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> I was born in 1976. I understand that in the eyes of millennials 1976 is around the same time period as 1796 Just to nitpick a little, the millennial generat
by imgabe 7y ago
> I was born in 1976. I understand that in the eyes of millennials 1976 is around the same time period as 1796
Just to nitpick a little, the millennial generation starts with 1980-1982 depending on who you ask, so 1976 isn't that old.
- Wohlf 7y ago"Millennial" has come to mean "young people", even though the oldest gen z are graduating college now.
- m00dy 7y agocome on. He is way more close to being a boomer rather than a millennial.
- chrisco255 7y agoThe cutoff for Baby Boomers is 1962. The first Millennials were born in 1982.
- m00dy 7y agoyou basically assume that generation division is based on uniform distribution on years. But, I don't think that is the way it is.
- barrkel 7y agoGenX are closer to millennials than boomers IMO, at least the stereotypes in my head.
- blowski 7y agoWhat’s the point of these labels? I know 16 year olds that talk like the stereotype of “boomers”, and 70 year olds that talk like “generation z”. Imagine we were making the same kind of generalisations about your gender, skin colour, choice of programming language - what would it add to the conversation? We may as well say “Scorpios like partying where sagitarians prefer reading books”
- mtreis86 7y agoWhile there may not be much value in stereotypes like that, with generations at least we are all somewhat interconnected by historical events. WWII defined one generation, and their kids. 911 defined another. Those things that change us as a society do have some impact.
- johnr2 7y ago> What’s the point of these labels? To dehumanise those they're applied to so you can say bad things about them without feeling guilty.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- chrisco255 7y agoWe do make generalizations about all the categories you mentioned. Some are harmless some are hurtful. This doesn't mean that demographics are irrelevant or that characteristics are randomly distributed. We are influenced dramatically by the environment we grow up in and nothing is quite so stable as the past. So, your exceptions do not discount the rule. I'll take my generation vs gen Z as an example. I clearly remember 9/11, blowing NES cartridges to get my games to work, rewinding video tapes, making phone calls to friends on a shared line using a corded phone, having to listen to a radio station for 3 hours to hear the one song I liked and then rush to hit record so I could save it for replay, and on and on. I cannot share these experiences with gen Z. They won't ever have that. I can talk about it but it's just like a Boomer telling me about going to Woodstock or making 10 cents an hour bagging groceries, or dodging minefields in Vietnam, or using punch cards to program. Sure I can hear those stories and be amused, shocked or whatever by them...but I'll never know precisely what it was like to go through all that, with the mood of the time.
- rmason 7y agoThe Baby Boomer generation is for those born from 1946 to 1964. The author of this article was born the year the Apple I was launched he's not old!
- barrkel 7y agoGenX, not boomer.
- hestefisk 7y agoI think you forget gen X, which are the kids of the boomers.
- wwweston 7y agoThe first rule of Gen X is that you don't talk about Gen X. Not because it's forbidden or anything (or because they all watched Fight Club), but because everybody just forgets Gen X. The second rule is whatever, man.
- crocodiletears 7y agoI always have trouble seeing millenials born in the 80s as such. I feel that as a cultural block, you need to bisect the definition between 80s millenials, and 90s millenials. 80s millenials (personally I call them Gen Y or Michael Moore Millenials) came of age in the 90s, could remember the Soviet Union (if only hazily), experienced its unique cultural excesses on a more conscious level, and directly shaped the technology that would later form the digital substrate of new millenium. They participated in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan from their onset, and were also old enough to viscerally experience 9/11. Their generation helped develop activist-consumerism when it was still counter-culture, tend to embrace the idea of a more global society, and came of college age just as the internet began to gain ubiquity. Even though they had to directly weather the financial crisis, they seem to have a more optimistic view of the future, and human potential in general, even if they often see progress as being stymied by bad people. The second group, (90s millenials or just millenials) have no collective memory of the Soviet Union, and entered the world as consumers of the digital transition, even if they were too old to truly be considered digital natives as their successors in Gen Z are. By the tine they were of age to join the military, the US had been at war for nearly a decade, and no one was quite sure why it still continued. The economy took a dive, and they were too young to experience it the same way as Gen Y did. Their early experiences of the internet were when it was still heavily decentralized, but had also become accessible to the technically illiterate. They were culture producers more than they were developers in the oughties, and they grew up alongside surveillance capitalism. Their view of the world is a bit more mixed, and they're also who the author is referring to, I think. I count myself among the latter group, if that offers some context to my perception.
- pas 7y agoAnyone using these terms (Gen X,Y,Z, boomer, millenial, etc) in a serious conversation/post without defining it is part of the problem. And maybe even just trying to somehow lump together hundreds of millions of people just because they are around the same age makes less and less sense. (Especially the anthropomorphization, that all X are lazy/dumb/entitled/etc.)
- 1996 7y agoThis is apparently an unpopular view, but after thinking a bit about it, I agree with your premise. Splitting older millenials with gen X, and younger millenials with gen Z makes sense, because instead of an arbitrary characteristics like "being 20 in the new century", this splits seem to better match some cultural changes that are not perfectly aligned with round dates.
- astrobe_ 7y agoI think what defines a generation is what people saw and remember, not directly years. From a European perspective, Boomers saw the first step on the Moon and May 68 events, their children ("Gen X") saw Chernobyl, the end of the Cold War and grew up with the Oil crisis and the constant warnings that pollution is going to be a serious problem if we don't do something (or rather, if we don't stop doing certain things). Their children ("Millenials") saw the second Gulf War and the collapse of the WTC.
- danans 7y agoI've heard the generation that straddles X and Millennial, which the author and I belong to, referred as X-ennial. More important that the name, everything from Chernobyl to WTC are strong memories for me.