5 ms·

You're missing the point of the abstraction: it's about groupings of people based on roughly how old they were at major cultural events. You're complaining tha

You're missing the point of the abstraction: it's about groupings of people based on roughly how old they were at major cultural events. You're complaining that the concept isn't "Generation 5993"--the point is that we all have all generations in us, but those of us who were in school when 9/11 happened have, as a group, a different perspective. Just because someone's a baby boomer doesn't mean they won't feel like Generation X every once in a while.

JonnieCache 15y ago
I can see how your 'life stage' at the time of different historical events might have some binding effect on different cohorts of the population. However I think this effect is so crowded out by the infinite number of other factors at play, socio-economic class, race, place of upbringing, parenting, genetics and so on, that it is effectively unmeasurable and therefore meaningless. The major effect it has is as a self-fulfilling prophecy: if "Generation $CHAR"ers do have stuff in common, its because they've been told that they have, over and over again for their entire lives. As I said in my other comment, the need to group ourselves in this way is a necessary social instinct. However much we have internalised neoliberal doctrine since the cold war, we are profoundly not just a country full of separate individuals, as this debate shows. You cannot have a country full of individuals, just as you cannot have a tribe full of individuals. We have to identify with each other or we will not survive. At the same time, we have to distinguish between each other or we will not prosper. I am going to stop this rant here, because I am not an anthropologist, and I realise that I am in danger of looking like I am pretending to be one.
- alphadogg 15y ago
  Hear, hear! I, too, am tired of this "binning by birth". It's as if people born in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s exhibit no behavioral clustering on any other, more common demographic variable.
- joejohnson 15y ago
  I agree. I was going to write something similar, but you said it better. Because of the many different factors in someone's life (like socio-economic class, race, place of upbringing, parenting, genetics) these "generations" encompass many diverse experiences than can't accurately generalized.

JonnieCache 15y ago

I can see how your 'life stage' at the time of different historical events might have some binding effect on different cohorts of the population. However I think this effect is so crowded out by the infinite number of other factors at play, socio-economic class, race, place of upbringing, parenting, genetics and so on, that it is effectively unmeasurable and therefore meaningless. The major effect it has is as a self-fulfilling prophecy: if "Generation $CHAR"ers do have stuff in common, its because they've been told that they have, over and over again for their entire lives. As I said in my other comment, the need to group ourselves in this way is a necessary social instinct. However much we have internalised neoliberal doctrine since the cold war, we are profoundly not just a country full of separate individuals, as this debate shows. You cannot have a country full of individuals, just as you cannot have a tribe full of individuals. We have to identify with each other or we will not survive. At the same time, we have to distinguish between each other or we will not prosper. I am going to stop this rant here, because I am not an anthropologist, and I realise that I am in danger of looking like I am pretending to be one.

alphadogg 15y ago
Hear, hear! I, too, am tired of this "binning by birth". It's as if people born in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s exhibit no behavioral clustering on any other, more common demographic variable.
joejohnson 15y ago
I agree. I was going to write something similar, but you said it better. Because of the many different factors in someone's life (like socio-economic class, race, place of upbringing, parenting, genetics) these "generations" encompass many diverse experiences than can't accurately generalized.