Gen X: The Generation That Never Existed

All the talk about self-branding and sales seems like a v v good metric for sniffing out a gen x-er because, yeah, I hate all that shit with fiery intensity. This is why I have no money. But boy do I have my integrity, by gum.

god i wish someone would buy all my excess integrity

I'm extremely averse to branding/advertising/promotional/PR shit, but it's possible I was more influenced by boomers & gen Xers that other millennials were?

It's also possible that it is hard to make accurate generalizations about entire swaths of the population based on year of birth.

That's not what my horoscope said.

🤯

It's also possible that it is hard to make accurate generalizations about entire swaths of the population based on year of birth.

― All along there is the sound of feedback (Sund4r)

And then again, it's possible that our unique shared experiences go beyond "We are the freakies and this is our freakies tree"

lol sez sund4r the 4v4nt g4rde c0mp0s3r and gui+4r t3ach3r yer such a gen-xer dude you can't hide your ~integrity~

gen-x betrayal!

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/nine-inch-nails-head-like-a-hole-anthem-900750/

But nobody could have predicted the song’s most recent iteration. On an episode of the anthology series Black Mirror, Miley Cyrus played the pop star Ashley O, whose biggest hit was “On a Roll,” a hilariously upbeat redux of “Head Like a Hole.” “I’m on a roll,” she sings over sleek pop production. “Riding so high/Achieving my goals.” Instead of “Bow down before the one you serve,” Cyrus sings, “I’m stoked on ambition and verve.” It’s such a magnificently perverse interpretation of the song that even Reznor approved of it, tweeting out “Feels like I’ve been here before” and even offering NIN–Ashley O crossover merch for sale.

Another 78'er here. I also abhor branding and selling. Although I am fine with making money.

personal branding is repulsive

Did wearing shirts/carrying bags with company logos skip Gen X? I wouldn't be caught dead wearing something that had words Supreme, The GAP, Hollister, etc, emblazoned on the front or a logo'd bag. I find it embarrassing but people actively seek this shit out.

what about hard rock café t-shirts

first time threadster was this done cause uh huh

One reason people my age get so bent out of shape about “generations” is that Gen X is the only one that fully KNOWS it sucks. Boomers and Millennials cry “Stop picking on us!” while Gen X has forty-five years of self-hatred cued up and ready to go! Stop ignoring us! WE’RE AWFUL!

— john roderick (@johnroderick) October 19, 2019

People my age did it back in the day but I'd bet dollars to donuts that those people would never have self-identified as gen x.

OMG, what if gen x is actually a form of self-selective branding, shoot me now.

xxpost

also there are those shirts that I think say stussy but until like 3 years ago I thought they said satanism. nb I am not very visually perceptive

Yeah my general irl steez is 'don't pay excessive attention to me' which is almost certainly rooted in some degree of free-floating self-loathing but I don't know if that widely applies to my age group.

Hard Rock Cafe gets a pass since it has a music link.

Skating and surf shirts get a pass too.

NOT SUPREME THOUGH.

Maybe I should make a powerpoint on this.

Did wearing shirts/carrying bags with company logos skip Gen X? I wouldn't be caught dead wearing something that had words Supreme, The GAP, Hollister, etc, emblazoned on the front or a logo'd bag. I find it embarrassing but people actively seek this shit out.

No, especially not if bands count as companies. But yeah, I've always found it strange when brand logos take over almost the entire surface of a garment. These days (say, the last 10-15 years) I prefer to wear logo-less clothing as much as possible. I make an exception for sneakers, because the ones I find comfortable - DC skate shoes, mostly - are heavily branded, but they do a pretty good job of making the logo a design element.

despite my sense that private property is the root of all evil I also wonder if I am a capitalist to my bones because I think Risky Business is the coolest movie ever, but maybe that's more a boomer flick than gen X? time of your life, huh, kid?

xpost I also completely hate attention but I have always really liked myself.

I have always really liked myself.

ILX post least likely to be cosigned since the site's inception.

I also really like myself and am mostly positive about attention, at least positive attention.

Omg I wouldn’t be caught dead in a branded t shirt — Hard Rock Cafe? Are you kidding? No. Absolutely not then and not now.

Like I said, this is the one thing I feel so strongly that I think it connects me to “a generation” whereas most other parts of my belief system remain relatively idiosyncratic.

I mean like corporate branded tees not band tees. Those are fine but within reason.

Yeah band t's or things for unique restaurants don't count. I completely don't understand a plain top that just has OLD NAVY or POLO on the front. Or those years that LV monogram bags were huge.

Omg I wouldn’t be caught dead in a branded t shirt — Hard Rock Cafe? Are you kidding? No. Absolutely not then and not now.

This is more aligned with cultural class than generation -- like Paul Fussell wrote about this at least as far back as 1980 -- he termed it "legibility" and it was a sign of the lower classes. According to Fussell, people from higher classes avoid and often abhor clothing and accessories that have visible branding. The next step down is very subtle branding.

Though not wearing visibly branded clothing because you are providing free advertising to shitty companies is not the same as not wearing visibly branded clothing because "it's tacky"

Though not wearing visibly branded clothing because you are providing free advertising to shitty companies is not the same as not wearing visibly branded clothing because "it's tacky"

I’m in box #1 — I fullyunderstand the cultural implications but for me it’s the free advertising I object to, not “it’s tacky”

I understand why people do it I just object to doing it myself.

agree with this assessment. feel like we have got to point where if u where anything heavily branded the autoresponse is “what does she mean by THAT”?

so im hip and wear things that say I REALLY DONT CARE DO YOU

Omg I wouldn’t be caught dead in a branded t shirt — Hard Rock Cafe? Are you kidding? No. Absolutely not then and not now.

Like I said, this is the one thing I feel so strongly that I think it connects me to “a generation” whereas most other parts of my belief system remain relatively idiosyncratic.

Not every Gen xer is or was a slacker anti corpratist. There were plenty of preps too! And what they'd call "basic" now. They wore this shit.

xpost LV monogram bags are still huge!

There was a time period in my genX suburban hell when Coca-Cola branded rugby-style shirts were a big thing. Awful.

Guess jeans. Reebok high-tops with the velcro closure. Branded items were certainly a Gen X thing.

I see a lot of people wearing that Obey and Pink garbage who seem old enough to know better

I am looking at the reeboks because I love velcro shoes and the 'Reebok' is very small?

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/cf/49/1f/cf491f0156e53da2613507928bc3538c.jpg

that is definitely not an ironic Z Cavaricci shirt -- though we were also the ironic t-shirt generation

This is more aligned with cultural class than generation -- like Paul Fussell wrote about this at least as far back as 1980 -- he termed it "legibility" and it was a sign of the lower classes. According to Fussell, people from higher classes avoid and often abhor clothing and accessories that have visible branding. The next step down is very subtle branding.

I think Fussell is otm about that. In the early days of corporate-branded clothing you'd generally see items that made some kind of statement, like wearing an STP t-shirt said, "I'm good with cars" or an Adidas t-shirt said, "I'm sporty and I travel." As you go up the class ladder fewer people feel the need to make statements like that.

What blows my mind is the sports-branded clothes and the fact that nowadays a huge section of the spectating audience wouldn't think of going to a baseball, football, or even basketball game without wearing their official team replica jersey. As late as the early '80s, iirc, that wasn't even a thing, there was no such market for that. I don't see much evidence Xers have resisted that particular phenomenon.

are we talking jerseys specifically, or sports-branded clothing in general? I'm pretty sure I had a Raiders hoodie in the early 80s, and the team branded hats were prevalent then too ... I definitely remember people wearing Giants and Raiders shirts and jerseys in the mid 80s.

Jerseys, basically, the kind that enables the fan to essentially disguise him or herself as a member of the team, with the names of real players on the back. I do remember that kids could order jackets or obviously fake team jerseys from the Sears catalog back in the '70s, but then this whole different level of identifying with the team exploded at some recent point

ohhhhh ok! I feel like different pro sports had slightly different timelines .... like baseball was different than football or basketball, also the shirts were different material, idk whether the actual fabric/manufacturing was a part of this. But in terms of NFL and NBA -- I wanna say that the Chicago Bulls were definitely at the forefront of this. I could be totally wrong tho!

I agree with Steve Dahl who said that if you're old enough to be on the team, you shouldn't wear the actual jersey

what if you're too old?

idk i feel like the sports merch started earlier than what you're positing, but maybe that's because where I grew up our teams actually won shit, and people like being associated with winners, and also for a kid who wants to look badass ... the Raiders logo was like a skull and crossbones and their shit was black. Like some of these teams had really non-badass logos and mascots and colors.

relatedly, some teams were appropriated more by bangers than others -- I'm pretty sure at some point in time, certain clothing was actually prohibited at schools because of gang associations which administration believed would lead to violence. I forget when that started though -- wanna say late 80s at the earliest, but definitely 90s it was a thing.

people like being associated with winners

this is the key idea that also explains a lot of the corporate-branded clothing, since people think of successful corporations as winners as well

which brings us to .... Beck

I totally forgot about BUM equipment lol
https://d328c8xxrtt5uf.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/22200412/5b0477ba28cc6.jpg

I really like the term "basic" to describe a certain normative aesthetic ... like ^^^