In my last
essay, we focused on the shifting trend of Millennials away from home ownership
toward the inner cities. Now let me ask
you all a different question, but somewhat along the same lines. How many people ages 18-35 talk to you about
the so-called “biological clock?” This
of course assumes you know what the biological clock is. By the time a woman reaches age 45 (give or
take a few years), her child-bearing years are behind her, and the closer you
get to that magic number, the number of risks inherent with pregnancy tend to increase. You knew that already, right? OK, so with that in mind, it would make sense
that people would want to start having kids earlier and younger while the risks
are less and the prospects of having a larger family would be more.
Statistic
number 1: the average age of marriage now (as of 2013) is 27
for women and 29 for men.
(Uh oh, I better get on that……)
This is up from 23 and 26 respectively in 1990 and 22 and 22
respectively in 1960.
Statistic
number 3: 65%
of young adults cohabitate at least once before getting
married, up from 10% in the 1960s.
Seems to me
from these statistics that the idea of a family is about as foreign to the
Millennial crowd as the house in which they would live. We could once again talk about this from an
economic perspective. Kids are
expensive! Yet, we beat that horse to
death in the last essay. Regardless of
the reason, kids are really on anybody’s radar.
However, that third statistic is rather telling: 65% cohabitation
rate. I may be reading between the lines
here, but methinks that they understand the biology of it all quite well thank
you very much.
I have one
theory as to why kids are not all that popular with the…um…kids besides the
economics. We have all heard the stories
of starving children in the third world.
They need our help. They do. They really do. You hear about the terrible stories coming
out of places like Darfur and Ukraine, and you are moved to help. This Millennial generation wants to see the
world (as discussed) and all that comes with it (thanks in part to social and
news media), so they make these areas more of a priority than a family that they
do not yet have. As a result, the family
is put off, and put off, and put off some more.
Some people have even said that kids are not on the radar at all.
However,
everyone eventually reaches an age where you start to hear the biological clock
tick. I believe that it is in everyone’s
natural instinct, biological instinct, to want to be a parent. Whether that is through the old-fashioned way
or through a mode such as adoption, people want to be parents. For some, that idea of parenting takes the
role of a religious vocation, but for most that means being Mom or Dad. What is really shifting is the AGE at which
this realization comes to be. Until that
happens, and it is happening later and later, kids and family are not even in
the discussion.
So until
that happens, what is the attitude of the Millennial? This is where social media really starts to
once again play a role. How many of you
remember the very early days of Facebook and Twitter? It was a race to see how many friends you
could get at once. There were people who
would have well over a 1,000 friends, and my first question was, “How many of
those people have you actually MET, let alone know?” I took a glance at my friend list on Facebook
the other day. I have at present 261
friends. By my count of that 261, 10 of
them are deactivated profiles and 2 of them are dogs, so that leaves 249 active
“friends” that I have on social media. I
made a point as I was perusing to ask myself, “How do I know this person
outside of Facebook.” I was able to
answer that question for everyone on there.
Now, whether or not I have kept in contact with these people is another
story, but I can safely say that I have actually met or otherwise conversed
with in-person everyone on my Facebook friend list. That number is fairly small compared to some
of the mammoth friend counts that I have seen people have on website.
My simple
question is why, but that is beside the point.
Once again, we live in an interconnected, instant gratification
society. We also all naturally want to
be famous. Who doesn’t? If you say you do not want to be famous you
are lying. I know I want to be
famous. Heck, where I work I am already
a rock star, but I always say that until you become President of the United
States, there is always room for upward mobility. People want to get their names out there, and
Facebook is a quick, easy, and most importantly free (for now) way of achieving
said fame. People have instantly become
famous for their exploits on Twitter and Facebook.
Take for
example somebody like George Takei (who I do in fact follow on Facebook). For those of you who might not remember,
George Takei was Mr. Sulu on the original Star Trek series. I know there is an *ahem* community of
devoted Trekkies who would consider it abject blasphemy to not know that, but
for us not in the inner Klingon circle, we now think more so of Mr. Takei as
that guy on Facebook with all the funny nerd jokes. He has thousands of “friends,” and I wonder
how many of them were referred. George
Takei is just one celebrity example, but it is still considered a badge of
honor to have that many “likes” and Twitter followers. Katherine Webb is another example, as she
gained almost over 100,000 Twitter followers overnight after Brent Musberger
ogled over her during an Alabama football game.
Until then, how many people actually even knew AJ McCarron had a
girlfriend?
Back in the day, “making it” was performing on the Ed Sullivan Show or something like that, but even then you had to actually *do* something to earn that fame. All Katherine Webb did was successfully distract a chauvinistic football commentator and a cameraman.
Now think
about this. You just had a lousy day at
work. You got chewed out by your
boss. You sat in traffic for an hour and
a half. The barista at the coffee shop
could not even make change for your $10 bill and the credit card machine was
broken. You finally arrive home and you
see 2.8 (OK, maybe not the .8 but hopefully you get the reference) smiling
faces under 4 feet tall whose world you just made simply by walking through the
door. They run at you (and maybe even
Rover too) and nearly knock you over in their excitement.
Then they ask you, “Mommy/Daddy (whichever applies to you), can we have pizza for dinner?!!?”
Only in
America
Regardless,
does not that sound like something that would just make your day? I am not trying to guilt trip anyone into
having kids right now, not in the slightest.
Nor am I criticizing those who have thousands of Facebook friends and
Twitter followers (OK, maybe just a little).
All I am asking is whether or not that might put a smile on your
face. Would it?
Next time,
we will discuss the third Pillar of the Millennial American Dream, which in my
opinion really encompasses the first two exquisitely: securing retirement
versus doing what makes you happy.
Thoughts?
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