What is a Millennial?

There are many different definitions on what the word Millennial actually means. For most, it is somewhat of a derogatory term intended to cause annoyance in Millennial's. When people talk about us it's almost never with a bright smile. If I had a dollar for every time I heard "Millennial's don't know what it's like to struggle" then I would be a billionaire already.

The dictionary definition of a Millennial is "someone who reaches young adulthood in the early 21st century" (dictionary.com), which puts quite a large number of today's adults into the group. The social definition of a Millennial however is "a special snowflake" (Urban dictionary). When you think about this, it's quite horrific. The issue I see here is that we "special snowflakes" were often raised by the very people who criticise us. I'm not saying here that anyone is wrong in anything, but every generation before has complained about the generation that comes after.

In truth there are two branches of Millennials. Those who are most commonly criticised are the Gen Z Millennials. This is what I am. We were born between 1991 and 2001. Because of this we grew up on the most current technology, saw the change of governments and the panic of our parents with this 1999 bug. Considering this, is it any wonder we don't go outside? The other branch of Millennials are called Gen Y. They are often confused with Gen X as they were born between 1981 and 1991. They were pretty innovative and were the first kids to personal computers. They also pretty much invented text speak.

There are a multitude of issues between the two groups and they don't often get along very well at all. In some cases, Gen Y Millennials are parents of Gen Z Millennials. They have very different views on the world and tend to blame each other. Gen Z Millennials often mistake Gen Y Millennials as Gen X and don't like to accept that Gen Y and they have a lot in common. Now, I'm just generalising and not speaking for everyone, but I do speak for a majority of people when I say that the biggest issue between the groups is the fact that Gen Y often take on many traits of those from Gen X and this annoys Gen Z.

Millennial's certainly struggle, in fact by statistics, we are the generation that have struggled the most. We are open-minded and willing to accept things like sexuality and gender (again I don't speak for everyone) and because of this we are often shunned for trying to allow "unnatural" things to occur. We live and work with the reality of the world today, we can't afford to live in a fantasy world where milk only cost 10 cents. (In fact most of us are vegan, so there's that) Even given that a lot of Millennials are vegan, it's hard to find vegan friendly foods that don't cost upwards of $20 for a stick of celery.

We understand that the world is changing, we're pushing for it. Millennials are changing the world, we've already changed how communication works and now we're working on changing the very nature of what it means to be human. Sit back, relax and watch us thrive. We were raised to be "special snowflakes" and make the world how we want it to be. Now, let us do what you raised us to do.