In my observation, a big part of social progress is each generation pointing out the hypocrisy of the previous. “All men are created equal” so how can you enslave black people? If men can vote, why can’t women? How come straight people can marry but gay people can’t? How is it fair to send an 18 year old to war but not let him vote?
A lot of these hypocrisies were so internalized that a lot of people of previous generations never even thought about them. It was like a mental blind spot. It took young people with fresh thinking to point them out and fight to fix them.
So, speaking as a Millenial, I’m asking what my generation’s blind spots are. What injustices are we perpetuating without even thinking much about it?
For reference, Millenials are currently in their late 20s to early 40s. Not running the world, but also not fresh eyed college grads.
Or readers, you can just say fuck OP’s premise and agree that we shouldn’t be trying to make enemies of strong allies right now - especially when we have so much existing consensus to continue a full-throated joint fight against.
Seems like an overreaction.
OP is asking how they can be better, I don’t see hate in that.
I mean, not everything has to be a fight. This is just asking for feedback.
Edit: I think there’s a general consensus that Gen X, Millenials, and Zoomers are all on the same side against the Boomers. But none of us are perfect.
I’m gen-x according to you. When I was younger there were none of these divisive nomenclatures. They’re stupid and harmful, the same as every stereotype, and anyone who uses them is a gullible fool
90% of people I know, from teenagers to pensioners, are lovely, interesting, amazing folk, and their age has as much to do with that as the colour of their skin
You should be ashamed of yourself for perpetuating divisiveness
I’m likely older than you and there’s always been generational name calling and judging.
Society-dependant I suppose. Doesn’t make it any less toxic
It’s descriptive. Do you want to use paragraphs to name a group of similar people, or a word? " The people born between x and y exhibiting these behaviors and traits, or have been imprinted by these traits, though it is not as strict rule," or “generation x.”
And yes, we are also allowed to critique people based off of these things. It’s how life works. It’s how we grow and change.
though it is not a strict rule
Vis a vis, a stéréotype
Keep 'em divided and angry at eachother!
Say you make a new invention. Are you going to give it a name, or are you going to use a description each time?
What about if you have kids. Are you going to name your kid a long winded description of their lineage, or something short?
I hate the idea of answering for my fellow idiots in my age group.
I think “generations” is a useful abstract thought, but it is really only usefully clear in more distant hindsight, and one where the conclusions have little actionable consequences. On the individual level, it is a poorly fitting stereotype.
I’m a hardcore roadie that almost died on a bicycle while commuting full time and riding over 400 miles every week for years. Do I get a say in my generation label and efforts to make change? My supercharged camaro always stayed at home. I didn’t have to ride.
I’m right on the GenX/millennial cusp, but since I was interested in technology as a kid, I align more with millennials in general.
How we treat transexual people will be our embarrassment. Not everyone, of course, but as a whole, it wasn’t something we ever talked about in the 90s, and if we did it was a joke.
We’re still learning, and there are many of us who want to be better, and others who will fight it because it makes them uncomfortable.
We’ll get there eventually.
How is it fair to send an 18 year old to war but not let him vote?
Where do you live where you can enlist at age 18 but don’t have the right to vote‽ Not in the USA…
OP was giving examples of things in the past. In the US the voting age was 21 until 1971 when it was lowered to 18. During the Vietnam War draft lots of 18-21 year-olds were drafted to fight a conflict they had absolutely no say in.
I believe OP is referring to the demands of the young people during the period between World War II and Vietnam War in the United States when 18-21 could be drafted but not vote, which resulted in passage of the 26th Amendment.
Also, Vivek Ramaswamy has talked about raising the voting age to 25 unless you serve in the military. Which is in effort to keep young people (especially Swifties!) from voting Democrat.
“Would you like to know more?”
“Service guarantees citizenship.”
Not in the USA…
Not anymore, thanks to the 26th amendment to the Constitution.
The hypocrisy calling out happens between the young generation and their parents. Millenials are more likely to be the older cousins to Zoomers than parents. Zoomers would be calling out the hypocrisy of Gen X, which would probably look something along the lines of “You spent your youth acting like caring about anything was lame and now mainstream art is just commentary about itself instead of anything sincere.”
I didn’t use the word hate. That said, you don’t bicker about minor things when the house is actively on fire. Focus, get some bigger wins collectively.
These types of introspective self improvement moments are for the quiet times, we’re not in the quiet times - those are a luxury that you earn, maybe. Much better use of our energy today than this.
In my observation, millennials are the perfect consumers. They do not stand up for anything. They have forgotten all the neccessary “fights for a better world” of the former generation, for the environment, for peace, for better social justice etc. and not adopted the ones of the younger ones, like vegans etc.
We stood up during the anti Iraq war protests, occupy Wall Street, blm, pro-choice, marched for lgbtq rights, human rights, the environment.
We’re burned out because (mostly) nothing changed or got worse… also busy working to the bone to be able to afford to go to work tomorrow.
Perfect consumer because everything we need to buy is designed to fail and not be repairable.
We fought, we argued, we protested and we got some shit changed, some attitudes evolved but we got older and we got on with making the best of a bad situation. Like EVERY GENERATION BEFORE US.
How many of the diehard peace and love hippies who were at woodstock arent angry old boomers now? How many of them kept up the fight their whole lives? How many of Generation X are still “Xtreem”? people get old.
Its the Zoomers time to shine now, I have a child to provide for and raise into a confident young woman who demands changes herself.
Veganism, or at least vegetarianism, was the first thing that crossed my mind. I bet future generations will not look kindly on us for eating meat. And yet still, I can’t turn down a good burger.
