What's Wrong With Millenials
- Thread starter boatsman
- Start date
Robin Mitchell
- Joined Oct 25, 2009
- 819
Im in that generation and here is what I believe is wrong:
- They all believe they are special
- They all believe that everyone can end war and become united
- There is a strong sense of "I deserve this" and "I dont need to suffer or struggle"
- Lack of responsibility
- Strange sense of belief that opportunities will fall into their laps
- Live in a consumer society and therefore are wasteful
- Believe that no one must ever be offended and that the majority are always wrong
Did he say, "1984" in the first few seconds? Bit of a mumble there.
That would be people up to 33 years old now. I don't think I've met any, unless you count the children of my friends, but I saw this coming a long time ago.
The way I put it is that I am the first of the pampered generations. I saw what my grandparents had to do to survive. They dug a root cellar because nobody was going to feed them if they didn't do it for themselves. My parents still had to go to the spring with a bucket to get water for drinking, cooking, and bathing. I had water in a faucet and electric lights and a toilet inside the house, but I was aware that I was only one generation removed from serious poverty. That put a fear into me. I knew I was standing on a ladder that my parents built, and I was only one rung above merely surviving.
As I journeyed through the world, I met people who seemed to have an excuse for failing at everything. I would say to them, "I can tell you have never known real hardship." Now we are observing, "The Millenials", a whole generation of people that have never known real hardship...or even looked at it as they drove by. When I think about what the real world is going to do to them, it conjures visions of actuarial tables. Looking at the children of my business partner, 2 out of 3 didn't survive because everything was handed to them. Another guy, one generation older, had 6 children and all of them survived. They all hold a healthy hatred for the parents who made them work, and they are all still alive.
It looks like a natural cycle. Disaster hits, the strong survive, and they want to make life easier for their children. "Nurturing Earth Mother" types are warm and fuzzy, but they cause children that don't know what hardship is. I can only predict that another disaster will happen and Darwin will do the sorting.
This is neither good nor bad. It just is.
It's the natural course of life, back to The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire and farther. Civilizations rise and fall. Disaster and poverty create strong people. Strong people create weak people. The wheel of life keeps on turning.
That would be people up to 33 years old now. I don't think I've met any, unless you count the children of my friends, but I saw this coming a long time ago.
The way I put it is that I am the first of the pampered generations. I saw what my grandparents had to do to survive. They dug a root cellar because nobody was going to feed them if they didn't do it for themselves. My parents still had to go to the spring with a bucket to get water for drinking, cooking, and bathing. I had water in a faucet and electric lights and a toilet inside the house, but I was aware that I was only one generation removed from serious poverty. That put a fear into me. I knew I was standing on a ladder that my parents built, and I was only one rung above merely surviving.
As I journeyed through the world, I met people who seemed to have an excuse for failing at everything. I would say to them, "I can tell you have never known real hardship." Now we are observing, "The Millenials", a whole generation of people that have never known real hardship...or even looked at it as they drove by. When I think about what the real world is going to do to them, it conjures visions of actuarial tables. Looking at the children of my business partner, 2 out of 3 didn't survive because everything was handed to them. Another guy, one generation older, had 6 children and all of them survived. They all hold a healthy hatred for the parents who made them work, and they are all still alive.
It looks like a natural cycle. Disaster hits, the strong survive, and they want to make life easier for their children. "Nurturing Earth Mother" types are warm and fuzzy, but they cause children that don't know what hardship is. I can only predict that another disaster will happen and Darwin will do the sorting.
This is neither good nor bad. It just is.
It's the natural course of life, back to The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire and farther. Civilizations rise and fall. Disaster and poverty create strong people. Strong people create weak people. The wheel of life keeps on turning.
Robin Mitchell
- Joined Oct 25, 2009
- 819
@#12 he said 1994
After reading many, many books on history, I finally arrived at the following conclusions:
- Human nature has not changed in the last 5,000 years
- Human nature is unlikely to change in the next 5,000 years
- Generations always tumble with the same problems again and again because people forget. They forget the sacrifice made by their predecessors that got them where they are. Or they just don't pass that knowledge on to their descendants out of a mistaken sense of protectiveness. And so end up condemning their offspring to making the same mistakes all over again. And sometimes, when they do remember, they refuse to give credit to the sources of their well being. It's just too humiliating for them to admit that most of what they are has nothing to do with who they are, and their wellness was inherited instead of actually earned.
In the words of Mark Twain: "History never repeats itself, but it rhymes"
MaxHeadRoom
- Joined Jul 18, 2013
- 28,688
I heard 1984!
Max.
MaxHeadRoom
- Joined Jul 18, 2013
- 28,688
Hello,
There seem to be a range of them.
From the wiki:
Millennials (also known as Generation Y) are the demographic cohort following Generation X. There are no precise dates for when this cohort starts or ends; demographers and researchers typically use the early 1980s as starting birth years and the mid-1990s to early 2000s as ending birth years. Millennials, who are generally the children of baby boomers and older Gen Xers, are sometimes referred to as "Echo Boomers" due to a major surge in birth rates in the 1980s and 1990s. The 20th-century trend toward smaller families in developed countries continued, however, so the relative impact of the "baby boom echo" was generally less pronounced than the original post–World War II boom.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennials
Bertus
There seem to be a range of them.
From the wiki:
Millennials (also known as Generation Y) are the demographic cohort following Generation X. There are no precise dates for when this cohort starts or ends; demographers and researchers typically use the early 1980s as starting birth years and the mid-1990s to early 2000s as ending birth years. Millennials, who are generally the children of baby boomers and older Gen Xers, are sometimes referred to as "Echo Boomers" due to a major surge in birth rates in the 1980s and 1990s. The 20th-century trend toward smaller families in developed countries continued, however, so the relative impact of the "baby boom echo" was generally less pronounced than the original post–World War II boom.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennials
Bertus
I pretty much agree with your analysis. Our kids are soft, by design. Our parents worked hard to make our lives better than their own, and we do the same. If we're lucky, our kids live in affluence (compared to most of human history) and peace (again, by any historical perspective). They are victims of affluence and can have the luxury of running around chasing Pokemon instead of catching grasshoppers for their dinner. Could they step up to meet the challenges our parents did? I hope we don't find out.
One quibble though. I've certainly tried to pass knowledge to the next generation and I'm sure some got through, but I was also surprised how differently my kids have grown up than we did. They've faced a different set of challenges than we did and some of my knowledge is not useful to them. Cursive writing comes to mind. Going forward I think they are prepared for things that us old farts couldn't handle. At least I like to think so. Maybe the challenges they meet in the next decades really won't be the same our parents dealt with. Maybe what I'm getting at is that while the human condition seems unchanged over the millennia from a mile-high view, it is different at the day-to-day detail level. Our progeny will not spend most of their days working for their dinner and for a roof over their heads. This has occupied most human labor throughout history. Humans have been poorly nourished throughout history. Maybe in 200 years they'll say we were malnourished as well, but just getting enough calories and a balanced diet has been a big deal until very recently.
One thing that I don't understand about millennials is that they don't see to want anything enough to work towards it. We worked for money to have a car, buy a stereo, have fun, whatever. Freedom. They don't want a car and can't be bothered to work for it. I don't get it.
Interesting observation. My kids don't quite make it to the millennium category, but they show some of those tenancies.
All of them have decent jobs and always have had them, but they are defiantly not driven as I was. They seem happy with enough. Maybe it's because they watched me as they were growing up and decided other thing were more important. On the other hand the boys are closer to their kids than I was.
I have had fantasies about the next generation being exposed to Calculus and Space-Time early enough to naturally think in those terms because I wasn't and I know I could have done better if I hadn't been sentenced to 13 years of lowest-common-denominator public education. What I'm trying to do here is peek under the other end of the Bell Curve and see if it's occupied. (That would be the other end from the double-thumbing Snowflakes in their Safe-Zone.)
Please tell me some of the latest generation of kids are zooming into their future as fast as they can go.
Please tell me some of the latest generation of kids are zooming into their future as fast as they can go.
Seems like all the money is in the internet.
Several are imports.
http://www.therichest.com/rich-list/world/top-10-richest-people-in-the-world-under-30/
Calculus? Space-time?? Who needs it.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/karste...e-jobs-will-and-wont-be-in-2017/#49164ec62e52
While I agree that emphasis in STEM education is important. I think it's even more important that we teach our kids the value of patience and hard work. And also how to communicate and get along with others; exercising both humility and pride at the same time in healthy and balanced measures. Unfortunately, the former has almost become an anti-value in our culture, while the latter has been distorted into a "better-than-thou" attitude that has me worried.
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justtrying
- Joined Mar 9, 2011
- 439
with 4/10 being founders of facebook... what does that tell you about the world... People are a commodity to be sold. Tesla died poor... Creating a social media network gets you billions. Should there not be a cure for cancer by now? Where is the millenial rage? I thought they wanted to "doSeems like all the money is in the internet.
Several are imports.
http://www.therichest.com/rich-list/world/top-10-richest-people-in-the-world-under-30/
something"... Ah, yes, there was Theranos...
Human nature has not changed one bit, I agree completely
