As an elder millenial I’d like to proudly declare I have never gone to and escape room or axe throwing because those would require some sort of social interaction.
I drink a lot of IPAs though, you don’t need to speak to people to do that.
TIL I’m a zoomer. Sheesh skibbidi rizz Ohio
That’s more alpha than zoomer.
What’s a zoomer? Old gen Z?
On God, no cap All facts no printer
Caps lock, no fax urinal
no fax
That’s something I can get behind, even if it’s at a urinal.
Does your urinal require a cover letter?
What’s the range of birth years for being one ?
As a millennial I share these qualities with zoomers. I wish I had friends to go axe throwing with.
I wish I had friends
I knew it, I’m just a zoomer born early.
As much as the whole generation thing is made up, sometimes being a zillenial (late millennial/early gen z) really makes one feel left out of everything
As you get older you will eventually be considered both. For example people who grew up believing they were gen X might technically be labeled millennial nows. Like there are millennials who are in their 40s
Being old millennial is weird too, most millennials think I grew up in the 50s compared to their life experience. The generation gap between me and my dad is what kind of manual car with a carburetor and hand crank windows we consider ‘‘new’’ looking. But I entered the job market at EXACTLY housing bubble burst. And I was worried I’d get drafted for Iraq, but, alas it thankfully didn’t happen.
The Gen Z bit is accurate, at least for current college students. I’m amazed at how little they do, how few relationships they have, etc. I actually feel quite bad for them.
Older Gen Z here. Getting involved in community organising helps.
I feel bad that I don’t see kids outside playing anymore, but I definitely see less young people out drinking and driving and getting into fights and shit as a plus in my book.
I also feel quite bad for us.
I just generally feel bad.
hug
Even the hugs feel bad now
It’s hard when everyone is doing the same thing, there’s a very strong force pulling you in that direction
The kids aren’t alright
GenZ has fallen victim to car culture and commodification of literally everything. There are no places to go and many younger people never even knew different. Life’s only affordable or respectable in the 'burbs where there’s nothing to do and nowhere to go without a car. Meanwhile inner cities with intact structures are bulldozed for more car infrastructure or unusable because of traffic.
Everywhere people can go costs money. Even the internet is no commons any more, peer pressure pushes people into walled gardens where algorithms push brainrot.
You can’t blame the people being affected by our literally unlivable world. It’s been getting worse for some time now and in some aspects millennials had it worse than gen X who had it worse than the boomers. No single generation is to blame for losing the class war, however I hold every single person not fighting against the capitalist class accountable.
I’ve just spent my evening nit leaving the house drinking wine and playing hell let lose with nt wife sitting behind ne playing the sims.
That’s peak millennial in my opinion
Yoooo - played Elden Ring whilst SO played TOTK on the same couch drinking wine and then we went to bed and totally didn’t do it because we’re both super tired 🙌 Peak Saturday Night Millennial Club
I played on my Steam Deck while my SO watched some drama last night, and we ended the evening w/ my SO bawling into my shoulder about something emotional that happened, which I had no context for but still gave some emotional support for.
Seems pretty Millenial to me as well. 😀
Old millennial here. Want to drink at home by yourself while I drink at home by myself?
Late xennial here, you’re a little late, but sure.
We drinking again? I still haven’t stopped from last night.
(stares at naked wrist) it’s blur o’clock, I can’t remember when the fuck I started, and I pretty sure I’m on an entirely different goddamn continent than the one I started on. So far it’s going pretty drink.
We can drink at home by ourselfs while hanging out in the same discord chat
This is the way
Edit: (to add some actual discussion) it’s honestly really nice since Ubers are getting expensive and no one will drink and drive. Sure it’s not the same as hanging out in person but it’s the next best thing.
Actually for real it is, my buddies and I just hang out and drink and smoke and have a gay old time. Maybe we’re all playing dufferent games, sometimes maybe somebody or nobody is playing nothing just chilling.
FR, this is what my wife and I do. We’ll get on a group call and chill with friends separately. Sometimes the same game, sometimes not. Less stress, saves money, still fun.
I already started
But I fucked up, I’m with friends now and beyond drunk.
🍻
Gen X here. When I get bored I go out to eat by myself. Without the drinking though. I’m lonely, not gonna lie.
When I am bored I go to the explosion museum of naval firepower. Its next to a brewery.
Explosion Museum of Naval Firepower
Wtf its an actual place! The name sounds so ridiculous i’s not sure if you were havin a laugh or not. :)
It’s a real place and a couple years ago I had a years ticket to go in as often as I like and take the ferry around the harbour to see other things too like the historic dockyard (Victory, Warrior, Mary Rose) and the submarine museum. All included in that one ticket. It wasn’t even that expensive really. Lasted for a year.
Wow! The Mary Rose… you just sent me down memory lane. I hadn’t thought about that ship in decades. So i saw that ship when it was still going through that water treatment business. Blew my mind then, i’s really young at the time.
And now i realise i’ve been to Portsmouth, we were staying over in Eastbourne at the time.
The trip was full of museums and castle visits all over the south of England at least between Battle and Tintagel. So we could easily have been to the Explosion museum as well. I’ll have to dig out the old scrap books and see if somethings written in them about it.
The years ticket to all of those sounds like a great way to spend some weekends, get to enjoy the harbour as well.
Looks like its £51 normally for unlimited access to everything for a year. Not sure how often they do it, I got it much cheaper because they were doing it for a pretty good discount for anyone with a PO postcode. Not sure if it was literally every PO postcode or just some of them.
38yo recovering alcoholic, I feel you. Losing pretty much the only way people socialize sucks.
I have a partner I love, still enjoy being alone when I can.
I would too. I get overloaded on social interaction pretty quickly.
Before ipas we had really light stuff, browner stuff and black stuff. It was a little boring
I’m kind of on the border between Gen Z and a millennial (1994) so I enjoy brainrot content but going out to go axe throwing or going to an escape room and having some drinks sounds amazing too. I wish I had friends to do that with :(
We exist, come find us. 😁
TIL I’m a 35 year old zoomer.
I don’t drink because I don’t wanna, and I don’t leave the house often because everything is too expensive. Home is nice and I have everything I need here. I’m basically a mid-40s zoomer I guess.
Same but also I don’t have any friends to go out with anyway, to fill out the full requirement I guess.
yes i do want to do the escape room axe throwing thing
I do not trust certain friends around throwing axes precisely because they’re way into the idea of throwing axes
Then do it!
zoomers don’t leave the house because the world is currently on fire
It’s been burning since the world’s been turning
We didn’t light it, but we’re trynna fight it…
But we didn’t start the fire!
thats not an excuse to be even more miserable. not that i dont do this too but still.
… and if you’re a stick (or a plant in general), the best thing you can do in that case is to not leave the house.
Sometimes the best thing a flower can do is die
…wait I think that’s the wrong reference
if you’re a plant, throw some seeds, bury them, hope they’ll make it once the climate’s better.
World has always been on fire
Shit sentiment tbh. The climate crisis has never been as bad, we’re also experiencing the fastest mass extinction event in history. Far right parties dismantle democracies around the world, there’s nowhere to go if you wanted to flee (besides, mass surveillance, border militarization and growing xenophobia made escaping much harder than it used to be). Life has rarely been as expensive as it is currently. So no, the world has never been as on fire as it is right now.
What control do you have over any of that? Adjust how much you focus on something by how much you can control it, and you’ll be much happier.
Yeah, the climate crisis is bad, and has been for 50+ years, it’s just getting a lot more media attention lately. Yes, politics is a mess (always has been), but it’s getting a lot more media attention lately. Surveillance is bad, but rights have always been stripped as much as the powers that be can get away with, it’s just a lot more accessible these days w/ technological progress.
Life has rarely been as expensive as it is currently.
Life is around the cheapest it has ever been, if you exclude the last few years or so of inflation, at least in terms of what a typical person can afford. The main problem I see today is that access to credit (i.e. spending more than you have) is so prevalent, so many people get themselves into trouble by spending beyond their means.
If you focus on what you can control and do your best with that, you’ll be a lot happier. This means:
- read less news - you’re more likely to get stressed than find something actionable
- spend less time on social media - social media loves to hyper-focus on a handful of things it dislikes (e.g. climate change)
- spend more time doing things you enjoy - get out in nature, work on hobbies, learn something new, etc
- look for ways to improve your financial situation instead of wasting what little you have medicating the first two bullet points here
Doing more of things that make you happy and less of things that stress you out. Generally speaking, you’ll be better off that way, and your capacity to fix the things that stress you out will increase.
Thanks for your effort post.
However, disconnecting from reality is not a good strategy imo. Too many libs care more about brunch than about climate change which is partly why we’re so deep in shit.
You might be right about affordability of fringe high tech products and fashion, but at least four generations before us had almost guaranteed housing. Now, buying a house is impossible and renting is expensive as fuck. My financial situation is fine (luckily) but seeing people around me struggle does not make me feel great tbh.
The advice that helped me way more than any of the calendar mottos you had to offer was ‘get organized’ and ‘improve your behavior’. I joined a party and local mutual aid orgs, stopped eating meat, sold my car, and stopped flying. Now I’m at peace because I know, even if everything goes to shit, it’s not my fault and I did everything I could. Put me mentally in a very good place.
disconnecting from reality is not a good strategy imo
I’m not suggesting that, I’m suggesting reality is broader than whatever comes in a news feed. You have limited time and energy, so it’s best to spend that on things you can impact instead of stressing about things you can’t.
Details about circle of control vs circle of interest
I like the book 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, and in it the author breaks things into three groups (image version):
- circle of concern
- circle of influence
- circle of control
You should be spending time from bottom up, and the more you do that, the more those circles will expand.
For example, let’s say you’re concerned about climate change, but you’re currently not equipped to do much about it. Instead of spending time worrying about it, focus on other parts of your life to become able to do something about it. Get your financial situation in order by getting a good job and getting some savings. With that, you’ll have flexibility to get even better jobs (skill up, take risks, etc), and you can eventually scale back your work and focus on policy (e.g. lobby for legislative change, or even run for office).
If you hyperfocus on what’s wrong w/ the world but don’t grow your ability to deal with it, you’ll just become depressed and angry, and that doesn’t get you anywhere. Instead, grow your capacity to impact the world first, and you’ll eventually be able to solve those problems.
four generations before us had almost guaranteed housing
That’s just not true.
TL;DR - housing ownership is increasing, but getting later in life
Here’s some stats for the last 130 or so years for homeownership rates in the US. It has kind of plateaued, probably because there will always be a fairly large part of the population that prefers to rent, as well as a large portion who hasn’t yet gotten the means to own (e.g. young people).
What has changed is the average age of first time home buyers. There are a lot of potential reasons for this, but one key factor is that the percentage of homeowners who are married is reducing. That means a higher overall demand for housing since people are expecting to live separately or have more fluid living arrangements.
There’s a far more recent affordability problem though, which stems from supply chain disruptions during COVID, which caused new construction to fall off a cliff. That trickles down to all types of housing, including apartments. That’s not a generations-long problem though.
In the past, multiple generations lived together, whereas today, everyone seems to want to live separately. It’s a complex issue, but I don’t see the trend you claim exists.
it’s not my fault
That’s part of what I’m talking about, but just saying, “did my part, screw you” isn’t the right solution either. The proper solution is to improve your ability to make an impact. Start with your own personal sustainability, then increase to local issues (help keep your parks and rivers clean), regional areas (push for local regulations/taxes to reduce pollution), and eventually more broad (lobby/run for office).
A lot of people get stuck even before the first step, they get overwhelmed at the things they can’t control and waste what few resources they had, instead of conserving them and growing what they’re able to control.
Delusional
I feel called out, somehow by both.
Me too, and I’m Gen X.
