#millennial rant

[deerstalkerdeathfrisbee]

Trust me, work with enough people who are way older than you and you’ll start to see the generation divide really sharply.

Older people literally do not understand some of the things we do. We’re the first generation to not really have ‘careers’ or many of the normal markers of adulthood or really any general feeling of stability. We’re sort of adrift. Gen Z gets it because they’re following in our dissolute footsteps and getting angry about all the shit we’ve pointed out as being shit but weren’t able to do anything about.

We’re sort of Generation Uncertainty.

Where our parents, if they did choose to be independent contractors or freelancers or private business owners, they *chose* to do so. We, on the other hand, can’t find work as anything else for the most part. It’s to the point where many people in their 30s are choosing to keep working at Starbucks because at least Starbucks gives you benefits. No, it’s not a respectable ‘career’ but who has those these days?

Fewer people are going to law school or medical school because no one can afford it.

Some people are predicting we’ll be the first generation to tell our kids not to go to college because the financial burden is too great. 

Sound familiar? That was what many working to middle class people told their children before the GI bill and other economic measures made college attainable for more people. Congratulations, America, we’ve regressed to the early 1900s again. 

We’re Generation Internet because the internet reflects our own impermanent state - it can be wherever we need to be, it allows us to connect with others across states and countries and continents AND our tech skills are the only thing giving us a leg up in the job market.

I had the most surreal, bizarre conversation of my life at work a few weeks ago (I have two jobs, and a boatload of student loan debt, yay!) where a man in his 50s or 60s tried to convince me that colleges brainwashed young people into being liberal capitalism-hating communists. I tried to explain to him that actually, after watching our parents suffer for capitalism’s mistakes in the recession and then getting our asses handed to us by capitalism’s ruling class on the regular, maybe our wariness is a little deserved. And oh, hey, learning socialism exists is not the same as communism, also Soviet Russia officially followed the Marxist-Leninist model and China follows the Maoist model so no, they’re not textbook communism any more than America’s economic model is pure capitalism either (seeing as it carries weird holdovers from feudal Europe and colonial life that affect it’s function as well). I could cite my sources. He could get huffy and waste 45 minutes boring me to death and not changing my mind. 

But hey, apparently the free market is going to save the world, so I can get pumped for that (sarcasm intended). 

Sorry for the rant, loves, I just had a shit week and I’m overworked, underpaid, underrepresented, and tired. 

[hufflepuff-dreaming]

When I was little they told me to reach for the stars. When I said I couldn’t reach they told me that I could build a rocket to see them sparkle. They told me every effort I made was amazing and gave me prizes for trying. “I came in last.”, I would mumble and pout under my breath. “You tried. That’s all that matters.”, they would say as they pat my head and give me a gold star. “I can’t do it.”, I would cry out when I was scared and unsure. “You can. You can do anything you put your mind to. If you fail I’ll catch you, but you won’t need me. You can do this.”, they would encourage as they pushed me forward. When I was little I would stumble, fall, fail, cry, and get bruised. They would pick me back up, brush me off, and encourage me to do bigger and better things.

I’m big now. Well, bigger than I was. Now when I reach higher they tell me I can’t do something. That I shouldn’t be trying to do something. That I need to earn prizes and don’t deserve one for showing up. “I never asked for a prize. You gave them to me to encourage me. I never said I earned that.”, I want to scream back. I don’t, I keep quiet. I wonder what I did wrong to lose their kind words and help. I fall, and fail. “That’s life.”, they say as they shake their heads and walk away. 

I wonder what is so different between me and that little girl they thought could conquer the world. What did I do wrong? What changed? When did they stop seeing the child and start seeing an adult that thinks they deserve the world without earning a thing? Why did they encourage me in the first place if they didn’t want me to accomplish anything?

[figsandfandoms]

Email isn't just annoying to Gen Z workers—it's stressing them out

Emails are stressing out workers, and the youngest people in the office are feeling the most pressure.

"More than a third, 36%, of Gen Z workers say they have over 1,000 unread emails in their inbox, compared with 18% of office workers overall."

okay maybe i'm channeling my inner boomer or whatever, but how do these people have jobs? if you're getting sent emails as a part of your job, and you're not reading or responding to them, how do you expect to keep your job?

like, i get it that responding to an email can feel overwhelming, i experience that myself, but if it's a part of your job you've just gotta suck it up and do it. otherwise you and your team will miss deadlines and look like jerks.

[defendjersey]

I hate the TD garden because back in the day for a radiohead tour when you had to sit through the agonizing process of ordering ticket bastard tickets over the phone I pressed that one because it was before the Philly TD venue in the list the computer voice would read out loud (there was only 1 number for ALL the stops for the entire tour that went on sale at the same time) and then when I got further in buying the tickets I realized and I had to start all over, thus dooming myself to much worse tickets

[bye-bye-sugar-blue-eyes]

"When I was your age we didn't need 'trigger warnings' on everything."

Yeah, and a lot of people suffered because of that. You shout your support for troops with PTSD from the rooftops, and that's good, they deserve respect. But you don't even consider that people can suffer from it for a number of reasons.

"We survived without cell phones. We don't need them."

Yeah, but if you had had them you'd be on them just as much as kids these days. And if they had existed, they could've literally saved people's lives. They have more purpose than just social media and texting.

"We didn't have all these complicated/confusing genders and sexualities. People were straight or maybe gay."

You may not have had the proper terms, but I assure you there were people who were transgender or asexual. There have been people as old as 50, 60, 70 that have come out saying they've always felt a certain way but thought they were crazy or wrong because there wasn't a well known term for what they were.

I'm sick and fucking tired of older generations calling us sensitive and lazy and snowflakes without considering why we do what we do. People my parents age tell stories about how their parents never took the time to understand them and just called them mindless rebels. Yet those same people are quick to judge my generation without trying to understand them.

We get told we're just kids and don't understand what we're talking about, so what we have to say has no merit. Yet at the same time we're blamed for the downfall of EVERYTHING! So tell me, how do we not 'count' as adults, yet we're supposed to take responsibility for everything that's wrong in this country? Where's the logic in that? We get called childish, sensitive little snowflakes, but the second some of us go against the norm, it's:

"MILLENNIALS KILL THE POPULATION BY NOT HAVING KIDS"

"MILLENNIALS DON'T BUY DIAMONDS. WHY???"

"MILLENNIALS AREN'T BUYING HOUSES"

It seems to me that they're the ones that are acting childish. They're the ones being sensitive. I'm gonna tell the next grown-ass adult that whines about my generation doing something that literally doesn't affect them to stop being a little snowflake.

[nostalgiakillls]

Millennials are killin' it

The whole "millennials are killing X industry" is such bullshit because... Fucking deal with it? We are not bad people for not wanting to support industries that different generations established. So what, I don't want to shop at soul sucking big box stores, buy fabric softener, or consume dairy. It's my life, and I'll spend what little money I am able to make in this economy (which generations before us made too btw) on things that I want!! I am under no obligation to buy whatever crap stale white males have been marketing to my parents and grandparents for generations. I am the consumer. The market follows what I want, not the other way around. Fucking die mad about it already.

[professionalcomplaintsbox]

I’d Like My Trophy Please

~~Okay. So even though this blog is dedicated to ranting, I’m trying to avoid political stuff as much as possible- I can honestly say that each side has points and reasons behind their actions that make sense to them. Discourse will lead to discussions, which will then lead to progress and growth as a nation (hopefully). This is all I’m going to say on this topic for now though.~~ The one thing that has really been consistently pissing me off in political arguments the past week is the overuse of the tired and overplayed statement of, “too many participation trophies” (or other similar statements) as a way to validate someone’s opinion and put down another generation. Really? Seriously? I mean, you actually made some valid points and you end on that? As if that’s a thing? Personally, I can’t speak for the entirety of my generation, the Millennial generation -or as I prefer, Generation Y, as in “Why the fuck are we still being called out for something that you did to us?” But, as a member of said generation- the tail end, depending on where you draw the line- I’d really like to call bullshit. I personally don’t care how coddled you think we are, because, well, that was your doing. Please don’t ask me to feel bad for your fuck-ups. Especially, please don’t expect me to feel bad for your perceived fuck-ups, but I digress. The bullshit that needs to be called, if we’re taking this statement literally, is the amount of trophies given and the fact that clearly it was too many. Once again, I can’t speak for everyone, but I don’t know what damn trophies you’re talking about. As someone who participated in this, that and the other growing up, I don’t have a single trophy to my name. Do you want to know why? Because I didn’t win. If this is such a common perception of generation Y, the “fact” that we were showered in trophies, giving us unwarranted confidence or expectations, I really want to know where this abundance of magical trophies are hidden. I mean, I did so much, clearly the sheer amount of what I did is worthy of at least one shiny metal object to show off to others and project my worth. What pisses me off most are the other members of our generation that then spit out this same old phrase as if they actually have trophies themselves. They generally don’t.*  Can you think for yourself, or did Daddy and Mommy train you to be their little parrot? I have honestly never seen anything awarded out past fourth place, it being the consolation prize more as a, “Well, darn. You almost made it bucko, but if you don’t already feel like shit enough, here, have a sympathy object” rather than “You are AWESOME! Totally equal to, if not better in ability, than those in first place!” At this point, you’re mistaking children for idiots. I can’t think of any other way to phrase it. No one wants to lose. No matter how many “well almost”s you give someone, they’re more likely than not going to still be very aware of the fact that they lost (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but losing and winning are really over emphasized in our society, but that’s a different argument). Just because someone has a different opinion or viewpoint to you and is of a different generation, doesn’t make them an entitled, spoiled, little brat. They are just as entitled to their opinion as you are, but broad, charged statements really don’t benefit anyone or get them to see things from your perspective. Especially if it has to do with the receiving of fictitious trophies that someone else had to give out. But, if for some reason I was a hiccup in the system, I’d like my damn trophy. *As for the Millennials that also like to say this, I personally think they’re just too scared they’ll be roped into the negative rhetoric that is constantly spewed about their generation, and therefor play the “trophy” card to be in favor of those who are older than them, and to elevate them above their peers.

[onceuponabeatle]

I am the textbook example of the issues in the American college debt system. I graduated from college in May of 2016 with an associates degree and a bachelor's degree. After 5 years of school, I managed to rack up only $40,000 of debt. This is a considerably low number, taking into account the fact that I attended a state school (private schools are much more expensive), and that I studied for five years as opposed to the "typical" four. I breathed a strange sigh of relief seeing that I'm only in $40,000 of debt. Some people have it much worse. I began applying to jobs months before I even graduated. I did everything right. I perfected my résumé and cover letter. I kept in close contact with my advisors. I applied for any job that I could see myself doing. Over a span of approximately six months after graduation, I applied to approximately 20-25 jobs. Some places flat-out rejected me. Others didn't respond at all. I began to get nervous, because the payments on my student loans were looming. I held on to my last $40 with all my might. I wasn't even getting the luxury of living paycheck to paycheck. I moved in with my sister, who supports me financially. She pays rent and buys groceries for us both. My parents bought me a used car after the brake lines in my 18 year old car finally gave way on the highway one day. So now, here I am with my two college degrees. Today, I managed to pick up a seasonal, part-time, minimum wage job at my local zoo. Don't get me wrong, I'm excited to be working again, but I accepted this job because it was the first thing to come along. I will be working 40 hours a week to pay my student loans. That's it. I still can't pay my rent or car payment. I won't have any extra money for groceries, gas, or (dare I say) the occasional lunch with friends, or shopping trip. I will likely be in debt for the next 10-20 years of my life. But tell me again how easy millennials have it.