What the Hell is a Millennial Anyway?

Today Vox published an article titled "Stop calling teenagers millennials". I have no doubt this confused many older people who tend to think of the term "Millennial" as only referring to kids in their teens and twenties. For those of you who don't know, the term "Millennial" technically refers to members of what we once called (and some of us still call)  "Generation Y". The term was coined by historians William Strauss and Neil Howe in 1987 to refer to the generation following Generation X. Messrs. Strauss and Howe treat Generation Y as beginning in 1982. That having been said, many (including myself) begin the generation earlier. MetLife treats Generation Y as lasting from 1977 to 1994. Nielsen Media Research sets the dates for Generation Y as being from 1977 to around 1995 or 1996. Personally, I always thought of Generation Y as lasting from 1978 to around 1994.

If the term "Millennial" was originally meant to refer to people born in the late Seventies, throughout the Eighties, and into the Nineties, why is it still being used of teenagers to this day? I think the confusion over the meaning of Millennial rests with the term itself. Speaking for myself, "Millennial" sounds like it refers to someone born shortly before, at, or shortly after the start of the Millennium. Given this, it makes no sense to refer to someone born in 1992, let alone 1977, as being a "Millennial". In fact, when I first heard the term "Millennial", I thought that it referred to people born, at the earliest, in 1994 or 1995. In other words, I thought it referred to kids. What is more, I used it that way too.

This confusion is made all the more worse by the stereotypes the media decided to attach to "Millennials". According to the media, Millennials grew up with digital media instead of CDs (they never knew vinyl), are obsessed with their smart phones, take endless selfies, and are active on social media. This does not fit any member of Generation Y I know. My oldest Gen Y friends grew up at a time when vinyl was still common place, cassettes were the dominant means of listening to music, and CDs were rapidly overtaking both vinyl and cassettes. Some of my Gen Y friends don't even own smart phones and those who do are on them no more than Gen Xers and Baby Boomers (going by my brother and my older sister, Xers and Boomers might just be on their phones more...). They certainly didn't have them (or any other mobile phone, for that matter) as children. My Generation Y friends also don't take a lot of selfies. In fact, I have one Gen Y friend who hasn't changed her Facebook profile picture in about 8 years and, it isn't even her--it is her old Mad Men avatar! While the stereotypes the media have applied to Gen Y don't seem applicable to any mid-twentysomethings and thirtysomethings I know, they seem perfectly applicable to many teenagers I know, individuals who just happened to be born at (yes, that's right) the start of the Millennium.

Of course, such confusion over generations is nothing new. William Strauss and Neil Howe always treated Generation X as taking place between 1961 and 1981, but many insist on treating Generation X as starting in 1965 and ending around 1979 or 1980. Speaking as a Gen Xer myself, I always think of Gen X as starting in either 1961 or 1962 and ending in 1977. I certainly do not identify as a Baby Boomer! Sadly, there are some who will insist on calling me one, so I can fully understand Gen Yers' frustration with the term "Millennial" being used of both themselves and today's current crop of teenagers.

Personally, I think the best idea would be to simply go back to calling those born from the late Seventies to the early Nineties "Generation Y". As to the kids born after that, I fear that calling them "Millennials" would simply continue the confusion. Given 2001 saw the start of the third millennium, perhaps we can simply call them "Trimillennials".  Okay, I don't like the term either, but given the confusion over the term, we probably shouldn't continue calling them (or anyone else, for that matter) "Millennials" either.