Millennials. Anyone born between 1981 and 2000. Often thought of as lazy, self-centered, entitled, dependent…a menagerie of condescending terms and scapegoat claims. We’re blamed for the economy and a "collapsing" society.
And we’re tired. I’m tired. I’m 19-years-old and I’m exhausted.
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I was four when 9/11 occurred; six at the start of the Iraq war. I’ve been desensitized to violence and death; every morning on CNN more faces are flashed across the screen and declared dead due to combat. I used to try and remember their faces. Now, it’s impossible. My compassion and empathy for the situation have been reduced to a dull ache because I’ve never lived in a time without war. We’ve been in the midst of this war for 12 years, spending over 2 trillion dollars, and I’ve watched my disabled veteran mother struggle due to being declined necessary medical treatment. There are tags reading "Support Our Troops" being sold in every drugstore in America while real veterans go without. It isn’t fair. Millennials know that, and we’re sick of it.
I was told all my life that if I did my best and worked hard I would get into college and subsequently get a job, but now that isn’t even guaranteed anymore. The bachelor’s degree is the new high school diploma, they say, and they’re exactly right. I’ve had high school teachers with doctoral degrees who cannot find employment anywhere else. The debt is enormous, and the risk is high; I’m not yet 20 and my student loans equal seven dollars per day I’ve been alive. I’ll probably be paying them off when I send my future children to college.
But apparently I’m lazy.
I’m lazy because I do not have the time in the day to work to pay off my tuition. Those who went to college in 1979 had to work 300 hours, total, at minimum wage to pay their tuition. A summer job. Not unreasonable. Students today would need to work 1,000 hours to pay the inflated cost. The national minimum wage is no longer a living wage, as the inflation has not been proportionate to the inflation of the dollar. Working through college is no longer realistic, almost everyone is forced into loans.
The American Dream is dead, and millennials were not who killed it. The American Dream has been reduced to a two bedroom apartment with a washer and dryer, a four-door sedan, and a job that provides dental benefits. We no longer have these great dreams of success because all we can focus on is just getting by.
Some things, though, make the millennial struggle worth it; we fight for what we believe in, and we have hope for a better future. We have friends of different religions and races, we cheer for gay rights and cry for those who are wronged by the system. We are men, women and non-binary folks who no longer sit stagnant and let our parents tell us how to think. We no longer stand for things that are "just a part of life." We no longer accept racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia or any inequality. We’re not a silent generation any longer. Especially with the next election coming up, the world needs to understand that we are millennials and we know that the world won’t change for us, we’re going to have to do it ourselves.
