Technology: the God for the Millenials

Michelle Liaszenik

11/13/2015

Technology: The God for the Millenials

Millenials are a generation of spoiled children that were never spanked or told no. They never had to work hard for anything, and as a result they feel like the world should be handed to them. Does that sound familiar? We’ve been told that our attitudes are all wrong, that we’ll never amount to anything, that we will never create music or art like the generations before us, and that we are less than worthy of the messed up world that our parents are leaving us so many times that we should believe it – yet we don’t. Our generation also knows that we are leaders in human rights and technology. We millennials believe in science and humanity – we aren’t content to just read verses in a book that was written two thousand years ago to learn how to best live our lives. That’s where you can hear a pin drop amongst the older crowd, because we just admitted something about ourselves that they think is absolutely abhorrent - and we wear it as a badge of honor. The problem, I believe, is not that millennials are godless, but rather that our faith is different from that of our parents and grandparents.

As I read “American Gods” by Neil Gaiman, I found myself drawing parallels between the things that he was writing, although the book was published near fifteen years ago, and what we can see happening today. The story follows a man named Shadow that has just been released from prison and told that his wife and his best friend were killed in a car accident. On his way home for the funeral, he meets a man that calls himself Mr. Wednesday. Wednesday, it later turns out, is actually the American incarnation of the Norse god Odin, and he offers Shadow a job working for him. They travel around the country together meeting other “old gods” as Wednesday tries to persuade them to join him in a fight against the “new gods” Media, The Technical Boy (internet and technology), The Black Hats (born of the peoples’...