I’ve been running a bit of a crusade against lazy generationalist assumptions for a long time (ie ‘all Baby Boomers are x, Gen Y thinks z’.) These perennial sweeping stereotypes raised their head in Monday’s Woodstock culture wars. Recently, too, we were treated to a veritable feast of them when Mark Arbib started banging on about “job snobs”. These sort of arguments are not just empirically questionable, but actually logically incoherent. John Quiggin calls them “zombie ideas”, and wrote an excellent piece in the Fin which demolishes this harmful and silly style of thought which just refuses to die.
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In my day, people didn’t make stupid generationalist assumptions.
I always noted the deafening silence of the Howard government towards generationalism, which in those days hadn’t turned to the attacks on Gen Y which characterise it now, but was more about Gen Xers claiming that the evils of the world were all down to the selfish boomers – which for some people descended into eliminationist speak.
I interpreted this as recognition that this did the Howard regime a lot of good. As long as there was a handy generational scapegoat, the C-word (class) and the N-word (Neoliberalism) and all the other factors like privatisation and the driving down of the social wage and social democratic features of society, wouldn’t come to the fore.
It was a passive divide-and-rule.
The pernicious power of generationalist thinking is evident in the fact that Professor Quiggin can’t avoid slipping into a little bit of generationalist language even when he’s critiquing the concept:
Tim, I think that’s a distortion. It’s a fact that some Gen-Xers (not all!), led by people like Mark Davis, were the ones pushing the generationalist angle, and it is in the nature of culture warriors to be gleeful when they think the group they demonise is about to get a comeuppance. You are confusing a historical stance obtaining at a certain time with supposedly rigid generalisations about whole generations behave.
There were (are) generations before and after the boomers?
Generational nonsense!
Helen, I suppose that’s true if you’re limiting the discussion to instances of generationalism in the media and opinion columns.
In my experience, a lot of the generationalist discussion occurs in the workplace, and is driven both by employers and by consultants – Both categories which include people in a variety of age groups or “generational” sub-categories, if you will, and not limited to “Gen X-ers”. So Prof Q’s comment is perhaps true, up to a point, when he refers to Gen X commentators (of which Mark Davis, is a particularly egregious example, I’ll grant you), but the reference to Gen X employers is a generationalist cliche, in my view.
And maybe,some people who may gather here today saluting the flag of generational convenience as it is lowered from the winds of change,may we pause in prayer! “Lord, Hear My Prayer,for it is come to pass that the name calling is falling more and more on deaf ears,the ones who practiced that as art form,and those who will be the same without the art form as age as reality and cliche’ has peculiarities of only ascending in one specific way.Some Lord ascend in other ways, that sometimes means flipping over by ones feet to hang so back and joints do not fuse,as willingly as injury and strain impresses.Let there be less burden for those whose curvature seems to be a repeated artifact that whistles through life like a cigarette, but would do if all cigarettes were participators in the Guiness Book of Records!Hear Thee Oh Lord, for beyond the dependence on Doctors la the ungainly need to stand on ones own understanding to allow oneself to feel good and complete without touching ones pockets like one is nude and missing the money or credit card thing.Pray for those,My Brethren… who touch part of their anatomy,without a calmness… for a Evil stalks them…. forever.”
“Generation’ crap annoys the hell out of me with its simplistic analysis that manages, deliberately I reckon, to pointedly ignore major influences on the behaviour and experiences of people such as regionalism, gender, race, ethnicity and class to pontificate and reiterate myths that serve to obfuscate rather than illuminate.
William Bowe recently linked to a parliamentary paper that estimated poverty in Australia had lately risen to 12% yet that was virtually totally ignored at Poll Bludger and, AFAIK, just about everywhere else.
Much easier to go with the personality politics interspersed with generational irelevancies.
I thought about your point before writing Tim, but it seemed to me that, in the pieces I was talking about, the writers and their sources self-identified as Gen X-ers. However, no doubt they weren’t alone.
I should mention that Mark Davis has done some very good stuff more recently, so I think he can be forgiven for Ganglands at this point.
I would like to propose my $0.02 generalisation about generalism:
- Generalisations provide shortcut summaries (statement of the obvious). We habitually classify and group things, to make a lot of material easier to digest.
- Most human beings in a complex world look for shortcuts and rules-of-thumb to manage their lives and avoid analysis-paralysis.
- Shortcuts make for easier decision-making (another statement of the obvious).
- Shortcuts and Rules-of-Thumb are sometimes completely inappropriate and cause major errors in judgement.
- Our problem is identifying a priori, when they are a help and when a hindrance?
Yes it’s cruel and stupid. They used to say we Gen X’ers were lazy and good for nothing:
.
It’s a terrible thing to generalize about generations and treat a decent hardworking X’er like one of those baby boomer arseholes or fuckwit Y’ers.
Zombie ideas are one of the things that I find rather puzzling about the humanities side of academia. How does one take the silver dagger (or the double-barreled shottie, or whatever other weapon one is supposed to use for this purpose) to a zombie idea over your side of the fence?
I’ve enjoyed the fact that the Woodstock thing has essentially undercut itself: the very idea that the half-million or so blissing out on peace, love and understanding apparently all voted for Nixon and Reagan and became as materialistic as billy-o. I’ve heard plenty of earnest explanations of this paradox, but those who try to maintain the generationalist thing tend to get stuck and find it difficult to get out, or lead anywhere worth going.
Robert Merkel @12: “How does one take the silver dagger … to a zombie idea…?”
I thought the gold standard was to expand on the zombie idea, blow it up to maximum dimensions, then due to inherent tensions it explodes with a satisfying bang!
Well, that was the theory.
Doesn’t always work…outcome depends a bit on the audience.
Sometimes one just has to be content with imagining a satisfying bang.
Picking up on Elsie@10. Someone who’s name eludes for the moment came up with this.
- Ignorance is innocence – complicated explanations are suspect.
- Certainty is strength, doubt is weakness.
- Changing one’s mind means one has wasted the time spent holding the prior opinion.
- When a person has studied a topic, he has no more real knowledge than you do, just a hidden agenda.
- The contemplative lemming gets trampled.
- Popular beliefs must be true – and even if a popular belief doesn’t pan out, at least you’ll be in the same boat as everyone else.
- Causality is selectable.
- All interconnection is apparent – otherwise, complicated explanations would be necessary.
- The end supports the explanation of the means.
- A successful person’s explanation of the means of his success is highly credible by the very fact of his success.
- You can succeed by emulating the purported behavior of successful people
- Your idol gets the blame if things don’t work out, not you.
- You have a right to your share – and you get to define your share.
- Your share is the least you will accept without crying injustice.
- If it’s good for you, it’s good.
- Society is everyone else.
- Good intentions suffice and consequences are things that happen to others.
- Only you can hold yourself accountable. Don’t let others make you do that.
- There are evil people and institutions, and surely one of them is more responsible than you are.
- An ugly image means a bad mirror.
- Tragedy is a synonym for calamity
- Bad things are never consequences of one’s own action or inaction.
A sixties to eighties collection of left wing mantras now become an eighties to noughties collection of right mantras.
Incidentally John Q, still looking for a subtitle for “Zombie Economics”?
“Dead Ideas That Walk Among Us.”
“I Walked With A Freidmanite”
“The Voodoo That Wasn’t Done So Well”
“Dead Plan Walking”
“an eighties to noughties collection of right mantras.”
Sigh. Insert “wing” between “right” and “mantras”.
And fuck “The Blue Angel”, now listening to Arthur “Crazy World Of ” Brown’s concept album “Vampire Love”. It’s not great but certainly not batshit either.
Robot or troll?
Completely agree with you about the overuse of generational generalizations. But generational analysis is getting more, not less, popular, so we might as well deal with it as accurately as possible. My main problem is with those who still don’t include as a full bona fide distinct cohort those born between the Boomers and Xers: Generation Jones. It’s ridiculous to still lump Jonesers in with Boomers or Xers.
It is important to distinguish between the post-WWII demographic boom in births vs. the cultural generations born during that era. Generations are a function of the common formative experiences of its members, not the fertility rates of its parents. Many experts now believe it breaks down more or less this way:
DEMOGRAPHIC boom in babies: 1946-1964
Baby Boom GENERATION: 1942-1953
Generation Jones: 1954-1965
Generation X: 1966-1978
HD4007, while you are at it, could you please give us the generational generalization for the Jones Generation?
Is this as in “keeping up with the…”?
Who are these “many experts” HD4007?
I think you are talking through your bottom.
HD4007 has ludicrously neglected to mention Generation Griswold whose dates are 3 June to 26 June 1957.
There’s an interesting article out there somewhere on Generation Jones, I’ll try and hunt it down.
The identifying factor for a Jones is grinding our teeth because we missed the Summer of Love and all that and got knocked off career course by the 1990s recession, yet cop all the flak that the early boomers do about being (supposedly) rich old hippies. WHERE’S MY BEACH HOUSE WHERE IS IT I WANT IT NOW… Ahem.
Don’t know if I’m talking through my bottom here, Grace Pettigrew, but I find that most generalisations about individuals, groups or people at large, whether young or old, are informed mostly by the observer’s perspective and prejudice. Whenever people complain about the “yoof of today” I recall my revered headmistress, also our classics teacher, quoting that observation of Socrates referred to by John Quiggin. That would have been around 1949 just before I myself joined the younger generation of the mid 1950s who received their serve of criticism as spivs and layabouts.
What is it about late adolescents and young men and women which so excites some people to criticism? I suspect it comes from a deep longing to recapture one’s own youth, to recover since mis-spent years and to make a better job of it all.
Through many years of teaching, and even today, I found myself in the reverse position, but perhaps with the same unconscious motivation. I have always loved sixteen to eighteen year olds, not just because their formerly childish minds suddenly somehow matured into rationality, but because they seemed to love study and questioning and finding answers. And they were so much fun! And beautiful too! And so wanting to make the world a better place.
I still see these “golden lads and lasses” everywhere, on bikes, on busses and at the beach. There are just as many of them around as ever. Thank goodness.
Patricia @22: “Through many years of teaching, … And they were so much fun! And beautiful too! And so wanting to make the world a better place.”
More power to you Patricia!
You sound like a happy optimistic person.
I bet you were an inspiring teacher, and well loved too!
I found myself in the reverse position, but perhaps with the same unconscious motivation. I have always loved sixteen to eighteen year olds, not just because their formerly childish minds suddenly somehow matured into rationality, but because they seemed to love study and questioning and finding answers. And they were so much fun! And beautiful too! And so wanting to make the world a better place.
I still see these “golden lads and lasses” everywhere, on bikes, on busses and at the beach. There are just as many of them around as ever. Thank goodness.
Oh, me too! I went to a school function last night at our scary, scary public school, you know where the yoof are all taggers and paint sniffers. No. I love dem.
Your heart-warming non sequitur threw me a bit off course, PatriciaWA@22, but I still want to know whether HD4007 can tell us who the “many experts” referred to @17 are…truth is, I am not sure that HD4007 actually has a bottom…might be a robot.
HD4007 ia indeed a robot. It appeared with the identical comment and link at my blog, immediately under my signoff noting that I am a member of Generation Jones.
Thank you quiggers…
I also second Patricia WA.
We had dinner with some Uni lecturers and a group of 2nd, 3rd year undergrads some years back. “How could you not enjoy your job?” my very wise wife said to one of the lecturers afterwards.
cheerio
Grace Pettigrew, thanks, glad you found it heart warming, but you rightly set me wondering how I segued into that particular non-sequitur…it was Quiggins reference to Socrates, of course.
This may not follow logically either, but talk about the Woodstock generation and others threw me further back to the nuclear disarmament campaigners of the late fifties and early sixties. If HD4007 is correct and “generations are a function of the common formative experiences of (their) members” it’s interesting that this particular generation hasn’t rated a mention here. They were predominantly young people all over the world who were either aware in 1945 when those bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki or soon were growing up to learn about and be appalled by those events of their recent past.
I was trying to follow Fran Barlow’s argument in last Saturday’s Salon about America’s responsibility (guilt no less!) for this and I was surprised at the strong feelings it aroused in myself and the astonishing tenacity with which the counter argument was pursued, which I was at first tempted to support.
I have no depth of historical knowledge about those years so I refrained from contributing to the thread, particularly since I knew that mine was a purely emotional rejection of Fran’s case. For over fifty years I have believed and wanted to go on doing so that dropping those bombs brought an early end to the war and saved countless thousands of lives. To have believed otherwise was unthinkable and would have diverted me from my biological and social imperatives of marriage and producing children.
Judging by the way the world now is most of my own and subsequent generations were of like mind. Now I have a different and more conflicted view, informed by a better understanding of how the complexities and contradictions of American imperialism and isolationism have impacted on the world and the global environment.
Does a concern for the planet help us to transcend generational generalisations?
Yes, I think so Patricia, particularly if you have the luxury of advanced age, and the wisdom (and emotional intelligence) that accrues…and the delightful prospect and huge responsibility of influencing the thoughts and attitudes of young grandchildren!