Showing posts with label generation y. Show all posts
Showing posts with label generation y. Show all posts

Friday, July 17, 2015

Our Obsession with Opinion

by J. Brown



We're obsessed with ourselves.

That's what previous generations thinks of us, and for the most part, they're probably right. My generation (Generation Y/ the Millenials/ whatever CNN uses to refer to us) is pretty vain. We created the selfie, the status update, and the Foursquare check-in. We've not only mastered the overshare, we've made it popular.

Most would look at this as simply a sign of the times, but I know better. I get that the generations before us might not have had Internet, but they weren't taking pictures of themselves with their Polaroids, either. They might not have had cell phones, but they didn't feel the need to outline their weekend and bore you with tedious details the following Monday. People have always had opinions, but they didn't always feel the need to share them. But those were simpler times. As technology became more complex, so too did our vanity. 

My generation's self-centeredness is perhaps best characterized by our infatuation with opinions. Over the past few years, it seems like the line between fact and opinion has become blurrier than it's ever been. You can't just be against gay marriage; it should be outlawed. You can't simply disagree with conservatives; they're bigots and should all be banned from Congress. You can't just be upset that Kendrick Lamar lost a Grammy to Macklemore; the entire Grammy academy must be racist. We as a generation have become quite fond of not only portraying our opinions as the right way of thinking, but actually getting upset with people for disagreeing with us.