Dear Millennials

[MlleCake]

This is the image that came up when I google image searched the word "Millennials".

Dear Millennials,

I'm firmly a GEN-X person. Many of the users on this site have parents or older relatives my age. I'm still a bit young to be a grand parent of a teen.

I don't want this to be a lecture. I really like you all. You have taken a lot of great things my generation did and maximized them. You are truly a digital generation and I think that's excellent. I like that you have many places you can express yourselves and gain acceptance from a community.

I am sorry many of you came of age hard hit by the economy, namely the recession. I had some glory days before then. It's been hard for a lot of people in my generation to recover - we were in the right place at the wrong time. But I see a lot of you making the best of it and working out how to have the things you need in life. That's a testament to the energy and hopefulness of youth.

I am really proud of you for taking some of this issues the previous two generations felt passionate about and radically redefined a number of things and pushed a very worthy agenda forward. When around me it looks dim I see you guys making a real difference in areas that matter a lot to me.

You teach me things every day. I got in the good habit of appreciating wisdom from whomever had it to offer, so I learn a lot from you even though you're younger. I hope you're learning a lot from us too - some continuity, some history, some of what it was like before life was so digital.

I hope you take the time to put down your phones sometimes to just enjoy the moment you are in.

I love that you really value nerdiness and intelligence even though your schools have been horrible. These days, you can nearly google up a better education than you can buy. Just develop your critical thinking skills and learn how to analyze what you read with a critical eye. Study some science and mathematics.

GAG is great. Never be afraid to ask the hard questions, or the ones you feel are silly. You have a million new ways to learn things than we did up until I was 20, then it was like an explosion of knowledge, and everyone could have access. I'm glad you have been raised in that time.

Take care of each other. Have fun. We have more in common than you may think.

Love,

MlleCake

[TheWombRaider]

The last GOOD Generation... Who here remembers... when you could pump gas b4 you paid LOL... Gas under a dollar.. NO cell Phones... No internet... No FB... When MTV played Music videos... TRL countdown

Michael Jordan, Michael Jackson... The goonies... 80s movies Back to the Future... Indiana Jones...

[MlleCake]

I remember those days too. But they are making their way in a world I never could have imagined.

https://youtu.be/A3ZVZVMIG7g

[BaileyisDarcy]

Pump gas before you pay? Wait... Are you saying where you live you pay first? How the fuck does that work?
The Goonies is still amazing, and Rage plays music videos on free to air.

What do the generations have to do with good movies, TV programs or customer service?

[DianaWest]

Generation Z Baby!!! Yeah!!! why didn't they start with A? They're gonna run out of letters pretty quickly.

[MlleCake]

Gen X got the name because we were right after the baby boomers and in some ways we got ignored as a generation. Then you guys got Y and Z. Sometimes Why? Because like Gen X, your generation got kind of ignored too.

[DianaWest]

Ignored? I don't think so, everyone is talking about how Generation Z is more innovative, creative, determined, and task-oriented. The world claims that we will make a large proportion of the population in a few decades, and most of the US GDP will be fed by my generation. Our problem is that we are too competitive/stuck in our electronics.

[Angelina25]

Uhm... am I GenZ according to the definition?

[BaileyisDarcy]

No. Millenials are born between 1980 and 2004. There isn't a name for the newest gen yet.

[0112358]

@BaileyisDarcy I don’t think most people include that age with millenials.

Basically millenials are the boomers kids. If your parents are gen x you’re probably not a millennial.

[BaileyisDarcy]

@0112358 whether they include it or not. Fact is, millenials are anyone born between 1980 and 2004.

[0112358]

@BaileyisDarcy according to one group while virtually every other group cuts it off earlier - often by a decade.

en.m.wikipedia.org/.../Millennials

[EnglishArtsteacher]

The infograph is a little off with the whole "confidence" thing, but to be fair, hardly anyone knows what the word confidence means.(even if they think they do). If anything, I would say Millennials are less confident than any other generation, especially the women. Just look on the internet of all the forums of people saying they feel like they're "fat", "ugly", "worthless"-almost all wrote by Millennials. Isn't the "selfie" a sign of a low self-esteem? Think about it: You need to take a selfie, and post it everywhere as a desperate attempt to make yourself noticed. Look at Instagram filters-all used by low self-esteem women. I don't see any other generation posting insecure "rate me" posts on here (or anywhere else for that matter).

Sorry for nitpicking one aspect of it, but I'm one of the few TRUE confident Millennials I can think of. To be honest, I complain about my generation because we do seem like a generation without ambition, a hard work ethic, and to be blunt, we're quite stupid.

[Unit1]

That was actually impressive! I thank you for sharing this kind lady.

I honestly expected it to be a rant about how the millennials are a failed project (due to all that social media drama, increased laziness, plenty of stupid and unfunny memes and "meming" in the real world and basically trying to score bitches at loud clubs/parties filled mostly with bitches and drunk idiots).

But there is no doubt about the existence of the kinds of us, who did not fall down that path, so it's not all that hopeless.
I was and still am someone, who is severely economically stripped. It's like this is the life, that I know is the "norm". I can only manage to get by and that's basically it.

Even if I'm not entirely fond of my generation, we aren't completely contaminated degenerates, although the scaling of it is fairly big enough.
Because I still remember those times before such technological advancements took place. The times before smartphones and social media. It was more like the real deal and today very many are submerged into the smartphones too deep. It's sad to see how this was unfolded.

Nevertheless thanks again!

[Raveagite]

Meh, you think it's just a gen-x boomer v millennial issue? Read a bit the same issues come up between every generation and the ones that came before it.

Showering the younger side in praise is almost as meaningless as having an irrational dislike and grudge against them. So many in every generation forget that they made the same mistakes, lose empathy and forget where they came from.

The other side like the OP would do nothing but offer praise and encouragement but is that really helpful for a generation which is acknowledged as perhaps the most spoiled in the history of the human species? Does everyone really forget that in the long run when you spoil someone they are the one who suffers most?

Only an honest look at both sides flaws and the reasons behind the disagreements and conflicts will produce any result worth the effort.

But hey I'm missing the point right? This wasn't about the issues this was about the OP winning points with the younger age group which dominates this board.

[jersos1]

I was born in 1996 but I feel that I am more of an old person as far as my mentality is concerned! I think like the past generations and the millennial give me inferiority complex. I am not confident and I get nervous far too easily, sometimes feeling that I am totally worthless because always my mind is filled with unnecessary (and wild) thoughts that is hampering every part of my life... my social life, physical life, my mental and spiritual life.

But I would like to say I am lucky to have born at a time when I get so many benefits of technology, albeit I am far too much technologically challenged than my fellow counterparts.

[chc0009]

As a millennial, I'm very different from my peers. In that I'm the only one I know who dislikes attention and hide my face on the internet, unlike most millennials, their selfies, and their "look at me" mentalities.

I'm too stern to be a millennial, I don't know why.

[A_Bell]

You know people are individuals, right?

Addressing generations as if they are a homogenous group is silly. Most of it is driven by substance free entertainment programs that simply copy each other and create an image of what people of a certain age are supposed to be.

Everyone, be yourself and stop letting people pigeon hole you into groups.

[acooke-13]

I know I technically am one, but I don't feel like one, I feel a lot older. But I always feel judged based on my age and because other millennials really don't know right or wrong - but there were people like that in every single generation, it just seems a lot more from us because police and the law are stricter, not because were worse.

[not_a_queen]

I saw you say Gen-X and prepared myself for a beat down but that was nice! I like your optimism (although as a late-millennial/iGen person, I found it a little too optimistic—but that’s just my opinion 😂) and how you didn’t go the route of senseless insults that many older people tend to prescribe. Thanks!

[torken]

I feel like people mis-interpret what a millennial actually is. 1980 to 2000 y'all... they are 18 to 38 years old.

Aka, those teenage kids you see running around with their hooverboards and fidget spinners... NOT millennials! Some of us are almost 40! Jees!

[JimRSmith]

This is far too uncritical.

I see what you're trying to do. You think they get given nothing but shit. I have some sympathy with that view myself.

But they've also got a LOT to work on. This Take seems one-sided without going into that, too.

[Max_winner1]

Melenials are a lost cause. They don't know the difference between right and wrong. A man could be screwing your wife and still not want to stop it. An immigrant rapes a little girl ohhh can't blame the immigrant he does not know the laws and says it's part of his culture.

[acooke-13]

The millennials are not in charge of who gets done for rape or not? Lol

[Chief16]

The Millennial, my generation is a pathetic one. We know no real struggles, today we value feelings more than ideas, words over actions, freedom over responsibility and duty. Everything that our parents and grandparents made great, we undo. No commitments, no dedication and no values. I identify myself less as a millennial than you do as a gen x.

[StickStickity13]

the older generations essentially fucked up this country. Stop glorifying the old generations, they weren't great at all.

[Chief16]

@StickStickity13 and what are we doing? There was a push to achieve something then. Now we have losers and whores walking about telling us how we should make the world a better place.

[StickStickity13]

The last great generation was the one around during the great depression. Before the baby boomers. The baby boomers were the biggest disgrace to the modern world. Millennial's work harder and are less entitled.

[Chief16]

@StickStickity13 yeah, after they voted Hilary, they're the most brainwashed generation on the planet. I don't like Trump but Hilary is just on another level.

[StickStickity13]

Guess what? Hillary is baby boomer

[Chief16]

@StickStickity13 who is gawked over by the millennials.

[StickStickity13]

Not particularly. Both candidates were less than ideal. Trump is far worse

[MrNameless]

that's just the people you know. I know tons of millennial coworkers and friends who work their butts off.

[BaileyisDarcy]

OP generations are not limited to fucking america. Im sick of being lumped into the same group as those whiny peices of shit who need safe spaces just because an oompa loompa has been elected.

[redrocket68]

@StickStickity13 I agree. Makes me sick. I hear so much anti millennial sentiment from the boomers. Failing to realize its impossible to buy a house in 2018 without a career like a real career not simply a "job" back then you could work in a factory and have an actual retirement. They also sold this country moved everything overseas weakening our infrastructure.

[winterfox10]

Well thank you for saying this, but as a Millennial I want just say that we do the things we have because we need to in order to survive. It's not like we're exceptional people (or at least any more exceptional than prior generations), we just realize that we need to do things a certain way to survive.

[MlleCake]

The adversity has made exceptional people of many of you.

[winterfox10]

I do worry about the seeming lack of hunger though... I'm sure that is changing, but when I was in college I saw a lot of very troubling complacency

[sp33d]

god damn millenials..
I mean that in the worst sense possible. Put down your god damn phone and look at the fucking road... -.-

[Silver158]

you're a millennial

[MysteriousDarkness]

There are people who grew up during the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s and 1990s that that use their phone while driving and i am not talking about hands free.

[sp33d]

@MysteriousDarkness fuck them, too :)

[Unit1]

Natural selection

[Anon-ymous1]

A nice Take; I'll simply say that the classification of generations is actually pretty nonsensical and has more to do with marketers trying to sell products rather than anything substantively philosophical. Generation classification is kind of illogical. It puts unnecessary figurative walls between us all.

[MlleCake]

You make a good point. I really see "Millennials" as more of a continuum of who Gen-Xers were when we were younger. We would have done all the same stuff if we had all the same technology.

[Anonymous]

Usually Gen X people are bitching about Millennials. Well, we're not all sunshine and rainbows. Despite being born in this generation, I really don't like the social media, the slacktivism, or the casual sex that many are involved in. I also dislike the unwillingness to grown up, and leave childish things behind. It's like everyone is 20-something, going on 30 and still have the demeanor and vocabulary of a 13 year old.

[Ahsthen]

Pffft. They 'value' nerdiness if it's on TV or their phones and has to do with scifi and Fantasy- even, and perhaps especially, the ones in technical fields - whereas their predecessors knew the difference between scifi and Science Fiction, and preferred the latter.

In essence, and pointing at your comment about critical thinking, a Scientific Practice in one's life is missing in everyone, and they are at the forefront of it.

[lilaqua]

I'm sick of getting shit on. Jesus you Xers should know what that's like, we called lazy but you guys got called stupid, I'd appreciate some self awareness.

[steveguitar]

This is refreshing, mostly you hear bashing about our generation,. A lot of what we get bashed for isn't our fault.