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BS: Generation W members, Unite!
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Matt_R Date: 09 May 01 - 08:38 AM Not really sure about the Kurt Cobain thing...I was only 15 when he comitted suicide, and I really knew nothing about him, except he was in a bang called Nirvana. Remember, I was listening to nothing but couuntry back then. So I really had no opinion on it, except "What a stupid thing to do." It really didn't define anything for me. I remember being more shaken up when Jimmy Valvano & Davey Allison died. And hating to bring it up, but I think that the defining "death" for this generation was Princess Diana. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Boab Date: 09 May 01 - 04:32 AM Hi, Kids! [generation W members and all---] I was born before "Walkin' my Baby Back Home" became a hit for the FIRST time------- Boab |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Peg Date: 09 May 01 - 12:56 AM Some have said, for our generation, the murder of John Lennon was the equivalent of the Boomers' memory of JFK's assassination; in that you remembered exactly where you were when it happened... I was a month old when JFK got shot in 1963. I walked into early-morning choir practice that December day in 1980 to see my friends sitting there looking depressed and when they told me what had happened I honestly thought they were joking... I think for the Gen-Xers it was the death of Kurt Cobain... I remember nightmares about nuclear war all through college (thanks to President Reagan). I remember seeing a screening of the film "Giant" at the University of Rochester in 1986 and many in the audience laughing and sniggering whenever Rock Hudson said anything that could possibly be construed as homoerotic... I remember going into a record shop that same year and seeing a Jefferson Starship album by the counter and asking the kid who worked there if they had any Airplane albums and he said "who?" and I said "Jefferson Airplane" and he said "who's that?" I remember the biggest TV events were the last episode of M*A*S*H and when the characters on "Moonlighting" finally got it on and when two men were shown in bed together on "Thirtysomething" and a bunch of advertisers pulled out (so to speak)... I remember doing Ecstasy when it came in a powder and you licked it off your hand... I remember my first rock concert: Ozzy Osbourne! I remember my first album I bought with my allowance: The Captain and Tennille! I remember having my ears pierced at home with a needle and thread and an ice cube... I remember getting red, white and blue sprinkles on my ice cream cone the summer of 1976... I remember my favorite album in high school: Songs From the Wood I remember a book that changed my life at 17: Atlas Shrugged I remember when the "worst" sexually-transmitted disease out there was herpes...cus it was incurable and never went away... I remember when people drove their cars without feeling the need to talk on the phone.
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Blackcatter Date: 08 May 01 - 09:53 PM I never really converted to cassette - oh, I used them to record stuff (like Dr. Demento) but I'm a cautious kinda guy and never trusted magnetic tape again. I went back to vinyl until CDs came out. Bought my first CD in 86 or so. (The Sting soundtrack) Remember when gaspumps changed to measuring liters for a while because they didn't have a dollar thingy to show the price. I still think they upped the price so that every gas pump could be replaced. Speaking of conspiracies - What about Swine Flu? How many got their shot? My elementary school bus had a FM radio and played Steely Dan, the Eagles and the like on the way to school (that was in Southern Calif. When I started working at Walt Disney World in 1985 - the ticket prices were $16.95. Today they are over $50. What are the general year ranges do you think? baby-boomer - 1945 to 1958? Gen. W - 1958 to 1970? Gen. X - 1970 to 1982? Gen. Y - 1982-1994? It doesn't really work - it mostly dependes on your schooling and how early you got interested in the world. My girlfriend was born in 1978, but doesn't really remember the Reagan Years, yet I was born in 1966 and remember Vietnam and Nixon. pax yall |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 08 May 01 - 08:47 PM I said the less important things, not that they weren't important, in their place.
For example historic upheavals like the Miners Strike in Britain, or in America, the Vietnam Resistance, or the Civil Rights movement divided generations, and united people across generations. The same kind of thing applies in a different way when it comes to a lot of things to do with folk music, and classical music as well, where 18 year olds can be looking up to people in their 80s in a way that is regarded as weird by their contemporaries (and it works the other way as well).
Which isn't to deny that the other side emphasised by mousethief doesn't matter as well. Obviously growing up under Thatcher (for example) was different from suddenly having Thatcherism descend on you when you'd known something different, but that's probably not as crucial in uniting or dividing people as whether you loved it or loathed it. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Matt_R Date: 08 May 01 - 06:02 PM My girlfriend is 7 years older...she fits in this catergory! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: mousethief Date: 08 May 01 - 05:55 PM Kim, go back and read what I said again. Alex |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Kim C Date: 08 May 01 - 05:51 PM Calendar, shmalendar. Age divides us but so what. Most of my friends are older than me, and several of them are Old Enough to Be My Parents. I cherish them and learn from them. Mister's 12 years older than me. Never been a problem - except I am a little resentful about the Ed Sullivan Show and all the Westerns.............
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: GUEST,Karen Date: 08 May 01 - 05:44 PM All I know is when my age disappeared off the roulette table, I was very depressed.... Thank God Keno goes up to the number 80!!!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: mousethief Date: 08 May 01 - 05:26 PM Calendar age, however, has a great deal to do with what experiences we have, which do have a great deal of influence on how we view the world. For example, nobody who hasn't lived through the Great Depression is likely to have quite the same attitude about "waste" and frugality than someone who has. We can pretend these differences don't exist, or we can talk about them so that people can learn where each other are coming from. The latter seems to me the far better option. Saying calendar age isn't important, or shouldn't be allowed to divide us, is self-deception, IMHO. It DOES divide us. But by talking about it we can overcome some of the differences and learn --inasmuch as it's possible-- to see the world through another's eyes. Alex |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 08 May 01 - 05:16 PM Michel Collins once said that he "felt much more at ease in the company of old people in the dark than I am with young people in the light"
Which I take it refers to the basic truth that calendar age and dates are among the less important things that divide us or unite us.
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Matt_R Date: 08 May 01 - 04:07 PM That's funny gnu...I though all the girls just peed in their pants when they came on... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: gnu Date: 08 May 01 - 04:05 PM Kim C... the Beatles on Ed Sullivan ! I forgot that many a town's water supply system had serious problems due to all the toilets flushing just after the Beatles finished their number on that show.... hey, what did you expect from a Cilly Engineer ? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Homeless Date: 08 May 01 - 03:50 PM Damn Clinton, you're only 31? How does someone get as surly as you in that short a time?
My rememberies- |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: IceWolf Date: 08 May 01 - 12:48 PM I was born in 1962, and have had my birthday this year, so I'm 39. I remember pieces of some of the events that have already been mentioned - Armstrong walking on the moon sticks out only because my sister's birthday was the same day. I remember the night Nixon resigned because my parents came down to the baseball field where I was playing and pulled me out of the game to "witness history". I vaguely remember the gas shortage, since I wasn't driving at the time. I remember Challenger blowing up. I was in Basic Training at Fort Dix, NJ at the time. My first stereo system had an 8-track player, and I remember the pain (as Alex mentioned) of finally converting to cassette. Much of my music is still on vinyl because I have been unable to find it on CD, though I pulled a lot off of Napster before they were shut down. The first calculator I ever bought (1977 I think) could only do the basic four arithmetic operations. It cost almost $40.00. Last year, I made a reference to a "slipstick", and got asked what on earth I was talking about. My first computer was a Tandy TX-1000 bought in 1988 while I was in the Army. It was one of the first with a 3.5" floppy drive. It ran MS-DOS 3.2. No Windows. I added a hard-disk to it later that year, paying $600.00 for a 60-Meg HD. IceWolf |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Kim C Date: 08 May 01 - 12:41 PM I was born in September 1967. What does that make me? I remember John Lennon getting shot, Ronald Reagan getting shot, didn't somebody try to shoot the pope?, when MTV was new and CD players cost a small fortune. We all wanted to see Tom Cruise in Risky Business but weren't old enough to get in. Us girls wore fingerless gloves like Madonna and lots of black eyeliner. And I learned the preamble to the Constitution from Schoolhouse Rock and to this day can sing the whole damn song. Where's the beef?!!? I also remember the Not Ready For Primetime Players, and how scandalous it was to hear "Jane, you ignorant slut!" on television. My brother, who is 46 (does that make him a boomer?) said he was shocked, just shocked I tell you, to be flipping the channels on cable and seeing some of what was on. Now, he is hardly a goody 2 shoes, but he said, man, I can't believe some of the stuff they show on TV now. When I was a kid, Lucy and Ricky had separate beds and they were married! Mister is 45 (yeah, yeah, he's a little older than me) and got to watch all the good Westerns on TV. And see the BEatles on the Ed Sullivan show. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: GUEST,Karen Date: 08 May 01 - 12:30 PM I had my brother install an 8-track player in my VW bug. It was bulky and I could only keep a few 8-tracks in my glove compartment. I suffered no angst in switching to a cassette player! Don't forget the big dilemma over which video tape to purchase...Beta or VHS. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: mousethief Date: 08 May 01 - 12:10 PM I used to have an 8-track of Hotel California! Did you carve yourself a wooden wedge to hold up the bottom of the tape so it would work better? Here's something that no Gen-X'er will have experienced: the pain of finally deciding to switch over from 8-track to cassette. Alex |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Blackcatter Date: 08 May 01 - 11:48 AM Amen Alex - I saw Star Wars in 1977 at the drive-in in Delta, Colorado - that and reading "The Lord of the Rings" were likely to be the two most memorable expereinces I had in the 70s. I also was the first kid on my block to have a stereo with a 8-track player/recorder. The first 8-track I bought? Hotel California. pax yall |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: mousethief Date: 08 May 01 - 11:16 AM Blackcatter, right on with the Star Wars. That movie -- seeing it in a theatre mind you, not on video -- really was a turning point. Alex |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: GUEST,Karen Date: 08 May 01 - 10:43 AM Good thoughts, DB. Thanks for that!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Dharmabum Date: 08 May 01 - 10:02 AM Well guys, Being born in 53, I guess that pretty much pigeon holes me into the Boomer catagory. I grew up watching Wally & The Beave,the Kenedy assasination,The Beatles,and the ensueing British invasion. I watched the nightly news as Walter Cronkite read the daily casulty reports of the Viet Nam war. I saw the Kent State tragedy & I took part in protesting the war.I can still remember looking at the TV screen,looking for my number in the draft lottery,(I was number 265). To this day,I cannot honestly say I would or would not have gone, had I been drafted. Luckily,by the time I turned 18,we were pulling our troops out of Nam & I was never called. I lost a good friend to that war. I saw the the civil rights protests in the south.The Martin Luther King assasination. I watched Neil Armstrong walk on the moon, & Richard Nixon's fall from grace.
I was lucky enough to see Jim Morrison & Jimi Hendrix in concert,(though not together) I got to see bands like The Who,Led Zeppelin,Jethro Tull,Steppenwolf,The Band,The Dead(about a half dozen times),The Allman Brothers Band with Duane. There were many others but I can't recall them all.
Some of these events were highlights in my life. Some I wish I could forget. ( I wish I could recall some of the events of the 70's a little clearer**BG**)
But I don't think we can define a whole generation by the events that take place during their lives. Rather ,let's define ourselves by the changes we've made in our society.
So ,be you a boomer,a w, x, y or z'er,I think the labels are much less important, compared to what we do with our lives,& the changes we can still make. DB. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: KingBrilliant Date: 08 May 01 - 09:26 AM Hey I feel all defined now. I'm a W-er. UK brand. Remembers...(in no particular order) Having no TV without being odd Videos did not exist Music was on vinyl Decimalisation (just about) Flares being really, really, really uncool Punk & the hot summer of 76 Radio Caroline & Radio Luxembourg Stylophones OOoohhh just remembered those horrible 'flicks' hairstyles where girls folded back their overgrown fringes & glued them into flat boards using 'hair laquer' Pale blue eyeshadow with flicks (see above) Big pointy collars on men's patterned nylon shirts Y-fronts!!!!!!!!! hehehehehe Hotpants & tank tops The Navy Lark on the radio Do-Do-Pad diaries (of which I didn't get mum to buy me one til the fad was over.... ain't that always the way) Belt & Loop ladies' 'things' Dad contemplating the building of a nuclear shelter Mum wearing 'coat-dresses'. Men with perms. 'The Family' fly on the wall documentary. ..... Sigh.... Kris |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Dave the Gnome Date: 08 May 01 - 08:25 AM An' I thought Generation-X was a spin-off X-men comic! The Gnomes DOB? 1953. Not sure what generation that makes me but I think we count differently here in the UK anyway. And 48 is just a kid if yer a Gnome;-) Cheers Dave the Gnome |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: catspaw49 Date: 08 May 01 - 02:58 AM Blackcatter........I don't have many people I am in awe of, but on the short list is Richard Feynman.......So us boomers and you W folks now have some common ground. I have never been able to express in words the things I believe made Feynman so great, but he had both an uncommon wisdom combined with an uncommon intelligence. He alwyas said he had no social knowledge or skills, but that is the one thing he was definitely wrong about......His humanity had great depth. Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Blackcatter Date: 08 May 01 - 02:09 AM Good list Alex - you're a bit more advanced than me (I'm 35) but most of it rings true. I used my mom's office word processor in high school and had to trim the right sides of the pages to satisfy a teacher who disliked "perfs" - that was not only before modern printers but even before "micro-perfed" paper. I loved Pong - kinda wished I still had my set. I remember when the local pizza joint got a "color" version of Space Invaders - they had put transparent colored strips of plasic on the screen so that when the aliens descended they would change colors. I had a scooby-doo lunchbox and then an Adam-12 one when a bully threw Scooby into traffic. I miss the microwaves with the twist knob - it was easier. We were excited by the animated movie "The Hobbit" in 1977 I had the "joy" of voting for Dukakas(sp?) for the first time. The first gas I ever bought was over $1 because of the second gas crisis (1982). We played D&D while listening to the final albums of the Eagles and Led Zeppelin. Our regular radio station was a "MOR" (middle of the road) that played Queen, Styx, Billy Joel, Jimmy Buffett, the Beatles, the Who, Kenny Rodgers, and Barry Manilow. I'd have to switch back and forth between 5 stations to get that mix anymore (not that I want to listen to Manilow). 2 days after the Challenger Accident I was only of the organizers of a SF Con - that was a strange weekend (comparatively so). It also introduced to me to Richard Feynman who would soon become one of my mentors. The biggest thing though? - two words: STAR WARS pax yall |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: mousethief Date: 08 May 01 - 12:17 AM Really Gen-W is defined more by what it isn't than what it is. BEFORE us (I mean before we were in high school) came the era of free love, of drugs are fun, of the Vietnam War and Watergate and Kent State and all that. After us came Sesame Street and Mentos and David Letterman and Jay Leno and the AIDS crisis. By the time "Schoolhouse Rock" came along, we were supposed to be too old for Saturday morning cartoons. Although you could tell who still watched them, by who was able to recite the preamble to the Constitution as soon as memorizing it was assigned. While we were in high school, give or take 5 years, we saw the election of Reagan (the first election I was eligible to vote in (and I did)), the Iran hostage crisis, the boycott of the Moscow Olympics, the first space shuttle being launched, the beginnings of MTV. Unless you had an older sibling or very young parents, you learned about the Beatles from the "Sergeant Pepper's" movie with Peter Frampton and the BeeGees. You argued with your classmates about which was better, rock or disco. The geeks played Dungeons and Dragons. The stoners played hookey. The band played the theme from "Hogan's Heroes." I actually took my lunch to school in those bags with the yellow smiley face and the "Have a Nice Day" slogan that we got free with fill-ups at Chevron. We remember full-service gas; presumably most of the Gen-X'ers do not. The gas crisis was the thing while I was in HS; I remember driving ten miles to find a gas station with a line short enough to get in. There was a brief period between the time we became sexually aware and the AIDS crisis. "Safe" sex meant nobody got pregnant (or caught). Paperback books still cost around $3. There were no computer games because there were no computers. Well, huge banks had them. When we got to college, we played "Quest" on the mainframe when we were supposed to be doing our FORTRAN homework. We took "typing" and not "keyboarding" in high school -- not elementary school! Typewriters with built-in erase tape were still a pretty cool thing. All our papers in college were typed on typewriters. Video games were things you plugged into your tv. You could play "Pong" and such. Some of the arcades had very primitive computer games. By the time I got to college they had things like Q-bert and Frogger and Pac-Man. Digital watches were all the rage when I was in high school. "Calculators" for the most part added, subtracted, multiplied, and divided, until I was a senior. Guns and Roses were things you shot with your dad, and gave to your mom, respectively. People still smoked on airplanes, and in offices, and everywhere else. Aspartame (Nutrasweet) came out when I was in college. Before that sugarless things were sweetened with cyclamates (in Canada) and sodium saccharine (in the US). Saccharine tasted awful. Diet Coke and New Coke had never been heard of. Classic Coke was just Coke. You didn't have 50,000 types of iced tea and other beverages at the 7-11. The only "sports drink" was Gatorade. Microwave ovens were something of a novelty; only the really rich people had them until late in our youth. They had knobs you turned, except the real Amana Radarranges, which cost five times as much, and opened like an oven rather than like a refrigerator. Most of us remember our first color TV but not our first TV. Cable came when we were still young, but not everybody got it. You could get maybe 21 channels. There were only 3 nationwide networks. These are a few things. Alex |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: GUEST,Karen Date: 07 May 01 - 11:58 PM I remember vividly the day we learned the Vietnam War was over. I was at school and my teacher's husband was in Vietnam. She was in the middle of a lesson when another teacher burst into the room and threw her arms around my teacher and told her the war was over. Being a parochial school all sixteen classrooms marched over to the adjoining church for prayers of thanksgiving. My teacher spent the rest of the day crying tears of joy. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Blackcatter Date: 07 May 01 - 09:35 PM Thanks for that Karen - I love unknowingly setting up someone for a really funny line. So what does define a "W" culturally, let's see. The Challenger Explosion? 8 years of Reagan? Iran Hostage situation? The beginning of both the computer revolution and the cable TV explosion? (I remember I was 15 or so when MTV began - and my first computer was a Commodore Vic 20, though I had a friend who had an early Apple) Some people say live aid, but I worked through most of it and after a couple days no one was talking about it. From another thread - Dungeons and Dragons and other role playing games. - I stil have the first editions of the DM's Guide, Payer's Handbook and Monster Manual. The end of casual sex and "safe drugs" (you probably know what I mean). anything else? More good stuff? pax yall |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: catspaw49 Date: 07 May 01 - 09:31 PM Karen is nine years younger than I am and I'm classic "boomer" being born in '49. We were talking just the other day about the similarities and differences and what constitutes the "generations." The one that struck us as funny at the time was that she remembers when McDonald's had either no or limited seating whereas I remember when there weren't any McDonalds! I know what Alex means though as Karen feels about the same.......too late or too early, your legacy is Disco. Seriously, as we age the years between have less meaning and our shared experiences take over and yet it is still strange to contemplate that when I was trying to get past "First Base" with various girlfriends, she was entering "First Grade!" Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Burke Date: 07 May 01 - 09:22 PM I have a friend @60 who defines his cohort according to who watched/listened to the McCarthy hearings after school. Another tweener generation, they knew nothing of the depression, little or nothing of the Great War, too old to be Boomers. The so called defining moments of the Boomers are well known & too numerous to mention, Kennedy assassinations, Moon walk, Beatles, VietNam, Kent State. What are the defining events historical, cultural, or whatever by which you'd identify a W? What common experience is it that unites you? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: gnu Date: 07 May 01 - 08:28 PM I'd say "The Spaw Has Landed" as far as I'm concerned. Although I am only four years older that MT, I have found that I more easily relate to people much older. No offense, Spaw, if that offends you. Perhaps it's because my career led me into situations where I constantly dealt with people older, and, many times, wiser, than myself. Odd thing, sometimes. Although you can learn a great deal from your juniors, most often, your seniors are the voice of wisdom. I just got an email from my ex concerning the death of a revered collegue over the weekend. While it saddened me greatly, I recalled that the crusty old bastard went out of his way to grind my ass every time he got a chance and I was better for it. It was his way of liking me ! Alex said... "Nobody cares what we think about, or like, or don't like, because there are too few of us... In this way we will take over the world." Wrong, buddy. We all care. Young and old(er). Like Red Green says, "We're all in this together." And I can speak for Red on your last comment.... you ain't gettin the keys until you learn to drive.
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: GUEST,Karen Date: 07 May 01 - 07:59 PM Thanks, Don! I love knowing I'm not the oldest one around. I was too young to be a hippie and too smart to be a preppie. ;-) Actually I WAS showing my age a couple of weeks back at work. I was talking to a co-worker (who happens to be 29 years old) and I used the phrase "The Eagle has landed." He looked at me in stupefied amazement and asked, "Do you even know where that phrase came from?" I came REALLY close to snapping, "Not only do I KNOW, sonny, I watched the event on T.V." I didn't though...I just smiled and said, "Yes, yes I do." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Don Firth Date: 07 May 01 - 07:28 PM Sheesh! Kids! I was too young to be a beatnik and too old to be a hippie. Don Firth |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: GUEST,Karen Date: 07 May 01 - 06:46 PM Don't worry about sterilizing them, Blackcatter. Rumor has it that eating Mentos causes a drop in sperm count. ;-) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Blackcatter Date: 07 May 01 - 06:34 PM I have been using the title Gen-W for myself until "W" became a cuss word with my friends. I remeber when I was a teen and got into the Beatles (10 years after they had broken up) and my mom started to listen to them as well - she never did before because it was the music her little sister listened too - I then told her that the beatles were actually all about the same age as her (she'll be 61 this year). She then thought it was ok for here to like them. We do appear to be the invisible generation - the Baby-boomers got a lot of press for being more affluent and better educated than their parents and the Gen-X crowd was discovered to be mostly mindless drones that advertising companies can talk into anything (i.e. Mentos) Sometimes I wish we could sterilize the great majority of Ge-Xers - mostly because I cannot figure how to make them way up as smell the dioxin. pax yall |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Ebbie Date: 07 May 01 - 05:49 PM Mousethief, does that mean we get to call you 'Dubya'? Ebbie |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: catspaw49 Date: 07 May 01 - 05:18 PM BOOM!!!!!........splurt....fizzle...................... spoit.......................pt........ ........*sigh*..................... Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: mousethief Date: 07 May 01 - 05:09 PM If you still have some left over from your party, why not? Otherwise don't feel you need to rush out and buy some. Alex |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: GUEST,Karen Date: 07 May 01 - 05:01 PM Well, since I'm a year older than you that means you're going to be having a "very special birthday" this year, right? Should I keep the black crepe paper handy? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: mousethief Date: 07 May 01 - 04:59 PM Karen, you are welcome to share the title with me! Fact is, you COULD have had a mother younger than Ringo, and that's good enough for me. Alex |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: GUEST,Karen Date: 07 May 01 - 04:57 PM Well, I want to be a GenW-er, too! I graduated the year ahead of you, Alex, although being the "baby of the family" have a mother who IS older than Ringo. P.S. I never COULD be a preppie because I look horrid in plaid! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: mousethief Date: 07 May 01 - 04:52 PM Burke, your fastidiousness would freeze beer. The "boomers" are always talked about in terms that vary little. One thing that you will find in any sociological description of the "boomers" is reference to the Vietnam War, which to us Gen-W'ers is completely moot. That war was over before most of us W'ers were old enough to understand what it was even about. "Preppies" is a sociodemographic description as well as an age-group description. If you didn't wear Izod sweaters and wear loafers, you weren't a preppy. It primarily refers to attendees of expensive, east-coast preparatory schools (hence the name), or those who tried hard to look-and-feel like them. So we're still left without a real "generation." Alex |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Burke Date: 07 May 01 - 04:48 PM The 'Baby Boom' was a demographic event defined by birth rates. From that definition it ran about 1944-1964. 20 years is too long a time period so late 'Boomers' like Alex don't have the experiences to really fit all the things that get attributed to them. IMHO the quientessial 'Boomer' experience was had by the earliest of the cohort. That late 60's early 70's unrest was more observed by the mid-late 50's kids than it was experienced directly. The boom being followed by the bust, puts the 60's babies experiences with a much smaller group so not one catered to you. I thought you were the 'preppies' |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Clinton Hammond Date: 07 May 01 - 04:47 PM I donno... I was born in 1970... what the hell does that make me, besides 31?? LOL!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: mousethief Date: 07 May 01 - 04:46 PM Older than my mother! Alex |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: CarolC Date: 07 May 01 - 04:35 PM Wow, Alex, your mother is younger than Ringo? How old is Ringo, anyway? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: hesperis Date: 07 May 01 - 04:35 PM Matt - they do? I though we were at the tail end of genX? Sheesh, no wonder I had such an identity crisis in high school... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: MMario Date: 07 May 01 - 04:27 PM yup - Alex, you're a "tweener" - as are my two youngest siblings. Really a whole different generation from both those a few years older and those a few years younger. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Generation W members, Unite! From: Matt_R Date: 07 May 01 - 04:25 PM Good God Alex, you graduated 7 months after I was born!! I know how you feel, I fall through the cracks of Gen X. They call us the Millennium Generation. |
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Subject: Generation W members, Unite! From: mousethief Date: 07 May 01 - 04:23 PM I know this "generation" stuff is a bunch of nonsense, and I don't even know if you use the same designations on the other side of the pond as we do here in the US&A, but ClintonHammond and I got into it a little on the tuning-your-penny-whistle thread, and I thought it should have its own thread so as not to hijack that one completely. Here's the last thing I said; Myself, I fall into that very strange group of people who get called baby boomers, but are really too young for the title.
-The Vietnam War was over before I was of draftable age Therefore I refer to myself as a member of "Generation W" (one letter before "X"). Nobody cares what we think about, or like, or don't like, because there are too few of us. In this way we will take over the world.
Alex |