Generation X...WTF? What is it? From a date or just not a Boomer?

I've seen it starting from 1961 to 1966...Which is it?????????????????

A Census report sez 1968 to 1979 is Gen X: http://www.census.gov/pred/www/rpts/Generation%20X%20Final%20Report.pdf

The same report cites some sources saying that 1961 is the blast off date.

Here's a Stanford article that uses "gen x" yet assumes a date I guess: http://www.stanford.edu/dept/news/pr/98/980821genx.html]

What the hell satrts this morbidly unique age group?

Btw "Boomer Nation" sez "Shadow Boomers" were born between 1958 and 1963...

1960?
1961?
1962?
1963?
1964?
1965?
1966?
1967?
1968? (Ok, I was born in 1968)
1969?

If these dates don't do it what the heck does? Is it all a "state of mind" or is there a concrete definition for certain demografic cohorts????

EDIT: I should add that the Census department also uses 1946 to 1964 as the BOOM. Which makes it twice as long as their definition of the X generation which makes this all just a waste of goddamned time it seems.

Which generation do I belong to? I used to think I was generation x, then I read somewhere that I am generation y. Would the person who is deciding when the generations start and end make up their mind??

Either these things mean something or they don't.

I don't however ming the "late boomer" or "early x'er" or "early y".

That'd be cool just give some statistically significant starting points and some decent swing ranges...

people born in the late 70s & early 80s. Makes sense to me, since I was born in the early 80s and I identify with aspects of both generations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTV_Generation

I also identify with both. I was born in the mid-late 70's.

You Know You Grew Up In The 80's If...

1. You've ever ended a sentence with the word "PSYCHE".

2. You watched the Pound Puppies.

3. You can sing the rap to the "Fresh Prince of Belair " ...and can do the "Carlton".

4. Girls wore biker shorts under their skirts and felt stylishly sexy.

5. You yearned to be a member of the Baby-sitters club and tried to start a club of your own.

6. You owned those lil' Strawberry Shortcake pals scented dolls.

7. "WOAH " comes from Joey on Blossom.

8. Two words: Hammer Pants.

9. If you ever watched "Fraggle Rock ".

10. You had plastic streamers on your handle bars... and "spokey-dokes" or playing cards on your spokes for that incredible sound effect.

11. You can sing the entire theme song to "Duck Tales ". (Woo ooh!)

12. You wore a ponytail on the side of your head.

13. When it was actually worth getting up early on a Saturday to watch cartoons.

14. You saw the original "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles " on the big screen... and still know the turtles names.

15. You got super-excited when it was Oregon Trail day in computer class at school.

16. You made your mom buy one of those clips that would hold your shirt in a knot on the side.

17. You played the game "MASH ". (Mansion, Apartment, Shelter, House)

18. You wore stonewashed Jordache jean jackets and were proud of it.

19. L.A. Gear... need I say more.

20. You wanted to change your name to "JEM " in Kindergarten. (She's truly outrageous)

21. You remember reading "Tales of a fourth grade nothing " and all the Ramona books.

22. You know the profound meaning of "WAX ON, WAX OFF".

23. You wanted to be a Goonie.

24. You ever wore fluorescent clothing. (some of us... head-to-toe)

25. You can remember what Michael Jackson looked like before his nose fell off and his cheeks shifted.

26. You have ever pondered why Smurfette was the only female smurf.

27. You took lunch boxes to school... and traded Garbage Pail Kids in the schoolyard.

28. You remember the CRAZE, then the BANNING of slap bracelets.

29. You still get the urge to say "NOT " after every sentence.

30. You remember Hypercolor t-shirts.

31. Barbie and the Rockers was your favorite band.

32. You thought She-ra (Princess of Power!) and He-Man should hookup.

33. You thought your childhood friends would never leave because you exchanged handmade friendship bracelets.

34. You ever owned a pair of Jelly-Shoes. (and like #24, probably in neon colors, too)

35. After you saw Pee-Wee's Big Adventure you kept saying "I know you are, but what am I?"

36. You remember "I've fallen and I can't get up"

37. You remember going to the skating rink before there were inline skates.

38. You ever got seriously injured on a Slip and Slide.

39. You have ever played with a Skip-It.

40. You had or attended a birthday party at McDonalds.

41. You've gone through this nodding your head in agreement.

42. You remember Popples.

43. "Don't worry, be happy"

44. You wore like, EIGHT pairs of socks over tights with high top Reeboks.

45. You wore socks scrunched down (and sometimes still do...getting yelled at by "younger hip" members of the family)

46. "Miss MARY MACK MACK MACK, all dressed in BLACK BLACK BLACK "

47. You remember boom boxes. and walking around with one on your shoulder like you were all that.

48. You remember watching both "Gremlins" movies.

49. You know what it meant to say "Care Bear Stare!"

50. You remember watching "Rainbow Bright" and "My Little Pony Tales "

51. You thought Doogie Howser/Samantha Micelli was hot.

52. You remember Alf, the lil furry brown alien from Melmac.

53. You remember New Kids on the Block when they were cool... and don't even flinch when people refer to them as "NKOTB".

54. You knew all the characters names and their life stories on "Saved By the Bell ", the ORIGINAL class.

55. You know all the words to Bon Jovi - SHOT THROUGH THE HEART.

56. You just sang those words to yourself.

57.You remember watching Magic vs. Bird.

58. Homemade Levi shorts. (the shorter the better)

59. You remember when mullets were cool!

60. You had a mullet!

61. You still sing "We are the World"

62. You tight rolled your jeans.

63. You owned a bannana clip.

64. You remember "Where's the Beef?"

65. You used to (and probably still do) say "What you talkin' about Willis?"

66. You had big hair and you knew how to use it.

67. You're still singing Shot Through The Heart in your head,aren't you!

Except my hair inexplicably grew into a mullet-like thing overnight one day this summer. It was cut off immediately though, before I even left the house.

How old are you?

I thought you were one of those young'ins?

things, but many of them I have no idea on.

some, I'm not sure if I'm slightly too old (some of the things seem more my brother's era than mine) or if I just missed them because I was in Germany at the time.

Oh, and:43. "Don't worry, be happy" :mad:
Don't put THAT in my head! I HATE that song!

The Bon Jovi is much less annoying.

:rofl:

You Might be a "Generation X-er" if ...


You wore anything Izod, especially those windbreakers that folded up
into a pouch you could wear around your waist.

You remember when Jordache jeans were cool.

In your fifth grade class picture, you're wearing an Izod shirt with
the collar up

You know, by heart, the words to any "Weird" Al Yankovic song

The Brady Bunch movie brought back cool memories

You ever rang someone's doorbell and said "Landshark".

Three words: "Atari" "IntelliVision" and "Coleco". Sound familiar?

You remember the days when "safe sex" meant "my parents are gone for
the weekend"

You remember "Friday Night Videos" before the days of MTV

A predominant color in your childhood photos is "plaid"

While in high school, you and all your friends discussed elaborate
plans to get together again at the end of the century and play "1999"
by Prince over and over again

You remember when music that was labeled "alternative" really was

You took family trips BEFORE the invention of the mini-van. You rode
in the back of the station wagon and you faced the cars behind you.

You've ever conversationally used the phrase "Jane, you ignorant slut."

You watched HR Puffenstuff as a child, but now that you're older, you
really understand that it would have been much better had you known
about drugs at the time.

You've recently horrified yourself by using any one of the following
phases:
- "When I was younger"
- "When I was your age"
- "You know, back when..."

Schoolhouse Rock played a HUGE part in how you actually learned the
English language

You're starting to view getting carded to buy alcohol as a GOOD thing,

You ever dressed to emulate a person you saw in either a Duran Duran,
Madonna, or Cyndi Lauper video

The first time you ever kissed someone at a dance came during "Crazy
for You" by Madonna

You remember with pain the sad day when the Green Machine hit the
streets and made your old Big Wheel quite obsolete.

The phrase "Where's the beef?" still doubles you over with laughter.

Honestly remember when film critics raved that no movie could ever
possibly get better special effects than those in the movie TRON.

(girls) you thought Sean Cassidy was "dreamy", lusted after "Ted, your
ship's photographer" on the Love Boat

You freaked out when you found that you now fall into the "26- 50" age
category on most questionnaires

Your hair, at some point in time in the 80's, became something which can
only be described by the phrase "I was experimenting"

This timeline appropriately describes actual events in your life: Star
Wars opens, you are still in single digit ages, and you think the
creatures are WAY cool. Empire Strikes Back opens, you are now in
early double digit ages, and you are convinced that the special effects
are much better, the characters are cool, and you want one of every
collectible out there. Return of the Jedi hits the theaters...you are
now a teenager, and you cannot get your eyes off Princess Leia's breasts
or Han Solo's butt.

You've ever shopped at a Banana Republic or Benetton, but not in the
last five years, okay?

You're starting to believe (now that it wouldn't affect YOU) that maybe
having the kids go to school year-round wouldn't be such a bad idea
after all

You're doing absolutely nothing pertaining to your major

You ever wanted to be gagged with a spoon

U2 is too "popular" and "mainstream" for you now

You ever used the phrase "kiss mah grits" in conversation

You remember trying to guess the episode of the Brady Bunch from the
first scene.

You spent endless nights dreaming about being the Bionic Woman or Wonder
Woman or the Six Million Dollar Man

You had ringside seats for Luke and Laura's wedding (on General
Hospital)

You remember "Hey, let's be careful out there"

You're parents wanted you to attend medical school, but you decided it
was pointless since Quincy got all the babes, anyway.

You know who shot J.R.

This rings a bell: "and my name, is Charlie. They work for me."

You ever wanted to learn to play "Stairway to Heaven" on the guitar.

You were unsure if Diet Coke would ever catch on, after all, look at
Tab.

You know all the words to the double album set of Grease.

You ever had a Dorothy Hammill haircut

You sat with your friends on a Friday night and dialed "8-6-7-5-3-0-9"
to see if Jenny would answer.

"All-skate, change directions" means something to you.

You owned a pair of Rainbow suspenders just like Mork used to wear.

You bought a pair of Vanns and wanted to order a pizza in history class
so you could be just like Jeff Spicoli in Fast Times at Ridgemont High.

You owned a preppy handbook.

You were too young to go see the Blue Lagoon so you just had to settle
for second hand reports.

You remember when there was only "G, PG and R", none of this PG-13 crap.

You learned to swim about the same time Jaws came out and still carry
the emotional scars to this day.

Wonder twin powers, activate! Form of a an iceberg, shape of a hammer

You remember when your cable TV box had the three rows of numbers and
you had to move the selector switch accordingly.

You actually believed everything Leonard Nimoy told you on "In Search
Of..."

The ABC After School Special "My Mom's Having A Baby" actually taught
you stuff you didn't know.

Your jaw would ache by the time you finished those "brick-sized"
packages of Bazooka gum.

You loved Bo and Luke Duke.

Your first VCR cost $1,000.

There was nothing strange about Bert n' Ernie living together.

You called everyone on Rotary dial telephones.

before my time...some are hilarious.

And I have to point out (geek that I am):
Wonder twin powers, activate! Form of a an iceberg, shape of a hammer

That would NEVER work, because the boy Wonder Twin did water/ice forms (iceberg is ok), but Jayne did animals - not tools :eyes:

Including the whole spectrum of teenagers, that gives us a range from 1961 (19 in 1980) to 1976 (13 in 1989).

The idea with X is that we were supposed to have been the marketing driven spoiled rotten children of the baby boomers, and that between our lack of a work ethic and our love of useless technology like videogames, we wouldn't amount to anything. As a result, we didn't "deserve" a name. We would never stand out and there would be nothing to differentiate our generation, so we would just be labeled "X". X, in this case, meant NOTHING.

We were supposed to be the Nothing Generation, and yet we built the Internet, pulled technology into mainstream society, and changed the world. Take that you shortsighted boomers :p

Gen X is 1965 on.

12/26/64 - got in by 5 days!

I am 4-7-64!

Can I retire now?

April 1946.

I have siblings born in both years they took are bookends of the Baby Boom.

from the wankiest British punk band that copped it's title from an book about what was wrong with the British kids of the early 60s.

:rofl:

But I think I am. I am not a Y. I am Kurt Cobain and flannel. I remember records - as in vinyl ones. Et cetera.

...so I guess I'm one of those 1964 people who don't think you're technically a boomer, but you may be an honorary one!

DUH.

I am saying I think I am X, not Y.

I'm far, far too young to be a Boomer (I was born in '66), and I have never identified with supposed profile of the Gen X-er.

Baby Boomers                     1946–1964
Beat Generation                    1948–1962
Generation Jones                 1954–1965
Consciousness Revolution       1964–1984
Baby Busters                        1958–1968
Generation X                        1961–1981
MTV Generation                      1975–1985
Boomerang Generation             1981–1986
Generation Y                        1977–2003
Internet Generation                1985–1999

Although many of these designations overlap...

Or split in two. What is Conscious Revolution by the way?

Sure I'm a Commie Thug but there's more of me?

Do I get a prize?

The Consciousness Revolution was a period of spiritual awakening in American history, according to Strauss and Howe in their books Generations and Fourth Turning. They put the years of the Consciousness Revolution as 1964 to 1984. Under Strauss & Howe's system, the era before the Consciousness Revolution was the American High; the era that follows it is the Culture Wars era.

The Consciousness Revolution began with urban riots and campus fury and swelled alongside Vietnam War protests and a rebellious counterculture. It gave rise to feminist, environmental, and black power movements and to a steep rise in violent crime and family breakup. After the fury peaked with Watergate in 1974, passions turned inward toward New Age lifestyles and spiritual rebirth. For many of this generation, the mood expired during Ronald Reagan's Presidential re-election campaign in 1984 as aging hippies reached their yuppie chrysalis.

Age Location in History:

The G.I. Generation was entering elderhood. As institution-founders and the "status quo", and they found themselves on the defensive side of the generation gap.
The Silent Generation was entering midlife. They were thirty something when the slogan "Don't trust anyone over thirty" was popular.
The Baby boomers were entering young adulthood. They were the masses that made Woodstock so idyllic.
Generation X was being born. Already, they were looking at the adult world as a source of mass confusion and were starting to be criticized as "bad". The criticism has moved up the age ladder with them.

I'm only in two.

very descriptive.

I particularly hate the "echo boomers" phrase. I mean, seriously, are baby boomers so self-important that they even have to co-opt an entire generation? :eyes:

According to a book on the subject I read, the living generations line up like this:

Lost/WW1 generation: 1883-1900
GI Generation: 1901-1924
Silent/Beatnik Generation: 1925-1942
Baby Boomers: 1943-1960
Generation X: 1961-1981
Millenial generation: 1982-?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generations_%28book%29

The term "Generation X" was created by people born in the early 60's, they were demographically part of the baby boom but weren't culturally, and so created the term to set themselves apaprt from boomers.


Oh, and my skin crawls every time us Millenials are called "GenY" by the media. :puke:

Here is a thread on the subject on another forum I post at: http://www.fourthturning.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1896

John Thune, David Vitter, and Barack Obama were all born in 1961.


way to make ME feel old.

(born 1969 - that's pretty non-negotiable Gen X)


I would've preferred to be called the "Blank Generation" because Richard Hell is so much cooler than Billy Idol.

Came to prominence when Douglas Coupland's book, Generation X, was causing a little stir about young people, "slackers," McJobs, and so on. My theory is that the media, or whoever decides this stuff, latched onto the book title since A. it was about people born after baby boomers coming of age and being hip and disaffected and all that jazz and B. that generation, as far as I know, hadn't been called anything at the time so this name seemed as good as any.

Thanks to that, we have Generations Y and I think Z, as well. Because "X" wasn't annoying enough on its own, apparently.

I don't know where I fall in all of this. I'm not a boomer. Beyond that, well, whatever.

(Sorry for being so negative, but I really, really can't stand this "we must have cute names for each generation and apply traits to them accordingly" nonsense. I know it won't stop any time soon, but that doesn't mean I have to like it).

"which makes this all just a waste of goddamned time it seems."

I couldn't agree more. Good call! :thumbsup:

and the damned nuclear obliteration clock, and you watched Testament and the Day After, and had fucking nightmares about nuclear holocaust, you qualify.

I always assumed that if your parents were boomers, you were gen. X.

I always figured you as older than that :hide:

Maybe because you seem wiser.

1962 here, and I refuse to be called a Boomer. I am not sure why. Is it better to be one of the older Xers or to be one of the youngest Boomers? Either way, it's fatal.

The authors of the seminal work "Generation X: abort, retry, ignore?" define Generation X as 1961-1981 and that's good enough for me. The thing that makes me deny being a Boomer is that the Baby Boom was a post WWII phenomenon. So 1962 was not part of that. Perhaps part of the same Generation, but it sucks that my entire g-g-g-generation. if it is mine, is named after one four year part of it which is so far before my time. It is as if Boomers who are not part of the Baby Boom really don't count. So we might as well be Xers, the forgotten generation.

My Mom is in the first year, I'm in the last.

:hi: Dont' tell them they're not. It'll turn their worlds upside down. :P

Aren't they the same ones who bought a Yukon?

And the definition I always read said that 42-64 was Boomer generation. I guess it depends on what book you read. :D

Me, I am a nothing generation. I don't fit into any of them.

It's a scary one...

:scared:

form a new generation. :D

some definitions of the boomers as including '44 - I expect it depends on the specific definition.

which means people like me born in 1965 are neither.

I hear is 1946-1964, which makes sense to me. Especially the start. The war ended in 1945 so when the soldiers came back they started families. I remember seeing a news report around 1986. It was about the last college boomer graduating class. These were students born in 1964. My little sister was born in '64 so I can always tell by her how old the youngest boomers are.

I prefer definitions based more on culture and worldview. people born between 1943 and 1945 arn't boomers demographically, yet identify more with Boomers then with Silents because they have little or no memory of WW2. people born between 61 and 64 are Xers because they were born too late to remember the world before the 60's social movements and came of age during the rule of St. Ronnie. As I said above, the term "Generation X" was an invention of the people born in ther early 60's to distingusih themselves from Boomers.

Generational Insights workshop

The course provides information on the multi-generational preferences in the workplace. We will discuss different generations (WWII generation, baby boomers, Generation X and Generation Y), some ways in which they are similar and some ways in which they are different. We will also identify some key management tactics for each employee segment. While you don't want to define people by a label (it is important we get to know our employees as individuals with individual preference), there is some general food for thought.

I should go to represent Gen X and wear a flannel shirt and be generally scruffy and cynical :)

I kind of prefer the moniker "Generation Y" as in Why Bother. Whereas the X was the first generation to have a lower quality of life than the predecessor, Y is probably the first generation to lower the intellectual bar and allowed the worst administration ever to be in power.

I'm gen x and I don't really give a shit.

created because they got bored talking about Gen X and wanted a new series of pointless stories about a generation.

Boomers being marked by a major social change in this country- the end of WWII.

As the time since WWII lengthens, the distinction between subsequent generations gets fuzzier and even more meaningless.