3 minute read
We Are So Much More Than a Millenial
We Are So Much More than a Millennial
If you were to type “millennial” into the Google search bar, you’d discover that “stereotypes” is one of the top autocomplete suggestions. Every generation has a term coined with it. There’s the Silent Generation, the Baby Boomers (our beloved parents), and then there’s us, those born from 1977 to 1995. So why then, has the world created such a terrible connotation with our term more than anyone else’s?
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The name has stuck with us and it pervades all our social media, news media and culture. It’s the only way we’re referred to these days. “Those damn millennials don’t work for anything,” some outdated minds tend to say about us. Apparently, we’re the lazy, bored, entitled brats that are too irresponsible to make critical decisions. They say that we don’t want to take risks for jobs, we just want everything to be handed to us, and we don’t have real values or beliefs. “Those spoiled millennials are incapable of growing up, and they’ll be absorbed into that rotting social media lifestyle forever,” those close minded individuals continue on.
That was hard to even type- because it’s a load of crap. Sorry Baby Boomers and those before, but it’s your way of thinking that’s lazy. Shouldn’t you, those that are raising us, be the ones building us up and encouraging us the most? Instead, you’re the first to name call when we have one screw up.
Maybe it’s because the only time we actually make the news is when a riot breaks out or when we don’t know who the Secretary of Defense is in those random street polls. It’s when we do something wrong that people pay attention.
Sure, we make a lot of mistakes, but we are so much more than that. We are more than the stereotypes people have unfortunately casted upon us.
Traditionalists or Silent Generation:
Born 1945 and before
Baby Boomers:
Born 1946 to 1964
We are extremely techsavvy. We know how to work technology, keep up with it, and maximize it. Technology has provided us with generous flexibility to work from where we want. We’re not bound to the typical 9-5 lifestyle anymore. We use our resources to their maximum capabilities to get the most not only out of work, but out of life. We are open minded. Our generation was the first to realize that nothing good comes from discriminating against someone because their beliefs don’t match yours or because their skin color is different. We embrace those around us and try to spread the same way of thinking to everyone else.
We are very hard workers, actually. Do you think we’d be out here digging ourselves in a college debt hole up to our necks if we weren’t motivated to make something of our lives? We don’t want to be just like our parents. We want to be us. We want to travel and experience new places and meet new people. We want to make our own living and change the world along the way.
Joan Kuhl, the founder of “Why Millennials Matter”, calls millennials a generation unlike any other, in a good way. She describes us as unusually large and taking over almost half of the workforce, incredibly diverse and already the bench strength for leadership. In her public speaking sessions and advocacy for millennials, she pushes the idea that we millennials are the future, and
Generation X:
Born 1965 to 1976
Gen Y/Millennials
Born 1977 to 1995
the future’s looking bright.
In reality, it’s easier to categorize us and place us into one big box than to realize our unique differences. We are changing the world. We are the reason people are more acceptive, understanding, and forgiving. We are the ones that advocate for one love for everyone. We’re all on this planet, no one deserves to be better than another - just different. And that’s okay.
So, I will continue to eat my avocado toast, bingewatch Netflix series, and communicate solely with memes as much as I please. I am a millennial - a pretty awesome one at that - and I don’t deserve to be in a box.
By: Araya Jackson
