I love generational discussions!!
First, Gen-X rocks!
I love the memes that have Gen X just sitting back w/ a drink in hand watching the Boomers & the Millennials duking it out.
(And, as an anecdotal note, I usually find myself equally irritated by both Boomers & Millennials when out & about, but for completely different reasons.)
Both my husband & I were born in 1973 - right in the middle of Gen X - and we fit most of the stereotypes… See my “anecdotal note“ above... as the original ”latchkey” generation, since we were ignored our whole lives & basically raised ourselves, we learned survival skills & how to be pretty independent, &, now, we just want to be left alone w/ sarcasm & “reality bites” as our SOP.
When all the other generations are done & gone, Gen X will still be standing. We’re the survivors. We’re the Red Dawn generation.
Because of how we were raised, we’re very adaptable. Besides the memes above I mentioned where Gen-X is just sitting back watching the world burn, I also enjoyed the various memes & reading articles on how & why Gen-X handled the pandemic lockdowns better than the other generations.
When it comes to our parents’ generations, my husband’s parents were on the tail end of the Silent Generation (1939 & 1944) while my parents were early Boomers (born in 1947), & I can see slight differences in them - and there were slight differences in how my husband & I were raised - which begs the questIon - are we more the products of how we were raised or more the products of how society was during our formative years?
And, when it comes to personal generational observations, the BIGGEST differences I‘ve seen are between the early Boomers, like my parents born in 1947, & the late Boomers like my brother-in-law born in 1964. My brother-in-law, born in ‘64, is right on the cusp between the Baby Boomers & Generation X - and he’s more Boomer than Gen X, but, still, he’s like a completely different generation than my parents born in 1947.
And, while Boomers hate on Millennials, I see a lot of similarities in the Boomers & Millennials & a lot of similarities in Gen-X-ers & Gen-Z-ers - w/ society playing a part in how each developed.
An interesting note - Early Boomers raised most of the Gen-X-ers while Late Boomers raised most of the Millennials.
My husband & I are Gen-X & have 3 Gen-Z-er kids.
I dislike being identified as a full-on Millennial and prefer to be called a "Xennial" (a real thing, look it up) because NO WAY did someone born in the early 80s have the same growing up experience as someone who wasn't born until 1995. SO much changed in such a short period of time as computer (mostly internet) technology started advancing like rapid-fire. The internet didn't even really become a thing that people were actually using until I was almost out of high school (When I was a senior, we had a new class called Internet Skills, which taught things like what a URL is and how to do searches on Lycos, LOL) but you want to tell me I grew up the same way as someone who doesn't even remember living in a time without internet? I think I read somewhere that the people who defined what a Millennial is and what years it applies to were mostly basing it on when home computer technology became "available" (80s) rather than thinking more practically about when a large percentage of people really-for-real started having them in their homes as a useful device rather than just being a novelty for nerds.
