Oh Gen Y, how I love thee so!
Two things happened today, completely independent of each other. Combined they signify a turning point in my overall feelings toward Generation Y.
First, I was doing a bit of spring cleaning when I came across an enormous box of old pictures. The pictures where mostly of my 20 something years when I lived overseas. I am at that “age” when people stop taking pictures of you and you’re the one taking all the pics. It’s a typical evolution of life when several years go by without current pics. Unless of course, you are one of those self-loving bloggers who take an abundance of pictures of themselves at strange angles (you know who you are!).
I realized how much I smiled in all the pictures. Whoever says high school years are the best, lied. The best years of my life (um, so far) is from 22-26yrs. Sometimes, I miss that period in my life.
Later on in the evening, I was fumbling though some my RSS feeds and Alltop pages reading different blogs. Typically, my response to most Gen Y (not all) blog posts have been the “WTF? You are so missing major historical points in the discussion.”
Tonight, though I started to say “WTF!”, I stopped before the end of the post. I realized Gen Y is that perfect years of innocent innovative thinking to which a person will never reclaim. Twenty somethings are old enough to know Kraft cheese slices come from cows, but are not jaded with the ugly truth of the dirty, unpublicized processes that go into making that cheese slice.
So tonight, I fell in love with Generation Y for the first time. It’s the love of an elder who listens and smiles as the younger generation speaks with flamboyancy and energy, hoping they won’t loose that spark completely as they grow up.
Blogging Stereotypes
Stereotypes are alive and well in our society. Even if we use them for humor, it proves stereotypes are alive and well in the back of head. Otherwise we wouldn’t get the joke.
Psychologist say our minds revert to trusting stereotypes when we are not presented will all the information. Whether it’s observing a couple interact from afar or developing our own ideals of how our lives are suppose to look. If stereotypes are ultimately wrong, wouldn’t it make sense to proactively abandon them in our own lives?
As society and technology evolves, I wonder how many new stereotypes are made. An acquaintance of mine was networking with a Generation Y focused blog site. The individual was discussing potential of guest blogging due to she/he’s expertise in a certain area. The individual was baffled when the idea was dropped because he/she did not meet the age requirement (18-30 years old). Is it acceptable to assume one’s knowledge or ability based on their generation? Why are still using stereotypes as marketing tools?
Blogs in particular seem to embrace stereotypes rather then prove them wrong. Look at the rise of Mommybloggers. As a group, society has deemed “mothers” who blog as the stereotypical mommyblogger. Even the former professionals or current professionals who use blogging to discuss parenting, are still grouped under the stereotype of mommybloggers.
Generational blogs, mostly attributed to Generation Y, are feeding stereotypes based on generational birth. In reality, the generation of a person’s parents and their philosophies of parenting contribute more to an individual’s personality than their year born. A Generation Y being brought up by older parents of older baby boomers, are vastly different then Gen Y’s being raised by old Gen X’s. What happens to Gen Y blogs as the Y’s grow up? Will they change their age requirements?
One would think the internet would move passed stereotypes versus creating their own. How much information or expertise are blogs loosing because they prefer to feed the stereotypes versus open up to a variety of information. How can we learn from conversations if we don’t attract a variety of readers and contributors? In society, it takes all of us to partake in order for us to evolve - not just one stereotypical group.
