Recently I found out from the London Telegraph and San Francisco Chronicle via Green Bean that I have an acronym!
You know, like a YUPPY or DINK or an SOB.
This is very exciting to me because I am obsessed with acronyms. I think it comes from my dad who used to refer to everything by its acronym.
For example, he often used to say: "Witbud, Arduous! Witbud!"
Now you may be thinking, "What the hell is a Witbud?"
Well, in fact "Witbud" is how one pronounces the acronym "WTBD." Which stands for, "What's The Big Deal?"
I don't know if you've met many or any teenagers, but to teens, EVERYTHING is a big deal.
So sometimes I would go into the litany of HUGE PROBLEMS with my LIFE.
To which my dad would respond, "Lilt!"
You are probably wondering, do they ever speak English?
But "LILT" IS English. Sort of. It means, "Life Is Like That."
Like the traditional, "Life Isn't Fair," saying only with more zing.
So you can see how someone who grew up in a very pro-acronym household might be excited to have an acronym of her very own.
And these people, they were kind of cool. Green Bean describes them as people who, "live beneath their means, buying little, donating to charity, shopping local, making their own, doing without and living a fuller life."
That's me, right?! That's totally me?!
So who are these mystery people? These people who are like us eco-nuts with the cool acronym?
Are they SEXYs for Super Eco Xcellent Youths? Or HEP for Hip Eco-People?
Well, they are called ... YAWNs.
Yeah.
It stands for Young And Wealthy but Normal. I mean seriously, yawn!
I am not a yawn! (Right, I'm not, right? Please tell me I'm not.)
Screw you, San Francisco Chronicle and London Telegraph! I reject your crappy acronym! I already have to live with being Generation Y (Why? Because it's after X.) I am not going to be a YAWN as well.
So your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to come up with a cool acronym to describe us non-consumerist green folk. Enter in the comments until Monday at 6:00pm PDT. If you win, I'll donate $50 to the charity/non-profit of your choice.
Get cracking, peeps. I mean, we may need to save the world, but FIRST, FIRST, we need to save it from bad acronyms.
2 years ago
20 comments:
Love it! I'll have to go work on an acronym but in the meantime, I'm going to link to this. What a totally non-yawny idea. You YAWN, you!
Hee! This is fabulous, but un-creative me is so not winning this contest. Can't wait to see the entries start pouring in!
oOOOHHH,
How about "Highly Intellectual, Planet-Protecting Youths"?
You could be the second generation HIPPYs.
Now that GreenBean has put the pressure on me by telling me I have a future in acronyms, I felt obliged to overdo it:
Low Impact Living Youths (LILYs)?
Voluntary Impact Minimizers? (VIMs)?
Low Impact by Design -- (LIDs or Liddys)?
Carbon Reducing Austere People? (CR -- er, maybe not...)
thinking, thinking...
The SWEETS - Sustainably Wise Ecologically Enthusiastic Trend Setters?
The BEANs (I couldn't resist) - Bountiful Ecologically Aware Non-consumers?
I'll be back with more. ;-)
EAGLEs - Ecologically Aware Givers Living Earnestly/Efficiently
Here are my husband's entries:
APLS ("Apples") - Affluent Persons Living Sustainably ("More APLS per day keep global warming at bay"!)
YEAPs - Young Ecological Affluent Persons/Professionals
PEAS - Professional Ecological Affluent Suburbanites
I think Apples (APLS) is the best one!
CRAPPERS: Carbon-Reducing Austere People Produce Extra Rich Soil.
Changing all the words but only one letter I propose DAWNS: Discovering a wisdom in natural symbiosis. We are all performing the emergence, the dawning of our acronymn.
Heh...I guess I'd just be a YAN, than - Young and Normal? Though I don't know how much I'd qualify for normal, either. But really, why do they assume everyone who cares about their impact has money?
I like Erin's 2nd gen HIPPY suggestion; that's what I get called most of the time anyway!
I really liked APLS, except I thought the affluent part doesn't apply to all of us. Then, I realized that compared to the rest of the world, we're all affluent. I vote for apples.
I really like APLS, too!
*****
I was talking about this with my husband last night. It went something like this:
Me: Reading great blog. New acronym YAWN, lame. Making up better acronym.
Hubby: Grumble. Acronyms, antithetical. Grumble. (Or something like that.)
Me: YAWN??, lame!! Choosing new one, fun!!
Hubby: Grumble. Labels! Why does everyone need LABELS!? Grumble. (Or something like that.)
Ironically, the only acronym I could think of was...wait for it...LBL's ("labels") - Living Better with Less!
I like CRAPPERS.
My contribution: Balls!
Blogging anti-consumers living life sustainably
I like APLS, too.
APLS FTW! LOL
Erm, GREENs - great, really excellent eco nuts?
I suck at this.
How about Freshly Renounced Excessive Extravagance (FREE) :)
whatever happened to "Yippie"? or does that not apply unless you're a white collar hippie?
and how is this "normal"? normal for SF, yes. but normal for much of the rest of the country? no way!
i like APLS better too.
p.s.: http://www.buzzfeed.com/peggy/yawns
Here's one I thought of just now: the MoJo's: people who are moderately joyful. Not a proper acronym though.
do they define "wealthy" - and for that matter, how is "affluent" defined in APLS?
They talk about people who are millionaires, donating $400K to a local art council and "limiting" themselves to $50K for annual living expenses.
I definitely don't qualify as "wealthy" or "affluent" in the US, though by comparison with someone in Ghana, probably so.
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