MOTUS A.D.: Viva la Vida: Homeland Version

Monday, October 13, 2014

Viva la Vida: Homeland Version

Heads up people! It’s time to name another generation. And since there has been an ongoing fight over who falls into which generation, the White House has stepped in to resolve this controversy. Yes, none other than the White House has weighed in to determine what the next generation is to be called and in what year that designation should commence. So don’t tell me we aren’t attending to business around here.

While the chart says “Census Bureau” at the bottom remember that since the Age of Obama “Census” reports directly to the White House.

I note that the WWII generation is referred to as the “Silent Generation,” Tom Brokaw not withstanding

Previously handled by those with the most vested interest – marketers – generational naming has now joined the White House’s seemingly unlimited list of “things we can politicize to our advantage.” So in a report on the youth of today released last week, the post-Millennials have been dubbed the “Homeland” Generation. That’s right, the first generation named after a TV show:

The title is eerily reminiscent of the Showtime political thriller series Homeland which documents an unstable world of surveillance and terrorism in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.

I find the name just a bit ironic since, as something like half of this group will have entered this generational designation from a “homeland” other than ours.

Or maybe not

Of course there is still plenty of controversy surrounding this generational designation, as reported in the WaPo. Even a casual observer might wonder why the ~~White House~~ Census Bureau chart shows some generations that include only 15 years (Gen-X) while others cover nearly 25 years (Millennials). Could it be trouble with our number bonds again?

The marketeers, who used to have a lock on determining this sort of thing, had previously agreed on a date for the beginning of the post-millennial generation, 1995, butt not a name. They were still considering several worthy names including my favorite, Re-Gen. Anyway, if you go with the marketers (and let’s face it, who would know better?) the earliest group of “Homelanders” are now hitting college age. No matter what you want to call these kids, I think we have cause for concern over and above the usual idealism of youth:

Brainwashing does that

Butt let’s look at the bright side, at least we have a group of mature Millennials in the White House now helping Big Guy make important decisions; like what to call their successor generation, and how to appeal to their own generation for their votes. And give them credit, they aren’t as stubborn as Gen Xers and Boomers, they’ll back down when ridiculed too much.Which is apparently what happened with their “Emoji strategy.”

The White House has apparently reconsidered its patronizing effort to attract millennials.

The much-touted “emoji strategy” was quietly removed from the administration’s “15 Economic Facts About Millennials” report over the weekend, the Washington Times reported.

The original reported was modeled after a Buzzfeed-style listicle and featured emojis sprinkled throughout.

“This is an example of what we heard about back in 2008, Obama using digital technologies to excite a new, younger demographic,” Natalia Mehlman-Petrzela, an assistant professor of history at the New School University, told The Atlantic on Friday. “In the world of Twitter and Instagram, millennials are using emojis more and more, so it makes sense to use that strategy to appeal to people.”