1965 is when Generation X began not 1961. NY Times ought to fact check and ego check. Graff image shown here is by ZEPHYR

Stacy Fine
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Ms. Slattala- here is one online source, happens to be the top hit for Q: "What year did Generation X begin?" Please read the first sentence. The (y)earmark is 1965.
FACT CHECK: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_X
I am posting this at my blog at Reality Sandwich w/ your response when it arrives and on my Facebook too. This is fun in a totally X manner:) Please rant back asap?

Begin forwarded message: From: Stacy Fine <stacyfine@earthlink.net> Date: December 16, 2008 10:09:51 AM EST To: Ms. Michelle Slatalla <slatalla@nytimes.com> Subject: 1965 not 1961! a hardcore opinion re: "Generation X-Getting Younger By the Moment" NY Times 12/11/8
Ms. Slatalla,

I am 99% sure that Gen X begins in 1965, in fact I would bet my house in Woodstock, NY on it. How do you come up with 1961? Please explain because I have researched this and it is apparent that those who were born pre-65 have very different financial, social, philosophical, economic stats and tastes than those of earlier years. 1965 is when the music went electric and out of the box. (will follow up w/ more proof.) I will research some more too to back this up (I have 2 kids and I'm in a rush to appointment.)

Douglas Coupland and Steven Blush would be the authorities on the subject and it is the subject of a book I'm working on as well. 1965 is the year that everything changed according to many musicians (rock) that I know. Sure some punk/new wavers put down hippies, but we were largely children of divorce, experimentalists and inheritors of DIY-- too young to be at Studio 54 but made it through the door quite easily regardless and many a girl was preyed upon by self-seeking (indulgent) boomers. Disco babies, club kids, hippie-punks and junior Parkies in NYC, we are a different tribe w/ different issues. Why would you say we frowned on Michael Lang's concert that changed the world? Pot? Some smoked some didn't, but NY State's greatest activist is an Xer and yr friends would die to get their hands on some seriously great herb. Chateaux Margot is nice but too pricey for most Xers who grew up on grunge and PBR a la David Lynch's BLUE VELVET. Eraserhead was our hero. The Beasties who were similar in age if not half of them exactly b. 1965-- they saluted Jimi Hendrix on "Jimi" (on "Some Early Bullshit" CD) and the Bad Brains were into Mahavishnu Orchestra. We grew up on punk and dead rock stars, funk and soul, oldies, new fluffy pop, reggae and discovering jazz n' blues and world beat on our own in collections and record shops, much like yourself. We were most influenced by Casey Casem's Top 40, Led Zeppelin, Bowie,The Grateful Dead, Stones and found the Beatles on our own-- etc, etc. The movies? Don't get me started, but seeing Tommy at age 8 was really cool. How old were you when you saw Twyla Tharp/ Milos Forman's HAIR? How old were you at ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW? Were you in the audience or in the stage show? If you saw Patti Smith early on like PISS FACTORY than you were of a very different generation that I frown to say are baby boomers. Patti was the gift given firsthand to our older sibs, while we played dress-up at home and waited for good movies on TV, but didn't go to Max's yet. I promise 1961'ers made a hell of a lot more money than X'ers and have a better employment record for sure.

Mr. Barack is a boomer. If he wasn't he would have pulled some combat troops out of Iraq immediately. He is too conservative to be an X'er. My husband can affirm this, he wrote the first book about HIP HOP titled HIP HOP and he was born in 1951. When did things change? 1/1/ 1965= garage rock and the 13th Floor Elevators, post Kennedy assassination, beginning of the crux of civil rights, Kent State, Velvet Underground, 1968 revolution (France) etc. See Bob Dylan to defend yr opinion or prove for or against mine.... Bad Brains played Rock Against Racism in 1980 while you were able to support yrself in college or grad school, travel the globe w/o People's Express and achieve stable marriages, incomes and not really care as much as Sue Coe and Jenny Holtzer about Reaganomix (guns no butter.) Do you have a masters degree? Most of your friends I assume here have (got luck) for 2 houses or kids at private schools and colleges? I am skeptical of your reportage and affluent egotistical style. Everyone I know besides myself who attempted marriage in the 90's is divorced w/ no kids. + really, who would have kids post 9/11? Only people who don't live in reality. I had one in 2000 and gave him a brother just to get through this lifetime with "together" consciousness, not the selfish attitude of a boomer who would put fancy furniture, doorpersons and haute cuisine first. My generation (X) and the hippies insisted on organic food first, the kids of Gen X won't be in the White House for years to come. BTW the formerly named Ms. Ali Wentworth married George Stephanopoulos. Ask George where the X'ers are today, they precede his wife's age entirely and she is just one year or more (prob 2 yrs) older than I. I ask this because he is a young elder spokesperson smart and qualified enough to comment au sujet. I know this 1965 idea is more accurately TRUE than you claim for Obama's contemporaries, so please defend in any way you wish why you think Obama is an X'er? I disagree entirely.

Rantingly yours,

Stacy Fine
ps- Oh yeah, the problems the youth (adolescents) enjoy today were secretive rarities when I was young and suffering--parental abandonment, deadbeat dads, anorexia... the whole nine--now all these problems have been explored and are "popularly acceptable problems" which are feeding boomer therapists' kids around the junkyard of a country your generation handed to us. "X" values are different. They include compassion and recovery, leaving the past behind because that is what created the dumb mess we are dealing w/ now. I don't even believe in money and I know AIM stands for AMERICAN INDIAN MOVEMENT. Look at Obama's cabinet. Is there anyone as young as he in there? NO. He is a boomer who wants to be surrounded by his elders and contemporaries. Shock value is not his strategy, truly a characteristic of X'ers. If he wanted to rock the world harder he would have used a Marley (Wailers) or James Brown song in his campaign to lift our spirits. Change? Buddy can you spare a dime?

LOVE + PEACE+ HEALTH,

Stacy

Comments

^wow

Submitted by Damien on Tue, 12/16/2008 - 14:46.
Informa infraction. ;)