A Case for Super Powers

Talkin' 'Bout My Generation

My generation finally has a (satisfactory) name: Millenials. Millenials are those born between 1982 and 2002.

I read an article recently by a Generation X-er bitching and moaning about how the Baby Boomers treated Gen-X so horribly, and treat us millenials like we're God's gift to the world. First of all, if you think that Baby Boomers love Millenials so much, you must not remember the 90s very well. I don't mean that we were treated uncharacteristically badly in the 90s, I mean that in order to think that Boomers love Millenials, you have to have run so many drugs through your system that an entire decade has passed you by.

But more important are the details: this article alleged that we Millenials have no youth culture, nothing that we can call our own. And this is true. But that's because we're not due for it yet.

Think about it: the Boomers, who were born between '40 and '60, did not really have their own youth culture until the mid '60s. Generation X, born from '61 to '81, didn't have their own youth culture until the late '80s to early '90s. A generation does not come into its own until a few years after the NEXT generation is starting to be born.

The article further stated that what passes for Millenial culture is the sorry state of affairs that is contemporary pop culture. Hate to break it to you, Gen-X-ers, but contemporary pop culture isn't OUR fault. It's YOURS. Half of yours, anyway.

Let me explain again: the first half of the Boomers created the youth culture explosion of the mid-'60s to mid-'70s. Then what happened? Well, by the mid-'70s, those original, older boomers were in their thirties. The Vietnam war was over, civil rights movement was pretty much all taken care of, and they really had nothing more to do. They got jobs, got married, had families. For lack of a better term: they sold out. Then you had the younger, latter half of the Boomers...in the mid-'70s, they were just barely becoming teenagers. They looked at their older counterparts, and they saw a hollow, superficial representation of what they were: sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll. They took that basic paradigm, and ran with it, but without any of the actual spirit behind it, and what was the result? The late '70s to '80s...a dark time, indeed.

Then the first half of Gen-X took over, and from the late '80s to mid '90s there was...well, admittedly, a time that scared the hell out of Boomers. You had the invention of Hip-Hop, alternative music. The general culture was like the dark, moody, gritty younger sibling of the hippies. Then something horrible happened.

That's right. The exact same thing that ruined the Boomers. The older Gen-X-ers grew up, got jobs, got married, had families, and the latter half of Gen-X took over. They looked at their older counterparts and thought "ok...long hair, facial hair, coffee...hip hop, punk, alternative...moody, angsty, dark."

So from the mid-90s to the present, we got guys with long, perfectly coiffed hair, neatly trimmed goatees and soul patches, who hang out all day at Starbucks. We got pop punk and mad-lib hip-hop.

Not to mention this little gem: that latter half of Gen-X saw their older counterpart's contribution to television, and this is how they reacted: "The Real World...real people, from different backgrounds, cohabitating, in an unscripted scenario. We can make an entire genre out of this!"

Don't blame us for the past ten years. Blame yourselves.

I predict that sometime within the next five years, we Millenials will define ourselves. To be honest, I fear that our biggest contribution to the music industry will be Emo. But there's still time...I think our film will be good, at least. I'm thinking about the work of Seth Rogen, and while the comedy market is way, WAY oversaturated, his work is some of the best out there. And even at that, he's just a writer, thus far. I'd like to see more serious films from Millenial filmmakers. I'd like to see what our Reality Bites is going to be.

Shit, I just realized...I may be part of the creation of Millenial Film. Goddamnit, now there's even more pressure on me than before.

I gotta tell you, the music of my generation is looking grim so far, but I'm eagerly awaiting the arrival of truly creative Millenials.

Don't bag on us just yet; wait until we really screw up.

Hope I die before I get old...