover Meisner (2020) encapsulates this approach.For Meisner, Boomer Remover reflects an 'intensification of ageism' (2020: 1) against older people on social media that has occurred during the COVID-19 crisis that 'should be criticized' (2020: 4).He frames it as part of a 'resurgence' in ageist hostility and 'hate speech' occurring in social media environments (Meisner, 2020: 1).For Meisner, there is little nuance to Boomer Remover, it is a celebration of COVID-19's 'population cleansing' power (2020: 3).He contextualizes it within a framework of anti-elderly ideology, what Gee (2000) called 'apocalyptic demography', a discourse characterized by extreme concern for the consequence of an aging population on health systems, social resources, and economies.Other accounts like Jimenez-Sotomayor, Gomez-Moreno, & Soto-Perez-de-Celis (2020) and Vishwamitra, et al. (2020) echo Meisner in reading Boomer Remover in context of the rise of offensive jokes and hate speech online.Lichtenstein, frames Boomer Remover as an example of 'intergenerational animosity' and contextualizes its use within a context of governmental 'out-of-sight out-of-mind responses ' (2021: 210) to the elderly during the COVID epidemic, where older generations, particularly those in nursing homes were infantilized and positioned as disposable for the good of the economy.Read as a discourse community then, we can see the discursive reference points that these analyses and the hostile journalistic accounts frame Boomer Remover in context of: the vulnerability of the elderly (to COVID and more broadly), hate speech, and governmental indifference.
The alternative discourse where Boomer Remover is seen as embodying the political, cultural and economic frustrations of young people has also emerged and been examined in academic accounts.Elliott (2022) offers an analysis of Boomer Remover within a context of climate change.She explores what she terms generational discounting: the marginalization and minimalization of an entire generation's needs and concerns by another.She argues that the needs of younger generations have been discounted by older generations in climate change debates, and the needs of older generations have been discounted by younger generations in COVID debates (Elliott, 2022: 79).Boomer Remover is a response to and enactment of generational discounting for Elliot (2022: 79).Likewise, the aforementioned Lichtenstein, while broadly situating Boomer Remover within context of ageist rhetoric, briefly notes that the older generation is a target of blame because it is 'considered to have enriched itself at the expense of the climate, progress toward social equality, and the well-being of future generations' (2021: 210).Irons contextualizes Boomer Remover within a post-Brexit Britain, where age-based tensions are high and exacerbated by the mainstream media (2020: 2).She argues that an indifferent or 'apocalyptic' approach to COVID from younger people is reflective of the lack of opportunity, security and hope they live with (Irons, 2020: 3-4).Sipocz et al. (2020), offer a qualitative reading of Boomer Remover through an analysis of tweets using the #BoomerRemover hashtag.They analyzed March and April 2020 and categorized the results based on the prevailing themes.Through their analysis they found that the most common theme was what they term 'conflict regarding nature and origins of moniker' (54%), with 'political conflict' (32%) being the next most common, 'derogatory endorsement of moniker' was 15%.It is perhaps telling of the clash between discourse communities with very different understandings of Boomer Remover that 'conflict regarding nature and origins of moniker' was present in over half the tweets studied.Equally important is that within tweets categorized as 'political conflict' Sipocz, Freeman and Elton highlight environmental destruction and concerns about Trump's presidency and the Republican party as the most frequent topics (2020: 170-171).Reading these accounts as reflective of a discourse community then, we see a very different set of reference points to the condemnatory discourse: climate change, economic uncertainty and progressive politics being the key discursive markers.
While accounts such as those by Elliot, Irons, and Sipocz, Freeman and Elton give us insight into some of the political contexts of Boomer Remover tweets, there is a deeper level of analysis of this discourse community that is possible.As Porter observed a discourse community is defined by its intertextual relationships.The accounts above offer us insight into the broad discourses in operation but do not give insight into the specificities of the intertextual contexts and heritages invoked.Here then I look to unpack the network of intertexts that define and construct Boomer Remover for those who use it for progressive political purposes.I show how the term arose and came to be defined within internet meme culture, and how this has shaped its discourse community.

Internet meme cultures
In contemporary discourse the term meme is primarily associated with online images, text, videos and sound.The most well-known example of a meme format is the 'image macro', where a single image is overlayed with captions at top and bottom; however, not all memes fit this pattern.The history of the term meme illustrates this variety.Evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins coined the term meme in 1976 to describe concepts and practices that spread through culture from person to person to permeate society and persist through time, such as 'tunes, ideas, catch-phrases, clothes fashions, ways of making pots or of building arches' (Dawkins, 1976, 192).For Dawkins, memes are to culture what genes are to biology, a key single cultural unit that gets passed on through generations, with a Darwinian process of selection where strong memes survive and weak ones are disregarded and forgotten.In 1994, journalist Michael Goodwin influentially adapted Dawkins' concept for the proto-internet age, using the term viral meme to describe an 'infectious idea' that circulates newsgroup and forum discourses (Godwin, 1994).From there the term 'internet meme' gradually gained prominence and became a widely adopted way of describing images, jokes, video clips, and other content spread user to user through social media and online forums (See Burgess, 2008;Knobel and Lankshear, 2007: 200-203;and Denisova, 2019: 6-10).
The contemporary concept of internet memes has deviated significantly from Dawkins' original definition.Meme theorist Bradley Wiggins argues that the ongoing association between internet memes and Dawkins original concept is often counterproductive (2019: 8).Where Dawkins emphasized fidelity as key to a meme's successful replication (1976: 194), Wiggins observes: 'internet memes as a digital phenomenon [are] marked not by imitation but by the capacity to propose or counter a discursive argument' (2019: 1).It is through an internet meme's ability to be repurposed and recontextualized that a memetic argument can be formed.Knobel and Lankshear (2007), observed in their study of internet memes that these memes 'were not passed on entirely "intact"' rather they were 'changed, modified, mixed with other referential and expressive resources, and regularly given idiosyncratic spins by participants ' (2007: 208).
Limor Shifman, also argues for a need to move away from Dawkin's original concept, outlining the need to abandon Dawkins' focus on the singular (unit of culture) and instead conceptualize memes as about groups of content; she proposes that internet memes be defined as: (a) a group of digital items sharing common characteristics of content, form, and/or stance; (b) that were created with awareness of each other; and (c) were circulated, imitated, and/or transformed via the Internet by many users.(Shifman, 2014: 41).
This conceptualization of memes as only understandable in relation to each other is echoed in the work of semiotician Sara Cannizzaro who argues that: if internet memes can only be studied in relation to their numerous adaptations and versions across a period of time, it follows that an internet meme cannot be defined as a single image or video or catchphrase… or, in other words, as isolated information; instead, internet memes must be defined at the very least as systems.(Cannizzaro, 2016: 572) Internet memes as a form therefore are best understood, not as discrete 'cultural units', but as part of an intertextual media and cultural system comprising relationships and reference points to other media that shape content, structure and meaning.Shifman argues that this intertextuality is a 'fundamental attribute of Internet memes', but it is not always overt and obvious and that 'memes often relate to each other in complex, creative, and surprising ways' (2014: 2).Knobel and Lankshear also point to this creative intertextuality, not just in relation to other memes, but broader media and cultural reference points, when they argue that in many successful memes one finds a 'rich kind of intertextuality, such as wry cross-references to different everyday and popular culture events, icons or phenomena ' (2007: 209).This intertextuality allows memes to offer a significant amount of meaning through a small amount of textual, visual, or audio material.Huntington (2016) argues that memes construct their argument through synecdoche and metaphor.For Huntington, this intertextuality is a rhetorical strategy that offers layers of comparison and critique, so simple combinations of image, text and sound, become stand-ins for far greater cultural and political debate (2015: 86).
At a community level intertextuality is also crucial.Analyzing the LOLCats meme community Miltner (2014) observes that 'intertextual links can help erect symbolic boundaries around a culture through a system of mutual referentiality'.Nissenbaum and Shifman (2017), similarly, observe how the 'correct' use and understanding of memes functions as a tightly policed form of cultural capital within internet communities such as Reddit and 4Chan.They argue that 'the deep connection between memes and the culture of some online communities means that they function as cues of membership, distinguishing in-group members from mere passersby' (Nissenbaum and Shifman, 2017: 485).Pelletier-Gagnon and Diniz argue the use of shared memes helps construct a communal digital environment fostering meaningful exchange and a sense of community (Pelletier-Gagnon and Pérez Trujillo Diniz, 2021: 7).We see here then, how memes and knowledge of memes, functions to create a discourse community.The intertextual process Porter described in discourse communities (1986) is enacted strictly to enforce the boundaries and norms of these communities.
While the primary goal of many memes is humor, there is also a significant history of political activism through memes.Analyses of US and UK elections point to the general public's use of memes as an organic mode of political engagement (McLoughlin and Southern, 2021;Ross and Rivers, 2017).Other accounts look at memes as a tool for political resistance that bypasses government censorship (Denisova, 2019;Fang, 2020;Mina, 2019) and challenges dominant ideologies in ways not possible through traditional media (Frazer and Carlson, 2017).Milner argues that memetic media 'evidence polyvocal public participation: that is, many voices can connect and converse-as well as argue and antagonize' (Milner: 2016: 11).The potentially trivializing and polarizing nature of memes has also been examined.Penney (2020) explores how an understanding of memes as a 'dumbed-down, "low-brow" form of humor that can degrade political discourse and feed into polarization' discourages some users from participating.Hristova's analysis of Occupy Wall Street memes argues this position, contending that the process of simplification undermined and neutralized the political ambitions of the movement (Hristova, 2014).The simplification of political discourse is also emphasized in analyses of the platforms through which memes spread with Bouvier arguing that the affordances of a platform like witter 'can work against coherent and careful discussion, fostering fast, simplified, contradictory commentary' (Bouvier, 2020).
McLoughlin and Southern note that memes that are 'more emotive and partisan… are more likely to go viral' and this may 'feed polarization' (2021: 79).Huntington argues that 'despite their fleeting nature' the filter bubbles that shape what memes we see may 'contribute to a polarized media environment' (Huntington, 2020: 1).Importantly, Wiggins frames this as an issue of intertextuality, by arguing that: 'with regard to politically charged or socially polarizing issues, an individual requires understanding of the context of the referent in order for the internet meme to achieve salience '. (2019: 11).In Wiggins' frame then, memes may not be inherently politically reductive and trivializing, but to fully understand the nuance one needs to be aware of the necessary context.It is this relationship between intertextuality and political impact that we shall explore through Boomer Remover.However where Wiggins suggests a contextual knowledge brings saliency, I argue that memes cannot be viewed through a singular contextual frame; the networks of intertextuality and the meanings generated are always divergent and contested.Different audiences bring radically different frames of reference.

A discursive genealogy of the 'Boomer'
Boomer Remover fits neatly with definitions of internet memes such as Shifman's (2014: 41): it is a group of digital items sharing a common characteristic: tweets, images, videos, songs using the phrase Boomer Remover; created with awareness of each other; and circulated, imitated, and/or transformed via the internet by many users.It also has a politics beyond those seen in mainstream media, and understood by a community constructed through intertextuality, but for those lacking understanding of its reference points, it is trivializing and reductive.To understand the politics of Boomer Remover, and what meanings it signifies to an internet meme community then, we must understand its network of intertexts, those memes that it is read in context of.To do this I will look at three important memetic precursors to Boomer Remover: 'Millennials are Killing', 'Boomer Humor', and 'Ok, Boomer'.
For my analysis here, I will borrow from critical discourse analysis (CDA) to conceptualize the mechanics of intertextuality in operation and the relationships of power that are established through this referentiality.Building of Fairclough's foundational three-part analytic model for analysis (1995) I read these precursor memes at the level of: 'text' in which analysis is focused in terms of language and content (1995: 57); 'discursive practice' which focuses on processes of production, consumption, dissemination and interpretation by creators and audiences (1995: 58); and 'sociocultural practice' which focuses on the economic, political, and cultural impacts and contexts of a text (1995: 62).In reading the emergence of Boomer Remover across multiple texts, I also follow the lead of Seantel Anaïs (2013) who advocates for a coupling of CDA with a Foucauldian 'genealogy'.Foucault used the term genealogy to describe a method of historical inquiry that focuses on the emergence of terms, discourses, and institutions, and then maps and analyses the contexts, contingencies, and power relations that shaped their formation, use and meaning (Foucault, 1980).In doing so a genealogy looks not for a singular 'true' reading or a definitive origin point, it does not seek to uncover a linear history, rather it explores the contradictions, shifts and mutations of culture and knowledge that change how an idea, object, or set of practices may be discursively constructed and conceptualized.For Anaïs 'the combination of genealogy and CDA serves to redress the ahistoricism apparent in much critical discourse analytic work… [and] genealogy is clarified and strengthened by some of the systematic elements involved in carrying out CDA' (2012).As such, I offer a condensed discursive genealogy of the Boomer Remover intertexts; Boomer Remover did not arise in isolation, it is a product of the textual, discursive and social practice that predated it.'Millennials are Killing', 'Boomer Humor', and 'Ok, Boomer' are not three individual memes, they are overarching framings of large meme sets each consisting of hundreds or thousands of individual meme images, videos, songs, etc.While these three sets in no way encompass the complete 'archive' of Boomer memes (this is beyond the scope of this project, if it is indeed possible) they mark significant turning points in this genealogy and are illustrative of the intertextual way in which meaning is negotiated and passed on in the meme format; they help us map the rhetorical conflations and slippages that produced the key discursive construction that underpins Boomer Remover: the very concept of the 'Boomer'.
Coming to prominence in the mid/late 2010s the 'Millennials are Killing' meme comprised collections of newspaper and magazine headlines that blamed millennials for the 'deaths' of various industries from: diamonds to napkins, McDonalds to yoghurt, beer to the housing market (Taylor, 2020).Reflecting on these headlines business reporter Kate Taylor argues they were so common that they 'became a trope that defined the decade' (2020).Noticing the trend some millennial's started collating and posting these headlines on social media.The collecting and sharing of Millennials are Killing headlines recontextualize a perceived attack, into a semi-humorous inadvertently selfparodic illustration of lazy journalism and reductionist politics.This aggregation and combination transformed Millennials are Killing into an internet meme.The problematic assumptions underpinning these headlines were 'wryly' (Knobel and Lankshear, 2007: 209) rebuked, not through commentary or critique, but by revealing the unacknowledged network of intertexts, highlighting that these articles cannot be understood in isolation but were part of a media trend.Soon this subversion was getting more attention than the articles, and the phrase Millennials are Killing became so recognizable and notorious that it fell out of popularity.As Taylor jokingly phrased it: millennials 'even managed to kill the "Millennials are Killing" headline'.Here then, drawing attention to intertextuality became a political tactic that helped erect and reinforce the 'symbolic boundaries' (Miltner, 2014) of a discourse community aware of the practice and politics of shifting blame to younger generations.
Reading Millennials are Killing through a CDA framework we see subversion at levels of text, discursive practice, and social practice.For a textual level the focus is on the 'specific linguistic features which are of particular importance' (Merkl-Davies and Koller, 2012); here that is the repetitiveness of the wording 'Millennials are Killing' across these headlines.This is a wording that encompasses: clear perpetrators (millennials), an active and immediate frame (are) and an immoral and disreputable act (killing).By collating and sharing these headlines attention is drawn to how the wording transforms changing consumer preferences into what Taylor terms an 'accusation' (Taylor, 2020) and Fisher sees as part of 'the gaslighting of the millennial generation' (Fisher, 2019).At the level of discursive practice we analyze the processes of production, and consumption; it is about the perceived and constructed audience and how they are engaged (Fairclough, 1995: 58).With the Millennials are Killing headlines we see an othering of millennials, they are not the intended audience for these articles.Shifting purchasing patterns are not normalized or constructed as the power of the free market as they might be for other generations, these patterns are positioned as a character flaw or act of malice.At the level of sociocultural practice, we explore the social impact of a text, how it reflects broader cultural logics and practices (Fairclough, 1995: 62).This meme highlights the alienation and marginalization of young people in broader cultural and political contexts.It illustrates one mechanism by which they are targeted (blame shifting), and speaks to the dominance of older generational voices in both media and business landscapes.These headlines reflect a reductive process of identity construction and codification that circulates traditional media and popular discourse, framing millennials as self-centered, lazy, and entitled (Stein, 2013), yet ignoring the economic, environmental and cultural realities that shaped practices of consumption and behavior for younger generations (Sander, 2019).
Where Millennials are Killing headlines discursively constructed an understanding of millennials, a number of retaliatory memes followed that introduced, codified, and discursively constructed the 'Boomer'.A prominent one of these was 'Boomer Humor'.Like Millennials are Killing, it collated existing traditional media work, to highlight the politics and cultural tropes circulated through them, but here rather than headlines, it was comic strips.Sites like the subreddit r/ boomerhumor collected examples of what they call 'the best (or worst) of jokes and memes created by the baby boomer generation' and has elsewhere been termed 'the weird cartoons and memes your uncle shares on Facebook' (Wayne, 2019).Boomer Humor as a genre became defined by its use of one or more of a set of worn discursive tropes: young people are entitled, oversensitive, emotional, lack common sense, and don't understand older technologies; marriage is a burden to be endured; and progressive politics is dangerous, naïve, and ridiculous (Wayne, 2019).
At a textual level Boomer Humor established (or more precisely redefined) a terminology for a group of people whose humor, values and politics was captured in these cartoons: the 'Boomer'.Notably this terminology is not obviously pejorative.Analyzed as a discursive practice this meme, like Millennials are Killing, inverts the audience.While these cartoons were originally made and shared by a conservative readership, in being collated and ridiculed in this way it is a progressive audience that find 'enjoyment' in them.More importantly however it is at the level of social practice where boomer humor is significant.It is here, in the intertextual repetition of cartoons on the same themes that the potentially non-pejorative term Boomer humor becomes a condemnation of a particular close-minded condescending form of conservatism, and the Boomer ceases to encompass all members of the baby boom generation.In analyzing Boomer memes writer Nicole Spector noted '"Boomer" doesn't precisely mean "baby boomer," not on the internet'.(2019).Lexicographer John Kelly argues that in these communities Boomer is far from being used simply to describe 'people who were born after World War II in the baby boom' rather the word is 'a catchall or stand-in for a set of attitudes'.(Kelly cited in Spector, 2019).These attitudes are the ones found in, and defined by, Boomer Humor.In this context a Boomer signifies 'an older, angry white male who is shaking his fist at the sky while not being able to take an insult' (Kelly cited in Spector, 2019).This is a group who has 'close-minded opinions, are resistant to change-whether it's new technology or gender inclusivity-and are generally out of touch with how their behaviors affect other people' (Kelly cited in Spector, 2019).Boomer Humor then signals a specific discursive construction and understanding of the Boomer within this meme culture.Here then, we see that the term Boomer once synonymous with baby boomer now has a narrower meaning; what looks like a simple shortening is loaded with intertextual significance.
The most famous and recognized Boomer meme, is 'Ok Boomer' which rose to popular awareness in 2019 on youth oriented social media sharing platforms such as Tik Tok.It featured not only in social media posts, but also appeared in advertisements and on clothing, was the subject of a popular song (which defined Boomers as 'racist, fascist Trump supporters' (Romano, 2019)), entered the popular lexicon, and even political discourse.OK Boomer as a term was used as a riposte to statements, jokes, posts, etc. that were seen as politically or culturally intolerant, or out of touch.Like Boomer Remover which followed, Ok Boomer bifurcated its audience, being denounced as ageism in mainstream media and academia (see, for example, Cowen, 2019;Iannone, 2020) and seen as articulating social and environmental frustration (Swim et al., 2022).Journalist Aja Romano (2019), in her analysis of Ok Boomer, argues that: '[i]t's important to understand that what really lies behind the meme is increasing economic, environmental, and social anxiety, and the feeling that baby boomers are leaving younger generations to clean up their mess'.This idea was echoed by 25year-old New Zealand parliamentarian Chlöe Swarbrick who responded 'OK Boomer' to an interruption to her speech on climate change by an older male colleague.Swarbrick (2019), refuted accusations of ageism arguing that OK Boomer was 'symbolic of the collective exhaustion of multiple generations set to inherit ever-amplifying problems in an ever-diminishing window of time'.OK Boomer further reinforced, and popularized the Boomer identity, here with a heavier emphasis on the political and environmental self-centredness and inflexibility of Boomers.
At a textual level Boomer Remover embodies a 'millennial' sense of frustration and disaffection, but also the memetic subversion of power relations.It begins as a mild affirmative (OK) but the follow-up (Boomer) reveals the sarcasm and lack of agreement.It is 'a verbal eye roll' (Spector, 2019) that does not seek to rewrite or reframe the argument, it assumes a futility of such gestures; it functions to dismiss, and therefore antagonize, a generation perceived to be unused to being ignored.At the level of discursive practice, OK Boomer marks the shifting of use of the term Boomer from the discourse community where its narrow meaning is known (as was the case with boomer humor) to a broader audience.OK Boomer is a retort, it can only be used in response to an already existing assertion or perceived attack, as such it is almost always said to someone not within the meme discourse community.At the level of social practice, OK Boomer is a political act of intertextuality.It is used to intertextually link, and in doing so dismiss, a statement (generally made by an older person) that matches the recognized and well-worn set of ideas and politics of the Boomer discourse and identity.As such, the term was used as an antagonistic 'callout' and challenge to dominant conservative political logics and assumptions.

Boomer remover as political discourse
The (partial) genealogical heritage outlined above offers a new context and explanation of how and why people might use and endorse the term Boomer Remover.Within this context Boomer Remover functions as a political rhetoric, it is an attention grabbing, intertextually rich critique of 'Boomer' politics.
At a textual level many Boomer Remover posts implicitly or explicitly draw upon a discourse of political consequence or karma (Godfrey, 2020)  At the level of discursive practice, many posts follow on from OK Boomer's lead of using the 'Boomer' terminology beyond the discourse community in which it originated.They address Boomers directly in order to frame COVID as a consequence of their political ideology: To all the elderly that voted #trump in for office.This is what you get.Enjoy the #boomerremover virus.You literally voted this in for yourself.Now the other side you hate so much are the ones fighting for your health.
The sociocultural contexts of these posts (and thousands more like them) are overt and direct, focusing on climate change and conservatism.We see in many posts however that it is not just the lack of action on those issues that drives an unapologetic use of Boomer Remover, it is the perceived hypocrisy in wanting societal transformation to protect Boomers from COVID-19, after not being willing to enact smaller measures to address climate change and other issues facing young people (Godfrey, 2020;Sood, 2020).This perceived hypocrisy of Boomers in the face of a crisis is a key reason the anti-Boomer discourse became more widespread and antagonistic during the pandemic, and it is explicitly addressed in memes produced: This framing of Boomer Remover as karmic retribution suggests that for many the term Boomer Remover is less a genocidal call of 'apocalyptic demography' (Meisner, 2020) and more a rhetorical device to highlight the inconsistencies and consequences of Boomer values and ideology.Used like this it is a pushback against conservativism, climate change skepticism, and millennial scapegoating, that sacrifices civility for impact.Boomer Remover is in this context a continuation of the political project of OK Boomer and its preceding memes.

Memetic polysemy and polarization
The framing of the term Boomer Remover as a recognition of karmic consequence, outlined above, is just one possible reading of the intertextual signifiers in action; as is Meisner's reading of it as apocalyptic demography (2020, 3).These radically different narratives that exist around Boomer Remover capture the difficulties of understanding and theorizing memetic media.The meaning of memes for the audience is dependent on subcultural knowledge, and understanding of the reference points.This is illustrative of the conflict between different discourse communities.With internet memes, where intertextuality is so central to the discursive function, these discourse communities are formed through the participants' knowledge (or lack thereof) of the intertextual reference points.In his work on intercultural communication Ron Scollon analyzed the ways in which misunderstanding, tensions and disagreements arise from a lack of shared discursive practices (Scollon, 1997).Like the cultural tensions Scollon examines, the controversies of Boomer Remover, are in part a product of the very different relationships and expectations of discourse within the audience (Scollon, 1997: 1).Rather than attempt to resolve these divergent readings however, and offer a singular 'correct' interpretation, it is more productive to recognize and reflect upon the process of polarization in action here.Understanding why memes as a medium bring about divergence of opinion and tension is crucial to understanding the impact of this medium.Boomer Remover shows us how the centrality of intertextuality to meaning-making in memes, produces a bifurcated understanding where it is both a politically progressive response to environmental and social crises, and a discriminatory ageist rhetoric.This dual nature is far from unique to Boomer Remover, as Wiggins observed, all internet memes that mutate and build upon past meme cultures (in short: all internet memes) split an audience based on their familiarity with the reference points (Wiggins: 2019: 11).Often this simply means a meme is puzzling or indecipherable for the uninitiated, but as memes become increasingly prominent in popular and political discourse, the impact of this polarization becomes more significant.It thus becomes theoretically and politically necessary when we discuss memes to acknowledge that memes are not simply polyvocal (Milner: 2016: 11) but are polysemic: they signify vastly different things to different audiences.As we have seen with Boomer Remover, younger generations find in it a means to pushback against a political process that marginalizes their voices, older generations find in it evidence of generational prejudice against them.Yet if we return to a critical discourse analysis framework of the text, discursive practice, and socioeconomic practice, we can see key differences that both amplify and conceal the polysemy.
At a textual level, the most notable difference between a meme and other media forms is the perceived complexity of the text.Polysemy may be difficult to recognize in any cultural text, but with memes there seems to be no space for it at all.Memes appear profoundly simple, they are: captioned images, hashtags, video clips, to be quickly grasped and digested.With a surface simplicity and brevity that suggest a straightforwardness of meaning, the layers of intertextuality and polysemy underpinning memes, are rendered invisible to those lacking the intertextual literacy (Wiggins, 2019).
At the level of discursive practice, an internet meme culture that produces and propagates memes, and shapes the literacy around them, is not only reluctant to signpost or articulate the reference points, but often takes pride in 'exposing' and confusing the uninitiated.(Nissenbaum and Shifman, 2017, 488).This is then coupled and compounded with the increased virality of emotive memes observed by McLoughlin and Southern (2021: 79) and the notorious difficulty in differentiating humor and sarcasm from extremism online (Milner, 2013).Within an ecosystem where intertextuality plays such an important role in anchoring meaning to past narratives and frameworks; and with few other cues of intent: bifurcation, polarization, and tension become predictable outcomes when a meme culture enters popular discourse.
At the level of socioeconomic practice we see a vastly different set of cultural, technological, and political ideologies and assumptions emerging through meme cultures.The discourses in use here are often fundamentally unfamiliar for those more used to traditional media forms.The humor, modes of interaction, language and terminology, are reflective of an often antagonistic but also playful discursive mode (Phillips and Milner, 2018), and as shown with Boomer Remover, the politics underpinning discussion, can be radically different from that of traditional media.This leaves those unacquainted with the culture little in the way of discursive anchor points through which to penetrate and understand.

Conclusion
This article used scholarship on memes and elements of discourse theory to unpack Boomer Remover and the tensions it embodies.In exploring Boomer Remover, I sought to look at how a term that would appear to advocate for the death of an entire generation can be used so widely and unapologetically.I argued that rather than simply reading Boomer Remover as a product of 'millennial indifference', 'generational discounting', or intergenerational tension it is more useful to understand it as a clash between different discourse communities.This meme means vastly different things to different people.Meme theorist Peter Lunenfeld refers to memes as 'ever mutating matrices of meaning' (Lunenfeld, 2014), and it is the matrices of meaning around Boomer Remover that I have sought to analyze here.It is the discursive system of reference points and intertextuality that make memes so complex and so powerful.Yet this complexity also makes memes so impenetrable to the uninitiated (those outside the internet meme discourse community), and so difficult to theorize and discuss.It is easy to condemn the exclusivity of meme culture, and its failure to grant others membership.Yet in its use of intertextuality, and lack of the bloating detail needed to initiate new members, this community has constructed a medium that communicates a lot with very little.This is a fast changing responsive space where brevity does not equate to superficiality.Memes, while simple and quick to make and view, encourage and demand a cultural literacy of their audience.As we have seen, even a two-word meme like Boomer Remover, evokes a sustained political project for those literate in the heritage.It is also tempting to dismiss those interpretations of memes that do not understand meme cultures' intertextuality, doing so however, ignores the reach of memes.It ignores that memes are increasingly seen by audiences not versed in meme cultures.It erases the tensions that memes produce.The polysemic nature of memes must be acknowledged, particularly when it comes to a meme like Boomer Remover where so much is at stake.The tensions here: from anxieties around apocalyptic demography, to climate change inaction, speak to the feelings of disaffection and vulnerability in contemporary society.Memes and the matrices of meaning we attach to them are powerful indications of the discourse communities shaping our culture, and the dominant political, social, and technological logics and literacies that circulate within.
As a term Boomer Remover faded from popularity as 2020 progressed.The reasons for this can only be speculated on: the natural half-life of a meme, the shocking reality of, and number of deaths from, COVID-19, the disproportionate number of African American, Indigenous, and Hispanic victims of the virus (a long way from the Boomer identity), and many other possible reasons.And while there were spikes again in usage, particularly with Donald Trump's COVID-19 diagnosis, it is unlikely the term will directly return.Yet the tensions it embodies, and the ideological battles it contains, will continue.Boomer Remover itself will undoubtedly become a reference point for future memes, its complex history will be layered into a new set of meanings.We will also likely see a repeat of the polarizing power of memes witnessed with Boomer Remover and its precursors.Boomer Remover will likely prove prototypical of a type of confrontational memetic political action that will only increase as time passes, and as meme cultures intersects the 'mainstream' more and more.If we are to understand future memetic tensions then, we must recognize the mechanics of what is taking place.Far from simple and straightforward; intertextual, polysemic, morally ambiguous, and powerful memes like Boomer Remover may be a template of what is to come.

Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
with COVID-19 positioned as the inevitable outcome of Boomer values.One prominent form of this consequence narrative comes in critique of climate change inaction and environmental disregard.For example, Boomers -*Pollute and Destroy nature for years* Nature in 2020 -My Turn Boomer Remover has logged on.
Millennials and Gen Z: dying from depression, homelessness, nonliving wages, mass shootings, poor healthcare, etc Boomers: Walk it off, snowflakes Millennials and Gen Z: calls coronavirus Boomer RemoverBoomers: NOW LISTEN HERE YOU LITTLE SHITS HOW DARE YOU PEOPLE ARE DYINGHere the classic Boomer trope of 'young people are overly-sensitive' is being intertextually invoked and wryly subverted and inverted.