Which generation were you born in?

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Raleel

Raleel

The Lemon LeCroix of Mythras
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Informal, I’m not going to get picky about years. Don’t think too hard about it ;)
 
I'm too young to properly get Spaced and I'm old enough to know I don't properly get Scott Pilgrim.
 
Post boomer, pre gen-x. I'm of the 'microcomputer' generation - roughly the first generation of kids that grew up with computers in quantity before adults (by and large) understood them.
 
Nobby-W said:
Post boomer, pre gen-x. I'm of the 'microcomputer' generation - roughly the first generation of kids that grew up with computers in quantity before adults (by and large) understood them.
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The Usborne computer books of the time were amazing! Maybe, in technical terms, they weren't great, but they were inspiring and made a lot of stuff seem accessible.
 
Nobby-W said:
Post boomer, pre gen-x. I'm of the 'microcomputer' generation - roughly the first generation of kids that grew up with computers in quantity before adults (by and large) understood them.
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However you like to go with it! Most folks don’t really think of a generation in there. I would guess I’m in that place. Early half of gen x
 
The greatest generation to me was my grandparents. They either went through WWI or WWII or both! They also had to go through the Great Depression. Just very nose-to-the-grindstone generation. I miss my grandparents and the stories they would tell, even if they told them multiple times. Never got tired of them.
 
Endless Flight said:
The greatest generation to me was my grandparents. They either went through WWI or WWII or both! They also had to go through the Great Depression. Just very nose-to-the-grindstone generation. I miss my grandparents and the stories they would tell, even if they told them multiple times. Never got tired of them.
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If yours were like mine they also managed to live from an era of horse and buggy and telegraph as still somewhat common until the very Dawn of the internet. That's a hell of a lot of changes
 
Either the last of X or the first of Y, depending on how you count it. When I was younger, I related better to older kids and now that I'm older, I relate better to younger adults.
 
Bunch said:
If yours were like mine they also managed to live from an era of horse and buggy and telegraph as still somewhat common until the very Dawn of the internet. That's a hell of a lot of changes
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Yep, my Dad’s mom was born in 1904 and would tell us about the horses and buggies that would be going around town. She would tell us what groceries cost, things like that. I wish my grandfather hadn’t passed away when I was two. I wanted him to tell me what living in Tennessee (his home state) was like back then.
 
My Grandmother was a telephone operator. She would talk about plugging the connection lines from someones party line to the line through to say San Francisco. There were only so many lines so maybe your call to the aunt in San Fran would go through maybe you'd have to wait until it was free. And then theres the whole party line. It does remind me that the more things change the more they stay the same. We like to think our conversations via email etc are private but really we're one hack away from it being everyones business.
 
Personally I think that Gen Y and Millennials are two separate cohorts, and I tend to identify with the former.
 
My favorite story my great grandma used to tell is where she sent my grandma into town for the classic 'loaf of bread, container of milk and a stick of butter' routine and in order to pay for it, she gave my grandmother a dime. Grandmother (who is probably early 2 digits in age back then) crosses a bridge over a river and drops her dime between the slats on accident. She sits on the bridge crying because she lost the dime and knows she's going to get in trouble. Man comes by and asks her why she's crying so she tells him. Grandma doesnt make it back to the house until sunset. No milk, no butter, but a shoe full of dimes. Grandma was a hustler.
 
I was a stereotypical Gen X slacker. I spent the entire first half of the '90s as a drop-out doing the absolute least amount of work to maintain my college-town, bohemian lifestyle. I buckled down and began to take more responsibility in the second half of the '90s, but I did that by running a FLGS, which hardly counts by the standards of most adults.

I remember catching the movie Slacker in a theater back in '91. I'd randomly stumbled on some friends walking to see it, and they invited me along, so I knew absolutely nothing about it when I sat down in the theater. It was genuinely startling to see the world I live in on a movie screen.

To be honest, I am still a slacker. I have just that I have found increasingly lucrative odd jobs as I age.
 
71 here. Dropped out of college after a few years. Worked shit jobs, realized I didn’t want to have shit jobs, went back and got a degree in CS in the late 90s. Been doing that ever since. A lot of slacking but also a lot of hard work. A lot of I’ll do it on my own fuck off, a lot of issues with the group thing. Just like a lot of genx.
 
I like the slacker part of us Gen Xers. :smile: Of course, it was mostly our Baby Boomer parents calling us slackers. We don't mind working hard, but we also really value our free time, hobbies, and personal relationships, and are willing to sacrifice a bit of work and money for them.
 
TheophilusCarter said:
I like the slacker part of us Gen Xers. :smile: Of course, it was mostly our Baby Boomer parents calling us slackers. We don't mind working hard, but we also really value our free time, hobbies, and personal relationships, and are willing to sacrifice a bit of work and money for them.
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I'd agree with all of that. I actually like working, but I'm not so ambitious that I feel the need to burn myself out doing. I actually average about 8-10 hours of volunteer work during a typical week on top of what I do to make money, so I don't actually think of myself as lazy.
 
Baulderstone said:
I'd agree with all of that. I actually like working, but I'm not so ambitious that I feel the need to burn myself out doing. I actually average about 8-10 hours of volunteer work during a typical week on top of what I do to make money, so I don't actually think of myself as lazy.
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That's really admirable, good for you. The missuz and I do a weekly shift at a local animal shelter, but it's not much more than an hour or two each week. I'm VERY selfish with my free time, mostly to devote to music; e.g., I put in 10-12 hours a week practicing piano, with the intention of not sucking quite so much someday ... I do try to throw some extra money to charities as we can afford it, though.
 
Is Gen-X basically the teens in most movies from the mid 80s to 90s like "The Breakfast Club"? And Baby Boomers are their parents?

Are the kids in Stranger Things Gen-X?

(Edit: Wikipedia seems to say so, but better to hear what people actually think)
 
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I have seen it presented like this (not sure if its been superceded or not):

Pre-1900: Victorian, Late Colonial, Pioneer etc - depends on location

Born 1900 to 1930s: Edwardian or Builders (as in Nation Builders) - depends on location. Sometimes also called the War Generation or the Lost Generation, due to the World Wars that dominated their lives. W Also those born specifically in the 1930s were sometimes called Depression Era Babies, due to the socieoeconomic situation. Sometimes the reference Jazz Age was also used for a more optimistic spin, given that it was the dominant popular music of the time.

Born in the 1940s & 1950s: Baby Boomers ( born in the post-WW boom years). Lots of social change occurred as this generation came of adult age. Sometimes also called the Rock n Roll Generation, the Protest Generation, etc depending on how the media wants to portray them.

Born in the 1960s & 1970s: Initially the term Lost Generation was bandied around again, as the media didn't know what to call the kids of the prolific Baby Boomers, but as things became more defined the term Generation X was popularised.

Born in the 1980s & 1990s: Generation Y (initially)

Born in the 2000s & 2010s: Millienials (initially)

Then apparently enough Gen Y came of age and didn't like the Gen Y tag as it felt a hasty add-on.

Gen Y hipster journalists liked the name Millenials that was being used to describe the current younger children, and given that Gen Y came of adult age during the Millienium then they pretty much claim-jumped that moniker.

So now Gen Y is an obsolete term for the Millenials. I don't blame them, as Millienials does have a cool flavour to it.

Considering that the Millennial term was taken off them, I'm not sure what the new term for those born in the 2000s & 2010s will be known as.
I wonder if the term Delta Generation is a reference to them?
 
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Mankcam said:
I have seen it presented like this (not sure if its been superceded or not):

Pre-1900: Victorian or Late Colonial

Born 1900 to 1930s: Edwardian or Builders (as in Nation Builders) - depends on location

Born in the 1940s & 1950s: Baby Boomers

Born in the 1960s & 1970s: Generation X

Born in the 1980s & 1990s: Generation Y (initially)

Born in the 2000s & 2010s: Millienials (initially)

Then apparently enough Gen Y came of age and didn't like the Gen Y tag as it felt a hasty add-on. Gen Y hipster journalists liked the tag Millenials that was being used to describe the current younger children, and given that Gen Y came of adult age during the Millienium then they pretty much claimed that tag, so now Gen Y is an obsolete term for Millenials.

Considering that the Millennial term was taken off them, I'm not sure what the new term for those born in the 2000s & 2010s will be known as. Is this the Delta Generation reference I see above?
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I haven't heard any new name yet for the current batch of kids. Most people my age and above seem to keep referring to teenagers as Millennials.

On the topic of alternate labels, back in the '80s and early '90s, Generation X was typically called the Baby Busters by the American media.
 
Baby Busters?
Never heard it down here, but I am not surprised.

Yeah initially we were in the shadow of the Baby Boomers so all kinds of terms arose early on in an attempt to tag the generation.
Which is actually why 'Generation X' ended up being a good title.
Initially it felt like a rebellious title that could not be defined, so us teens embraced it back then, once we were actually aware of it.
 
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Mankcam said:
I have seen it presented like this (not sure if its been superceded or not):

Pre-1900: Victorian, Late Colonial, Pioneer etc - depends on location

Born 1900 to 1930s: Edwardian or Builders (as in Nation Builders) - depends on location. Sometimes also called the War Generation or the Lost Generation, due to the World Wars that dominated their lives. Also those born specifically in the 1930s were sometimes called Depression Era Babies, due to the socieoeconomic situation.

Born in the 1940s & 1950s: Baby Boomers ( born in the post-WW boom years). Lost of social change occurred as this generation came of age.

Born in the 1960s & 1970s: Initially the term Lost Generation was bandied around again, as the media didn't know what to call the kids of the prolific Baby Boomers, but as things became more defined the term Generation X was popularised.

Born in the 1980s & 1990s: Generation Y (initially)

Born in the 2000s & 2010s: Millienials (initially)

Then apparently enough Gen Y came of age and didn't like the Gen Y tag as it felt a hasty add-on.

Gen Y hipster journalists liked the name Millenials that was being used to describe the current younger children, and given that Gen Y came of adult age during the Millienium then they pretty much claim-jumped that moniker.

So now Gen Y is an obsolete term for the Millenials. I don't blame them, as Millienials does have a cool flavour to it.

Considering that the Millennial term was taken off them, I'm not sure what the new term for those born in the 2000s & 2010s will be known as.
I wonder if the term Delta Generation is a reference to them?
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Essentially, before the baby boomers, it was regional. Up here in the us where the X in Gen X isn’t upside down like down there, we call the early 1900s the greatest generation and the interwar gap as the silent generation.

The delta generation is the post-millennials. Many of our kids are here.
 
Baulderstone said:
I haven't heard any new name yet for the current batch of kids. Most people my age and above seem to keep referring to teenagers as Millennials.

On the topic of alternate labels, back in the '80s and early '90s, Generation X was typically called the Baby Busters by the American media.
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Yes, in the US (and I think everywhere else) Gen X is small. Birth control legalization, smaller families, divorce, urbanization, etc.
 
This is the first time I have seen the term Delta Generation, but I expect that it will spread. My kids will eventually want some name for their era.
 
Mankcam said:
This is the first time I have seen the term Delta Generation, but I expect that it will spread. My kids will eventually want some name for their era.
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I would have gone. With the YouTube generation myself. That’s largely replaced television for them.
 
Raleel said:
Essentially, before the baby boomers, it was regional. Up here in the us where the X in Gen X isn’t upside down like down there, we call the early 1900s the greatest generation and the interwar gap as the silent generation.
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As a non-American who has spent time in a lot of different countries, you definitely want to be careful using some of these labels internationally. I've lived in Japan, and I am pretty sure referring to the '20s-'30s generation as the Greatest Generation would carry a highly dubious ideological subtext over there.

Mankcam said:
This is the first time I have seen the term Delta Generation, but I expect that it will spread. My kids will eventually want some name for their era.
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Maybe. I remember largely being annoyed at any article that was trying to define my generation when I was young, and I was someone that actually fit the stereotype. For everyone that was a cliche slacker like myself, there were more of my peers who just went straight through college, got married, got a mortgage and had kids.

And how many Baby Boomers were actually hippies back in the day? Any generational stereotype is doomed to have more people that don't fit the label than are described by it.

To bring RPGs into it, it's like when people describe the history of RPGs and break it down into eras. "During these years, people played games of this type!" It's always a serious oversimplification.

Whatever label kids today get stuck with, most of them are probably going to dislike it.
 
Yeah the reason we liked Gen X was it was a reference to a population that the Media was initially having problems defining.

So it was one of many references, but the one that eventually stuck. Musicians liked the rebellious tone of it, so I think that was when it gained momentum.

Gen Y was a contrived title, hence why that was discarded by that crowd during this decade, I can see why the prefer using the Millienial monkier

Whatever the media uses will probably eventually be redefined by the generation itself as it finds something broadly comfortable
 
Mankcam said:
Yeah the reason we liked Gen X was it was a reference to a population that the Media was initially having problems defining.

So it was one of many references, but the one that eventually stuck.

Gen Y was a contrived title, hence why that was discarded by that crowd during this decade, I can see why the prefer using the Millienial monkier
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Yes. Just like Gen X didn't want to be the Baby Busters, which was also building from the name of the previous generation.

I think it was especially the case with Gen X though. As the Baby Boomers were a huge demographic bubble, the media and entertainment industry stayed centered on them for so long that it felt stifling. Kids of Gen Xers don't seem as resistant to the media of their parents as Gen Xers were, probably because Gen X has a smaller cultural footprint.
 
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