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==Explanation==
 
==Explanation==
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This comic was released on the first day of the year {{w|2020}}. It was the second of two [[:Category:New Year|New Year comics]] around the 2019-2020 New Year, after [[2248: New Year's Eve]].  
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{{incomplete|Created by a PEDANT. Explain title text.}}
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This comic was released on the first day of {{w|2020}}. [[Megan]], [[Cueball]], and [[Ponytail]] are all happy for the beginning of the new {{w|decade}}, for a variety of reasons.  
  
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The comic opens with [[Megan]], [[Cueball]], [[White Hat]], and [[Ponytail]] celebrating the new year. Ponytail expresses relief  that, they can now unambiguously name the decade "the 20s", since the decade has a well-defined name, any cultural trends that begin in the 20s can be attributed to the decade itself, and not to the generation that happens to coincide with it.
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In panel 1, Ponytail is happy that decades have "easy names" again. Decades such as the 1960s or 1970s had easy "names" - '60s, '70s, etc. The 2000s and 2010s were sometimes named the "Aughts" and the "Teens", names that did not enter popular usage, but we can return to the shortened decades name with the '20s decade.
  
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Prior to 2000, and particularly in the latter half of the 20th century, eras were often defined by decades, such as discussing the social movements of the 60s, or the music of the 80s. Beginning in 2000, this trend was noticeably reduced, most likely because the first two decades of a century didn't fit into the same naming convention, making it clunkier to discuss. "{{w|Aughts}}" and "Teens" were names suggested for the {{w|2000s_(decade)|2000s}} and {{w|2010s}} respectively; however, neither of those names managed to gain widespread acceptance.
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In panels 2 and 3, the group discusses cultural trends. In decades before the 2000s, trends were named for the decade in which its members reached adulthood / teenage years, e.g. a trend from the '90s. After 2000, many trends have been labeled with the "millennials" term, which refers to an entire generation who grew up in the 2000s. Cueballs and Ponytail hope that trends will not be labeled as "millennial" or by generations in this new decade. This phenomenon was previously discussed in [[1849: Decades]]. Millennials have also been mentioned in [[1962: Generations]] and in [[2165: Millennials]].
  
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In this same era, there was an increased emphasis on generational cohorts, which Ponytail seems to see as a replacement for dividing time into decades. {{w|Millennials}} is a name given to the generation which was born in the 1980s through the mid 1990s. The term is sometimes used pejoratively by older generations who view millennials as immature or complacent, and this was particularly common in the 2010s. It's possible that this focus on the generation was really a substitute for a focus on youth culture of that era. This is particularly notable since, as time moves on, Millenials continue to age, but the older generation still views them as the current youth. This phenomenon was previously discussed in [[1849: Decades]].
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The main point of the panel, however, which [[White Hat]] and [[Ponytail]] argue about, is White Hat's claim that the "20s" don't start until 2021, citing that {{w|Century|centuries}} are "off-by-one" (for instance, the {{w|20th century}} lasted from 1901 through 2000) and attempting to draw something, presumably a number line that starts with "Year 1" as the Anno Domini / Common Era years do. Ponytail's argument is that, while centuries are numbered ordinally (see trivia) and thus start with a year ending in "1", decades are more commonly delimited by the tens digit and thus start with a year ending in "0". For example, the {{w|Roaring Twenties}} are the years whose three most significant digits are 192, running from 1920 through 1929 (sometimes said to end slightly before the end of 1929, with the onset of the {{w|Great Depression}} in October 1929). Nobody{{Citation needed}} refers to this time as "the 193rd decade", which would run from 1921 through 1930.
  
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White Hat, however, raises a pedantic objection to Ponytail's celebration: he believes that the new decade does not "officially" start until 2021.
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Megan breaks up their heated argument by stating that {{w|MC Hammer}}'s song ''{{w|U Can't Touch This}}'', released in 1990, was featured in a 1990s-themed television show ({{w|I Love the '90s (American TV series)|''I Love the '90s''}}) instead of its 1980s-themed counterpart. Perhaps with the speaker being concerned that a single datum-point is not sufficient proof, the title text continues this theme with a hit song from 1980 grouped with the 1980s, not the 1970s. The title text ends with {{w|Q.E.D.|QED}}, traditionally used at the end of a mathematical proof to mean "thus it has been demonstrated", as if this second landmark piece of evidence is now sufficient to prove Megan's point as conclusively as a mathematical proof would.
  
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Ponytail corrects him on this, but he refuses to accept the correction until Megan cites an unlikely source: the fact that the {{w|VH1}} television show {{w|I Love the '90s (American TV series)|''I Love the '90s''}} categorized MC Hammer's 1990 single "{{w|U Can't Touch This}}" as a 90s song, which supports Ponytail's definition of a decade. The joke is that a pop culture documentary is not an authoritative source for definitions of time standards,{{Citation needed}} yet everyone is willing to immediately accept its authority on such matters anyway. Demonstrating the common usage of language is a valid argument, but the degree to which the authority of a single cable channel resolves the argument is unexpected.  
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{{w|VH1}} is the parent company of MTV, a cable TV channel known for grouping music by decades.
  
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The disagreement over the definition of when decades start is due to the fact that there is more than one way to count decades. You could do it in one of the following two ways:
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==Transcript==
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*By counting every span of ten years that has occurred since the start of year 1 in the Common Era (White Hat's definition)
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{{incomplete transcript}}
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*By taking the digit that is common to all years in a given ten-year span (Ponytail's definition)
 
  
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White Hat's definition is an "ordinal" method since it functions by counting the number of ten-year spans ''since the first one'', which is defined to have begun in the year 1. However, Ponytail's definition is the "cardinal" method, which simply groups years by their common most significant digits. For example, when we say "the 1980s", we mean "the span of ten years that all began with the digits 1-9-8".
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:[Megan entering the panel, with Cueball, White Hat, and Ponytail standing in a line.]
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Neither definition is technically wrong, but Ponytail's definition is clearly the more common one. She notes that this is not how decades are typically determined, and the fact that we count centuries in an ordinal way does not require that we do the same with decades.
 
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White Hat's objection (probably deliberately) recalls an issue that was frequently discussed around the year 2000.  Because we ''do'' count centuries ordinally (eg. "1st century", "20th century", etc.), and the first century began on the year 1, the 21st century did not technically start until 2001. Much of the world, not understanding this (or not caring), celebrated the dawning of the year 2000 as the start of both a new century and a new millennium, ignoring those who point out the change wouldn't happen for another year. (Though it should be noted unlike decades this is a genuine mistake rather than two slightly different definitions.)
 
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Megan's exclamation "Stop!" is similar to the line famously used by MC Hammer in "U Can't Touch This" ("Stop! Hammer time.").
 
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Continuing the dubious "proof" offered by Megan, the title text goes on to use the {{w|Billboard (magazine)|Billboard}} [https://www.billboard.com/charts/greatest-billboards-top-songs-80s Best of the 80s] chart as proof that the 1980s started in 1980, as their chart includes {{w|Blondie (band)|Blondie's}} "{{w|Call Me (Blondie song)|Call Me}}", which was released in 1980. The title text ends with {{w|Q.E.D.|QED}} ("quod erat demonstrandum"), which means "which was [necessary] to be shown", and is traditionally used at the end of a mathematical proof, implicitly equating such pop culture references to unassailable logical evidence.
 
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==Transcript==
 
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:[Megan walks in from the left greeting Cueball, White Hat, and Ponytail standing next to each other, the last two looking in her direction.]
 
 
:Megan: Happy new decade!
 
:Megan: Happy new decade!
 
:Ponytail: Welcome to the '20s!
 
:Ponytail: Welcome to the '20s!
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:White Hat: '''''Actually—'''''
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:White Hat: ''Actually—''
 
:Ponytail: I'm excited we can name decades again.  
 
:Ponytail: I'm excited we can name decades again.  
 
:Ponytail: "Aughts" and "teens" never caught on.
 
:Ponytail: "Aughts" and "teens" never caught on.
  
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:[Megan stops next to Cueball as White Hat has his finger raised.]
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:[Megan, Cueball, White Hat, and Ponytail standing in a line. White Hat has his finger raised.]
 
:White Hat: Actually, the new decade doesn't start-
 
:White Hat: Actually, the new decade doesn't start-
 
:Ponytail: Mostly, I'm just glad we can go back to attributing cultural trends to decades instead of generations.
 
:Ponytail: Mostly, I'm just glad we can go back to attributing cultural trends to decades instead of generations.
  
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:[All four just stand normal.]
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:[Megan, Cueball, White Hat, and Ponytail standing in a line.
 
:Cueball: Yeah.
 
:Cueball: Yeah.
 
:Cueball: Decades were silly, but making everything about "millennials" turned out to be even worse.
 
:Cueball: Decades were silly, but making everything about "millennials" turned out to be even worse.
 
:Ponytail: Seriously.
 
:Ponytail: Seriously.
  
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:[Only White Hat and Ponytail are shown, both with their arms held out to the sides, with White Hats's arms more relaxed than Ponytail's.]
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:[The panel zooms in, displaying only White Hat and Ponytail.]
 
:White Hat: It's technically not a new decade until 2021.
 
:White Hat: It's technically not a new decade until 2021.
 
:Ponytail: OK, listen.
 
:Ponytail: OK, listen.
 
:Ponytail: If you're going to be pedantic, you should at least be right.
 
:Ponytail: If you're going to be pedantic, you should at least be right.
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:White Hat: I '''''am''''' right!
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:White Hat: I ''am'' right!
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:Ponytail: You're '''''not'''''.
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:Ponytail: You're ''not''.
  
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:[Zoom in on White Hat and Ponytail's upper bodies as they gesture towards each other both raising their hands, palm up. Megan interrupts them from off-panel, as made clear in the next panel. Her voice comes out of a starburst on the left panel frame.]
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:[White Hat and Ponytail gesture towards each other.]
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:White Hat: See, the 20<sup>th</sup> century didn't start until--
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:White Hat: See, the 20th century didn't start until--
 
:Ponytail: But decades aren't centuries. They're not cardinally numbered.
 
:Ponytail: But decades aren't centuries. They're not cardinally numbered.
 
:White Hat: You don't get it. Let me draw a--
 
:White Hat: You don't get it. Let me draw a--
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:Ponytail: No, '''''you''''' don't--
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:Ponytail: No, ''you'' don't--
 
:Megan (off-panel): Stop!
 
:Megan (off-panel): Stop!
  
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:[All four characters are displayed again. Megan has raised a finger and all the others look at her.]
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:[All four characters are displayed again. Megan has raised a finger.]
 
:Megan: I can resolve this.
 
:Megan: I can resolve this.
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:Megan: *Ahem*
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:Megan: *ahem*
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:Megan: MC Hammer's ''U Can't Touch This'' (1990) was featured in '''''I Love the '90s''''', not ''''' '80s'''''.
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:Megan: MC Hammer's ''U Can't Touch This'' (1990) was featured in ''I Love the '90s'', not '''80s''.
 
:Ponytail: ...That settles that.
 
:Ponytail: ...That settles that.
 
:White Hat: Yeah, I accept VH1's authority.
 
:White Hat: Yeah, I accept VH1's authority.
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==Trivia==
 
==Trivia==
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* Millennials were also mentioned in [[1962: Generations]] and in [[2165: Millennials]]. Also, [[Randall]] himself is a millennial.
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Traditionally, the First Century starts in year 1 and ends in the year 100, the Second Century starts in the year 101 and runs through the year 200, and so on, because {{w|Zero-based numbering|zero indexing}}, like the number zero itself, was not in wide use at the time. However, due to an error by {{w|Dionysius Exiguus}}, the year 1 was after the death of {{w|Herod the Great}}, so Jesus could not have been born in that year, and was probably born either in 4 B.C. or 6 B.C., so the first, second, etc., century after his birth would actually end in the mid '90's.
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Also at the end of article "Usage" from `[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decade]]` there is an image showing that
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2020s start with 2020, but 203rd decade starts with 2021.
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{{comic discussion}}
 
{{comic discussion}}
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[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
 
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
 
[[Category:New Year]]
 
[[Category:New Year]]
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[[Category:Pedantic]]
 

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