The COVID-19 pandemic has brought with it many legitimate hardships of both the physical and economic varieties. It’s understandable that people of any age are concerned with both reality and the future beyond these long days of quarantine and self-distancing. No matter the generation, we’re all affected by this unprecedented event. An overwhelmed healthcare system, rising unemployment, and business instability affect us all.
In the midst of the crisis, there appears to be a tendency for some to declare millennials as the ones for whom life has been the most unfair. This insular line of thinking not only dismisses our shared experience, but is glaringly ignorant of history.
At The Atlantic, Annie Lowery wrote about the economic catastrophe brought on by the pandemic and how it disproportionately harms millennials. From her perspective, this generation, roughly defined as those born between 1981 and 1996, will bear the brunt of the financial pain. But more than that, Lowery seems to claim that millennials are continuously dealt the worst hand in life.
Lowery isn’t alone in thinking millennials have been saddled with the worst of times.
Millennials have been historically screwed by forces beyond their control twice, and the effects will last their whole lives. https://t.co/cOfW7D6OGo pic.twitter.com/JOaPv5bGGH
— Ezra Klein (@ezraklein) April 13, 2020
Can’t stop thinking about how anyone who is a millennial or younger has literally never known stability. Crisis after crisis after crisis. A generation of anxiety. https://t.co/PRYpAE5Su5
— Aleigha Cavalier (@aleighacavalier) April 10, 2020
As a member of this “lost generation” myself (who was born in the early 1980s), I can understand and sympathize with a portion of the frustrations, but certainly not all of them. To act as if we are the most downtrodden, crisis-ridden, and unlucky souls to have been born would be to dismiss decades of experience by my parents, grandparents, and millions of others who are in older age brackets.
My grandparents went through the Great Depression, served in World War II, witnessed Korea, and had children who served in Vietnam. My parents had siblings in Vietnam, experienced the cultural turmoil of segregation, saw the fight for basic civil rights, went through times of severe recession, and learned of a new, mysterious health epidemic called HIV/AIDS, among many other things.
The millennial experience may not look exactly like that of our elders, but this does not mean we are special victims.
If anything, history shows that no generation is ever immune to hardship. Advances in technology, healthcare, and increased life expectancy don’t guarantee that our lives will be free from sorrow and struggle. And despite some members of the millennial generation believing they’re the center of the universe, we’re actually not. Many of us may be in our prime, in the midst of thriving careers, and starting or raising families, but none of these factors is a license for either arrogance or ignorance.
Instead of looking inward and marveling at our youth, vitality, and misfortunes, we should educate ourselves. Millions upon millions of people in the United States have experienced crises, worked through, and learned from them. We can, too.
Eventually, this unexpected pandemic will reside in the past. For those who will have gone through it, there have been and will be lessons learned about compassion, necessity, community, and sacrifice. Those in the millennial generation may feel especially burdened by current events because of our stage of life, but as the course of our nation’s history plainly shows, we are not unique.
Kimberly Ross (@SouthernKeeks) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner‘s Beltway Confidential blog and a columnist at Arc Digital.
