‘Geriatric Millennials’: 4 better ways to say that

Let’s face it. Generations are hard — and hard on each other.

Millennial takes selfie

Photo by Christine Warner via Flickr, licensed under Creative Commons 2.0

The convenient but arbitrary cutoff dates that cleave generations always leave some people on the cutting room floor.

Start with the fact that the labels are usually imposed by other people and add the situation that people at the cusps of generations have more in common with the people who came before them in the previous generation or the one that comes up next.

Word that leading edge Millennials born between 1980 and 1985 (we have two sons in that mini-bracket) are being called “Geriatric Millennials” does not sit well with many of them. Some are cross. Some are meh. And some have alternatives. And you thought Gen X had attitude.

Lizzy Acker, a Millennial who knows when she is being called old, wrote about four alternatives for Oregonian:

The Oregon Trail Generation

The Home Alone Generation

The Book It Generation

Millennial

Check out Acker’s reasons. They make sense. And you can see how she dressed when she and a Millennial co-worker pitched the so-so-Millennial idea of a pop culture blog for KQED radio in 2012.

“100 Questions and Answers About Gen X and 100 Questions About Millennials” is available in one double guide from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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