Posted on 01/04/2008 3:51:25 PM PST by unspun
WOW... I never realized that McCain was a year older than my father. He is kinda up there in years, isn’t he?
There are no good breakdowns. I tend to prefer this once since I’m obviously Gen-X (I was born in late 1963), even though Qam prefers the 1965-1981 breakdown. Thing is, with a 20 year spread, there is going to be little in common. Sociologically a generation should be 10 years even though 20 years is a good biological definition.
Actually, there is a name for us. Google Generation Jones.
You are right, although it’s not just GenY — I lost at least one classmate from High School in Afghanistan, and my best friend’s husband is going over there sometime this Spring...
Also, please remember that it was mostly GenX that fought in the first Gulf War, and all the “little” skirmishes in between — the “new recruits” in the first Gulf War were from my HS graduating class (1990). It’s not like we’re all “untouched” or didn’t see any hard times at all. (Not to mention growing up during the end of the Cold War — we still had air raid drills — although they said it was just for tornados. Anyone else remember “The Day After”???
Plus, both my parents were born in the 30s so they were quite “old school” compared to some of my friends’ parents, and DEFINITELY my Sister’s friends’ parents.
I think it has more to do with what generation your PARENTS belonged to that determined how you viewed the world, frankly...
Interesting, I was born in 1963 and I consider myself an Xer. Although big boomer events mean nothing to me. I was a newborn when Kennedy was shot, so I have no idea where I was. Psychadelic music was old before I ever developed an interest in music. I learned about Viet Nam and the moon landing from history books. My family never owned a black and white television etc etc.
On the other hand, I remember all the pivotal X’er events very well. I remember being woke up when Callenger exploded. I waited in line to see Star Wars. I owned an Atari, a Colecovision and a personal computer before I was grown. And most importantly...I know all the words to every schoolhouse rock song ever broadcast.
Make it about 15 years and I think it’d be a lot closer. LOL
‘65 - ‘79 = X
‘80 - ‘94 = Y
‘95 - ‘09 = Z??? LOL
You’re right though... There is no perfect breakdown... LOL
You actually had a history book that covered Vietnam? LOL Our HS History books didn’t have but one or two paragraphs in it about Vietnam in the late 80s!
Seriously though, the Schoolhouse Rock songs — Yep, definitely a Gen X thing. Ditto for Star Wars, PONG & Atari 2600, The Challenger Disaster... etc...
This is me.
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It may be you but my experience with xers is that a large percentage of them expect their parents to take care of them forever. Maybe I am just unfortunate but the ones I know show less independence at thirty than most of my generation(world war II babies) did at twenty. Of course “fending for themselves” would have to be defined. For me it meant doing chores as soon as I was physically able, plowing with a draft horse, cutting wood with an axe, pulling one end of a five and a half foot crosscut saw etc. while still in grade school. I suspect that for the gen X group it might have meant making your own sandwich when you got home from school while Mom was still at work. I don’t know, you tell me. I am sure that if someone even permitted his children to do what my father required me to do as a pre-teen the state would take them away to a foster home.
Talk about drama queen teen angst and hysteric nonsense.
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Amen, Johnnie! Please read my post no. 88 on this subject.
I was born in 1968, making me a “Gen Xer”. I remember the how bad the ‘70s and the Carter administration were. When Reagan was elected I sensed fear in a reporters voice. I saw how America changed radically for the better in the ‘80s. Today I work with a bunch of “Gen Y” twenty somethings who were taught that Carter and Clinton were great presidents, Reagan was a terrible president and that Bush is practically the Antichrist. I try to talk some sense into them but they don’t listen.
I’ll just call myself Xoomer Jones. Maybe Spielberg will make a series of adventure films starring me.
There is no way that Gen X goes up to those born in 1981. The “X” (from Douglas Copeland’s book, not the band that predated it by well over a decade), is the “baby bust”. The Baby Boomers who started having kids brought us Generation Y, another boom.
I was born in 1968 too (by parents who were born during WWII, who happened to be conservative)and agree with what you said. We were lucky enough to go from teen to adulthood with the greatest President of our time in office, which is why Gen X tends to be more conservative...at least the older part of Gen X anyway. As a teen, the Reagan Presidency made me (and a most of the people I grew up with) proud to be an American.
You’re not going to be able to sell the Weasel in Sheep’s Clothing here.
I have similar memories...I remember kids on the schoolyard talking about the election, and all of them thought Carter was a moron. And this was in Southern Maine!
I suppose that could be one reason I would not try to sell any rodents here, but I hadn't thought of it.
Oh!
Are you referring to Mike Huckabee?
He's very human and is not a curmudgeon and I like that guy. FReepers should listen to him with open ears.
He has been learning a lot, in the last dozen years or so and gives indications he won't stop learning important and even unsettling lessons. I'm not sure I can say the same, for many FReepers -- but I'll still discuss such things.
Is Z gonna be the last generation? Or do we start all over again at A?
I think they have determined they must then go with numbers, maybe.
Who would have thought that lowering the voting age from 21 to 18 would turn this country into a failed Socialist state in just two generations.
Why in the bloody world would you think that because I don't support your guy I haven't paid attention to him?
I was listening real good the other day when Mr. Positive said "What does it profit a man to gain the world but lose his soul" while he did his "I won't say Mitt Romney is scum, but I will show you my ad saying Mitt Romney is scum" dog and pony show in Iowa. Yeah, I expect politicians to act like politicians, but that whole deal was Clintonian.
I have been listening, and what I've learned is that he doesn't have the character he's flim-flammed you into believing he has, he is ideologically no better than the Rudy McRomney crowd and his fair tax proposal makes him unelectable in the general.
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