The Me Me Me Generation

Never since secondary school had I read every word from an article about the Millennial Generation.

But the TIME article by Joel Stein had me.

Perhaps it is because I am no longer reading it for academic purpose, and had the whole night to slowly read that 6 pages..

Or perhaps because what it says struck me.

Quoting from the article:

I am about to do what old people have done throughout history: call those younger than me lazy, entitled, selfish and shallow.

Millennials worldwide are more similar to one another than to older generations, with the help of the Internet and urbanization.

Poor millennials have even higher rates of narcissism, materialism and technology addiction.

Millennials have less civic engagement and lower political participation than any previous group.

The problem is that when people try to boost self-esteem, they accidentally boost narcissism instead.

All that self-esteem leads them to be disappointed when the world refuses to affirm how great they know they are.

Millennials have the highest likelihood of having unmet expectations with respect to their careers and the lowest levels of satisfaction with their careers.

A crisis of unmet expectations.

Now that they have cell phones.. they’re living under the constant influence of their friends.

Peer pressure is anti-intellectual; To develop intellectually you’ve got to relate to older people, older things.

Millennials are interacting all day but almost entirely through a screen.

They’re deeply anxious about missing out on something better.

That constant search for a hit of dopamine - “Someone liked my status update!”

Millennials lack empathy, and lack the intellectual to understand from others’ points of view.

Turn themselves into brands - “friend” and “follower”.

People are inflating themselves like balloons on Facebook.

Millennials don’t respect authority, yet also don’t resent it.

The information revolution has further empowered individuals by handing them the technology to compete against huge organizations:

hackers vs corporations, bloggers vs newspapers, terrorists vs nation, YouTube directors vs studios, app-makers vs entire industries.

Millenials don’t need us.

That’s why we’re scared of them.

Like all O/A Level essays, the author goes on to say some contrary views.

Millennials are nice. The Internet now is 90-10 positive to negative.

Millennials are more accepting of differences - gays, minorities.

They’re not into going to church, even though they believe in God.

One-third of adults under 30 are religiously unaffiliated.

They want new experiences, which are more important to them than material goods.

They are cool and reserved and not all that passionate.

They are informed but inactive.

They love their phones but hate talking on them.

If you are still Me Me Me… watch this commencement speech.

“Climb the mountain so you can see the world, not so the world can see you.”

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