Recently, when 25-year-old New Zealand politician, Chlöe Swarbrick, was interrupted by an older MP during her speech in the parliament, she resorted to using the term ‘OK boomer’, which has been making the rounds in the internet of late. Ever since, her response has gone viral online again. While some people described the witty remark as ageist, others engaged in a war of words.
From ‘
baby boomers
’ to ‘snowflakes’, here’re some of the generation nicknames that have, over the decades, made their way into common parlance…
Baby Boomer
This term is used to refer to a person born during a ‘baby boom’. Specifically, it refers to people born after the Second World War (between 1946 and 1964) in the UK and the US. Today, the viral internet slang ‘OK boomer’ is used by youngsters to point out the perspectives of the older generations that they find disconnected or disagreeable. The retort is often used when young adults find that the older generation do not understand the issues they face, and are fed up with the same.
People born in the 1960s and 1970s, particularly in the US, are often termed ‘Generation X’. Sometimes, this generation is also referred to as the ‘latchkey generation’, meaning they were raised by working parents and were left alone at home after school. Apparently, this ‘independence’ defined their personal identity to a great extent. During their formative years, they were also often dubbed the ‘generation that had no clear direction in their lives’.
While they were initially described as ‘Generation Y’, the term ‘millennials’ is what this generation is popularly known as. These are individuals born between the early 1980s and the mid-1990s. Some also consider the late 1990s and the early 2000s to be part of the millennial generation. This often refers to the set of adults, who are most adept at using the internet and are constantly evolving in terms of technology. They are also called the generation that constantly strives to have a good work-life balance. Millennials are sometimes called the ‘
snowflake
generation’ by the ‘baby boomers’, because ‘they get easily upset and offended’.
The Silent Generations
While not used much in the current lingo, the term ‘silent generation’ usually refers to those born in between 1925 and 1945 — a period when speaking out was apparently considered dangerous. It is interesting to note that Generation Z, which is used to refer to people born after 2000, especially in the US and Western Europe, is being called the ‘new
silent generation
’, given the amount of time they are expected to spend online.
