TL;DR: Don’t make ‘millennials’ sound like exotic care package skilled in the art of squandering their lives away, while perched on top of a hipster-lingo that defines “cool”.
I've come to detest the word ‘millennial’. What I detest more are the ungainly associations drawn.
Word has it that our drug-addled brains are lazing around in workplaces while munching on avocados and swiping right/left on each other. We're flaky, moody, our attention spans are outrageous, and our screen time will be our ultimate undoing. I was once advised to get off my phone and “enjoy nature”. Yeah, right. Nature, after all, can be found across the street, peddling its wares amidst clouds of smoke and dust, nestled between skyscrapers.
Anyway, getting back to the allegations:
Yes, our attention spans are outrageous. (So is everyone else’s, thank you very much! At least everyone equipped with a functional WiFi connection.) Most of us are a product of our times and the internet hit us like Incredible Hulk on an adrenaline rush, just like pagers and Nokias hit our worthy predecessors.
Is it fair to constantly blame us for what was served to our pre-pubescent selves with a ceremonious flourish? The economy picked up, free markets burgeoned and an overwhelming deluge of perspectives and ideas struck our beaten paths, while we were still in our pimply teens. Yet, we are constantly admonished for adapting to the whirlpool around us. Doordarshan never messed with attention spans and screen time, dear detractors. That's our tragedy and your jackpot.
Of course, there are cons. Change is good and bad. But trust me, we are trying to fix it. It is difficult to extricate yourself from something that’s trying to constantly subsume you. A few of us, in fact, have. The others, like me, are on the way.
(PS: My mother spends more time on Instagram than I do. With delightfully curious eyes, she peers into her screen, her eyes lit with a joie-de-vivre rarely spotted in her interactions with me. Of course, she joined the party late. But once in, she picked up the ropes faster than I did. She is one short sigh away from going LIVE on Instagram, while I am wistfully longing for... more and more avocados?
No, I am not.
I am as puzzled by this generalisation as the daal-chawal on my plate is. Let's get this straight:
‘Millennials’ aren't breathing, eating, cursing, dancing, and snorting avocados. )
No, we are not lazing around in the office. Somebody's money is ALWAYS on us and somebody's a** is, consequently, always on the line. It is the exact same principle underlying every workplace dynamic since Thomas Alva Edison lit a lightbulb. You work, you rake in the moolah, you don't, you're shown the door.
Yes, we are swiping. Constantly. But not at the cost of work or deadlines. Jostling between long hours of work, very little sleep, and weekends that are spent in bed, we've reached a dead-end. Where does one meet new people? We're also learning, every single day. Compatibility, emotions, consent, and boredom--we're teaching ourselves something new about all of this every single day.
Cut us some slack, please?
Yes, we are moody (for lack of a better word!). But, believe it or not, we care. (If you know of “millennials” who're abrasive, irritable and self-centred all the time, that's just them, not something that can be excused as part of a wider inevitability.) We aren't the stone-hearted cyborgs we're made out to be.
There is a LOT happening around us and we are only trying to keep up.
We're trying to nurse life and take things in stride, invariably getting tangled in complex emotions. So much so that a lack of it is viewed with admiration and... boredom!
Oh! Also...
We care about history.
We care about literature.
We care about politics.
We care about our stories...
It affects us as much as it affects everyone else. We don't exist in isolation and not all of us are privileged enough to not care. We care, as much as we care about the lighter elements in life that are adamant in subsuming us completely.
Bottom Line: One step older, two steps younger.
(The above is a part of TLDR (Too Long. Didn't Read), a weekly blog that aims to crunch things down for you. I will give you the long and short of most things that need to be taken extremely seriously like your bookshelf, beer, existential dread, aimless conversations, rainy days and bubble-wrap. I promise to cater to all readers, but I brazenly harbour a soft-spot for skimmers, bathroom-readers and infinite scrollers. Now, let's bring the written word back!
P.S: Follow me @medhac1)
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