A friend posted this video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MC2X-LRbkE) and I ranted on his Facebook.
I’ve written about Millennials before. I AM a Millennial. I struggle with the term because I hate fighting the negative stereotypes. I HAVE known people who are entitled shits. But you know who else is an entitled narcissictic shit? Donald. J. Trump. And he is a baby boomer.
You know who has a history of being selfish? Baby Boomers. Look at how many bust-boom cycles the economy has been in from ~1980 (the “young” end of Boomers is 1964 which made them 16, so a large majority were at least voting). Look at the boom-bust cycle since 2000. Look at Enron. Look at the recession of 2008. And the economists say we’re probably about to have another one. So AT LEAST one per decade!
I know awesome Baby Boomers. Unlike many of the critics of millennials who love to use sweeping statements about “most” and “all” – I actually recognize that voting in this country has been getting more progressive. the New York Times has a cool interactive map of electoral college runs. (https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/23/upshot/50-years-of-electoral-college-maps-how-the-us-turned-red-and-blue.html) George W. Bush only got 47.87% of the vote and Donald J. Trump only got 46.09% of the popular vote. That’s a different issue.
To respond to Simon Sinek – here is exactly what I put on my friends’ wall:
I disagree with him. And it started with his FIRST statement. It isn’t “1980 on,” It’s ~1980 to ~1996.(Gallop says 1980, Pew says 1984, Neilsen says 1977 – almost all of them mention 1996 for the range)
1) the only true part was that the person who just got the “participation ribbon” WAS embarrassed. And the students whose parents fought for them to be in honors classes without earning it – they knew that too. There is a diffference for asking for a cost of living raise and “entitled” – the MAJORITY of people I have ever worked with were asking for the former. In almost 10 years I’ve only ever known one person who had their mother call to quit their job.
2) Baby boomers are seeking the same dopamine addiction – they just use alcohol instead of Instagram
“Researchers see a steady rise in alcohol use and binge drinking […] in the 65-plus demographic” (took out a bit about clinical definition) (https://www.chicagotribune.com/…/ct-baby-boomers…) Boomers use a different addiction to deal with stress -but ALSO don’t have the tools.
3) he might be right about SOME of the issues with instant gratification, but it isn’t as simple as the marshmellow test (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/…/new-research…/) – the research is showing inter-sectional issues like race, socioeconomic status growing up, security, etc. has a huge effect. AS WELL – the millennials even given this test did better than the generation before and WORSE than the kids in the early 2000s (https://www.inverse.com/…/48642-personality-traits-that…)
I do agree there is a leadership problem. People who were promoted to initial management in the ’90s and ’00s were promoted because they were good at their tasks – and never taught how to MANAGE others. Now they are moving into senior leadership and they don’t understand why the people under them are frustrated because they were never taught (or told they needed to) connect to their subordinates.
4) He talks about depression like there aren’t a myriad of factors that can increase that risk. During the Great Depression suicide rates jumped from 12.1 out of 100,000 to 15.4 out of 100,000 (the actual year of the crash it was over 18/100,000 but then it went “back down.” There is a STRONG correlation between economic insecurity and increase of suicide “CONCLUSION: Economic recession periods appear to increase overall suicide rates, although further research is warranted in this area, particularly in low income countries.” (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4473496/) but no, no, no – it can’t possibly be that people who can’t afford to buy houses or get married or AFFORD THEIR OWN CHILDREN get depressed. They just need to be told to BE PATIENT.
Simon Sinek isn’t an idiot – but I wish people wouldn’t listen to him on the psychology of Millennials. He never cites any actual references, just is damn OPINIONS on what he “FEEELS” and he can take those feelings and shove them where the sun don’t shine – ’cause when you shine light on his FEEELINGS they are pretty full of shit.
Dream by Day 