Perhaps you’ve heard the news about Millennials and their relationships: between technology and other factors in their upbringing, it’s getting harder and harder for twenty-somethings to develop intimate relationships of any significant length of time. We don’t even have to be talking about marriage, per se: just the kind of face-to-face interaction that could count as dating or ‘courting’ has fallen by the wayside.
Illustration by Lauren Rolwing for The NYT
It’s one of the many facets of Millennial life Eric will be tackling in his upcoming Millennials Reading. And it’s a subject others are beginning to take up with some urgency.
Among the factors at play are: ‘hookup culture’, which prioritizes no-strings, short-term sexual interactions; emphasis on career-building and ‘being an individual’; and the supremacy of texting and social media over meeting face to face for a conversation — and undoubtedly more, such as media representations of sex and the proliferation of Internet porn. All of that apparently combines with the paradox that these young people, despite being aware of the reality of their parents’ marriages (somewhere around half are divorced), still hold an idealized version of marriage so high (it must be to a ‘soul mate’) that the bar may be unattainable.
The net result may be that higher education needs to take on the task of teaching this generation how to love, how to allow vulnerability and therefore intimacy. This is one of the conclusions made by Andrew Reiner, a professor of writing at Towson University, in his February 2014 New York Times article.
Speaking about colleges now holding workshops on such topics as “How to Be in Love,” Reiner writes, “When Dr. [Theresa] Benson, [assistant director of the counseling center at the University of Illinois], says that ‘students may not be learning the interpersonal skills to communicate face to face,’ she may be couching this trend a bit too tentatively. That there is even a need for these workshops speaks volumes: The most elemental skills of romantic intimacy are going the way of cursive handwriting.”
Reiner also notes that, “During class discussions, my students often admit to hoping that relationships will simply unfold through hooking up. ‘After all,’ one student recently said, ‘nobody wants to have The Talk’” the dreaded confrontation that clarifies romantic hopes and expectations. ‘You come off as too needy.'”
If you can’t talk, how can you relate? And if you can’t relate — even remotely intimately — where does that leave you?
Consider also a piece from the Millennial trenches. Sarah Hartman, a 24-year-old writing over at Thought Catalog, has put together her list of “7 Reasons Why Relationships Are Hard For Millennials.” Here’s item number seven from her list:
7. Romantic notions are scary and forward.
People are so afraid of appearing clingy, too forward, or too sappy, that it seems notions of romance are circling the drain. Growing up, it seemed that every movie and TV show depicted a first date as having a guy show up at the door with flowers and a cute smile. Now the norm is a text of, “here” as he waits outside. For some reason, men of my generation seem to have associated romance with sappy clinginess, and have eschewed both. Hand holding, asking to kiss, or just kissing a girl is a rarity. Of the past four first dates I’ve had, only one asked to hold my hand. The rest just felt like hanging out with a friend of a friend after the mutual friend left the room. So much for sexual tension.
Indeed, how does one emit, allow, receive or even recognize sexual tension if the door to in-person communication is guarded by the ultimate commandment of, “Thou shalt not look like you are interested”? How do you teach your voice to speak your heart when your heart is seen as an impediment or handicap, and your voice has been sublimated to your fingers? Something tells me alternative healers are going to be doing a lot of work on throat chakras and heart chakras in the coming years.
This is a real issue and I’m glad someone is talking about it. But, I have always identified this as a U.S. problem. It’s certainly one I grew up with and it feels different in other countries I have lived in–Europe and South America. I’m not quite a Millennial, born in 1976.
Amanda – fabulous article. Thank you…
If you think about it, pre-teen and teenagers are awkward enough with so many hormones flowing and confusion over their bodies and how they relate to themselves and the world. Add that natural tension to how they relate to the family unit. It was difficult before the age of cell phones for families to talk back in the day, now it’s crazy! Just go to any public place, especially a restaurant and look at everyone texting, browsing the internet, playing games, anything, not to engage with each other it seems– including the parents! If children, pre-teens, teenagers, young adults, the millennial generation haven’t learned how to relate with one another and communicate, then how can they be expected to have those skills/knowledge in intimate relationships, including dating?
consider the fact that the internet is really disjointed data~it doesn’t provide the tools on how to process it, in other words, it doesn’t provide the logic and reasoning to turn data into knowledge. Yet it is being accessed as if it were knowledge. Knowledge has a structure, a logic and reasoning system, morals and social norms~borrowing from Immanuel Kant here. This generation that is so heavily relying upon data from the net that they will have to be taught how to process it, hopefully, by the family, schools and interaction in other social settings, (sports, music, extra-curriculum activities, etc.) and if they don’t learn it there, then self expression will be challenging. And it is likely, that it will be nonetheless because there is only so much that can be learned when interacting with another, especially if the other is at a low learning curve. And it is likely the other person is at a low learning curve and/or feeling awkward. It’s not their fault, or anyone’s fault, it just is.
Part of this evolved from the state of society turning into the working family whether by single parent or two parents working and without casting any judgment here, many children are alone, groping to learn a lot of this on their own through what they perceive to be knowledge the data tool in front of them–the internet.
I look forward to Eric’s continued treatment on this topic and thank you Amanda for this posting.
P.S. I am a single working mom and unfortunately, I do have to travel out of town fairly regularly so my two teenage kids (one of college age) are home alone often enough. My rule is (and yes, I have rules) no phones at meals, and we generally sit down and eat family meals (while I am at home and they are not at activities). I also make them engage in uncomfortable conversations (for us all) but in the end, I think they (and I know I) enjoy sharing their day. And yes, they think I have, I don’t know, maybe 8 heads…and clearly can’t know anything!
I’m having a difficult time with the elder generations nit-picking the ‘millenials’.
Personally, I have friends across the board, from 10 to 80.
What I do see is a lot of projection (as has always been) from generations previous, and egocentric mindsets, to attempt an irrational understanding and control by default, by those who may be better off taking control of their own generational karma (might be more well served?).
I absolutely agree this is a fabulous conversation, that needs to be dialogued. I also feel (being a ’75 baby) this needs to be taken to heart within each one of us before we light the torches.
After all, the circle is a constant. There are no breaks…
Me
Well said Jere. I fully agree. Every generation is a product of their time and place. This generation is an example of how life has been evolving. What I see is a group of people becoming prepared to unravel the maze of complex problems this world is strangling from. My boys can unravel the twists and turns of every video game they are challenged by – with extraordinary speed and determination. I believe they are here to save the world.
Jere — I hear you, and you make some excellent points! That’s one of the reasons I wanted to include Sarah Hartman’s blog post in this piece: she’s a Millennial. And I think that hearing her express her own frustrations with how her generations does (or doesn’t do) “relationships” is worthy of consideration. It sounds to me like she knows this could work better, but has no idea how to go about transforming it given how enmeshed she and her peers are in their context. I applaud her efforts to look at it critically and question how it’s working (or isn’t).
Yes, Jere. Thank you. One of the things I’ve noted in recent history is the lack of models/role-models for the millenial generation, largely due to the speed at which everything is shifting and increasing irrelevance of older models of relating, economic-izing, preparing for the future, etc. But perhaps what CAN be role-modeled in relevant ways is the act of taking responsibility for and acting on generational karma and reclaiming all those projections. Dig.
It is very interesting that you mention the emotional connections in the context of going the way of ‘ cursive writing ‘ as it is known to be the way to teach children to string cognitive thoughts together, literally. The debate about whether to teach this skill in third grade anymore is disconcerting to me for my grandsons.
My daughters are Millenials that rebelled about my ” old school ” ways but I see that with their own family they fall back with adjustments. Isn’t that the way of each subsequent generation?
Concern for the speed of the robots’ effect and lack of understanding due to the rapid tweet length conversations is well worth pointing out.
I love this generation for so many reasons, but many are failing at relationships. Not just romantic relationships, they struggle with friendship. I have four children in this age group. It is a constant frustration for them. Some individuals in this age group can’t make a commitment to go to the movies. Of course, this is a broad generalization. And I find there is always some duality to these generational traits. On a positive note, this generation realizes that many relationships have a time limit. This does not negate the importance of the relationship.