Call this a pet theory. I’ve been wondering how boomers inherited pure Americana, yet turned into this majority that despised their own children and country, rebelling against their namesake. We already know Fabian socialism was fighting a quiet war over government control since right before the world wars, that the churches were being indoctrinated by Zionism during the same time frame.
What isn’t quite as clear is how the boomers became quasi hedonist/ nihilists which only solidified over time. There’s multiple facets you could point to like the sexual “revolution”, drug use, hippy culture, etc. these however don’t explain NeoConservatism which was/is overwhelmingly supported by Boomers, or how community disappeared overnight during the boomers reign as adults.
I would argue something different, the fallout of communism/ socialism in America created a fallout from tribalism/ community as a second order effect. “Rugged individualism” became nihilistic individualism which neocons embraced in totality, “you are only responsible for yourself, heritage means nothing, blah blah bootstraps”. This was/is the defining creed of the boomer “right”. This is where the “propositional nation” and “creedal nation” nonsense comes from. This is also why the left and right were nearly indistinguishable on immigration where H1Bs and illegal amnesty were actual neocon babies. (Reagan said he would grant amnesty years before the bill and “dem betrayal”, George Sr favored a second wave of amnesty, etc).
So you might think on the flip side of neocon boomers, the neoliberals, that if they were opposing force that they would be the “communal” party. Which is partly true, this is why leftists of the time created the NIMBY laws and why even today the wealthy left lives in overwhelmingly majority white gated neighborhoods. What the neoliberals would not do, however is support Americana, that was their great evil, and the best way to destroy it was “diversity”/ multiculturalism. It is societal nihilism versus individual nihilism.
This also supports why both the boomer left and right despises Nazis in totality and was their unifier. The neocon right sees Nazis as racial socialists, which is in opposition their founding myth of nihilistic individualism. The neoliberal left sees Nazis as racial nationalists, which is in opposition to their founding myth of societal nihilism.
Its a combination of a huge number of things.
Race is at the core of a great deal of it, but so is Soviet posion operations, as well as just normal power hungry decadent empire shenanigans.
As an example to point to. Bush Sr, the democrat campagin against his elections was themed around him being a wimp. He originated the concept of "compassionate conservativism" the idea that libertarian "poors deserve it" and socialist "burn the oak doors" weren't the only options.
But think about this, Bush wasn't a wuss. He was a fucking Spook. None of that narrative actually makes any sense. Conservatism isn't the idea that if you're poor you suck, it's that the natural process of humans is a positive one, without need of engineering. So Bush wins the "conservative" position by advocating for better engineering. It doesn't work at all in reality, it's all self contradicting. Clinton runs on "the third way economy" which is the EXACT same platform.
So we have to go FURTHER back. It traceable ultimately to Licoln, but the FDR years were a major part of it too.
At its core, the idea that took hold was clean slate theory. It didn't matter where you came from or how you were born, you could be ANYTHING. Which again, isn't the ACTUAL promise of America, the promise of America is that nobody could TELL you what to be based on your heritage.
Everything else is in service to that idea, the philosophical tendrils are significant, enough for pages and pages of analysis. But the simple version is, it's a feel good idea that serves both main schools of human idea. Christian thought says "everyone is made in the image of God, thus we have a flattened humanity, all equal" whereas secular thought gets a twofer, they can tie humans into evolution as "another animal" while also still granting a special place "the only animal that's equal"
Blank slatism/ tabula rasa became wildly prevalent because it was a narrative pushed by Fabian socialists who were the architects of the slow march through the institutions. I don’t think Fabian’s could have dreamed of the nihilism that gripped the boomers on both sides, but they definitely fostered it when they saw how hopeless the generation had become in regards to societal issues.
Its why it's difficult to answer. You say tabula rasa, which leads to soviets, which leads to infiltration, then intelligence and the CIA. Then you're on race politics, crack and the unions. But you can't talk about unions and crack without talking about ghettos, and you can't talk about ghettos without talking about civic planning. Which you can't talk about without FDR coming up. You're all of a sudden talking about labor movements in the 40s and 50s and their setting the stage for integration of the 60s. On BOTH ENDS. The labor movement creates white anxiety at the same time as robber barons move to undercut the movement with racial equality. Leftist movement undermined by leftist movement opposed ny populist movement undermined by liberal movement etc. Etc.