Zero Hour for Gen X

How the Last Adult Generation Can Save America from Millennials

Matthew Hennessey

• Éditeur: Encounter Books
• Année: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781594039959
• Sujet: Politics & International Relations
• Sous-sujet: Political Process

In Zero Hour for Gen X, Matthew Hennessey calls on Generation X to take a stand against tech-obsessed Millennials, apathetic Baby Boomers, utopian Silicon Valley "visionaries," and the menace to top them all: the soft totalitarian conspiracy known as the Internet of Things.Soon Gen Xers will be the only cohort of Americans who remember life as it was lived before the arrival of the Internet. They are, as Hennessey dubs them, "the last analog generation," the sole remaining link to a time when childhood was still a bit dangerous but produced adults who were naturally resilient. Zero Hour for Gen X is a cultural history of the last 35 years, an analysis of the current social and historical moment, and a generational call to arms. The Baby Boomers are exhausted. The Millennials are preoccupied with their gadgets and apps. In Zero Hour for Gen X, Hennessey argues that the time has come for Generation X to stand up and be counted.

INDEX

ADHD, Internet use and, 45

AIDS, social anxiety and, 52

Alaska, universal basic income and, 112

Albright, Madeleine, 35

Alexa. See Amazon Echo

Altman, Sam, 111

Amazon Echo, 72, 80–86

Amazon Music Unlimited, 81

Amazon Prime, home device of, 80

American exceptionalism, differing generational opinions of, 59

American Press Institute, 92

Amusing Ourselves to Death (Postman), 76

Analog world: patience instilled by, 40–41; personal contacts and, 122, 123; productivity and, 41

Angels in America (AIDS drama), 52

“Anticipatory package shipping” system of Amazon, 82

Apple, 96; Apple Music, 125; exclusive services of, 71; HomePod device of, 82; millennials’ job choices and, 60, 110; privacy issues and, 81, 85, 85n, 88; Siri and, 85

Appliances, privacy issues and, 80

Army Times, 60

Artificial intelligence, 37, 51, 71, 88–90, 106; future of, 95–96, 102; privacy and, 85

Atlantic, 18

Attention spans, Internet’s influence on, 43

Automobiles, hackability of new, 89–90

Baby Boomers: definitions and descriptions of, 4; demographic numbers of, 4; economics, politics, and culture during youth of, 5–6; influence on Generation X, 15–16; negative characteristics of, 2–3, 37; war against American institutions and values, 7–8

Baby monitors, hackability of, 87

Back to the Future (film), 14

Basic Income: A Radical Proposal for a Free Society and a Sane Economy (Van Parijs and Vanderborght), 114

BASIC programming, 50

Beamer, Lisa Brosius, 33

Beamer, Todd, 33–35

Begala, Paul, 7

Bell, Alexander Graham, 71

“Benching,” online dating and, 75

Berlin Wall’s fall, Generation X’s interpretation of, 19–20, 29, 30

Berners-Lee, Tim, 53, 112

Bezos, Jeff, 82, 107, 108–109

Bicentennial celebrations (1976), influence on Generation X, 16, 35

Bin Laden, Osama, 27

Bingham, Mark, 34

Boring Company, 109

Bowden, Mark, 18

Bradley, Tom, 22

Branson, Richard, 111

“Breadcrumbing,” online dating and, 75

Brick-and...