One doesn’t need to look far to see countless online opinion articles calling the latest generation to come of age out for their attention seeking habits, their laziness, their technology addiction, their entitled nature, their coddled upbringing. And even a cursory search pulls up nearly as many articles by millennial apologists who spin theses traits as positives necessary for survival in our evolving world. There’s only one clear consensus that all these writers come to: those born between 1980 and 2000 are a generation unlike any other in human history. Much electronic ink has been spilled espousing theories for why millennial break the generational mold: changing parenting styles, the birth of the internet in their formative years, economic trends, shifting population demographics, it’s all been considered, and for me, none of them have provided a satisfactory answer for what’s wrong with millennials. But after poring over years and years of data, I think I’ve finally found the solution: we’ve spoiled millennials by writing too many think pieces about them.
It may seem to simple to be true, but trust me, I’ve run the numbers, and it all works out. Why are they so obsessed with technology? Because there are so many articles about them plastering social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. Why are they so entitled? Because, without so much as lifting a finger, they’ve become the focus of essays by well established writers, published everywhere from Brietbart to The New Yorker. Why are they so obsessed with attention? Because we’ve given it to them in limitless quantities, going so far as to write entire books complaining about them.
Some might argue that this isn’t so large a change, that every generation has an editorial or two calling them lazy, pretentious morons. But even if a few people did pen letters to the editor harping on Baby Boomers’ lack of work ethic or Generation X’s tendency to shirk real responsibility, they certainly didn’t have the mass electronic circulation that today’s articles demonizing 75.4 million young people get.
The truth is undeniable: by writing articles that simplify all Americans between the ages of seventeen to thirty seven into broad, ubiquitously negative stereotypes, we have turned them into phone-obsessed, superficial, sheltered weaklings with lots of fancy educations but no real world skills.
Of course, some of the more soft-hearted generational analysts may blame themselves for inadvertently creating a generation of shallow cowards who can’t handle the real world by relentless name calling in practically every magazine and journal. But the real blame here lies in the millennials themselves. The Greatest Generation lived through economic ruin and apocalyptic war and, through combined strength and courage, turned America into a golden haven of prosperity. Can’t these tech addicted airheads have thick enough skin to be pseudo-scientifically analyzed on numerous online forms without turning into braindead screen-zombies?
While these kids should have grown up when they turned eighteen just like every other generation, the only option now is to resort to what I call “Plan Better Late Than Never.” We have to cut them off from our stream of derision and condescension. No more think pieces, no more articles, not even angry Facebooks rants. Millennials won’t have us adults around to constantly tell them that they’re a turning our society into an unmanly, sheltered, spineless cesspool of overpriced avocado toast and useless liberal arts degrees, and if they don’t like it, then they’ll just have to learn to live with it!
