Agreed. I know myself, I don’t see myself as a Gen X’er nor a Baby Boomer. I was born in 1966 so there is a niche generation called “Generation Jones” that had elements of both Boomers and X’ers. I see myself in “Generation Jones.” I guess when it comes to similar experiences in growing up and so forth, I think generations do apply there but as you put it, we are individuals too. It is like when Glenn Beck, born in 1964, talks about how his family loaded up in the station wagon and did this and that, I’m two years younger so I remember the same things, I could be his baby brother. B-) Yes, we have lazy people but I think you’re right where dues to government policies and the layoffs of our parents from industrial jobs, there is a jaded cynicism out there. I know I feel it, many of us in our ages, let alone the ones following us, are very cynical one way or another when it comes to jobs, business and government. Most of us generally know how things should work and so on, but in the real world, because of our downward slide, it is hard not to be cynical and even depressed.
I was born in 1956 and I really don’t consider myself a “Boomer” either. I think generations are defined more by events that define them. The Boomer’s was Vietnam. By the time I turned 18 the draft was over and the war was winding down. College radicalism was on the wane and pretty much gone by the time I graduated. It really was a different experience.