An Open Letter to My Generation, in regards to the Millennials

My Longform response to an article written by a Millennial about the term “Millennial” for Al-Jazeera online. The article dealt with embracing the concept of “millennial” as an adjective to describe those born roughly between 1980 and 2000, which is, numerically speaking, the largest generation in history. The author wanted millennials to realize their power as a group 30 million strong, and discussed several ways they are alike, contrary to their own opinions about their uniqueness and ‘specialness’. The original article is called “In Defense of ‘Millennial’” and was written by Jordan Fraade. This was originally posted on my G+ thread, and some light editing has been done for this version.

The problem is not the millennials- Any way you slice it, whatever you want to call them, they are the future. The real issue is the Boomers who are disparaging them the same way they disparaged Gen Xers 20 years ago. This is made worse by the fact that the fact that the Boomers refuse to do anything to resolve the fundamental imbalance in the work force that their refusal to vacate it causes, for Gen Xers, but also for Millennials, who are probably more technologically well-suited to step into meaningful, well paying jobs today than their somewhat less productive (in terms of work over time) Gen X predecessors are, who grew into computers rather than growing up WITH them. There is a small issue that Gen Xers, like myself, born in 1976 have with technology- We have a foot in both worlds, the pre-internet world where nobody ever imagined the ability to text with your friend in California and real time video calling was the stuff of futuristic science fiction (performed in movies by camera tricks), and the post tech revolution world where something like that is actually a reality for millions and millions of people. We know the problems that technological change causes for the the social fabric of this country. Technological advances outpace the ability and willingness of society to adapt. There is also an economic issue that apparently Boomers refuse to speak about (because they are the primary financial beneficiaries) and Millennials can’t see because they are so fully immersed in the system that it is difficult, if not impossible to see beyond it, but Gen Xers see as clear as day.

Most of the technology which empowers Millennials is being created and utilized for profits, and sold to satiate artificially manufactured demand from consumers (most of whom come from this group of people who themselves don’t have to raise their own kids, but most of whom nonetheless feel a certain social pressure by their peers and their jobs to maintain a certain lifestyle.) This full adoption of technological innovation, which itself is promoted by planned obsolescence for the sake of underwriting the profits of stockholders in several sectors of the economy, none of which actually benefits the society directly, in turn, through various mechanisms, makes a lot of this technology indispensable for a lot of the rest of us…

Gen X has already been eclipsed by the rise of people who speak tech like it is their first language. We have been cut out of the chance to run things, forced into retrograde by the refusal of the Baby Boomers to get the f — — k out of our way and let us take our jobs from those who are holding them too long. Generation X has lived up to the image that those assholes who came before us painted for us about ourselves- The perpetual losers in the generational game, screwed over by the Boomers who are too selfish to relinquish their place, and outpaced by those who are able to work smarter than we can or do, a skill that is sought by profits-hungry corporate boards bent on cutting wages and benefits for workers long before they would ever consider cutting “administrative costs” or executive salaries. As Gen X, our choice is to either align ourselves with another generation or fade into debt-crushing oblivion (where most of the same Boomers who are now alternately picking on and attempting to advertise to Millennials predicted we were going to go anyway.)

This is where the country is going- The country will be tech savvy, it will eventually be run by people who, for better or worse, did get trophies for just showing up, and people who think that every vapid opinion they hold should be shared with everyone around them: these are the sorts of people who both have the ability and the ambition to claw, with regard for nobody else, their way to the top of a socio-economic structure which has been reoriented to reward precisely that sort of behavior (for the sake of shareholder profit, by the way), while completely debasing the skills that people like myself bring to the table (for example, the ability to write a thesis. Who knew when I was 16 that nobody would be writing coherent thoughts, let alone complete arguments, in long hand anymore?) But at the same time, it is wrong to paint an entire group of people of a similar age with the characteristics of its worst segment. Most “millennials” are not narcissistic climbers who post ridiculous YouTube videos for no other reason than they want to be “YouTube famous.” Instead, most of them are kids, and like kids, they are inexperienced. The difference between these kids and Gen Xers 20 years ago is that nobody expected anything from us. The Boomers were still fully in charge and were secretly planning to keep their jobs, come hell or high water for the next 30 years.

This is why they sold us on this idea of taking our student loans- it kept us out of the labor market for x-years and ensured that we would be the ones taking all the awesome low wage jobs at McDonalds that Boomer Bill Clinton created for us so we could find a way to repay those loans, thus allowing the Boomers to keep whatever high paying jobs that corporate bosses couldn’t outsource. These Boomers have been robbing Gen X for two decades by denying us the opportunity to obtain good work and live comfortably, pocketing the difference between what we are making and what we should be making now, and then using their position to prevent us from rising.

And now they are starting to try to do it to the Millennials too- Their attitudes toward Millennials, which are clearly stated in arrogant article after arrogant article, condescending speech after condescending speech, is clear, and by the way, it mirrors their attitude toward Gen X in most ways. It’s all an effort by that generation and its allies among my generation to shift the blame for the collapsing society and economy off them and onto someone else who is not now, nor has yet been in charge of anything, while they continue to try to wring the last little bit of wealth out of the society and put it in their pockets.

But the Boomers are starting to retire, and so they are forced to look for their replacements, which in this case happens to be people born after 1980 (which is reasonable, because they prolonged the hand off for three decades while they took “theirs’ out of it). Now these kids are being expected not only to fill the positions finally being vacated by the Boomers, but they also bring a whole new technological skill set into the field. The expectations are high for inexperienced people who prefer to communicate with their friends with text messages and whose parents have unnecessarily prolonged their childhood, probably more out of love than out of anything else. It’s almost like a recipe for disappointment and failure. It’s almost like the Boomers created yet another self-fulfilling doom prophecy.

As for me, I don’t hate the Millennials, nor do I fear them. I want to like them and learn from them, because it is their way, not mine which will rule this planet going forward. Gen Xers remember back when there was cool music on mainstream radio. Millennials don’t really listen to the radio. :) This is a grand allegory for the shift that is leaving Gen X in the dust. But in their rise to the top, it is my hope that Millennials don’t forget the advice and the harder-than-usual gained experience of people who should be seen as their older brothers and sisters. We’ve had our hands on the levers for a long time, and I hope that the Millennials, most of whom I don’t think are like people describe them, take a few cues from my generation, and let our consternation at being passed completely over be to their benefit. Because we have a lot more in common with one another than either group does with the Baby Boomers, and Gen X should be willing to accept the task of undoing as much of the damage that the Boomers did to our society, for the purpose of making straight the path for that generation which is following us. We won’t, of course reap any of the rewards, unless you count the enjoyment of a formerly rudderless society finally being righted and put back on course again.

But- it’s our lot in life to be disregarded and forgotten, so having the opportunity to do something good for society finally, in spite of that reputation, will be reward enough for Gen Xers. :) As long as we can still listen to the Red Hot Chilli Peppers and Pearl Jam and NWA and REM and Alanis Morissette on our iPhones, I suppose many of us will be quite happy with our part of the bargain, all things considered.It may seem odd that I should advocate that Gen X play a conservative role in the transition, but not when you think about it: The Revolution has already happened. Gen X’s role in the Revolution should be to ensure that society doesn’t become complete unanchored and obliterated. If not carefully tended, the sort of technology which is ubiquitous today, especially among Millennials will, without question lead to this sort of social entropy. Gen Xers have the experience to know this, but Millennials have yet to fully understand this key fact, and they demonstrate their lack of understanding or fear of social atomization by continually welcoming new, faster, shinier, but only marginally more practical technological platforms, regardless of their cost, and with no regard for the almost still-current technology that they are abandoning.

If Generation X does not rise to the challenge and work to protect the very idea of real, as opposed to virtual community and society, it will be obliterated as a relic of the past which is made obsolete by the next version of facebook or instagram, whatever that happens to be at the moment, and that will essentially be the end of the thing which separates humans from machines. As much as the Millennials push back, on this one point, Gen Xers must stand because we remember that real social interactions used to be the primary way people interacted with one another, and the Millennials will only realize that they need to temper their enthusiasm for the new with some concern for the world outside of their iPhone. We have to work to slow the revolution until society can evolve to adapt to it.

Outside of this conservation role, Gen Xers shouldn’t expect to lead anything. Instead, we should play the role of Confucius or SunTsu- the wise adviser who wants the best for the leader and offers him advice based on experience of the real world which the leader does not yet possess. If Gen Xers can keep it together long enough for the Millennials to learn how to fail and then, more importantly, how to recover from that failure, if we can right the ship long enough to allow this very young, very inexperienced, and in many ways, very coddled generation to get its feet under it and gain a bit of experience and self-confidence which doesn’t come from the number of “likes” it has on its immature social media postings, we can be sure of emerging on the other end of the tunnel happy, healthy and well off, as a society, rather than a mass collection of a bunch of folks who are texting one another, and calling that “friendship”.

Let’s give the Millennials a chance to learn about society, outside of social media, and as Gen Xers, let’s offer to be allies with the Millennials. They will be the leaders of the coming society, which is building all around us. The role of the Gen Xers has to be that of regent until they have enough experience to fully take over. If they can, (I don’t doubt it, assuming the Boomers get the hell out of the way and not torch opportunity for yet another generation in their scorched earth mission to wring every last drop of vitality out of society and inject it into their own lips) we’ll see an end to these negative depictions of the Millennial Generation in the popular media, because those making those depictions, namely the boomers and the atavists among the Gen X crew who are being used like puppets by the Boomers, will be in the grave, finally.