The Xennials (The Oregon Trail Generation)

Most of the Xennials’ cul­ture has van­ished — but not all of it.

The micro-gen­er­a­tion born between the years 1977 – 1983 has been labelled The Oregon Trail Generation, named after the sem­in­al video game. Other names include The Xennials, The Carter Babies, Generation Y, and Generation Catalano. We grew up with one foot in the ana­logue world and the oth­er in the digital. 

One day, the Xennials will be “the last gen­er­a­tion that remem­bers and lived a life before the Internet.”

I was born in 1979 in Sweden. In 1987, at 7 – 8 years old, I gathered my sav­ings and bought a com­puter, the now-legendary Commodore 64. Growing up meant play­ing not only Commodore 64 but also Atari, Amiga, Sega, and Nintendo with friends. 

And yes, I played Oregon Trail and many oth­er games like it.

As 90s teen­agers, The Xennials, The Oregon Trail Generation, grew up watch­ing My So-Called Life, Beverly Hills 90210, Melrose Place, and Friends. We listened to Nirvana, Guns N’ Roses — and that par­tic­u­lar brand of artsy but upbeat pop that the 90s had to offer. We were socially con­scious but not rebel­li­ous. We suffered nor­mal levels of teen­age angst and were all iden­tity-seekers with no com­mon goal to unite around.

But all of that is in the past. And we have since moved on.

Today, we find ourselves amidst a hyper­bol­ic cul­ture war, where both extremes grav­it­ate towards oddit­ies like iden­tity polit­ics, semi-organ­ised online bul­ly­ing, and can­cel cul­ture. I’m afraid I must dis­agree with either side of this war or any point along the diag­on­al between them.

It begs me, “What’s my cul­ture — and where did it go?”

Here’s my hypo­thes­is: Xennials, as a gen­er­a­tion­al cohort, struggle to nav­ig­ate the cul­ture wars. We can­not come to terms with today’s zeit­geist. We want to — but it eludes us.

When exactly, we ask ourselves while scratch­ing our Xennial heads in bewil­der­ment, did the vil­lains become the heroes?

To us, it’s simple: We know we’re not spe­cial. In Tyler Durden’s words, “You’re not your job. You’re not how much money you have in the bank. You’re not the car you drive. You’re not the con­tents of your wal­let. You’re not your fuck­ing kha­kis. You’re the all-singing, all-dan­cing crap of the world.”

We all have per­son­al struggles, but no one gets a free “douchebag pass.” Sure, Xander had a rough go grow­ing up, and he also wasn’t chosen to be a vam­pire killer like Buffy or bestowed with magic­al powers like Willow, but he opted to be a good friend.

People some­times dis­agree and fight, but bullish and selfish beha­viour is a symp­tom of per­son­al trauma. If today’s polit­ic­al cli­mate were an epis­ode of My So-Called Life or Beverly Hills 90210, both sides would even­tu­ally have to deal with their emo­tion­al baggage.

Some con­ver­sa­tions are uncom­fort­able, but that means that they must be had. And then we need to move the fuck on. Hate will only fester and trans­form its bear­ers into those dark creatures of the Upside Down in Stranger Things.

Still, I don’t think our sense of being out-of-sync has any­thing to do with the cur­rent state of pub­lic affairs. As a small and unas­sum­ing gen­er­a­tion between Generation X and the Millennials, I guess we some­how for­got to pro­tect our values:

Honesty. Vulnerability. Tolerance. Acceptance. Support.

Instead, the Xennials have been con­di­tioned to bridge back and forth between two large cohorts. Like a gen­er­a­tion­al middle child, we’ve made our beds as we go — los­ing much of our cul­tur­al identity. 

Generation X pro­mote self-right­eous­ness and cyn­icism, while Millennials grav­it­ate toward emo­tion­al safety and enti­tle­ment. So, when Generation X accuses Millennials of being entitled and uncool, we chime in. And we chime in when Millennials accuse Generation X of fuck­ing up the plan­et and being laggards.

If we, a quiet micro-gen­er­a­tion, have pre­served any dis­tinc­tions or hall­marks, what are they?
Do we even have any cul­tur­al fea­tures left?

While most of what used to be our cul­ture has van­ished, I think that one char­ac­ter­ist­ic remains: Xennials still frown upon douchebag­gery, that type of mega­lo­mania that seems so prom­in­ent in today’s me-culture. 

Read also: The Selfie Generation — An Epidemic of Online Narcissism

I can­’t ima­gine them as poten­tial friends when meet­ing people who brag about their her­it­age, status, careers, achieve­ments, hard­ships, spe­cial interests, per­sua­sions, or tal­ents. Like, “Ross, spare us that lec­ture on palae­on­to­logy, please.”

Your qual­it­ies are defined not by how you self-identi­fy but by how you behave towards your friends. Anyone is wel­come to stop by and hang out; just don’t put on airs.

Case in point: My wife was born in 1982, and we share these micro-cul­tur­al pref­er­ences. Whenever we have a couple of hours to spare, we hang out. It’s like an epis­ode of Friends where our liv­ing room is our Central Perk. I could nev­er see myself liv­ing with someone who doesn’t put being a good friend first.

I think that the Xennial gen­er­a­tion still shares this deeply rooted anti-douchebag­gery pref­er­ence. If you want to play rich on Instagram or brag about your hip­ster hob­bies, I’m sorry: you’re an asshole.

Ultimately, at least to us, your char­ac­ter is a choice.
And — it’s the only choice that truly matters.

If noth­ing else, mor­al char­ac­ter choices were the cent­ral theme of our pop-cul­tur­al upbring­ing; it’s that man­dat­ory socially-con­scious epis­ode of every weekly tele­vi­sion drama or sit­com for an entire teen­age dec­ade. We want to hang out, be nice, and play video games with friends. 

Do you want to be a social justice war­ri­or to show the world how pure you are? Do you want to wield the con­ser­vat­ive axe in the fight against lib­er­al snow­flakes? Do you think your emo­tion­al bag­gage makes you more “spe­cial” than oth­ers? Maybe you have many social media fol­low­ers; per­haps your car is nice? 

That’s fine; you do you. 

But if you want to get in with the Xennials, don’t for­get what it means to be a friend. Check your ego bull­shit at the door, and come lounge with us. We have sofas and tea.