Age of P-F members?

[rob_s]

I think a lot of what gets blamed on Generations is age related.

I'm a Gen Xer . When I was 20 I was a fucking moron, just like most 20 year olds. When I got to 30 I was still a moron but less of one. Now that I am in my 40's I remain a moron, but one with the wisdom of all those mistakes. I have a bunch of twenty somethings who report to me. They're good kids, and I see them making the same mistakes I made, and giving ,me the same "yes old man" looks I gave guys my current age giving me advice when I was young. I would hazard a guess that it was the same for my parents and grandparents, and it will be the same for the kids coming up now.

I tend to agree, generally.

However, there are definitely aspects of various generations, call them "stereotypes" or "tendencies" that hold true IMO. Also, there are certain aspects that are simply agree related based on when various generations "came of age", particularly relative to tech.

The best description of the difference between Xers and Yers that I've ever heard is that "parents of Gen X asked them 'what makes you think you're special' while parents of Gen Y told their kids 'you're so special'". We can debate the relative merits of each, but so far, that's been the best explanation I've seen.

There are other aspects, such as Gen X being the first generation where divorce among their parents became normalized, meaning that some Gen X kids of divorce may have been made to feel "weird" about it as a kid while your typical Gen Yer is more likely to have been raised by divorced parents *and* have had that seen as far more normal then Gen Y.

Finally, I tend to find that who was in the White House (or the political climate in general) when someone becomes politically aware is very, very telling both in their political leanings and resultant behavior.

Gen X, in my view, created the "aspirational class". Something I'm coming to find more and more distasteful. Gen Yers took "aspirational class" and added crystal meth.

[BehindBlueI's]

I think a lot of what gets blamed on Generations is age related.

I'm a Gen Xer . When I was 20 I was a fucking moron, just like most 20 year olds. When I got to 30 I was still a moron but less of one. Now that I am in my 40's I remain a moron, but one with the wisdom of all those mistakes. I have a bunch of twenty somethings who report to me. They're good kids, and I see them making the same mistakes I made, and giving ,me the same "yes old man" looks I gave guys my current age giving me advice when I was young. I would hazard a guess that it was the same for my parents and grandparents, and it will be the same for the kids coming up now.

There is some of that, of course. Gen X was supposed to be a bunch of angry socially disconnected athiests as adults per the predictions based on us as youths. But there is some very real differences based on coming up in a different society with different technology, etc. We had to be able to tolerate boredom and amuse ourselves in ways today's youths never experience because little screens are omnipresent. We could escape our social groups and be isolated, today both your friends and your bullies are just a keystroke or tap away, etc. That changes how people interact, how they mature, what they decide is important, etc.

[blues]

There is some of that, of course. Gen X was supposed to be a bunch of angry socially disconnected athiests as adults per the predictions based on us as youths. But there is some very real differences based on coming up in a different society with different technology, etc. We had to be able to tolerate boredom and amuse ourselves in ways today's youths never experience because little screens are omnipresent. We could escape our social groups and be isolated, today both your friends and your bullies are just a keystroke or tap away, etc. That changes how people interact, how they mature, what they decide is important, etc.

We played "Army" using sticks as guns...or...if we were lucky, with a cap gun...but that was mostly reserved for "Cowboys and Indians" or shooting desperadoes.

We'd ride our bikes for hours with our parents having no idea where we might be until we returned home for supper.

We'd hang out with our friends, or if in a fight, off on our own taking a magnifying glass to burn etches into branches...or explore the world of nature such as was available to us in urban settings. (A lot, surprisingly.)

Screens? That was the black and white we watched after dinner and homework was done.

[Caballoflaco]

We played "Army" using sticks as guns...or...if we were lucky, with a cap gun...but that was mostly reserved for "Cowboys and Indians" or shooting desperadoes.

We'd ride our bikes for hours with our parents having no idea where we might be until we returned home for supper.

We'd hang out with our friends, or if in a fight, off on our own taking a magnifying glass to burn etches into branches...or explore the world of nature such as was available to us in urban settings. (A lot, surprisingly.)

Screens? That was the black and white we watched after dinner and homework was done.

The funny thing is that while we had a couple more channels and maybe played video games at night sometimes, this sounds like my childhood growing up in the eighties and nineties. I consider myself lucky to not have had to deal with all the social media and digital world kids do now while I was growing up.

[blues]

The funny thing is that while we had a couple more channels and maybe played video games at night sometimes, this sounds like my childhood growing up in the eighties and nineties. I consider myself lucky to not have had to deal with all the social media and digital world kids do now while I was growing up.

When one of my nephews was born in 1991, I was mortified by the "helicopter parenting", (an appropriate term I wouldn't learn until some years after), that he was subjected to.

It seemed like there wasn't a minute out of the day that wasn't structured and supervised, even the "fun" and "play" activities like karate and rock climbing walls etc.

It was so antithetical to the "go out and play" and "be home for supper" we grew up with, that I felt like my nephew was in Sing Sing. We literally roamed miles from home as kids, and it's a bit surprising that more of us hadn't "gone missing" altogether. (Though there were some I can remember like it was yesterday.)

Our structure hardly progressed beyond knowing who we planned to meet up with down the block or at the schoolyard to play stickball, softball, basketball, handball or Ringolevio. Or who was fighting who after school.

[Borderland]

Our structure hardly progressed beyond knowing who we planned to meet up with down the block or at the schoolyard to play stickball, softball, basketball, handball or Ringolevio. Or who was fighting who after school.

Lunch break was just as good in the city park a block from campus. Look outs were posted. Amazing what you could find to do for entertainment without a cell phone. We also played poker in the restroom in that park. Hardly anyone had a car. Now HS parking lots look like large shopping mall parking lots.

[Elwin]

It’s interesting looking at the generalizations from something of a “liminal space”- I kindof agree with most generalizations of X and Y because I got to experience both. I’m 27 and the oldest child, but my parents were older than normal when I came along - both are on the young side of Boomer. Up until about high school I had a Gen X style childhood. We didn’t have a computer in the home until I was in 6th grade and it didn’t have an internet connection until I was in 9th. I didn’t have a cell phone until I needed one at 15 because I was starting on driving, and I only got a smart phone after college. So I kindof got hit with the Gen Y tech influence all at once at around 15 years old after being somewhat abnormally insulated from it for my first decade and a half. I’ve always gravitated towards being friends with people older than me, and this is probably part of why.

It’s definitely informed how I plan to raise my kids. Careful exposure to tech is necessary because they’ll have to learn to navigate it someday anyway. But it should be constrained so they can have what I consider to be a heathy childhood - with lots of playing outside, reading, and having real conversations with people older than you. I’ve experienced plenty of social media, but have a personal memory of life without it because of being without it until high school, and that has me thinking it’s not a net positive. Which means it’s something I’m going to be hyper vigilant of with my own kids.

[BehindBlueI's]

The funny thing is that while we had a couple more channels and maybe played video games at night sometimes, this sounds like my childhood growing up in the eighties and nineties. I consider myself lucky to not have had to deal with all the social media and digital world kids do now while I was growing up.

Same. I bounced back and forth between my paternal and maternal grandparents growing up, largely based around the school calendar. When I lived with the "city" grandparents it was bike riding and playing with friends and building bridges across the ditch at the dead end. Except Wednesday, when my best friends had church most of the afternoon, so I played by myself. Saturday mornings were cartoons and a giant fucking bowl of sugar cereal. While with my "country" grandparents there were no other kids and it was too isolated to really go anywhere by foot or bike. I played in the woods alone quite a bit, but also a lot of farm related chores. I was hunting small game by myself when I was about 12. I killed a lot of squirrels with my granddad's Stevens 12g, which I own now. I plinked a lot with a .22 revolver and a tube fed rifle. My uncle has the revolver, I have the rifle.

Growing up like that had definite advantages, not least of which was the wide variety of experiences. I got to see middle class suburbia and I got to see rural poverty, and frankly both have their advantages. I'm glad I didn't have Facebook, meth and job loss hadn't destroyed small towns, there was no 24 hour news cycle to keep you worked up over the crisis of the day, etc. I know it wasn't all "better" then, but I'd not trade it for a childhood today.

[Totem Polar]

Growing up like that had definite advantages, not least of which was the wide variety of experiences. I got to see middle class suburbia and I got to see rural poverty, and frankly both have their advantages. I'm glad I didn't have Facebook, meth and job loss hadn't destroyed small towns, there was no 24 hour news cycle to keep you worked up over the crisis of the day, etc. I know it wasn't all "better" then, but I'd not trade it for a childhood today.

This.

I still have the flatgate single-six, Winchester ‘61, and crossman .22 pump air rifle, with actual wooden stock, from my youth. The Schwinn Stingray bike is somehow lost to the sands of time, along with my copy of the Vanessa Williams issue of “Penthouse,” but in all, I’m glad to have matured (more or less) before having to deal with the onset of modern tech life.

[RJ]

If anybody else needed a refresher on "Gen" terminology (I did), I found this article pretty helpful:

https://www.kasasa.com/articles/gene...-x-gen-y-gen-z

What separates Generation Y from X? And hey Gen Z, welcome to the party! What’s the cutoff? How old is each generation? Are they really that different?

It’s easy to see why there is so much confusion about generational cohorts.

If you’ve ever felt muddled by this "alphabet soup" of names — you’re not alone. The real frustration hits when you realize that Millennial consumers represent the highest-spending generation in 2020 — with a projected $1.4 trillion tab.