Boomers for Zoomers

We imagine how famous Boomers would cope in jobs characteristically performed by Gen Z-ers.

Robert Peston (b. 1960):
Billie Eilish Fanfic Author

With his wild imagination, probable social media addiction and manic-in-a-way-that-might-be-mistaken-for-soulful stare, Peston is perfectly placed to join the internet subculture around the No Time to Die theme singer. His conflation of the imagined creative process behind Don’t Smile at Me and soft-core, speculative Furry eroticism remains incomprehensible to many but has him earning a bomb through Substack.

Andrew Lloyd Webber’s (b. 1948):
Minecraft Walkthroughs

Headset on, mic softly lisped into, that heavy-set brow furrowing each time a redstone logic gate construction goes awry: Lloyd Webber is Minecraft. He even looks as though he’s made from five to six pixels, max. The most recent iteration of Cats might – rightly – now be consigned to the very darkest corners of the internet; in another part of it tweens watch whole six-hour segments of the Evita composer showing how to construct a digital Taj Mahal from scratch. Just don’t mention Cricket (Hearts and Wickets) or Love Never Dies in the rolling comments section.

Cherie Blair (b. 1954):
TikTok Prankster

Whether it’s hiding a rogue Amazon Alexa in the home of an increasingly angry and immobile John Prescott or bursting in to film her husband as he secretly tries on his Garter robes for the 48th time that week, the polarising First Lady of New Labour is perfectly placed to take the TikTok pranking crown for the older generation. Her gurning laugh and common touch means that a PFI arrangement with LadBible to monetise her prank confusing former Home Secretary Jack Straw by wearing a hoodie back to front in his kitchen is only a little way away.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s (b. 1954):
OnlyFans Account

Trading under the username ‘turkishDlite’, the 12th President of the Republic of Turkey has successfully monetised videos where he is seen criticising the narrative around the Armenian genocide whilst in the shower, threatening the European Union with an immigration surge on its Eastern border whilst in the bath and one, which earned him £5,000 in an hour, of him rigging a presidential election whilst fingering himself.

Melanie Philips (b. 1951):
School Strike Climate Activist

Not one to shy away from ‘controversy’ is our Melanie. Having changed her mind on any number of subjects and, of course, fought the great ogres of our time – from IVF to the MMR vaccine – beginning her own ‘skolstrejk för klimatet’ was the next logical step, despite her stated opposition to the science around climate change. Whether it’s screaming, ‘How dare you’ to assembled world leaders at the United Nations when she’s supposed to be doing her homework for The Moral Maze or chaining herself to the railings instead of doing her column for the Times – look forward to her sailing across the world and engaging in a subtweet battle with Donald Trump some time soon.

Prince Andrew’s (b. 1960):
Bubble Tea Emporium

Was it more than just a nostalgic love for tapioca that first drew the troubled ninth in line to the throne to the world of bubble tea? Or was it a final, last ditch attempt to appeal to teenaged girls? Who can say. The concept of ‘grouse-flavoured boba’ may need a bit more tweaking and the sight of the anime, neon-lit mascot version of the Duke of York staring out from shopfronts in malls across the Western world might sound a little disconcerting but, with bubble tea shops known for gatherings of social outcasts and the otherwise shunned, it’s the perfect home for the formerly respected Falklands War veteran.

 Mary Beard (b. 1955):
Bored Ape NFT Entrepreneur

‘Pulvis et umbra sumus’; we are but dust and shadow. So wrote Horace in his Odes, a piece well known to Classics professor Mary Beard. And just as no ordinary people really know how Latin grammar works, they also don’t know how it is that someone can make tens of thousands from online pictures of monkeys. Consequently, for someone so steeped in the ancient world’s cynicism about the earthly, a move into trading in non-fungible tokens of a chimp in a sailor’s cap is the obvious next step. Zooming live from Newnham College, Cambridge, Beard now delivers online lectures on exactly how much the Roman denarius was worth in contemporary bitcoin denominations whilst decked in Web3 streetwear.

 Morrissey (b. 1959):
Disinterested Barista

Heroically ignoring customers at the Trafford Centre’s branch of Caffè Nero is Morrissey. From deliberately mishearing an order for an americano to spitting inside the ham and cheese croissants, his interpersonal skills are made for the role. Whether his tenure can survive the inevitable incident when he draws a swastika on a macchiato made with non-almond milk is another question.

Ian Botham (b. 1955):
BTS Army General

Given Baron Botham of Ravensworth’s last foray into the world of online subculture involved him accidentally tweeting the shaft of his semi-engorged penis to an unsuspecting world, he wasn’t the obvious choice for a rapid promotion within BTS Army, the K-pop group fandom organisation. Botham is now an ‘Adorable Representative MC for Youth’, with the role yielding similar networking and access opportunities to his membership of the House of Lords. Beefy now benefits from early release of BTS event tickets, a monthly birthday celebration video and close access at concerts so as to have a better chance of hitting one of J-Hope, Suga, or, his favourite member, V, with soiled pieces of his rolled-up underwear.

Alan Sugar’s (b. 1947):
Unboxing Commentary Account

‘Blaady hell! Look at the masking tape on that!’, ‘I am sick and fackin’ tired of bubble wrap’. Lord Sir Alan’s video of him spending one hour and 20 minutes talking through his unpacking of the Amstrad E-m@iler is endlessly quotable and, at one point, had nearly 125,000 people watching live. Since then, Sugar’s rep as an unboxing legend has grown, to the extent that he has had to move full-time to Florida after the hallway of his Chigwell mansion became so full of unsolicited Amazon parcels as to render the rest of his house inaccessible.

George Galloway (b. 1954):
Boohoo Ambassador

Whether the remnants of the Workers Party of Britain (currently registered to a semi-detached house in a Birmingham suburb) really needed its leader to double up as its own Boohoo Campus Ambassador is the sort of question someone who doesn’t get Boohoo would ask. Addressing the proletariat while modelling a range of makeup palettes is exactly the ‘grammable content we need going into 2022! (If you want 25% off your next Boohoo order, then use the code SADDAMWAS-INNOCENT03 at the checkout!)

Lady Colin Campbell (b. 1949):
Instagram Hypebeast

Who’s that finessing a 20-post story from the front of the queue for a special set of Yeezys commemorating the twentieth anniversary of the death of Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother? Lady Colin Campbell, of course. And who’s that, having hyped them to the max over multiple social media platforms, making money on the secondary market by flogging exactly the same unworn Yeezys the following week? Why, Lady Colin Campbell, of course. Sometimes, grifting is cross-generational.

Martin Amis (b. 1949):
Love Island Contestant

‘Once again, Martin has failed to participate in today’s tasks, instead subjecting three other islanders to a lengthy monologue about his feelings of inadequacy with regard to his relationship with his late father, Sir Kingsley. He has consequently been eliminated.’