Babyboomers, how do you feel about Gen X?

[Taverner]

Since we are culturally your offspring...after all you were our teachers, our parents, our ministers, etc...

We've been labeled with nihilism, but in many ways it was just cynicism that we picked up from you...

We also took up the torch you guys left us politically - without Abbie Hoffman there would be no Bill Hicks, without Gloria Steinem there would have been no Jeanene Garafalo...

So "mom"..."dad"...how we doin? :)

[fishnfla]

1. everything' s cool

except for the music, the clothes , the body piercing, the tatoos and the cars you drive


other than that, its all good :)

[kalian]

5. Ummm...you got the wrong generation there mate....

research it a tad better and you will find that GenXers aren't into
body piercing, etc. ;)

[fishnfla]

9. When you're a hammer, everything's a nail

and when you are over the hill, everyone on the other side looks all the same.

and, oh yeah, the attitude, forgot that part. harumpph! :)

[dolo amber]

23. What gen-Xers do you know?

I'm genX and I have multiple body piercings...I'm pretty sure none of my friends are tattoo and/or piercing free...:shrug:

We must just run with different crowds. ;)

[The Traveler]

6. Hey!

I like the music, the clothes, the body piercing ... oh, I get it. Yer making an ironic generational funny.
:hippie:

[The Traveler]

2. Not too shabby, really

Gen X hasn't quite found their compass, but when they do they will shake things up. My prediction, for what it is worth.

[DAGDA56]

3. Do me one favor...

...get one of your top bands to try and sing harmony. You get an exer band with harmony vocals, and you have a hit! (you guys already have the chops when it comes to your instruments)

[Taverner]

13. What about Alice In Chains?

They did harmony in a way only Gen X could do....

[DAGDA56]

19. I stand corrected...I almost typed Staind corrected...

nt

[Taverner]

21. Course we Xers can't thank you enough

for Iggy and the Stooges, MC5 and Velvet Undergound....

[DAGDA56]

24. OK, you made me go put on the Bananna CD by VU...

...it may take a few minutes as I have to time the rocking chair just right so I land on my feet and not on my ass. By the way, I am always surprised about how the Exers know their history...VU is one thing, but a picture of Phillip K. Dick? Amazing, eclectic mind you've got there.

[Taverner]

26. PKD was the MAN!!!!

and a son of the town that, no matter where I live, I will always call my home (Berkeley, CA)

And I never get sick of Ubik - almost named my cat Ubik (well, she was EVERYWHERE!)

[DAGDA56]

27. Unless I'm mistaken...

...he lived for a while in a town I also lived in...Ukiah, CA...I was only a kid, but there was something pretty weird and wonderful about the place in 1969.

[skooooo]

4. Generation X definition not so clear....

In the 1990's it was anyone born anytime after 1961 to about 1980. Seems like the definition keeps changing.

[ForrestGump]

12. I originally thought that it was

anyone born starting from either 1969-71 (the dates varied depending on who defined it to me) to as late as 1975. Kinda made me wonder what we called the 'lost' generation born after 1964 but before the Xers. Imagine my surprise, a few years ago, when some pundit stated for the record that Generation X began in 1975 and was complete long before I thought it was, by the mid-90s.

Confusing. Stupid, really -- same old arbitrary classifications that both divide and provide fodder for experts of all kinds of stripe, some dubious.

Just looked at this Web site (http://users.metro2000.net/~stabbott/genxintro.htm) and saw this:

"The 1961-81 years are also being accepted and popularized by media like TIME magazine, which has used those years in a Gen-X cover story. The years 1965-79, 1964-82, 1960-1970, 1966-1977, and 1970-1983 have also been used in articles on Gen-X, but these all seem very arbitrary, and as you can tell, are all over the map, demographically."

Seems like nobody really agrees, though the site's owner is in favor of the 1965-75 bracket. I always thought that human generations were generally defined as about 20 years, though.

What's really interesting is this:

"Then what's the 1976-81 crowd called? "Generation Y" comes to mind. (Or is that,"Why?") Also known as the "Baby Boomlet", because birthrates went up again in those years, what the media often mis-names "Gen-X" are the "grunge" kids that would be as alien to a high school campus in 1985 as we would have been in at high school in the 1970s. As a side note, it's ironic how this "Boomlet" group is being molded into little clones of the Boomers as they were in their youth, as if they were re-living their youth vicariously THROUGH them, which is, of course, exactly what's happening. The bell-bottoms, drug use, and even the revival of "folk" music- though most don't recognize it as such - looks and sounds shockingly similar, and it's not an accident. (Their little minds are being shaped to mimic Boomer's political and social values, too, but that's another story for another time.)"

[Nite Owl]

7. Geez, you're sure makin me

feel old! You guys are the greatest. (From a Mom of two of them)

[ForrestGump]

8. Buncha whiny, sniveling, slacker, surly punks

:P

Well, that was 'til I found out that Generation X -- whoever decides this stuff -- started out years before I thought it did. So, to the wahtever-titled generation after them, let me just say present company excepted, of course.

For what it's worth, I think that America's turned into a buncha whiny, sniveling, slacker, surly punks (yep, baby Boomers included) in general.

[fishnfla]

10. Boomers, by far, the most selfish pricks ever

I ought to know. ;)

[ForrestGump]

17. Present company excepted, of course

[AntiCoup2K4]

11. Some of Billy Idol's best work......

[Skittles]

14. I think you are terriffic

I have dated several of you :7

I've never fallen for the generational sterotyping. NO GENERATION HAS IT EASY.

[Taverner]

16. Yes I definitely think there's a difference between we Gen Xers

Who were raised mainly by flower children, and the Gen Yers who were raised by yuppies...

[starroute]

15. I'm not your mom -- my kids are Gen Y

And please don't take it personally, but they don't have much use for Gen X at all. ;-)

I always figured the Gen X'ers were the offspring of the people a little older than I was -- the ones who grew up on some curdled late 50's mixture of white bread rock 'n' roll, Beatnik existentialism, and Eisenhower/Nixon foreign policy. They're the ones who were having kids in the 1960's and 1970's, when us Boomers were still running barefoot through the dew or declaring we would never bring kids into this messed-up world.

I don't know what Gen Y is going to turn out to be -- but they seem to have a certain contempt for the cynicism and nihilism of Gen X. I'm hoping for better things from them.

[Taverner]

18. Well I'm Gen X and I was born in 1970

My parents were, as you said Eisenhower/Nixon-esque.

But...all of my teachers were boomers. All three of our ministers at our church were boomers, and most of our heroes were boomers.

Thats more what I meant :)

[bloodyjack]

22. wait, so between what years was generation Y born

or is it still in the process of getting born?

perhaps 1980 - 2000?

[starroute]

29. My older son, born in late 1978, says he's on the cusp

On that basis, I'd say that 1978-79 are the transitional years, with some people that age falling on one side and some on the other.

The difference has a lot to do with computers, video games, anime, geek culture in general. All that stuff that came in around 1984. Gen Y'ers are the ones who grew up with those things and have been shaped by them the way Boomers were shaped by television.

Back in 2001, I asked my younger son (born in 1982) if 911 was going to be the defining event of his generation. He answered, "No, we already had our defining event, and it was Columbine." I don't know if he still feels that way -- but I take it a statement of geek alienation.

I strongly believe that there will be a new counter-culture starting up in the next few years and that it will be a geek-oriented counter-culture, based on an understanding of the world that will be just as alien to Gen X'ers as to Boomers. I'm half eager to see what it produces and half afraid.

[stellanoir]

20. well. . .I was born between the boomers and the X'ers. . .

I used to like to call it. . .generation wondering. . .that was before the initial "W" derivied such negative connotations. It's strange though that generational thing. I had to listen to this guy who's younger than me, bitching about teenagers performing a ritual of "cleansing the flag" in front of the state house this week. I thought, "my goodness these kids are politically engaged and active. How can that be wrong. . .?"

He was merciless about it. I found it refreshing and hopeful.

[welshTerrier2]

25. beware of divide and conquer politics

we've seen blacks and whites set against each other ... and the left began to divide ... and we've seen women set against men ... and the left began to divide ... and we've seen one generation set against another ("boomers won't leave anything in the social security fund for the rest of us") ... more division ... and we've seen the north set against the south ... still more division ... and jews and catholics and muslims and arabs and asians and on and on ... now we even have old europe and new europe ...

and most people in each of these groups have virtually no power ... and what little power they do have gets divided and divided and diminished and diminished ...

the game being played by those who hold the cards is called divide and conquer ... and it's not that there aren't some legitimate issues being raised by these factions ... but these issues must never obscure the fact that the powerless must always seek unity if any progress is to be made ...

we need to understand that it is a very small group of the wealthiest elite that controls far too much of our lives ... we need to find unity among our many factions ... and until we do this, we will all remain virtually powerless ...

my view on gen-x (i'm a baby boomer, btw), we need them in the movement with us as we need enlightened people of every generation ... don't let the right continue to divide us ...

[tigereye]

28. nicely said

each generation brings its own gifts and challenges

I'm technically a boomer, but I think that is a stereotype. Most of my peers were punk-rocker types who were and still are politically aware, artistic and not "yuppies." People are complex.

[SarahB]

30. I guess I'm Gen-X

I never fit the stereotype tough. (Just try fitting me into a Demographic. I dare ya!) Never had that "slacker" anything down. Perhaps slackerness would have been fun. Who knows? :shrug:

My parents are boomers and they're the most self-absorbed humans I know, but I can't base my opinion of a generation on it. As always, we are all individuals- all 6.whatever billion of us. :7

[lucidmadman]

31. I have to weigh in here...

...I feel kinda sorry for Gen X. I'm 52 and childless BTW. I can't imagine what it would've been like to come-of-age with MTV. You had rock and roll stolen from you and made into a TV show! What a gyp!(my apologies to the Romany people). I haven't really seen/heard much that's original come from Gen X. The styles all seem to be derivative. As if it's all chosen from off the rack in some vast museum of past styles.
I like some of y'all on an individual basis. It's just the mass media saturation level has made y'all a little shallow. That and the decline of public education. Do they teach any history or civics in public school anymore?
I guess I'm just an old fart at this point. Old like the late Joey and Dee Dee Ramone and Joe Strummer. What's been really new since 1980?