STUDENT SHOUT: How the baby boomers created monsters

Student Shout is a weekly column by journalism students at Highbury College. Here, Holly Sayer-Gray gives her take on millenials.
Holly, herself a millenial, says her generation is guilty of self-obsessionHolly, herself a millenial, says her generation is guilty of self-obsession
Holly, herself a millenial, says her generation is guilty of self-obsession

Millennials, the generation born between 1984 and 2002, have been accused of an endless list of negative traits: a sense of entitlement, opportunistic idealism and rampant consumerism.

As a millennial, I look around at my generation and, as much as I love them, those negative traits can be seen as clear as day.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The obsession with mobile phones, clothes, gadgets and who’s got the best of everything – the consumerism is endless.

Self-obsession is the norm.

Profile statuses on social media scream ‘look at me!’ (though I have to admit to being guilty of this).

There is also an unstoppable self-belief that we can do anything we want.

We can career surf, become famous, conquer the world – even though most of us won’t have a mortgage until we’re in our 40s.

This generation is insane! But why?

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

For me, the reason is simple. A lot of our parents grew up in the punk era, and earlier.

They endured poll tax riots, Maggie Thatcher... and even flares.

Unlike many before them, they wanted a freedom from society.

They were in a position to give their children more than their parents gave them. So they did.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

During my lifetime technology has developed at the fastest rate in human history and that has directly affected our social behaviour.

Advertising and marketing has made it normal to ‘want’.

Fundamentally, we are a society created by baby boomers – and with anything new there will be bumps in the road.

When you think of us, try not to explain away our behaviour.

Just think, ‘If this lot are bad, what’s coming next?’

Related topics: