Let's talk about gen X because no other bugger does.

[Mach3]

Hail fellow X'ers.

We are never mentioned. It's always Boomers, Millennials or gen Z.

Why the fuck not?

We definitely exist, we were very cool people.

I have such good memories of my 70's childhood and teenage years in the 80's.

And all the goodness of the late 80s and early 90s.

It did happen didn't it?

I'm a gen x raising a (12yo) gen alpha DD. I think gen alphas are really cool - and quite similar in outlook to gen x in many ways. Not quite as recklessly free range as we were, but still nicely independent.

Where we live, the kids are out all day at the weekend going into each others gardens and houses. But they don't make dens in dumps and play in building sites like we did..

They make their own way to school and are OK at home alone, but will ask for lifts and like being with family (I'm aware that probably won't last much longer!)

They use tech but the dangers of the internet are better known than 10 years ago - and drummed into them early and often - so they take online content with a pinch of salt. They spent so much time on devices during lockdown that they value being with friends irl.

They've been taught to not be horrible to each other (which we weren't) but seem to be less navel-gazing than Millenials (perhaps because of how they use technology differently)

They have the same irreverent, funny, not-taking-things seriously attitude as gen x, but they feel more comfortable with adults than we did.

Gen X is very awesome. I think gen Alpha is also going to be very awesome.

I am going through the posts and I feel really nostalgic.
Gen x here, born late 70s, childhood in 80s and teen in 90s.

I am not British but the funny part is that i can really identify with the majority of stuff being said.

Life in Spain in the 80s and 90s was amazing. I do think that being born after 1975 was the biggest change between generation, as Franco died and we transitioned to democracy. Madrid was the center of a cultural movement with new bands, cinema, night clubs. We look up to London and how cool everyone seemed.
We joined the EU and everything seemed possible then.

We were free without parents knowing where we were. Walking to school by ourselves. I had my own key age 10. Music was amazing. Access to University to all.
We had a basic gameboy when kids and we played tetris and pac- man in arcades. We did meet in arcades and bars and could spent a whole evening with 10 euros. Nobody would ask you for ID when asking for a drink age 15. I got my first basic mobile phone age 20 which allowed me to send texts and make calls. Internet connected to the phone line and that first email, I think I must have been 19 or 20.
You met people in real life, you arrange meeting someone the week before and didn't change the time and location. I can go on forever. I would do anything to go back.

My grandparents were the lost generation.
My parents were the silent generation
I'm an X
My kids are zoomers.

We keep missing a generation. (One because grandmother lost her sweetheart in WW1)

Yes! I remember going to.Madrid in about 1985, it felt so fresh, like something was happening.

I really love my gen z children.

They're 16 & just about to turn 18 and very cool.

We speak well. Very openly, in a similar way me and my 'boomer hippy' parents did.

I think it's just about open communication and keeping one's eye on the ball.

Understanding what influences and speaking the language of 'youth'.

Whatever that may be.

And I do think the Millenials were badly served by having unalloyed access to the Internet.

I do think they were the generation that have been broken by porn and socials.

Which is why there's a massive shift between them and the boomers.

And X, Alpha and Z are more simpatico.

They don't talk about Gen X because they think you're all Boomers.

It's all bullshit, anyway.

I think that's true.

I wonder whether the start date for Alpha will shift to about 2014-15, who hadn't settled into school before lockdowns happened and were too young for lockdown learning. That feels like quite an experience shift.

And whether there might be a micro generation from about 2005/06 to 2013/14. Those late zoomers/early alphas had very different formative experiences than early zoomers, who went unprotected into the Wild West of social media before anyone realised how dangerous it was, and then were hit by lockdown just as they reached the age of going out into the real world. Those were tough breaks 😥

X ers were the most creative generation.
The music the fashion .
Proud to part of it all!

Thats very true, I had panic attacks throughout a lot of the 80's. Didnt talk publically about it at the time but a few close friends were aware, nor was it officially diagnosed until early 90's. Did limit my life a lot so my teenage years were very restricted. I had a better time in the mid 90's onwards when they eased and I met my now DH.

I had horrendous MH difficulties in the 80s and 90s. I look at some young people
I work with now, and on the one hand I envy the help they get and their ability to be open about their difficulties and recognise that there’s something wrong. On the other, I worry that some of them over-identify with their diagnoses, letting it become bigger than they are, iykwim.

I just thought I was bad and broken, though, which can’t be the best way, no matter how resilient it’s made me.

Watched Dog House yesterday.

A gay man mentioned how he knew he was attracted to men as a teen/young man in 80s, but also wanted children so went down the nuclear route, getting married and having children, but also partly because it wasn’t easy to come out in those days. It was almost unheard of for gay people to adopt then also. He wife sadly passed away but gave her blessing/encouragement for him to find a male partner, as she knew he was gay.

I think there’s many more stories out there like that, of gay men and women who suppressed their feelings.

I've struggled with my mental health from age 11 in the 80s. No support then, or not that I was aware of. I struggled with my mental health throughout the 90s too, as a teen and early 20s. Though I think the 90s were much nicer than the 80s, and more caring, many of us still suffered in silence.
I definitely think young people today are much better about talking about their mental health, and much of the stigma has gone, not totally.
Far too many people suffered hellish mental health issues and lived with consequences silently for way too long. Many things are worse today, but that's one thing that I think is much better.

Maybe.

I preferred the old-school model of lesbian/gay man co-parenthood. Than the new one which buys wombs and spunk.

I dunno.

Call me old-fashioned.

Re mental health, I had about six months of mad panic attacks, probably past trauma and drug related..

But, but, I remember sitting in a bar one day waiting for a friend and thinking, this is a panic attack and if I don't talk myself out of this, I'm fucked.

And I never had another panic attack.

I understand ACE. I do think that trauma can become ingrained by group-think, as can any non-typical behaviour or response.

I do also think that the best way to deal with trauma is really simply, as has been shown with EMDR or playing candy crush or tetris after a traumatic event.

Get it out simply. Don't keep playing it over. Which I think many online communities encourage.

Totally agree. I had a potential PTSD event 10 years ago but i cried it out for a week. You don’t forget but it doesn’t overrule my life either

I always thought Gen X were a fairly odd generation in terms of their attitude to those younger than them from my experience. Sometime born in say, 1974 make out "they are old enough to remember" (it's never just "I remember when..: they always have to add the "I'm old enough to remember..." 🙄😆) from 1970 all the way through the decades. Yet they'll say of someone born in 1984 "I'm surprised you even remember the 90s" 🤨🤔 because they are soooo much older 🤣

I did actually have that comment of I'm surprised you even remember the 90s! So I don't remember the first 16 years of my life then 🤔

When I was a teen I worked with boomers and a few silent generation and got on well, age was never a factor or mentioned. It was fun hearing stories of their teen lives etc and they never patronised me being a teen and were great fun. Then when I mover jobs and there were women there who were gen x that just couldn't believe how young I was (I was early 20s) and just couldn't believe I had little memory of the 80s. They had a real mindset of superiority that was so odd and something I'd not had from the older generations I'd worked with. This carried on as I had my dc in my 20s and most of the mums were older than me in their 30s.

I like this one:

This is so true 😂

Let’s not forget the silent generation. Now they’re the ones that are tough as nails being through war and all.

I never under why gen X think they're tougher than other generations. Every decade has tough times from war, rationing, strikes, recessions, mass unemployment, terrorism, housing crisis etc etc.

I'm gen x, and I agree! I don't think I'm tough at all! I'm extremely sensitive. People are people ultimately. I actually don't think it was that great being gen x. Growing up with Thatcher as PM was grim!

Though, as mentioned up thread, having my 20s in the late 90s was glorious. Two extremes. - 80s and 90s!

Yes the later 90s felt hopeful. Less in your face racism too compared to 70s/80s.

And also the 90s was the start of having an awareness of climate change.
End of the Communist block and the USSR.
Definetly felt hopeful.
Love the 90s.

Sorry I’m late! Born in ‘69 and had the most blissful 70s childhood ever. Out and about by ourselves all the time, walking to school with nary a parent in sight. No money, but fun was free back then.

Then an 80’s teenagerhood and university - ‘nuff said!

Lastly, being able to buy a nice big 4 bed family house for just 3x one salary in the 90s before housing went bonkers.
We haven’t been so well blessed with pensions as previous generations, but all in all I’m glad I was born when I was!

That’s interesting as I felt like I was the only one at work in mid to late 90s going on about recycling our waste. Took them awhile to catch up.