anoceanofstarlight:

enfj-in-a-strange-land:

dragynfox:

starrynight35:

julialoveandlightt:

kyraneko:

anightvaleintern:

yolandaash:

teapotsahoy:

jadelyn:

doctor-segmentium:

let’s be honest though, millennial hate is totally a thing rich folks started because they’re pissed that we have really unpredictable consumer habits and it isn’t as easy to get us to buy into stuff, so they’re mad we aren’t just money giving/traditional economy supporting machines like they expected us to be

like look at how much millennial hate articles are things like “millennials aren’t eating cereal and it’s hurting the cereal industry” or “millennials aren’t buying houses and that’s bad” or “millennials #1 utmost priority isn’t trying to make as much money as possible” and rich folks are mad about it, so just posturing our unpredictability/nontraditional values as “laziness” gets everyone else on board the hate train in some weird attempt to collectively subdue us

“You are Doing Capitalism Wrong and it scares me” – bitter Boomers to Millennials who are not buying into their shit (or buying their shit)

Keep in mind that the subprime mortgage crisis was at a pretty pivotal time in Millenial’s lives, and taught them that financial institutions are not on your side, will lie to you, and specifically will lie to you about what you can afford.

Like, this isn’t coming from nowhere.

I mean boomers refuse to pay a living wage to anyone and then wonder why those people don’t buy anything? I am sorry but what exactly is the disconnect here?

Millennials value work that has meaning above work that pays well and they hate that as well.  It means we can’t be shut up with busy work while they’re made to seem like they’re running a well oiled machine.  They come from a generation of a boss being someone who says “do what I say because I told you to” and we come from a generation who values a boss that says “what can I do for you that will help you excel at your job?”

Millennials do not cope well with meaningless busy work so their boss looks better.  They don’t cope with being talked down to or not being assisted by their boss when they have a problem.  They do not deal well with their innovative ideas being shut down because “that’s not how we do it here.” and I don’t see how any of those things is a problem.

Millennials are also the first generation since the internet was a prominent thing to utilize it as a source of information in a way that is empowering for each other.  A single millennial can buy a product and then inform anyone who wants to know about the quality of said product.  It only takes a handful of millennials to say “this is a substandard product” to render all the millions of dollars spent on advertising that product completely useless.

Big business has been a blotch on millennials lives since before most of you could even assume a role in adulthood to effect it, so you trust one another more than you trust advertisements or sponsorship, etc.  

On the flip side, though, you enthusiastically will push and promote things that you love.

Big business and their baby boomer CEOs and presidents HATE this.  Because it means that they can no longer provide a substandard product while making the consumer feel there is nothing better out there.

In the past, if every dish soap was awful, you just had to continue using awful dish soap.  Now, you can crowd source an alternative.  You can post in a forum, your facebook, a mass text, etc and say “I hate every dish soap, what can I do?” and you will be directed to actual good brands or you will be taught how to brew your own.

You’re a great generation, I’m really proud of you guys.

Seriously, tho.

I’d love to buy a house, but I can’t afford a down payment and can’t be certain that I’ll have the same income levels for thirty years and I don’t actually know whether the banks will accept my highly-fluctuating, self-employed-and-seasonal-labor income as stable enough or high enough to be approved for a mortgage.

And also every new housing development I’ve seen in the past five years has been “Executive Housing, Starting At 390K” and the realtor websites are full of last decade’s foreclosed subdivision homes in the $275K region, and there’s legit no one, including the zoning board, that’s going to help me find or make a cute little house on a tenth of an acre in the region of $50-60K, let alone every other millennial who might like to settle down in a place that suits her desires and means.

Oh, and that same zoning means five people aren’t allowed to share that $300K, 5-bedroom McMansion, because fuck us, that’s why.

And what else? The refrigerator that recently conked out on me was manufactured in 1967. That thing lasted almost fifty years, and today if I walk into a big box store’s appliance department to buy a new refrigerator they will tell me I should really buy a warranty to cover the apparently-substantial risk that it will break within two to five years.

Oh, and there’s apparently a $400ish premium to buy one with a convenient configuration because if you want the refrigerator on top and accessible without bending down for anyone taller than your average first grader there aren’t any of those in the entry-level price range. Once again, fuck us.

Then there’s the labor market itself, where “entry level” positions want three-to-five years of experience, and everybody won’t shut up about the trades but even that requires a $5K+ outlay to go to school for it, and every fast-food restaurant out there has a permanent “Now Hiring” sign up because they drive employees away as fast as they can replace them.

And so many food-service jobs involve being forced to throw away loads of food as it expires but if you eat it or take it home it’s viewed as stealing, and retail jobs sometimes require you to smash perfectly good computers with a sledgehammer so nobody can use them, and fuck all of this, yes, I’m gonna make my own goddamn laundry detergent from a recipe I found on the internet, and I’m gonna buy as much of my vegetables as possible in seed form, and I’m gonna fucking read the consumer reviews on shit before I buy it and I’m going to source a refrigerator from Cragislist for approximately the price of the warranty on a new one, and if The Market wants me to buy a house, it can bloody well wait for me to have the money.

Because seriously, with its “Ask not what your economy can do for you, ask what you can do for your economy” mindset and historic, far-reaching fuckery, the business side of the equation has little room to complain about millennials being the selfish ones.

I reblog this every single time it shows up on my dash

I’m on the Gen X/Millennial cusp so to speak, and this post is every fucking thing. Everything.

All so true.

OK there’s something I’d like to say
about the sentiments expressed in this post and similar sentiments I
see expressed elsewhere.

Speaking as a millennial… mind you
on the slightly older end… I’ve been through school, several shit
jobs and then back to school again to try and better myself. All the
while fighting depression, anxiety and a few health issues.

I
believe if there’s anything millennials truly suffer from, it’s a big
fat victim complex. And I say this out of a place of love, let me
tell you. I’m concerned for my friends and other members of my
generation because they’re setting themselves up for miserable lives
by thinking the way they do.

Let’s lay a few things out
here…

The older generation will always complain about you.
ALWAYS. It’s true of every generation that passes. Hell, there are
quotes from ancient Greek texts that have the older generation
bitching about the new one. And eventually the millennials will do
the exact same thing to the generation that follows. This isn’t just
a baby boomer trait.

As for this unfortunate world we’ve
found ourselves born into… let’s get one thing straight. The world
has always been shit. Every generation has had to suffer through
garbage in one way or another. Whether it’s famine, war, oppression,
collapsing economies, fear from nuclear destruction, the big guy
stepping on the little guy, people working jobs they hate, marrying
people they hate, kids dying from the plague, etc. Even the very rich
are not completely immune to the turmoils of life. So I mean, things
aren’t perfect right now but when are they ever? We’re still not the
worst off by far.

I see the majority of complaints seem to be
concerning jobs and not being able to afford school, housing, etc.
But from what I can see from several people complaining about these
issues is they seem to be under the impression these things SHOULD be
easy to get. I’m sorry to tell you they aren’t and why the hell
should they be? Why are we the generation expecting handouts?

In this day in age, we have to be clever about
finding good work and good paying jobs. They are out there, don’t say
that they’re not. Because, believe it or not, some of us are making
it and it’s not because they were handed these things. You have to
make sacrifices to get there. Do your research, make connections,
work a bullshit job until you can afford the relevant education (if
it’s required) and you continue to work your ass off until you get
there. Then one day if you’re driven and clever enough you can actually find
yourself in a more preferable life. But don’t just sit at home
wallowing in self pity about how the previous generation didn’t make
it easy for you. Blaming them is just a pathetic excuse to not get
the job done yourselves. You are responsible for your own life and well being.

The stage has been set. This is the
world we have to work with, whether you like it or not. Be creative,
be clever and stop giving up so easily just because you’re too
sensitive to take orders from some over-paid asshole with the
intellectual capacity of a grapefruit. Because I can tell you, all of
your fellow millennials who are actually succeeding right now went
through it all, and maybe are still going through it. But the difference between them and the people laying down and dying is they haven’t given up. Take responsibility for your own happiness and
trudge through the muck. I grew up poor, and I can fucking tell you,
I’m not giving up until that hole is far behind me.

Don’t
surrender without a fight. And if you fall, pick yourself back up
again. It’s only one failure out of many and it’s going to shape the
person you become. A more fulfilling life is out there, you just have to move through some unpleasant things to get to it. 

You’re ignoring the very real systemic factors that the economic royalists have instituted in order to deprive the middle class of their means.  The economy, the way it is today in America and around the world – jobs being hard to find, houses being impossible to afford, affordable healthcare rapidly rising out of the reach of even well-to-do people – it is not a force of nature.  It did not just happen by itself. Lamenting that Millennials are “laying down and dying” rather than standing up and taking care of themselves is a really short-sighted and selfish display of over-confident tert Se.  (I’m not judging you – I see it in you because it’s in me too.)  It feels comforting to believe that we live in a just world, but that is a fallacy.

The world is not fair, but more than that, it is imperative to acknowledge that it was intentionally stacked against us. I strongly suggest that you do some research about the Lewis Powell memorandum, generational cycles of history, and conservative strategy in the ‘60s and ‘70s, among other topics.

Some heavily recommended reading:

• The Crash of 2016 by Thom Hartmann
• The Fourth Turning by Neil Strauss & William Howe
• The Big Short by Michael Lewis
• Don’t Think of an Elephant by George Lakoff

Your voice has a lot of power.  I know your intentions (inspiring people to take responsibility for their own success and happiness) are pure and good, but it’s cruel and counterproductive to do that when people are being forced to participate in a cruel, jigsaw-esque rigged game.  What we need now is not merely the individual will to thrive, but rather the collective will to overcome our monied oppressors and reclaim our society, our middle class, and the dream of prosperity for anyone who genuinely does work hard to succeed.  That dream is dying, and encouraging the economic losers to fight over the ever-dwindling pile of scraps is not empowerment. To succeed today, we must lift each other up and start to fight back against the Kochs, the Waltons, and others in the top tenth of the top one percent.

Also, remember this: the vast majority of baby boomers are themselves victims of the decades of vicious and calculated propaganda proffered by these assholes, and fighting against other underdogs – even those of them who are brainwashed into believing the lies they’ve been fed – is also counterproductive.  Remember who the real enemy is – and make them pay for it.