Millennial is a very loaded term. Is it good or bad? Does it even matter?
A millennial, according to PewResearch, is born on or after 1980. This is the first group of adults in the new millennium. There’s a lot to be said about the generation that grew up with the Internet and cell phones.
In fact, this TIME article, which arguably set the tone for the term millennial and brought it into popular culture, really highlights the generation gap. And the cover? A young girl taking a selfie.
The conclusion the story draws, or at least pretends to draw, is that taking selfies makes millennials self-entitled narcissists. The article tries to provide a counterargument and toes the line by stating some facts about the millennial’s strong work ethic, but it also provides some statistics about “A’s for effort” and trophies being given out just for entering. That may all be true, but we, as a generation, didn’t get there on our own. Someone had to raise us this way.
But the heart of the story is that, of course, social media is indeed one of the defining characteristics of our generation. It’s not a surprise that an incredibly large percentage of millennials use Facebook and other social media sites.
With this social media comes the ever-important topic of the selfie once again. It is, after all, the defining characteristic of our millennial generation. Selfies are “normal” to us. The front-facing camera was an innovation that truly changed lives. In another TIME article, they delve into the selfie. They literally try to figure out what a selfie means. Sure, we can be psychoanalyzed all they want, but, to quote the queen of selfies Kim Kardashian, “I was feeling my look. Can I live?” There is almost no reason to take a selfie other than feeling good. Honestly, more likely than not, it’s out of boredom and sent via Snapchat for, hopefully, no more than seven seconds. Who sends a selfie for a full ten? We are grown adults.
Anything that promotes body positivity, especially for girls, is a good thing. Lord only knows they need the self-confidence in a world that tells them to be supporting characters in a man’s story.
Feature Photo via Flipboard
