I’ve come to accept that I am a “millennial.” Born on the cusp in 1984, I have done my best to separate my life experience with that of the mainstream concept of millennials. A generation raised by Hollywood; our parents came home from work to watch TV and passively parent their kids. Now, of course, TV was popular before the Advent of Generation Y. And, to be honest, I don’t blame them, that shit was good. Whatever your interest, no matter how bored you got, there was something for everyone on TV.
Being from the earliest group of the millennial generation, I endured history’s most lackadaisical parenting period. Rules were lenient, under-enforced, and, often, not followed through with, we ran free. As a general rule, most parents were clueless about what their kids were exposed to on TV, outdoors playing, the early Internet, social media, cell phones and so on. The general recklessness led rapidly into a more-coddled era. Either end of the millennial spectrum equality of outcome as spoiled rotten exists, just in a different way. Despite admittedly spoiled technology-wise, we have suffered through a harsh economic time.
TV: 30 Minute Millennial Life Coaching
I grew up on the “mean” streets of Southie – pause for the intended chuckle – (South Boston, MA) and spent most of the time outside. By choice, I restricted TV time to lousy weather, punishment sentences, and evenings. My siblings, however, preferred indoors and were allowed to indulge in as much as they chose. To be clear, my parents only excluded shows not quantity; I just had different interests. Fair to say, the average millennial (and person, in general) consumes far more television than me.
When I would watch TV, I preferred a combination of MTV, sitcoms, and shows that terrified me about rescues or unsolved crimes. Topics commonplace on basic cable TV at that time many now consider inappropriate for young children. Even the channel numbering system implied safer channels to under-concerned parents, Disney on Channel 24, Nickelodeon on 25, MTV on 28, VH1 on 29 where I lived. Most sitcoms and “terrifying” shows I mentioned available on local channels 5 through 13.
Music Television is a Millennial Too
Music Television throughout the 80s-90s exposed me to the debauchery equivalent of Las Vegas bachelor party while attending a small parochial school. Young millennials watched shows while our parents assumed we didn’t understand. Plenty of young kids understood the second meaning to children’s cartoons. Every kid I knew watched the same shows for the most part, so I believe this to be a widespread issue. Millennials’ expectations of life shaped by footage of a small percentage of wild people.
Sitcoms and Dramas
In a lot of ways, I understood being an adult better than being a child. Every 30 minutes, we could watch a family experience some unfortunate event, work their way through it, and come together with a solution and life lesson. Seriously, every 30 minutes, as if life transpired that easy. Unsurprisingly, some millennials feel “invincible” and “well-equipped to deal with the world” brainwashed with the idea that all problems are easily solved.
Television benefits society greatly, allowing multiple cultures to find common ground where previously they may not have realized one. For example, when you start a new school or job or move across the country an easy way to break the ice is to mention a favorite TV show and go from there.
24/7 Real Life Tragedies
News Media transformed from a daily paper to a combination of multiple times per day updates and 24-hour news networks. With the first 24-hour cable news network launching in 1980 (practically a millennial), America became addicted to and reliant on the news. For some time, the first reporter to break a story became revered locally, but cable networks offered national viewership. On national television for decades, some news personalities are trusted like the family by millions of loyal fans.
In 2018, mainstream media resembles a soap opera primarily reporting on political gossip. Media memorializes perpetrators while belittling and victimizing the law-abiding masses. Tragic events, which in the past would not necessarily make national coverage, now used to push agendas and funnel heart-broken people’s money around. Alleged news reported (often taken as fact, contradictory to word choice dictating otherwise) with minimal verification that spreads like wildfire one click at a time.
Millennial Surviving the Technology Craze
In the early days of the Internet, it wasn’t hard to stumble upon inappropriate information and images. Occasionally, a page with a checkbox to certify that you were over a certain age increased the time between you and grotesque and unsuitable. I won’t go into detail, but I saw more absurd shit by accident in the mid- to late-90s than I do now.
Wild West Days of the Internet
We prayed no one called once we sat through the dial-up experience. Humbly amazed, at the time, by the speed and ease, we accessed information on just about anything. Places like AOL, AIM, ICQ, and chatrooms, allowed us to connect with anyone in the world. Viruses from sketchy downloads were common. File sharing sites like Napster and LimeWire gave the music and Hollywood industries a gut punch. Of course, the Internet is still a wild place, but for a young millennial those early days were exceptionally easy to access.
Mobile Phones
After the short-lived beeper fad, I got my first cell phone in 2000 (maybe 2001) while still in high school. At this time, more people around driving age were starting to have cell phones. Texting and driving weren’t much of thing quite yet, and the mobile Internet was costly and difficult to use. We had long-lasting batteries in our Nokia’s, fancy Motorola flip phones, the thumb-balled Blackberry, and Nextel walkie-talkies to name a few.
Time passed, old-school clunky phones dwindled, and smartphones emerged. Texting and Internet surfing surged in popularity. Full graphic video games, music, videos, books, the world now fit neatly in our pockets. The computer memory in the smartphone we own today would have taken up an entire building not that long ago.
Social Media
Then there was myspace from our good old friend, Tom. Teenagers spending endless hours customizing and beautifying our profiles for reasons we cannot recall. I was in college when Facebook came out and remembered waiting patiently for my school to be added to their system so I could join. Oh, how Facebook has come from those days. Unrecognizable.
Social media certainly changed the world and the evolution doesn’t seem to be slowing down. To this day, an app update can please or upset millions of people overnight. Word travels faster and farther than ever before. Some in need have been able to find charitable help urgently, while others get bullied by strangers all over the world. Our feed determined by algorithms shaping our beliefs and who we communicate with, often tunneling us in one direction. The full impact of social media is yet to be determined, yet it is hard to remember life before it existed.
Anti-Victim Status
It would be pretty easy to blame the parents, but they were doing the best they knew how. The technological growth in my lifetime amazes me. I cannot fathom the additional influx of tech since the birth of my parents’ or grandparents’ generations. Like most 1980s millennials, I first logged onto the Internet in the early 90s over dial-up on a boxy computer. Then, I couldn’t’ve even imagined having the world at my fingertips 24 hours a day compactly and at high speed.
Over the past few decades, the average person’s life experience increased in excitement. Our attention spans are short and require flashier stimuli. We’ve created a 24-hour a day life, where we rely on government and big companies for virtually all aspects of our life.
Big Brands
Have you ever thought something without verbalizing it then shortly after that you see an Internet ad for it? I won’t say they are reading our minds, (they could be I guess) but likely we are gently guided to think about certain things. Companies like Google and Facebook create wealth using artificial intelligence technology to provide what information they believe suits our needs best. If you react to sports news, you see more sports-related; if you respond to fashion, it will be shown first, if you go down a negative route, another related negative post appears.
We consume a mind-numbing amount of advertising each day linked to instantaneously available purchases. Free apps with virtual deals for intangible products are a dime per dozen. The average American spends all of their money well before they earn it and often without ever touching a physical bill.
We take for granted the conveniences technology provides us. Whether poor or rich, we have very similar access to technology only differentiated by brands. Maybe you can’t afford a Tesla or Rolex, but you can likely buy lower cost equivalent. As a society, we take this for granted.
Government Reliance
Politics and government are sensitive subjects, so treading lightly here. Government responsibility limited to bare necessity provides the best quality of life to all. Utopian ideas pushed back and forth between the Left to the Right distract us from this reality. Not all people have the same needs, all of us deserve the ability to make our own choices. Each time we involve the government more profoundly, we artificially increase the cost of doing business.
When the government is responsible, the costs are always third-party purchases. The government is neither the recipient nor the funding party meaning they have no stake in the game. As a general rule, third-party investments result in the least overall value. Why anyone would want stuffy, old, pretentious politicians to make decisions for them is beyond me.
Anyone who even remotely follows politics or watches the news could tell you that the government regularly fails at the tasks we put under their authority. Like millennial parents, the government is doing the best it can with what is available to it.
Millennial Survival
As I mentioned earlier, the millennial generation is technologically spoiled, during an economically challenging time. Millennials and older generations are now addicted to consumeristic materialism which only perpetuates “the rich keep getting richer and the poor keep getting poorer” by consuming more than they need. Our reliance on the government to sustain a large percentage of the population tied to this system.
As individuals, it is time to take responsibility for ourselves and our families. Reliance on any more significant power to provide the highest good to all is unsustainable and flawed logically. If/when the system breaks, those who relied mainly on others will fall hardest and fastest least capable of survival.
Now is the time to take back our lives and our money. Time to stop chasing the newest trends and enveloping ourselves in debt. Instead, help each other, cooperate with locals for food, products, and services. For lack of a better term, we should strive to be the survival of the fittest culture humanity once was.
We would love to hear about your experience as a millennial. Let us know in the comments below or email us at emails@dirtywindshield.com.
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