I’ve come to realize that millennials, such as myself, can be influential in today’s society. However, in the constant information overload of the Internet, we are abusing the possible powers we have to change the way the world thinks.
Rather than making world issues go viral, we are choosing white and gold dresses and cat videos. We have anything and everything we could ever want to know at the tips of our fingers, but we still aren’t realizing the impact we could have because of the Internet and social media.
An example of what we could be thinking in a few years is John Sylvan, the inventor of the K-cup that is used with Keurig.
“I feel bad sometimes that I ever did that,” said Sylvan, according to ABC News.
He’s worried about the environmental impact it’s having on the planet but didn’t realize the potential harm when he was designing the product.
This could be the whole generation of millennials, looking back at their past and saying, “Wow, I should have made the issue of the youth unemployment rate in Greece go viral rather than my cat chasing my dog around the house.”
We are spending so much of our time wanting to receive praise and adornment through
likes, shares, comments, up-votes and tweets that we forget to find the importance in the information we deliver to our newsfeed and blog.
I’m not saying this is true of every millennial.
Andy Cabistan, a local entrepreneur, is making all the right steps to better himself and his endeavor, but he is also pushing to better the world and our generation. He believes that millennials need to become more involved in their own communities and world issues, which is why voting is important.
The Washington Post stated, “General election voter turnout for the 2014 midterms was the lowest it’s been in any election cycle since World War II, according to early projections by the United States Election Project.”
This is dismal because we could be making huge changes through voting and involvement in our current issues and foreign affairs. If we hadn’t been guided and given instructions for every step we’ve taken since entering into college, we could be making these conscious decisions for ourselves.
According to an infographic by Goldman Sachs, “Millennials have come of age during a time of technological change, globalization and economic disruption. That’s given them a different set of behaviors and experiences than their parents.”
However, because of this difference, millennials have a huge possibility of making an economic, technological and global change.
Millennials need to release themselves from the proverbial praise of social media for their “selfies” and hilarious GIFs and concentrate on the important issues that will soon affect our well-being.
Lauren Purcell is an English communications major at Armstrong State University and editor of the school newspaper, The Inkwell. She is currently interning with The Creative Coast, a not-for-profit organization that promotes the creative and entrepreneurial community within the region. Lauren can be reached at 912-447-8457 or lauren@thecreativecoast.org.
By Lauren Purcell