The New York Times has become obsessed with belittling millennials. I must say, it makes a change from its incessant Britain-bashing content. My personal favourite? A dated and deeply uncool piece called Beyond Porridge and Boiled Mutton: A Taste of London. The same 2018 article mistakenly referred to Mayfair as Mayfield and therefore has all the authority of a substitute teacher on the last day of term. Now they’ve moved their vitriol to millennials, most recently with a piece headlined: Hark, the Millennial Death Wail.
The “hot take” ponders whether millennials — the largest living demographic of people spanning the ages of 28 to 43 — are becoming obsolete. They are peering into “the abyss of middle age”, says writer Joseph Bernstein, showing signs of ageing (gross) and having to work hard to remain culturally relevant. I came across the Instagram post as I was taking a break on a walking holiday in Pembrokeshire, enjoying a homemade Welsh cake, a cup of tea and thumbing through a copy of Richard Osman’s The Thursday Murder Club. I felt like I’d been slapped round my nascent slackening jowls: middle age was here. It had happened. Too late to reverse the truck now.
