Yesterday at work, I had the pleasure of viewing a presentation about a specific age demographic. This well-known organization had a name for the group (but I think it's proprietary.) It was those people who bridge the gap between the Gen Xers and the Millennials.
However, that is not what the invite said initial. Instead, it said how it was going to discuss the oldest Millennials, and then it shared the age range 25 - 34. So, at first I was quite confused, because this would include me ... and I've never considered myself a Millennial. So, I was grateful for the clarification at the beginning when they explained it was those at the very end of the Xers and the beginning of the Millennials. For some reason, I could feel more comfortable with that label (if we must be labeled.)
I didn't learn anything new from the presentation, just nodded, was sort of amazed at the questions asked and sometimes started to think about the weekend. There was one part of the presentation that did take me by surprise. They explained that they asked the different generations to pick a movie that they felt like defined their generation. First they showed the boomers, and there were movies like Star Wars, American Graffiti. Then they asked us what we thought the Xers picked. I immediately thought Reality Bites, Singles ... nope, Xers selected The Breakfast Club and St. Elmo's Fire. My gut said, man, those are old movies (but after talking to D tonight, who is in the middle of Gen X - he validated that those were the right movies. Then they showed the bridge group ... and I was sadly disappointed. While movies like The Breakfast Club showed up on the word cloud ... the movie most frequently mentioned was The Hangover.
Really? Really? We are saying this movie defined us as a generation ... a situation where you don't remember what happened about the night before. A movie I had to force myself to watch to convince myself that I would at some point find the humor. (Sorry fans of the movie, this one just didn't go over in my house.) They showed us what younger Millennials picked and they had options like Mean Girls. Okay, I get that, it's relevant its about people in that age category ... so again, The Hangover? Right when I was finally feeling somewhat comfortable being categorized ... it all came crashing down.
So, here's to no labels.
1 comment:
I've heard us called generation Y before in real estate seminars. Hangover is too new of a movie! That seems ridiculous. Should be a movie from the late 90s.
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