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If there’s one thing I know about old people, it’s that they love to complain. They complain about everything from the pace of life speeding up to someone else not wearing a coat when it’s cold outside. They also love to complain about millennials. At least, that’s how millennials see it.
In this fast paced, 24-hour news cycle world we live in, it’s difficult to tell how many of the complaints are real or imagined. Sometimes I don’t hear about an issue until the backlash to the backlash pops up on The Facebook.
Oh, millennials are constantly being shat upon by the olds. The memes and Buzzfeed tell me this is so. “They complain about us getting participation trophies, as though we created these Little League policies,” the Tumblr posts say. I see more complaining about the complaining than I see actual complaining. Buzzfeed was wrong about my favorite NickToons show based on my choice in ice cream flavor, maybe they’re wrong about cranky Baby Boomers.
The sad thing is that Baby Boomers and Millennials have so much in common. They both enjoy indulging in a little bit of nostalgic “back in my day” talk, though only millennials make the insane, arrogant assertion that only 90s kids will have a memory of Blockbuster (EVERYONE ELSE HAD IT ERASED FROM THEIR MEMORY ETERNAL SUNSHINE STYLE). These two generations have so much in common that Baby Boomers were instrumental in electing our first millennial president, Donald Trump.
“Hold the corded phone, Denny,” I hear you saying to your screen, because you’ve definitely checked the author of this piece and given me a nickname, “Donald Trump debuted the same year as Tupperware[1]. He’s no millennial.”
Oh, he is. He checks all of the boxes, and in a way, he explains the frustration directed at millennials. Baby Boomers, like most humans, are most annoyed by the flaws they possess themselves.
Let’s review a thoroughly researched list of Things People Dislike About Millennials (compiled with help from The Prompt staff).
1. Safe spaces, trigger words, victimization, and claiming to be the focus of an attack.
The culture of victimization gets a lot of column inches on the internet. Safe spaces and trigger warnings generate a lot of eye rolls—not all of them undeserved—and the slippery slope argument follows close behind.
“We can’t baby-proof the world,” says a person who doesn’t want to spend mental energy on a problem they didn’t know existed until just now. And it’s true. Not all disturbing subject matter can be labeled, nor can you force someone to label all disturbing subject matter. But the desire for a cozy, welcoming mental space is not just a plague of 13 to 35 year olds.
When Donald had his Ruskie buddies over to play, he didn’t allow the mean old (American) news reporters to watch. They treat him unfairly, he claims. They say mean things about him. They don’t report on the stories that he wants them to report on. So, he didn’t let them take pictures at his sick hang-out sesh. He needed a place where he didn’t feel attacked. A zone where the ideas that made him feel uncomfortable weren’t allowed. A space where he could feel protected and safe. He needed a safe space.
Trump, who definitely knows how to read, complained that out of all politicians in all of history, a history that includes Harvey Milk and Barack Obama, men who respectively were assassinated and had their citizenship questioned, none have been treated more unfairly or worse[2] than he has. Everyone is so unfair to him. This guy belongs in a Hot Topic.
Remember way back to the presidential debate, when Hillary Clinton called him a puppet? Did he maintain his composure and offer a coherent retort? No, he went tween meltdown and answered, “No puppet. No puppet. You’re the puppet.” Sounds like our man Donald was triggered by the word puppet.
2. Snowflaking, entitlement, expecting to be a CEO in 6 months, and participation trophy culture.
Old people hate millennials for acting all special and what not. And apparently our aversion to 3 years of unpaid internships while getting berated at our coffee shop side hustle is akin to hating capitalism and demanding to run a company within a year. In truth, most younger people don’t want a bullshit job at a bullshit company. But we’re painted as hating the grind.
You know who really hates the grind? D.J. Trump. Every business venture he enters, he wants to be seen as the best. Hotels, steaks, beauty pageants, catheters—he feels that his should be the best because his name is on it. But that’s insane. Pick a lane and stay in it, Donnie. No one needs excellent steak from a high quality diploma mill.
At some point, Donald must have heard the advice “fake it until you make it,” only he wasn’t clever enough to fake it beyond claiming to be or have the best of whatever he’s talking about. Then he forgot that he was faking it and never got around to making it. Donald claims to be great at everything. He campaigned on being the only person who could turn this country around. That’s pretty snowflakey.
3. Twitter mobs and social media addiction.
If Donald Trump goes 24 hours without tweeting, it’s a goddamn news story. And if you point out that maybe his current job is serious enough that he shouldn’t be on his phone all the damn time, he will whine about how it’s the only way for him to truly communicate with the American people.
And we all know that he doesn’t lay off Twitter because of self-restraint. Do you doubt—for even a second—that during the Comey hearing, there were 5 adults lying to the president, saying, “No, sir, I don’t know where your Blackberry is,” and passing it back and forth when his back was turned?
I’m also positive that covfefe was the result of him not having the self-control to put down his phone to either go to bed or attend to an intense poo.
4. Inability to communicate in traditional ways.
You know what else gets crotchety old people hard/wide? A firm handshake. Oh they can’t get enough of it. Back in their day, all you needed to get a job was direct eye contact, racist hiring practices, and a firm handshake. Do you know who the concept of a normal handshake continues to elude? THE MOTHERFUCKING PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES!
Usually when someone has a shitty handshake, you only know about it from firsthand[3] experience or word of mouth. Your handshake game has to be hot garbage water for someone to visually confirm that you aren’t doing it right. And we all see it. He holds on too long[4] or attempts a death grip with his cocktail sausage fingers. I don’t think he snubbed Angela Merkel for a handshake as some power play. I think he was terrified of getting his shit wrecked by a lady.
5. Poor grammar and making up words like “bae.”
Trump may or may not have said “bigly.” I believe he just muddled the phrase “big league.” But go back to covfefe. He tweeted a typo. Fine. Did he own up to it? No, tried to play it off like he meant it. Doing something mildly embarrassing and then attempting to make it seem ironic or so hip and cool that the squares just don’t get it is a classic millennial move.
As for his grammar, the man only speaks in sentences that are somehow both run-on and incomplete.
6. Not committing to relationships.
Millennials get dinged for “hooking up” rather than dating (the modern term for courtship with the goal of marriage), but that’s not even a bad thing. Millennials are being honest about their capabilities to commit to a long term romantic partner. But they also know that they shouldn’t be deprived of that sweet, sweet lovemaking. Donald Trump’s three marriages don’t show his willingness to settle down in a relationship, they show a lack of self-awareness of his capabilities. Which surprises no one.
7. Attention deficit
Trump needs infographics instead of intelligence briefings. We are all fucked.
[1] Which is why his skin is coated in the melted version of it.
[2] It is impossible to even paraphrase him without sounding like a drunk toddler.
[3] See what I did there?
[4] Can someone make a supercut of Donnie’s handshakes set to the Wilson Phillips classic “Hold On”?
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