I noticed the same error made by journalist who started using the GenX term interchangeably with twentysomething in the 1980s and continuing to do so for more than a decade I guess the best argument is that the term X is a variable in algebra to stand for any value so the variable label X is constantly being re used to stand for different things and that X doesn t stand for any fixed thing However this argument loses steam once we realize the whole term is Gen X and not just X