“I reject your reality and substitute my own.”
3 Likes
Oh, I like that! Let’s make it happen.
C’mon kids, bashing the Boomers is such a Gen X thing to do.
Anybody remember Strauss & Howe? They said in their book “Generations” that, according to their broken record theory of history, Gen X would face a crisis (check), their hard-bitten cynicism would give them the reality-based vigor to conquer the crisis (nope), and that they would be reviled and/or ignored for their efforts (1/2 check for “ignored”).
I look at my mother’s generation (Boomer), my siblings (Gen X & Y), and their children (Millennials) and see that we all have to scrape for a living. I wonder if Strauss & Howe have to scrape for a living after being demonstrably, publicly wrong?
And all of us ~33 year olds just want to hang out where our older siblings are…
4 Likes
What years are you putting on those? What is Y, if not Millennial?
1 Like
I thought this was neat:
12 Likes
Isn’t part of the problem that the power structure still skews towards boomers? I know that’s a reason why in my field new positions aren’t opening up, because boomers don’t or won’t retire. Of course, as you point out, they often CAN’T retire. From reading Piketty, one thing I think that people don’t seem to realize is that the boomers and the economic expansion that they saw in the postwar period into the early 70s was a historical anomaly, not the new norm. But we’ve essentially gutted the various alternatives that made life effective in expectation that the new norm included a constant expanding economy, with the ability to accommodate all.
probably not.
6 Likes
Well, why not!
1 Like
This is where it becomes clear that the generation thing really starts breaking down – this is when the internet hit, but before it had demolished the ‘serial monoculture’ thing. They experienced the demolition–the transition from one “age” to the next–in their teens. So they (we!) tend to define ourselves by our awareness of that transition more than the things transited from and to.
I’ve seen " the gamer generation " – but that too just illustrates that this was the time when “generations” stopped being perceived as universal and started being applied to behaviors or choices.
6 Likes
I don’t know, though, Rob, was there EVER a serial monoculture. How much of the notion of a unified cultural generation really stems not only from marketing, but various projects of historical nostalgia in the first place? How much of the boomer’s generation is constructed more from the various media’s nostalgic references rather than lived reality? We known how unreliable human memory is, so reinforcement of key moments can almost become retroactively a unifying moment.
I do think what actually unifies all these generations into some common themes is how their cultural experiences are mediated by the concept of youth in the first place. It kind of goes back to the 20s, but that was still very much an elite thing. Being a teenager became far more universal in the postwar era, because the majority of teenagers were being marketed to aggressively and they were housed together for the majority of their day in high schools. In the 40s was when the majority of teens started going to HS:
3 Likes
I’m in the liminal generation too (born at the end of 1979). I don’t really feel like I belong to Gen X, but I can remember Ronnie, Maggie and the Eastern Bloc while most Millennials can’t.
2 Likes
You forgot that boomers invented throwing boomers under the bus.
4 Likes
You mean there is no generation jones?
1 Like
1 Like
I guess this is where we get back into gradations that @beschizza was hinting at regarding the millennials. My point is that, despite the real cultural differences, is that our experiences across these three generations have some similarities, which include our similar relationships to popular culture and how consume it. Those are still pretty similar, even with the differences that exist… if that makes sense! 
1 Like
Exactly. I saw Reality Bites when it came out in theatres, and thought “Well, I’m certainly not in THAT generation”
2 Likes
How about Heathers… Isn’t that movie very? Doesn’t it just sum up all that’s wrong with the marketing of generations in the first place… Rather than a celebration of generational unity, I always found that movie to be a pretty good meditation on what’s wrong with the mind set of generational unity, as well as the attempts to rebel against it, which all too often just turn into empty, murderous rage.
I just realized that you could never have had that movie made now, post-Columbine, could you? A bomb in the basement of the school, with a suicide note from the entire student body? Yeah. A brilliant movie that could not be made now.
6 Likes
By the age ranges above there are some silent generation ones that wont retire as well. Some are being forced out along with Gen X though as companies have figured out oh hey we can ‘move the job’ and the old settled folk don’t want to move so we can lay them off and then hire 20 something kids out of college for 1/3rd the salary.
So yeah they are getting forced out but then a lot of us GenX are too old already as they want cheap 20 somethings.
1 Like
Well, but the silent gen is pretty much well past retirement age and have been pushed into very marginal work - the ones that are still around. I think it’s some older boomers that are getting pushed out. But the current crop of boomers still dominant many industries and in our governments, with the possible exception of the start ups, which are dominated by millennials or gen xers.
Apart from the ones running for President (again).
But if the only Gen X candidates are Ted Cruz, Scott Walker and Marco Rubio…
1 Like
