# Thirtysomethings: an age group with no generational affiliation **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 26, 2015, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609 "2015-11-26T05:38:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2016, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/81 "2016-10-28T04:44:44Z")
> [@TwiSpark](#): > > Huh, didn’t know the definitions were so vague. I was 18 in 2000, which I was told at the time (though the only source was my parents) means I’m in Generation X. Which confused me a first as I wasn’t aware of being a comic book superhero. > > Bastion of absolute non-refuted and well verified fact Wikipedia [says](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_X): > So at least by that definition it puts me at Gen X. Huh? You wrote that right after you quoted Wikipedia as describing for GenX “ending birth years ranging from the late 1970s to early 1980s.” So Wikipedia is saying more like “maybe, maybe not, depending on the source”. > [@Tzigone](#): > > It’s funny how terms change meaning. And I’m seeing in this thread “Millennials don’t remember 9/11” as a definition, too. And it’s strange to me, because I first heard the term “Millennials” used _before_ 9/11 happened. I share this story a lot, but it was the mid-to-late '90s when I heard “millennials”, and it was applied specifically to start with the birth cohort that generally was going to graduate high school in 2000 (I know, 2001 was the new millennium, but almost nobody uses it that way). > > I suspect the term will always be fuzzy, and won’t have even much of an agreed-upon definition until it stops getting used for young people of the day. Agreed. But that “Millennials don’t remember 9/11” one is so bizarre, and a really huge retcon. I can only assume that people who believe that one don’t remember stuff like the 60 Minutes story I linked to upthread. If in 2007 they were talking about Millennials graduating college and entering the workplace, it’s absurd to think they wouldn’t remember 9/11 if it happened when they were old enough to drive. ---
**Author:** ![Tzigone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Tzigone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tzigone)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2016, 11:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/82 "2016-10-28T11:12:37Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Agreed. But that “Millennials don’t remember 9/11” one is so bizarre, and a really huge retcon. I can only assume that people who believe that one don’t remember stuff like the 60 Minutes story I linked to upthread. If in 2007 they were talking about Millennials graduating college and entering the workplace, it’s absurd to think they wouldn’t remember 9/11 if it happened when they were old enough to drive. I just Googled “millennials” and at least the first result (the definition) backs us up “a person reaching young adulthood around the year 2000” [Here’s a 1998 article from the Baptist Press](http://www.bpnews.net/1646/millennial-markers-traits-of-generation-y) that uses the term. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2016, 11:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/83 "2016-10-28T11:50:13Z")
> [@Tzigone](#): > > I just Googled “millennials” and at least the first result (the definition) backs us up “a person reaching young adulthood around the year 2000” > > [Here’s a 1998 article from the Baptist Press](http://www.bpnews.net/1646/millennial-markers-traits-of-generation-y) that uses the term. Great find! By their definition, the oldest Millennials would have been 24 in 2001, and about to turn 40 now. Of course, no one is defining them that way at this point, but one wonders if it may revert back to that definition eventually, when the next generation is named and becomes the shiny new youth market. That analysis is pretty sharp in general for the generation (which they also still called GenY and other things at that time). But one thing I’m surprised they didn’t find problematic: they made GenX \*really \*short (11 years long), but had no problem making Millennials almost twice as long (“born in the past two decades”), similar to the '46-'64 Baby Boom. This despite the fact that Millennials (once called “echo Boomers”) and Boomers both had much higher birth rates, so this definition would make GenX something like one-third as big as either of them. Is this vision one of GenX just being a little buffer, a road bump, between the two? ---
**Author:** ![TwiSpark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/77aa72/32.png) [@TwiSpark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwiSpark)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2016, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/84 "2016-10-28T13:32:25Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Huh? You wrote that right after you quoted Wikipedia as describing for GenX “ending birth years ranging from the late 1970s to early 1980s.” So Wikipedia is saying more like “maybe, maybe not, depending on the source”. If the sarcasm of calling Wikipedia the bastion of absolute truth wasn’t obvious: that was sarcasm (a means of acknowledging that not everyone agrees with Wikipedia because otherwise you just get dozens of people telling you off for citing it) I don’t actually see the contradiction though? I was born in 1982, which fits the date range of 60s to early 80s that I quoted. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2016, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/85 "2016-10-28T13:46:58Z")
> [@TwiSpark](#): > > I don’t actually see the contradiction though? I was born in 1982, which fits the date range of 60s to early 80s that I quoted. What you quoted said (my bolding added): > [@](#): > > There are no precise dates for when this cohort starts or ends; demographers and researchers typically use starting birth years ranging from the early to mid-1960s and **ending birth years ranging from the late 1970s** to early 1980s. To which you responded: > [@](#): > > So at least by that definition it puts me at Gen X. And my comment, which I still stand by, was: > [@](#): > > Wikipedia is saying more like “maybe, maybe not, depending on the source”. Keep in mind that I personally _don’t_ accept early '80s as GenX. And you more or less said that Wikipedia’s definition says I’m wrong–that early '80s is GenX, by their definition. So I’m arguing not to be nitpicky, but to defend my definition and point out that you are overselling what Wikipedia said. They describe “ending birth years” (i.e. cutoffs) “ranging from the late 1970s to early 1980s”. IOW, what I said: “maybe, maybe not”. Notice though that this has really drifted over time, due to the whole point that started this thread: not wanting to acknowledge older Millennials any more (at least, not until the next generation gets its place in the sun). Back in the early '90s when talk of Generation X was fresh and all the rage, they were not including grade school kids in the generational definition. ---
**Author:** ![TwiSpark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/77aa72/32.png) [@TwiSpark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwiSpark)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2016, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/86 "2016-10-28T14:08:42Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Keep in mind that I personally _don’t_ accept early '80s as GenX. I said that **by that particular definition that I quoted** , it agrees with me being gen x. If you have a differing opinion then you have every right to it, but you seem to be pretending the **to early 1980s** part of the quote doesn’t exist. You can’t just pretend words don’t exist to claim someone’s made an incorrect statement! What you’re stating is an opinion. It doesn’t make my differing opinion less valid. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2016, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/87 "2016-10-28T14:12:13Z")
> [@TwiSpark](#): > > I said that **by that particular definition that I quoted** , it agrees with me being gen x. You did say that. But you were wrong. You did \*not \*quote a “particular definition”. You quoted a Wikipedia article that referenced \*multiple \*definitions–some of which would include you and some of which would not. It would be equally accurate to say “ **by that particular definition that you quoted** , it DISagrees with you being gen x.” You for some reason believe the “early '80s” cutoff applies, but the “late '70s” cutoff does not. Not sure why. ---
**Author:** ![TwiSpark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/77aa72/32.png) [@TwiSpark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwiSpark)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2016, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/88 "2016-10-28T14:25:23Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > You did say that. But you were wrong. Nope. The comment matches the part that I quoted. Never mind the rest of the article, I didn’t quote the rest of the article. I see you doing this all the time in the thread, just asserting that anything that doesn’t suit your personal definition is “wrong”. Opinion != Fact, especially when there’s no universally agreed-upon definition (which there isn’t, no matter how insistently you repeat your rhetoric). ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2016, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/89 "2016-10-28T15:18:37Z")
> [@TwiSpark](#): > > Nope. The comment matches the part that I quoted. Never mind the rest of the article, I didn’t quote the rest of the article. I didn’t read the rest of the article. Just the part you quoted. If you think you correctly characterized the part you quoted, it doesn’t look like I’m going to change your mind. :dubious: I can’t really say more than that without insulting you. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2016, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/90 "2016-10-28T16:58:40Z")
I was definitely Gen X when I was growing up and only retroactively put into the bucket of Millennials once the term gained widespread use. Similarly, I think a lot of kids who are growing up as “millennials” nowadays will retroactively have another generational label placed on them once we come to a consensus as to what it is. Definitely someone born in 2005 deserves to have a different label placed on them than someone born in 1987. ---
**Author:** ![Tzigone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Tzigone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tzigone)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2016, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/91 "2016-10-28T17:15:57Z")
> [@](#): > > Definitely someone born in 2005 deserves to have a different label placed on them than someone born in 1987. That’s pretty much the complaint of the Boomers, isn’t it? 1946-1964 birth years often used, right? ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2016, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/92 "2016-10-29T00:21:48Z")
Right, except the ones born in the JFK years are hardly ever called Boomers in practice. In the Eighties there was a lot of talk about Boomer nostalgia for Sixties music (e.g. “The Big Chill”), even though the ones born in the early 1960s would have only been college age. ---
**Author:** ![brujaja](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@brujaja](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brujaja)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 8:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/93 "2016-10-30T08:35:06Z")
Hey everybody! Instead of relying on vaguely-or-arguably-defined artificial constructs like generational tags, just do what I do – when embarking on a discussion about era-dependent media or social references with a person of indeterminate age, just say: “Are you old enough to remember xxx?” People who are a little older than you think will be flattered, and people who are a little younger than you think will be happy to show off their knowledge of prehistoric minutiae. ---
**Author:** ![bienville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@bienville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bienville)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 10:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/94 "2016-10-30T10:35:59Z")
I was recently talking to a family friend who is 15 years old. I told her about how she’s in the upper age range of a generation that doesn’t have a name yet. I encouraged her to get ahead of the media on this, to determine a good name for her generation, and to post a cool funny Buzzfeed article about it. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 10:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/95 "2016-10-30T10:52:39Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#): > > I was definitely Gen X when I was growing up and only retroactively put into the bucket of Millennials once the term gained widespread use. Yeah, the same thing happened to me. I was a bit annoyed at the time: “Hey! I don’t remember all this 1980s stuff, I was born in 1984! My earliest memories are the Gulf War and the first contemporary pop music I payed attention to was grunge!” I’d be happy if people came into this with a better knowledge of how memory works, frankly: Yes, I was born in 1984. I don’t remember 1985, because one-year-olds don’t form lasting memories. I don’t remember Reagan’s second term, even though it roughly coincided with the first years of my life, because young pre-schoolers mostly focus on home life and are rarely known for their political opinions. Therefore, if you’re going to date generations by memories and experiences, you probably should not assume that someone born in 1989 is going to remember how it felt when the Berlin Wall came down. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/96 "2016-10-31T20:53:15Z")
Yeah, that’s silly. Boomers are often nostalgic for the 1950s, but that’s more about the way suburban family life was different then, which a young child is much more likely to remember. > [@bienville](#): > > I was recently talking to a family friend who is 15 years old. I told her about how she’s in the upper age range of a generation that doesn’t have a name yet. I encouraged her to get ahead of the media on this, to determine a good name for her generation, and to post a cool funny Buzzfeed article about it. That would be pretty awesome, and it would even be provable, unlike most pop-culture coinages of the past. ---
**Author:** ![Macca26](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/13edae/32.png) [@Macca26](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Macca26)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2016, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/97 "2016-11-01T15:29:21Z")
As a Millenial myself, it seems perfectly cut and dry to me that a Millenial was born between 1980 and 1995. Generations by generational theory cover approximately 15-18 years and as someone born almost exactly in the middle of this generation I can say for sure that I don’t identify on a generational level with those born before 1980 and those born after 1995. They definitely have different mindsets, and to me it’s quite plain who is a Millenial and who isn’t. I graduated almost exactly on time with the 2008 recession. This event is what defines my generation; most of us dealing with that recession right when we are supposed to go out and get jobs and pay off the student loans our parents convinced us to get, and finding there aren’t any jobs available. I can tell it’s stunted my career quite well, to be honest. I’ll be playing catch-up all my life. So yes, I’ve definitely noticed the media and other adults putting me in a no-man’s land and instead labeling the current crop of 14-21 year olds “millenials”. Even here on the dope. They’re not Millenials - they’re the next generation, and hopefully soon people will start realigning themselves as they realize the median age for Millenials right now is about 30. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2016, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/98 "2016-11-01T22:52:42Z")
**Macca** , I like the cut of your jib! Well said. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/99 "2016-11-07T04:20:22Z")
Here’s a counterexample that comes out of what may be a countervailing pressure in the media: the desire to declare the “first millennial \_\_\_\_\_\_\_” to provide a fresh take. In politics, if you treat millennials as eternally under 30, it’s hard to write that story. So Missouri’s Jason Kander, running a close race against incumbent Roy Blunt, is described in [this POLITICO story](http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/kander-blunt-missouri-senate-230611) as a millennial, despite the fact that he is 35, born in 1981: > [@](#): > > If he wins, Kander could be the first millennial senator and a Democratic Party star to boot. But as this kind of thing happens more and more, there is going to be more and more need to come up with the name for the next generation. Five years from now, you can’t have forty year olds and high school kids in the same generation. Once they sort that out, there will be a kind of shock wave, like an elastic band snapping and resorting a lot of people. Some younger folks who had been appended onto “Millennials” will suddenly have a new name for their generation (and will, like some of the other border dwellers who weighed in here, go through life a little confused as to where they actually belong). And the millennials born in the early to mid-'80s will get that label back for good, after having had it in their twenties and wandering in a nebulous no-generation land for most of their thirties. And then in just a few years after that is sorted out, we’ll do the same dance all over again when the next generation hits 30. Sigh. ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 10:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609/100 "2016-11-07T10:41:12Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > But as this kind of thing happens more and more, there is going to be more and more need to come up with the name for the next generation. Five years from now, you can’t have forty year olds and high school kids in the same generation. why? this whole “naming” of generations (Gen X, Y, Millennials) is just marketing bullshit and there’s no “need” for it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thirtysomethings-an-age-group-with-no-generational-affiliation/738609.md?page=6)