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There was a generational war that
started between the Millennials and Gen Z. It’s not the shoot ‘em up kind of
war depicted in our history books, but apparently some type of culture war being
waged on social media platforms. I say “apparently” because, as a member of Gen
X, I am oblivious to this sort of petty infighting. Or maybe it’s that I am
aware, I just don’t give a crap. (Yeah, probably that second one.)
The irony is that there always
seems to be some sort of generational unrest. Every generation thinks that the
“new kids” are completely different than their own clearly superior group. It probably started
when the people born between 1901 and 1924 called themselves “The Greatest
Generation”. That pretty much screwed all future generations and set them up
for failure, right? I mean, if you’re already the greatest, you can only go
downhill from there.
And it does seem to be true since
those that followed (1928-1945) were called “The Silent Generation”. Then
again, I’d be silent too having to live in the shadow of such greatness. Or
maybe they were quiet because life had beaten them down so much they just
didn’t see the point of raising their voice. Think about it, the average life
expectancy back then was like 60. Not to mention that WWII came along and
killed over 400,000 Americans.
After that came the Baby Boomers.
(1946-1964) I’m guessing this generation celebrated the war a little too much,
if you know what I mean. The name is pretty self-explanatory…yeah, all that
post war celebrating (bow chicka wow wow) lead to a crazy amount of
babies being born. Marvin Gaye didn’t have to tell this generation to get it
on, they did it all by themselves.
And those babies produced during
that boom? Generation X. This generation spanned through all the peace, free
love and hippies (1964-1979). It’s quite possibly the best generation out
there, and not just because it’s the one that I belong to. X’ers were raised on
the cusp of the days of old and the technology of new, with one foot planted
firmly in each world. We can remember 8 tracks and the AOL dial up sign on. We
had the benefit of crazy, supervision free childhoods and new technology with
fun names like Alexa and Siri.
Then the X’ers moved out and the
Millennials moved in. (1980-1994) Legend has it that Millennials are the most
suppressed, repressed, regressed, and depressed group that has ever lived.
Well, at least in the last “millennium” that is. They will tell you tales of
living through 911 and explain how the generations that lived before them have
ruined the world. How they can’t afford houses and they live for work-life
balance unlike their work horse predecessors.
Then came Gen Z. (I don’t know who
was in charge of this, since they skipped the letter Y, but I can tell you that
it definitely wasn’t someone with
OCD.) Gen Z is “woke”. Apparently the rest of us sleepy generations don’t have
a clue living in our classless, gender labeled, politically incorrect worlds.
They were born with a smart phone in their hands and have never had the joy of
using encyclopedias for information gathering. In fact, if you asked them what
an encyclopedia was, they’d have to google it.
Ask any generation what is wrong
with the next generation and they’ll have a dozen reasons to give. They’re
lazy, stupid, have no values, lacked discipline, no rules or boundaries…the
list goes on and on. One thing that they won’t do, however, is accept the blame
in any of it. Yep, that’s right, I said it. Every generation screws their kids
up somehow. Either we over correct or under correct, but damnit, we do something that causes them to cry foul.
And seek copious amounts of therapy. I’m pretty sure it’s in the “Generational
Living for Dummies Handbook”. Page 37.
So back to this culture war. I’m not sure who started it. I’m not even sure why. Or what the point is. All that I know is that it wasn’t enough for Millennials and Gen Z to do battle, no….they had to drag the X’ers in too. Here we are, minding our own business just like we were trained from infancy to do, and then BAM! Suddenly two generations noticed us sitting in the corner, out of the limelight. What they failed to recognize in their zealous attempt to yank us into their twisted game of monkey in the middle, was that we really don’t give a shit about your stupid little war. We have things to do and being forced to defend ourselves is not only unfathomable to us, it would never cross our minds that we would need to. Gen X was, and is, the feral generation that fended for ourselves so long and so early on in our lives, that it’s foreign to try and accept help from anyone for anything. Yeah, we’d probably give ourselves a hernia before asking someone to help us move this couch….but believe me when I say that couch would be moved regardless.
I guess the the moral of this story is this: Yeah, you're probably screwing your kids up. (Although, to be fair, I think we can give some of the blame to whomever named them "Generation Alpha".) Just think of it this way though, you're giving them a reason to feel superior to the next generation. And that ain't nothing.
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