worst generation

that's exactly what a gen xer would think tho

Ditto the Gen X ones, sarahell. They only sound cool to you bc you're infatuated with them. Not bc they're actually cool or meaingful.

'* emphasis on the idea of outsider-y, "punk rock" coolness

punk rock coolness is no longer outsider-y but commodified, especially with the kids that are now in high school.

'* resistance to labeling and marketing
'* anticapitalist and antigovernment attitudes, often absent a coherent political philosophy

millennials have easier access to these kinds of ideas -- like every other kind of idea -- but we were still brought up with the apparent revolution in marketing-shit-to-kids. not just the huge late 90s trends, but especially them.

'* inherited quasi-utopian idealism, often soured by apathy and a lack of faith in the possibility of positive change

yeah millennials are often aware of that second part but openly resist it.

'* obsession with pop culture

think you can say this about every generation in some way

'* interest in the homemade & small-scale vs the mass-produced

nah we love mass produced shit, even if we're being self-aware about it.

'* deliberately scruffy bohemianism

also commodified

http://karisable.com/cobain6.jpg

I just can't handle being the most successful musician in america!!! </ gen x>

thing is, that doesn't really describe the entirety of my generation, just the "cool people"

resistance to labeling and marketing - yep, capitalism def came to a standstill while you consumer rebels were around

http://cloudfront.bostinno.com/wp-content/uploads//2012/02/whitney-houston-the-bodyguard.jpg

I just can't handle being the most successful musician in america!!! </ gen x>

like, your list is such a transparent self-glorification predicated on cliches, generalities, and feel-good sentiments you must've picked up from such cinematic luminaries as kevin smith and john hughes. i could make a similar list about how gen y'ers are global, and technologically savvy, ambitious about the future, guardians of the environment and closer than ever to their families, masters of instantaneous communication with friends scattered throughout the world, ppl are closer than ever, the future is dawning, strong and resolute in the face of a crumbling world economy, blah blah blah. but it's nonsense, right?

you mean that i delivered by necessarily rather general summary in the eeyoreish manner of my generation? sure. i won't quibble with that, and i agree that any attempt to sum up a generation in a nation as big and varied as the US is bound to failure. nevertheless, my sense of my cultural era is as valid as anyone else's, regardless of what film it might seem to resemble.

also lol at the whole 'harsh cruddly life' that was the 1990s

well the basic generalization i've always read about xers is that they hate the state of the country and blame boomers for all of it

contenderizer posts are like the portlandia 'dream of the 90s' song with zero irony

kurt cobain spoke for all gen xers when he killed himself because he was rich, he is the ideal gen xer

u guys are really making a bad case for Gen X with your unironic embrace of your own special snowflakedom

it's just a shame he wasn't around to buy a bubble house

re: kurt's t-shirt, it always bugged me that someone in marvel's legal dept was tuned in enough to some tiny band to sue captain america. are lawyers secretly the hippest people?

any attempt to sum up a generation in a nation as big and varied as the US is bound to failure

and yet here we are 400 posts later

kinda surprised anyone really wants to argue about this

eh, who cares anyway? participation trophies for everyone!

who said we were trying to make a good case for it!

u guys are really making a bad case for Gen X with your unironic embrace of your own special snowflakedom

resistance to labeling and marketing - yep, capitalism def came to a standstill while you consumer rebels were around

i'm not sure what your objection is, mordy. it seems to me that gen x's resistance to labels and marketing was itself predicated on a "cool stance" that was sold to us by MTV et al, and that it was quickly co-opted as a means of marketing to the supposedly market-resistance. it wound up having little political substance.

every generation in the 50s has been given such a hormonal bath of marketing/advertising/consumerism from birth that it's hard to separate out the definition of any "generation" from this, especially given that generationalism is itself a marketing tool

i think every generation thinks they have a special immunity to marketing.

i don't click on fb ads, i mute the tv during commercials, i am a marketers worst nightmare

the messages of the marketing/advertising/consumerism have shifted over time, though.

Hurting so otfm

I mean it's no coincidence that the first generation to "rebel" in mass against their parents was also the first generation told, in mass, from childhood, that their parents old fuddy duddy bullshit wasn't for them!

gen x's resistance to labels and marketing

I'm not sure why you're saying this is a given

re: bubble house, i think in the cobain diaries, there's a scrawled section that says "get into real estate!" not kidding. i think it was mostly commercial buildings though, so he would have done okay.

(above post should have been every generation "since" the 50s, not "in")

contenderizer posts are like the portlandia 'dream of the 90s' song with zero irony

well, they're based on living in seattle, portland and olympia in the 80s and 90s, so that shouldn't be too surprising. but i don't know where you get "unironic" from. i'm not particularly proud of any of the things i'm describing, and i view them all quite ironically. gen x was the flowering of a generation that had been feed a myth of specialness by boomer parents, and a myth of faux-punk hipster cool by MTV.

i took contenderizer's list to be what certain gen xers think of themselves not necessarily how it went down

xp - our parents were silent gen and early boomers though! the majority of the boomers had special snowflake millenial kids

iirc, and i do bc i can just scroll up the thread, he prefaced his list by saying, "what would you say are the traits the define you & your peers, and when were you born (if you don't mind my asking)?"

RE: Gen Y loving authority figures & consumerism. Is there any overwhelming evidence for this? Just curious. Personally my values and the values of my friends seem to be more in line with Gen X, but I feel like "Gen Y <3 consumerism!" could just be a nice way to market stuff via cultural narrative. Also I guess if you're writing an article about Gen Y and having a hard time coming up with something besides computers/internet, you can just pull this out of your ass as a way to contrast it with Gen X.

gen x was the flowering of a generation that had been feed a myth of specialness by boomer parents

quite the opposite -- I saw boomer parents hardening into Reaganites.

remember upthread where I showed that that is a sorta make believe narrative

if anything, i'm pretty sure Gen Y purchasing power is comparatively low bc of economic downturn and we will likely see less spending, more saving, less mortgages, more rentals, etc.

there are way more of you Gen Y-ers than there are of us.

like before "Generation X" was coined, ours was called the Baby Bust

This thread will be noted in the annals of history as the first shot fired in the Generational Wars. Which us gen x-ers will lose why because we're such slackers.

watching our mtvs

i think every generation thinks they have a special immunity to marketing.

― Mordy, Wednesday, May 2, 2012 1:01 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

maybe, i dunno, but gen x was an attempted response to the way that beat freedom, hippie revolution and punk nihilism had been appropriated and turned into cartoons of themselves for marketing purposes. the idea that "you are a target market" was everywhere, as were naive attempts to construct cultural identities that might be resistant to this. it wasn't entirely new of course, but the dedication to keeping it small, keeping it homemade, keeping it unflashy & recycled & out of the camera eye were new-ish. resistance not through rebellion, but through disengagement, invisibility. of course this was a romantic attempt - it was dreamed up by kids. but i'm not romanticizing it.

wtf is w/ this "special snowflake" meme anyway? i mean, did you young 'uns go to "special snowflake" indoctrination camps or something?!?

yes, we did.

that would explain crabcore and twilight, at least.

http://catmacros.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/why_so_mean.jpg

xp to adam bruneau: well the gen y thing with consumerism isn't necessarily dealing with the same type of consumerism gen x was 'rebelling against'. and i'm obviously not saying it's a blanket generalization for everyone; i hardly buy anything ever except food and rent and i pirate my pop culture anyway. but there's a huge prevalence of product-love and brand-love and defining ourselves by the things we own and surround ourselves with.

ok i'm updating my list:

1. harry potter
2. spongebob
3. nutella

i took contenderizer's list to be what certain gen xers think of themselves not necessarily how it went down

― JIM THOMETHEUS (zachlyon), Wednesday, May 2, 2012 1:03 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

iirc, and i do bc i can just scroll up the thread, he prefaced his list by saying, "what would you say are the traits the define you & your peers, and when were you born (if you don't mind my asking)?"

― Mordy, Wednesday, May 2, 2012 1:05 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah, my list is an attempt to describe the values and attitudes that got enshrined as representative of gen x. i don't think i'm bullshitting anyone or romanticizing anything in describing that. as seen from within, at least, these are the things that seemed to unify my peers.

I never felt any special connection to gen X.

xp - our parents were silent gen and early boomers though! the majority of the boomers had special snowflake millenial kids

― sarahell, Wednesday, May 2, 2012 1:04 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah, good point. but all that "you are SPECIAL and everything you do is GREAT" shit was definitely part of how i was raised, both at home and in school.

the gen-x "rebellion" against marketing was really all about being sick of seeing beer commercials w/ Phil Collins and Steve Winwood ... Madison Avenue figured out that they should call cars "punk rock" and make raver-friendly clothes and make pets.com-style commercials, ergo problem solved!