Why 1996, 1998, and 1999 end dates are flawed

[Ghost]

Most mainstream communities that discuss generations tend to view them from a more pop cultural perspective. The thing I have noticed is that many of those communities fail to focus on the bigger, more historical picture regarding generations. This is especially common when defining the Millennial generation - people focus more on who followed pop culture trends and relatability instead of actual history. For example, one guy on the Internet says 1996 was the last to get into electropop and 1998 was the last to get into EDM. This is extremely flawed because there can be one guy born in 2000 into both of them and a 1998 baby not into any of them at all because he was simply not interested. There might also be people that aren't even born yet that will be into those trends, and obviously they are not Millennials. 

Pop culture depends on where you live in my opinion. Some areas may have trends appear and fade away earlier/later than others. I do not think you can really make claims like "Gen Z culture began in X year" because it will be different for everyone. Some pop cultural trends are also different in appearance and style depending on where you live.

Another thing I notice is that pop culture generally tends to recycle itself every 20-25 years or so. This is not a rule of thumb, but I did notice this for the past ten years or so (early 2010's tended to have late 80's nostalgia, mid 2010's tended to have early 90's nostalgia, etc). I remember one guy on a subreddit about a year or a year and a half ago saying that the 2009-2013 electropop era kind of "echoed" the 1987-1991 neon era, and to be fair, I think he is correct. 15-18 year generational groupings are almost like saying pop culture echoes every 15-18 years, in my opinion. The Y2K revival going on in 2022 appears more like teens/young adults of 1999/2000 passing the torch to teens/young adults of 2022, and when most people think of "passing the torch", they think of one generation going away and the next one coming in. I think it is further proof that ranges like 1981-1996, 1981-1998, 1981-1999, and 1982-1999 do not make that much sense. However, if we were to define generations by things like this alone, this would create 20-25 year long generations. Since 20-25 year generations are too long for most people, I think people should split these 20-25 year "supergenerations" into 10-12 year "generations".

Memory is flawed when it comes to defining generations. No generations other than Millennials are defined by remembering X event. The oldest Boomers were not born yet when WWII ended (start of 1T), the oldest Gen Xers were not born yet when JFK was assassinated (start of 2T), and the oldest Millennials were not born yet when Reagan got elected (start of 3T). However, the oldest Gen Zers were either 1, 2, or 4 when 9/11 happened (the most likely start of 4T). Memory is something that isn't fixed for everyone (some people can remember things as early as 18 months although it's extremely unlikely, and some people don't even remember their 6th birthday), and remembering 9/11 is also a location and arguably a time zone issue IMO. I do not think a 1997 baby from rural Oregon or Washington that uses Pacific Standard Time will have as good of a chance as one from NYC that uses Eastern Standard Time. I also notice that some people try to make the amount people born in X year that remember 9/11 blown out of proportion. I remember seeing two users in a generation-related subreddit in particular, one born in May 1998 and the other born in September 1998, that try to act like 1998 babies were affected by and have a good chance in remembering 9/11. Just because you were born in 1998 and remember 9/11 does not mean everyone or even most people born in 1998 will. In fact, I checked a poll done by Pew, and apparently, 1995 was the last birthyear where more than 50% of the people born that year in the US remember 9/11.

The national and world moods of a certain year tends to define generations, as well. 1T began when WWII ended and Baby Boomers started in 1946. 2T began when JFK was assassinated and Gen X started in 1965. 3T began when Reagan got elected and Millennials started in either 1981 or 1982. 4T most likely started when 9/11 happened, but many people start Gen Z in either 1997, 1999, or 2000. 1997, 1999, and 2000 were still either purely 3T or at the very least heavily 3T leaning. In all three of those years, people were either hyping up for the new millennium or celebrating being welcomed "to the future", the economy was doing well, Clinton was still the POTUS, America was not really involved in any major 21st century war yet, and mass shootings were not really that common yet (I know there were incidents like the Pearl and Columbine shootings, but back then, events like that were rare).

I think a lot of pop culture/trends/memory arguments also serve as unnecessary fillers to emphasize a point that one birthyear is different than the next. IMO, the only things that really split 1996 from 1997, 1998 from 1999, and 1999 from 2000 are being at elementary school when 9/11 happened, voting in 2016, and graduating high school before the Parkland shooting, respectively. Many of the arguments I see that split 1996 from 1997, 1998 from 1999, and 1999 from 2000 can at least be mitigated to some degree or apply to another birthyear. I remember seeing two users on generation-related communities born in 1998 that try so hard to distance themselves from their 2000 born siblings (using things like Vine or tide pods as arguments), and I laughed about this one user talking about how he was different from his 2000 born sister because of a Mickey Mouse related show on the Disney Channel.  

FYI, I say 1996, 1998, and 1999 end dates because a vast majority of the time on generation discussion communities, people end Millennials in either of those three years (they are also abused on the Internet, IMO).

[Eric the Green]

That's progress, and in fact Gen Z doesn't start until at least 2003.

[pbrower2a]

(10-19-2022, 01:19 PM)Ghost Wrote: Most mainstream communities that discuss generations tend to view them from a more pop cultural perspective. The thing I have noticed is that many of those communities fail to focus on the bigger, more historical picture regarding generations. This is especially common when defining the Millennial generation - people focus more on who followed pop culture trends and relatability instead of actual history. For example, one guy on the Internet says 1996 was the last to get into electropop and 1998 was the last to get into EDM. This is extremely flawed because there can be one guy born in 2000 into both of them and a 1998 baby not into any of them at all because he was simply not interested. There might also be people that aren't even born yet that will be into those trends, and obviously they are not Millennials.

Pop culture is overrated as a cause of lasting change. OK, there was the Beatles; there was the Big Band Era; there was ragtime; it is arguable that Strauss waltzes and even the music of Mozart was pop culture in his time. Does pop culture change how we see wars, revolutions, pogroms, religious reformations, and constitutional reforms that change the most basic of human relationships or the ethnic or religious mix of a nation or region? The Islamic takeover of Iran practically destroyed one old and distinguished religious tradition (Zoroastrianism) through subsequent events. World history is far different if Iran remains Zoroastrian. We have yet to see the effects of Mormonism upon arts and philosophy (I consider the rise of Mormonism as, for Mormons at the least an event on the scale of significance as the Pr0otestant Reformation). After the Holocaust, Humanity cannot think quite as it did before. I am tempted to believe that the Holocaust occurred because Jewish morality was incompatible with Nazi depravity and not due to any fault of Judaism. As I have said many times, there was nothing wrong with the German people between 1930 and 1945 that Judaism would not have solved. Jew or Gentile, we can no longer be so naïve about human nature as we were before the Holocaust. Whenever someone offers me cockeyed optimism about human nature I can only think of the Holocaust, not to mention the Holodomor, the Turkish genocide of Armenians,  the nuclear devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Atlantic slave trade, or the decimation of First Peoples of North America. We can be saints individually, but Humanity has no collective goodness. Then after all that one hears of the Killing Fields of Cambodia, Satan Hussein gassing the Kurds, and perverts commandeering jetliners to fly them into the Twin Towers, the Pentagon, and probably the US Capitol building. 

Cultural changes from consummate creativity? I could make the case that practically all classical music and even much that is not classical derives (if through intermediate creators like Chopin or even Duke Ellington, Roy Clark, or Jimi Hendrix) after about 1760 ultimately derives from the music of Franz Josef Haydn. Art? Literature? Perhaps more profound. Most pop culture (and yes, some  serious efforts) is transitory in interest. Tastes change over time. In baroque music, "stately" performances of the early twentieth century that slowed and bloated the music are deprecated today. That's before I even discuss the increasing competence of orchestral players through the conservatism and the homogenization of style of playing. 

Technology? OK, the telegraph was a big thing in its day, and if there had been no new method of disseminating data as with dots and dashes, then we would still be getting much of our information that way. News photos have been disseminated by telegraph. For all practical purposes, phenomena as supposedly modern as e-mail and chat lines are really telegraphy. Should we run out of fuel, we will use clipper ships to deliver stuff across the seas and horses to haul stuff to or from the seaports. Our technology allows us at its best to do things more effectively and with fewer inputs. Your 45" flat-screen TV uses less energy than a cathedral-style radio of the 1930s and has less material put into it.            

Quote:Pop culture depends on where you live in my opinion. Some areas may have trends appear and fade away earlier/later than others. I do not think you can really make claims like "Gen Z culture began in X year" because it will be different for everyone. Some pop cultural trends are also different in appearance and style depending on where you live.

Nope! Where you are may shape your tastes, but I can assure you that K-pop and manga are available almost exactly half the way around the world in southeastern Brazil. The big city farthest away from the northeastern USA, Perth, Australia, listens to the same pop music and gets the same successful Broadway plays as do people in New England, New York, and Philadelphia. Cervantes, Goya, Albeniz, and Picasso are well known in New Zealand, also antipodal in distance. I'm not saying that people dance the hula in Botswana...       

Quote:Another thing I notice is that pop culture generally tends to recycle itself every 20-25 years or so. This is not a rule of thumb, but I did notice this for the past ten years or so (early 2010's tended to have late 80's nostalgia, mid 2010's tended to have early 90's nostalgia, etc). I remember one guy on a subreddit about a year or a year and a half ago saying that the 2009-2013 electropop era kind of "echoed" the 1987-1991 neon era, and to be fair, I think he is correct. 15-18 year generational groupings are almost like saying pop culture echoes every 15-18 years, in my opinion. The Y2K revival going on in 2022 appears more like teens/young adults of 1999/2000 passing the torch to teens/young adults of 2022, and when most people think of "passing the torch", they think of one generation going away and the next one coming in. I think it is further proof that ranges like 1981-1996, 1981-1998, 1981-1999, and 1982-1999 do not make that much sense. However, if we were to define generations by things like this alone, this would create 20-25 year long generations. Since 20-25 year generations are too long for most people, I think people should split these 20-25 year "supergenerations" into 10-12 year "generations".

People can also outgrow it or become separated from it. Attend college and you might get separated from popular ephemera because there are richer or more compelling things in life. Were I a Jeopardy! contestant (I am 67 years old) I would fare well on pop culture of the '60's and '70's because the pop culture could imprint itself upon me. After that, I lost my exposure to that. It has nt imprinted on me. Maybe a sophisticated person born in the late 1970's might know little about pop culture of the 21st century. Pop culture is easy to outgrow, especially if it isn't all that good. "Achy, Breaky Heart", anyone?  I'd rather relate Schubert's Octet (which in a particularly tough time convinced me to not commit suicide). I had just gotten poor in the most materialistic, callow society on Earth (you know where) in which second chances in life do not come to people in their sixties.  

Quote:Memory is flawed when it comes to defining generations. No generations other than Millennials are defined by remembering X event. The oldest Boomers were not born yet when WWII ended (start of 1T), the oldest Gen Xers were not born yet when JFK was assassinated (start of 2T), and the oldest Millennials were not born yet when Reagan got elected (start of 3T). However, the oldest Gen Zers were either 1, 2, or 4 when 9/11 happened (the most likely start of 4T). Memory is something that isn't fixed for everyone (some people can remember things as early as 18 months although it's extremely unlikely, and some people don't even remember their 6th birthday), and remembering 9/11 is also a location and arguably a time zone issue IMO. I do not think a 1997 baby from rural Oregon or Washington that uses Pacific Standard Time will have as good of a chance as one from NYC that uses Eastern Standard Time. I also notice that some people try to make the amount people born in X year that remember 9/11 blown out of proportion. I remember seeing two users in a generation-related subreddit in particular, one born in May 1998 and the other born in September 1998, that try to act like 1998 babies were affected by and have a good chance in remembering 9/11. Just because you were born in 1998 and remember 9/11 does not mean everyone or even most people born in 1998 will. In fact, I checked a poll done by Pew, and apparently, 1995 was the last birthyear where more than 50% of the people born that year in the US remember 9/11.

The generation following Millennial youth has experienced the effects of COVID-19 as children. Homeland kids have missed out one or more of the predictable events of growing up from a First Communion to the Senior Prom due to COVID-19 making a travesty of life. Those adults who failed to take it seriously and tried to act as if it didn't happen are most often the ones who died of it. Through their deaths as parents, grandparents, aunts or uncles, or whatever influential roles had in children's lives whose untimely disappearance breaks that influence. Is death from COVID-19 more tragic than death from heart attacks, strokes, cancer, vehicle crashes, or industrial accidents? No -- but there are simply far more of them concentrated in a time. But the disruption of children's lives as the result of COVID-19 has denied or deferred such events as a bar mitzvah or a quinceanero celebration  for teenagers that fit one into a cultural expectation. Having to take K-12 coursework at home because schools are closed is an experience abnormal for other generations. Lots of people hold off starting college rather than going directly from high school; few miss a high-school graduation (unless Homeland) due to a dangerous, contagious respiratory disease floating around. If the response to COVID-19 is a mere inconvenience for adults it is a huge disruption in childhood passages for the Homeland generation.  

Also worth noting is the crackdown on certain sexually-related or gender-related conduct. LGBT people may be cut a break for sex, marriage, and adoption and get better protection from discrimination in hiring and on the job; at the same time we have a serious crackdown on sex and pornography involving children, date rape (and date-rape drugs),  sexual harassment, domestic violence, and gay-bashing. Even if the Dobbs decision allows states to prohibit abortion, this unpopular decision is likely to get reversed through legislation -- and so are state laws that prohibit people from traveling out of state to get abortions.  Even if I am straight I militantly supported LGBT rights with the understanding that those rights made me safer from gay-bashing. Mainstream gays and lesbians threw the child-molesting perverts under the bus; I rhetorically cast violent homophobes under the same rhetorical bus. I'd say that that was a fair deal. As children and young adults the Homeland generation is far safer than earlier generations of adults and children due to the sexual crackdown (except on abortion, and the Dobbs decision is simply perverse).   

Quote:The national and world moods of a certain year tends to define generations, as well. 1T began when WWII ended and Baby Boomers started in 1946. 2T began when JFK was assassinated and Gen X started in 1965. 3T began when Reagan got elected and Millennials started in either 1981 or 1982. 4T most likely started when 9/11 happened, but many people start Gen Z in either 1997, 1999, or 2000. 1997, 1999, and 2000 were still either purely 3T or at the very least heavily 3T leaning. In all three of those years, people were either hyping up for the new millennium or celebrating being welcomed "to the future", the economy was doing well, Clinton was still the POTUS, America was not really involved in any major 21st century war yet, and mass shootings were not really that common yet (I know there were incidents like the Pearl and Columbine shootings, but back then, events like that were rare).

Reminder: of living generations:

GI 1901-1924 (Walt Disney, Jimmy Carter)
Silent 1925-1942 (Andy Griffith, Barbra Streisand)
Boom 1943-1960 (Randy Newman, Amy Klobuchar)
X 1961-1981 (Barack Obama, Beyoncé Knowles)
Millennial (1982- ca. 2003) Justin Verlander... I'm not guessing on which year is last

PS -- happy 80th birthday, Boom Generation!

This is according to Howe and Strauss. GI's missed out on the alienation resulting from the disillusioning events following WWI in which returning soldiers received the cold shoulder. 
1925-born WWII veterans usually entered late enough to do occupation duty instead of active combat, and to not make rank as GI's did. GI women were pressured to do war work, and Silent women were pressured to get their MRS degrees even if they graduated from college in deference to GI men getting their civilian jobs back and to have opportunities resulting from the GI Bill. . Children born in 1942 have memories of WWII; children born in 1943 generally did not, and that shapes the differences in their assumptions in life. Howe and Strauss see 1960 and 1961 as the divide between kids who  got something out of the Boom Awakening (and especially the "sexual revolution") and those who got hurt by it. Kids born after 1980 got to experience GI-like structure in life. 

The new Idealist generation (and for our sake let us raise it free of the sort of destructive narcissism that Donald Trump oozes  from even his sweat glands) may be being born now.   

Quote:I think a lot of pop culture/trends/memory arguments also serve as unnecessary fillers to emphasize a point that one birthyear is different than the next. IMO, the only things that really split 1996 from 1997, 1998 from 1999, and 1999 from 2000 are being at elementary school when 9/11 happened, voting in 2016, and graduating high school before the Parkland shooting, respectively. Many of the arguments I see that split 1996 from 1997, 1998 from 1999, and 1999 from 2000 can at least be mitigated to some degree or apply to another birthyear. I remember seeing two users on generation-related communities born in 1998 that try so hard to distance themselves from their 2000 born siblings (using things like Vine or tide pods as arguments), and I laughed about this one user talking about how he was different from his 2000 born sister because of a Mickey Mouse related show on the Disney Channel.  

Agreed. Cultural ephemera and electronic gadgets do not so much shape a generation as do wars, lifestyle trends such as increasing or decreasing divorces, wars, economic crashes, plagues (Spanish Influenza, AIDS, COVID-19), criminal crackdowns, or sharp changes (like women getting the vote, Prohibition, the GI Bill, Civil Rights Act of 1964, Citizens United vs. FEC,  Obergfell vs. Hodges)  in law. If someone is to suggest some personal computer or cell phone, then I instead suggest the Model T Ford, the Douglas DC-3 aircraft (which made passenger flights much less expensive), the Tennessee Valley Authority, or the Pennsylvania Turnpike. It's hard to see which cheap phonograph, radio, or television did most to change people's lives. 

Quote:FYI, I say 1996, 1998, and 1999 end dates because a vast majority of the time on generation discussion communities, people end Millennials in either of those three years (they are also abused on the Internet, IMO).

My best guess is 2003. People went back to what they were doing before (with some added inconveniences) after 9/11. After the Pearl Harbor attack, the US practically shit down all luxury production quickly (Make it do or do without!), rationed tires and gasoline, imposed a national 35-mph speed limit, established rationing and price controls, and in generally put an end to a consumer economy already looking more like that of 1947 than of 1927. Dubya told people to travel and go shopping, exactly the opposite (and very much 3T activities) from what FDR called for in 1941 when  the survival of our civilization was at stake from the demonic Axis Powers. 2003 also marks the first kids to have at most toddler memories before the 2008 financial crisis.

[Eric the Green]

The next prophet/idealist generation will start being born in 2025, give or take a year.

[bjoh249]

I was born in 1981 and don’t consider myself Gen X. I go by the Xennial tag. I know this forum is for discussing Strauss and Howe but I don’t agree with them. I made an account specifically to state this.