By David Crow
Conversations
David Crow
My grandparents were part of the “Greatest” (read World War II) generation, my parents are part of the “Baby Boom” generation and I am a part of what they call “Generation X.” Given that, it seems my children are part of the “Millennial” generation.
I’ve been hearing a lot of curmudgeonly carping about millennials lately. I’ve heard that millennials are soft and lazy. I’ve heard that millennials are entitled and demanding. I’ve heard that millennials are needy and impatient. I’ve heard that millennials are ignorant and naïve about the way the world works. I’ve heard that as soon as they hear the word “no” they go into fits and run to their parents to make things better and that this behavior just won’t work in the “real world” when they have to work with “real people.” I’ve heard people say that those millennials have got a nasty surprise coming when they get out on their own and have to earn a buck like the generations before them. I’ve heard millennials would rather stare blankly at their cell phones than have a conversation with an actual person.
I’ve even heard grave predictions that millennials won’t be able to hold down jobs, have to move home with their parents and that the entire socioeconomic order of the entire world just might collapse under their watch. Striking.
It’s striking to me that the curmudgeonly carping comes from people my parents’ age and people my age. It seems that we’re curmudgeonly carping about our grandchildren’s or children’s generation. Odd.
It’s odder still that most of the people we refer to as millennials are either right around college age or fresh out of college. That means they either have no jobs or starter jobs, no money and no positions of power to speak of. Yet somehow this millennial lot is getting the lion’s share of the blame for the recent stirrings in our social and political arenas. Strange.
It’s strange to think that millennials, without money, without position and without power get blamed for a lot of the “disquiet” and “disruption” in our society right now. It also seems strange that a bunch of people openly derided as soft and lazy, entitled and demanding, needy and impatient, and ignorant and naïve, have managed to pull all that off while staring blankly at their cell phones rather than having actual conversations with actual people. Remarkable.
It’s remarkable that a previous up-and-coming generation has heretofore never expressed any ideas and/or thoughts that were different from those of the previous generations. Never has a generation said or done things that the previous generations found daring, unsettling or even abhorrent. Such a thing must be unprecedented in the history of mankind. Peculiar.
Yes, peculiar. Why would such people on the cusp of adulthood be concerned about their futures? Why won’t they heed the warnings and wisdom of their elders? Why would they worry what the economy, the society or the environment will look like when they begin to produce the next generation?
Surely no generation before them ever contemplated such things. I mean, no previous generation ever watched too much MTV or told their parents not to be “fuelish with fuel” or asked the world to “give us kids a chance,” right?
And just where did they get those cell phones anyway?
Until next time, y’all come out.
David Crow is a lawyer who lives in Orange.