this is long, but THANK GOD for the Millennial Generation...I love you guys
So. I’ve wanted to say this for a while, and the last and first hours of the year are as good a time as any, so here goes…
I want to thank the Millennial Generation, the ones especially here on Tumblr. I want to tell you thank you from the bottom of my heart. I am thanking you as a middle aged person who is often burdened by her cynicism and experience, but I am especially thanking you as a mother. Let me tell you why:
It is New Year’s Eve. My children are out at parties. I am enjoying a quiet evening at home with my knitting and writing, wondering if I am motivated enough to organize my closet, knowing I’ll probably just do needlework and watch the Walking Dead marathon. As I type this, I have a small but solid devil on one shoulder, whispering re-runs of all the horrific news this year, reminding me that children aren’t safe, that terrible things happen at parties, during celebrations, at schools, at movie theaters, at malls… that I should shelter the kids under my wings and never let them wander outside my shadow. I struggle with this devil. I try not to be overprotective. It’s a battle I’ve been fighting for twenty years. I try to remember that my children are clever, that they’re strong, that life is mostly just fine. Most of the time the angel on the other shoulder wins. I kiss my children as they walk out the door and I smile as they drive away.
Sometimes the devil wins. Sometimes I am so afraid, I can’t get a full breath in my lungs. My blood runs cold, my hands shake.
It’s not that fear is new to me. You learn to live with fear when you are a mother. It’s the cost of admission. You learn to walk the razor’s edge, knowing that potential sorrow and potential loss walk with you, that you absolutely will not recover if balance is lost, if something happens to your child.
I have gained and lost many things in my forty years, had my life honed to a narrow path, and I have learned what is important to me. Here’s my line in the sand: that my children are happy and safe, everything else is negotiable. Happy comes and goes, so actually their safety is the thing; that they are alive and healthy and free to figure out their own lines in the sand, work out their own priorities, their own roads.
Like any mother, I worry. I specifically worry about about madmen hunting and torturing LGBTQ youth, about rapists passing around unconscious teen girls, about things I never could have imagined in my worst nightmares. I stopped watching the news last year. I couldn’t take it. I’ve talked to other mothers, moms of LGTBQ kids, moms of teen girls, all kinds of moms, and they are fearful, too. A lot of them have stopped watching the news as well.
However, unlike me, most of them are not on this site and I tell them they are missing out, that it is a little different here. I tell them it’s hard to explain. They are on Facebook, on Pinterest, on Instagram, but they’ve heard things about Tumblr so they stay away. There’s some divisive stuff here, sure, but here’s the main thing I find here, day after day: HOPE.
So. When people write derogatory stories about the Millennial Generation, it makes me angry. It is witless and lazy to point fingers at the younger kids and make lists about their shortcomings. It was boring when our grandparents did it and it’s boring now. Yes, yes, they’re different from us, their music is strange, their art is provocative and their values are not what they used to be. Which makes me say THANK GOD FOR THAT. Thank God things aren’t the way they used to be. I knew two gay kids in high school, one died of AIDS, one committed suicide. There was no Pride club, no official stance on bullying, on hate crimes, no LGBT support or sex education. I knew girls who had been raped; they didn’t file police reports. They knew the status quo, they knew they would be vilified, that the rapist would get a slap on the wrist and a talk about girls not knowing their own minds.
THANK GOD FOR THIS GENERATION. Or thank the universe and all its awesome science. Whichever you prefer. This is the generation that said, “Hey, you’re transgender and gay? Not a problem, and frankly, not the most interesting or important thing about you. Pull up a chair and tell us what IS important and interesting about and to you.” This is the generation that refused to ignore rape. The generation that said NO MORE, not on our watch. The generation that is more comfortable with their own sexuality, and the many shades and degrees therein, who understand the difference between gender and sexual identity, who’ve learned in record time about concepts like consent and patriarchal oppression, about healthy relationships, about what constitutes abuse.
Millenials are so damn smart. I am so proud of you guys. You are the generation that grew up talking intelligently about the balance of power, gender definitions, and racial divisions and equality with the same ease that you embraced technology, and these are complicated issues that have defeated many people. This is the generation that passes around anti-suicide messages and hang in there messages. This is the generation that said “If you’re feeling down, I’m here. Message me. I’m here for you,” and meant it.
You are the generation that uses technology and information, words and pictures as skillfully as surgeons and warriors and soldiers in a crusade to make the world a better place than the one you inherited. Many people try to start revolutions; you kiddos are living one. Whenever I start to panic, to let fear lead me, to derail me from being the best parent I can be, I am often reminded of things I have seen and read on Tumblr, and believe it or no, it actually helps me regain my equilibrium. I remember that there are really smart, really good, really brave kids who, by their very existence, keep my kids safe and respected. Thank you for that. Thank you so so very much for that, for taking care of each other, for easing each others burdens. You ease my burden. You give me hope for a better world, a world of inclusion and acceptance. World building is happening, right here, right now. It’s amazing to witness. It’s easy to be afraid, to be discouraged, and yet you guys are out fighting the good fight and taking care of each other in spite of some significant burdens and limitations.
So I don’t want to hear any more nonsense putting the Millennial Generation down. I don’t want to read any more click bait type headlines about how this is the most entitled, laziest, most anti-social, etc, generation. If you see that crap, you tell them to come talk to me. You and I will have cookies while they sit on the Naughty Step until they stop telling lies.
kianamaiart
izzy806
germansingergirl
