In a conversation I kept speaking of something I ended up calling the “millennial blunder“. By “millennial” I mean a mentality that became prevalent in the late 1990’s and climaxed in the early 2000’s creating what can be called a “millennial craze”. It seems, to me, that this craze is on the decline. This craze had great impact on the generations growing at the time causing what can be called the “millennial generation”. It is this generation that this blunder was most pronounced.
THE “MILLENNIAL MENTALITY”
The “millennial mentality” consisted of a mentality which displays qualities such as:
- It worships technology to the point that they placed it above everything else, even oneself, and others.
- The worship of youth.
- A worship of social and national ideals.
The most memorable qualities about it was the worship of technology.
This mentality, from what I observed, primarily appeared as a result of the end of cold war. When this happened people tended to glorify aspects of America as, during the cold war, the US was fighting the Soviet Union, which was opposed to American ideals. In some sense, by glorification of America was something like a “victory lap”. They glorified things such as :
- Americas beliefs and ideals
- American innovation and inventions
- American politics
- The youth as the representative of those ideals
Behind it all, really, is what can be described as a “worship of America”. In so doing, by the early 1990’s the youth were looked at to represent and carry on the “glories of America”, such as innovation and continuing Americas ideals. By the late 1990’s, when the mentality was becoming established, it became an image of the “youth representing America’s ideals”. As a result, the youth had to do the American ideals . . . excel, succeed, go to college, and get a high paying job. What better way to show the greatness of America than to have the youth reflect American ideals!
THE EFFECT OF TECHNOLOGY
The growing success of the internet and other technology, which happened at the same time, became an “easy avenue” for many of these expectations. As a result, many of the kids began to worship technology as an “easy” way to fulfill the image the country wants of them. In this way, the “worship of technology”, by many of the millennials, was really an “easy out” of a predicament they were put in, which was caused by the unrealistic expectations of the nation. In a way, they “hid behind technology”. They used the fantastic achievements of technology, that so impressed everyone, as a “replacement” for what they were supposed to do. This “hiding behind technology” made many of this generation become overly dependent on technology. It became, in a sense, their “alter ego”. Because of this, many people of the millennial generation tend to have a “nobody” quality as they depended on technology to be themselves.
ATTITUDES AND CHARACTERS IT CREATED
The “millennial mentality” created certain attitudes:
- An attitude of submission and a sheep-like mentality . . . because they were blindly following things
- An arrogance . . . because they were using the glories of technology to make themselves great
- A snobbishness . . . because the use of technology made them think they are great
- A “nobody” and “person-less” quality . . . because the mentality never allowed them to grow as people
- An addiction quality . . . because they needed technology and social ideals to be someone
With these different attitudes, the “millennial mentality” created a number of different characters. Not very often did a person reflect all the attitudes. Some people were affected by one attitude, some by a number of them. In this way, these different attitudes created many different “millennial characters”. Some examples include:
- A person who mindlessly follows social ideals, technology, etc.
- A person who uses social ideals and technology to glorify himself
- A person who depends on and needs technology for everything
- A person who needs social ideals and technology to make them someone
THE “MILLENNIAL BLUNDER”
Despite all the different characters it created, as a group, they all contribute to create the “millennial blunder”. Basically, the “millennial blunder” consists of the fact that they have allowed technology, and social ideals, to not only dominate but to have complete control over their lives and dictate who they are. They literally gave up their lives to it.
A statement I’ve often said goes something like this: “They made the mistake of giving up their lives to ‘one thing’, making it out as if it is all there is in life. In so doing, they left out a lot of life and lived as if ‘in a shell’ removed from life and the real world.”
To me, this seems a major blunder and I’m not the only person to say that.
There seems to be two main avenues of this blunder:
- Technology
- Social ideals
It seems, to me, that technology is just an extension of social ideals as it represents the ideal of “American innovation”. I often felt that technology became particularly powerful because it had these qualities:
- It was growing day-by-day
- It impressed everyone
- It could be used in ones job
- It could make money
- It could be used daily
- It was tangible and something one can “grasp”, whereas social ideals are more fluid and difficult to grasp
These things, I often thought, gave technology more prominence than social ideals. As a result, it made it more impactful for this generation.
Interestingly, this blunder varies with male and female, I’ve noticed. I often see this pattern:
- Males make the blunder of allowing technology to control their lives
- Females make the blunder of allowing social ideals to control their lives
This pattern isn’t clear-cut and seen in everyone, of course, but it often seems to follow this pattern.
THE EFFECTS
In so doing these things, they did a number of things:
- They turned themselves into puppets
- They sacrificed their personality and became sort of a “nobody”
- They undermined society and social institutions
- They helped enslave society to all of this
In short, because they made their lives revolve around ‘one thing’ they tended to make society follow this same pattern.
It appears, though, that its effects are waning . . .
THE DECLINE OF THE “MILLENNIAL MENTALITY”
Overall, the “millennial mentality” seems to be in decline and even seems to be falling. This seems to be a result of a number of things:
- COVID, which brought the fact that there are other concerns in life
- The problems surrounding Trump, political problems, social problems, and such
- The fact that the millennial generation is getting older
- The fact that the “wow factor” of technology is declining
- Various historical events
These have all directed attention away from the “millennial mentality” by showing that there are other things in life and that life does not revolve around technology and social ideals. In so doing, it is as if making the millennial generation “defunct” and “old fashioned”.
Copyright by Mike Michelsen
Mikes passing thoughts Blog 