Zero Hour for Gen X: How the Last Adult Generation Can Save America from Millennials

by Matthew Hennessey

Overview

In Zero Hour for Gen X, Matthew Hennessey calls on his generation, 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 adult generation,” the sole remaining link to a time when childhood was still a bit dangerous but produced adults who were naturally resilient.

More than a decade into the social media revolution, the American public is waking up to the idea that the tech sector’s intentions might not be as pure as advertised. The mountains of money being made off our browsing habits and purchase histories are used to fund ever-more extravagant and utopian projects that, by their very natures, will corrode the foundations of free society, leaving us all helpless and digitally enslaved to an elite crew of ultra-sophisticated tech geniuses. But it’s not too late to turn the tide. There’s still time for Gen X to write its own future.

A spirited defense of free speech, eye contact, and the virtues of patience, 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.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781641770644
Publisher:	Encounter Books
Publication date:	02/04/2020
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	152
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Matthew Hennessey is an associate editorial features editor at the Wall Street Journal.

Table of Contents

Preface to the Paperback Edition ix

Introduction xiii

1 The Baby Boom and Everything After 1

2 Watching the World Wake Up from History 13

3 The End of the Innocence 31

4 Hard Habit to Break 37

5 Smothered in Hugs 47

6 Near Wild Heaven 69

7 (I Always Feel Like) Somebody's Watching Me 79

8 Great Big No 95

9 Money for Nothing 105

10 Right Here, Right Now 117

Acknowledgments 129

Index 131

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“As the baby boomers fade from the scene, and as the millennials take their place as the largest and most influential generation, who will speak for the slackers? Matthew Hennessey’s Zero Hour for Gen X is a spirited defense of the last cohort of Americans to have been raised in an analog age, and a call to arms against today’s technomania. Whether you are a digital native or a dyed-in-the-wool Luddite, this lively book will keep you on your toes.”

—Reihan Salam, executive editor, National Review


“Generation X invented the modern commercial Internet, social media, and the 24-hour news cycle, which together amounted to a sociopolitical weapon of mass destruction that Generation X then handed off to the millennials, the feral children of Facebook and Snapchat whose bottomless sense of entitlement and contemptible general mopery were thereby amplified and weaponized. The baby boomers came close to destroying the country, and the millennials are ready, willing, and—thanks in no small part to the entrepreneurs and innovators of Generation X—now able to finish the job. All that stands in their way is Generation X and their own irrational fear of making telephone calls. Matthew Hennessey contemplates the dawn of this grim new day with as much good cheer as a Generation Xer can muster—and with a great deal of good sense and wit, too.”

—Kevin Williamson, author, The Case Against Trump


“Most generational stereotyping is a mush of platitudes (ironically, it’s a fad we largely inherited from the baby boomers). But generational analysis, when done seriously and thoughtfully, as Matthew Hennessey does in Zero Hour for Gen X, can be a vital clarion for awakening people to the obligations required of all citizens. This is an important and eloquent call to arms to the men and women about to take control of the commanding heights of our culture.”

—Jonah Goldberg, Cliff Asness Chair in Applied Liberty at the American Enterprise Institute, author of Suicide of the West


“Generation X, as the label suggests, has long been viewed as an indefinable cohort. A more charitable way of looking at it is that our generation deliberately prized individualism over group identity, rather than let the self-righteous baby boomers dominating corporate America extract a pound of our flesh. Now we’re sandwiched between the boomers and millennials, a generation that’s been so digitized and commodified from birth, they don’t even recognize their own entitlement. In Zero Hour for Gen X, Matthew Hennessey marshals everything from economic data to unique pop culture insights to make a powerful case that the individualistic Generation X better find a way to collectively assert themselves socially, economically, and politically. Otherwise, an America that prizes things such as free speech and the ability to avoid staring at a screen for more than five minutes will become a distant memory.”

—Mark Hemingway, senior writer, Weekly Standard