The greatest generation kicked off the 20th century, followed by the silent generation, the baby boomers and Generation X. Each generation has complaints about the next, resulting in stereotypes that are forever attached to each group.
Now, young adults in the United States are referred to as millennials, and they are not immune to such stereotypes. Selfish, sensitive and lazy are only a few of the commonly said things about millennials, but not everyone has a negative opinion about this generation. Among the more open-minded individuals are students and a professor, at IU.
Emily Koehler, a senior studying marketing, said she discussed the stereotypes regarding millennials in her consumer behavior class last week.
“The first things that came to mind were selfish, self-centered, impatient, tech-driven, poor communicators, bad interpersonal skills,” she said. “But I think that those are the kinds of things that our parents and that older people have sort of instilled to us, and I think we sort of resent that term because of those preconceived notions that a whole lot of older people have about our generation.”
Koehler said while millennials seem to be most criticized, other generations often forget they were once in the same position of scrutiny.
“Every generation looks back on the generation that precedes it and the generation that comes after it and has complaints about it,” she said. “We can look at the generations that are older than us and say that they’re too set in their ways, that they’re not looking out for the future of us, and I think that there’s an equal amount of complaints to the prior generations that they have to our generation."
Koehler said that although stereotypes about millennials have been created by her parents’ generation, it was not intentional. Instead, she said, it is simply an effect of the transferring of her parents’ ethics to her own generation.
“A lot of our parents grew up in poorer families,” she said. “They worked hard to get good incomes, so we’re in better positions than they were. They’re providing for us more than what they had.”
Koehler said this more-privileged upbringing has allowed millennials access to higher education, and this grants millennials the power to be more influential in changing global communication and affairs than any preceding generation.
“Millennials have had more educational experience than any prior generation,” she said. “The more you know, the more you can empathize with people of other cultures, the more you can empathize with someone across the world because you’re connected by this global web and by this knowledge that just wasn’t available before. Education breeds success, and education breeds empathy and understanding.”
Along with greater access to higher education, technological advancement is thought of as intrinsic to the millennial generation. Another IU student, Sarah Phillips, a junior majoring in human biology, said the two work together in making our generation one of the smartest yet.
“From the 1980s till now, everything has changed so quickly,” Phillips said. “In the past, there’s been technological revolutions like this, but nothing that has given the wealth of knowledge to the masses in the way that the internet has.”
Phillips said although the internet is a groundbreaking technology that makes aspects of life easier, it also creates a competitive environment that calls on certain strengths of the millennial generation.
“We’re hard working,” Phillips said.
Students aren’t the only ones on campus not condemning the millennial generation. Anthony L. Fargo, associate professor in the Media School and the director of the Center for International Media Law and Policy Studies, considers himself a part of the late baby boomer generation. He said while he is fairly neutral on the topic, he is optimistic about the abilities of millennials.
“Each generation I think this is true probably, that you don’t have some of the prejudices that my generation had, or even that some of the generations after me had in terms of race, sex, ethnicity, religion,” Fargo said. “You do have things you feel passionate about, and that’s a good thing.”
Fargo said he thinks millennials might be tired of having to fight the same battles over and over, such as ensuring women’s access to free birth control. He said this weariness is often mistaken for excessive sensitivity.
Despite the stereotypes with which every generation is branded, Fargo said each generation is more diverse than it looks on paper. He said he looks forward to what millennials will hopefully accomplish.
“With you guys, I’m kind of waiting to see, actually, what you’ll do,” he said. “Given how divided the country is right now, I think it’s potentially possible that you guys will be the ones who bring it back together.”
Fargo said that each generation is less prejudiced than the previous one and that he hopes to continue seeing this trend.
“I think you’ve kind of come to the conclusion that we should be over some of this stuff by now, and let’s just move on,” Fargo said. “So I’m optimistic, to some extent, that you guys will get us further past the past.”
