Being a member of "Generation X", I have many thoughts about this, none of which are encouraging. In general, I agree with this article, which is sad.

Excerpt: "Maybe not the glory of rushing a Nazi foxhole, or braving municipal billy bats to stop a war in Indochina," he notes, trying to get a fix on what exactly he and his ilk achieved in their heroic youth, "but the privileged of our generation did what they could, like the rest of us."

We did what we could: the slogan of the underachiever, the excuse maker, the loser. What they did, at least on the evidence of Milo's testimony, was smoke weed, argue about Theory, sleep with one another's girlfriends and boyfriends and wonder what was going to happen next.