Dear America,

Over the past week, we have all watched in absolute horror as the higher education system, freedom of speech, and all sense of rationality completely and totally crumbled under the pressure of social justice warriors and college students who very clearly left home unwillingly. I have watched, and felt personally responsible. Did I draw the poop swastika (poopstika? swasticaca?)? Did I shout racist things at student body presidents? Did I make disparaging comments regarding Halloween costumes? The answer to all of these questions is “No.”

But there is something in me that feels responsible. I am, after all, of roughly the same generation as these students. This summer, I will be ten years older than this year’s graduating high school seniors. We all went through our childhood sometime around the turning of the new millennium. We are millennials. And we are absolutely, largely without exception, awful, awful human beings.

My generation has never truly grown up, have we? We went through school with mommy or daddy holding our hands, telling us we were perfect angels and that our teachers were pretty much the worst people ever for giving us lower than a C on a report card. They saw our feelings get hurt when we didn’t get a top athlete award, and so they convinced our coaches to give us trophies just for playing. At times, they just did our homework for us or made excuses when we couldn’t do it.

Then, we graduated from high school, and it was time to leave home. Only, a bunch of us didn’t. And, if we did, we chose to bring as much of home with us as possible. There are professors at universities, who receive calls, emails, and even visits during their office hours from parents. Other students, refusing to adapt to the real world, want safe spaces to just be a little kid again, even for a moment.

And it continues, as well. Parents of these millennials will go to job interviews with their children to help get them through it.

This is a generation that is terrified of not being home anymore. We want mommy and daddy to be with us all the time, help us get through things, and we don’t want the responsibility of being an adult and dealing with adult things. Part of the blame does inevitably go on the previous generation, who did such a horrid job of preparing their kids for the world that they now feel obligated to continue assisting them even through adulthood. But a lot of the blame does rest on the current crop of mindless man-children who really want nothing more than a fuzzy blanket and a place where the bad words won’t find them.

I am sorry for my generation, America. I am so, so sorry.