We live in a world where most college students pride themselves on being open-minded and liberal. All people are accepted and included regardless of race, religion, body size, sexual orientation, gender, political viewpoints, physical disability, or mental illness. This is how it should be because we are all human beings of value and we all have something to offer the world.
Everyone should be treated with respect and allowed to express themselves and live their lives in a way that makes them comfortable. This is what most millennials preach.
Gone are the days where people are judged for their actions. If a person smokes marijuana, takes LSD on occasion, has sex on the first date, gets drunk every weekend, or avoids the gym entirely, it is ok. No one will judge you for these things because they are your choice.
What a person chooses to do or how they behave is totally up to them and anything, as long as it doesn't cause harm to someone else, is acceptable. It is not ok to slut shame, fat shame, or do anything that could result in making someone feel bad about their choices. It should be that way. No one should be made to feel bad about their choices and lifestyle.
The problem with all of these open minds and good intentions is that there is judgment, judgment towards people that fit into more traditional societal boxes. A person who is of average size, heterosexual, and without physical or mental difficulties has to walk on eggshells because anything that they say in reference to someone else can quickly have them labeled as a bigot of some sort.
An innocent question regarding someone's gender, ethnic background, or political viewpoint can cause a verbal attack on character. The same question asked by someone in the LGBTQA community or someone on the Autism spectrum, for example, would be answered with respect and in the spirit that the question was asked, to learn and gain a better understanding of others.
An example of judgment that I personally have experienced has to do with actions.
I have friends and know people that make a habit out of going to bars and getting extremely drunk on a weekly basis. That is their choice and neither I nor anyone else can comment negatively on their behavior. I recently turned 21 and chose to spend my birthday at home.
I went out with my family and ordered one Mimosa and then came home and spent a quiet evening there. People asked me why all my birthday pictures were with my sister, why wouldn't I do a bar crawl like "normal" people, and they told me it was weird. Somehow that was ok.
Judging a person for not doing something that "everyone" does seem to be acceptable. On that same note, girls who don't partake in one night stands are judged as prudes, people who choose not to smoke are asked why, and people who go to the gym on a daily basis are called pretentious.
People don't realize that these sorts of judgments and comments are just as harmful and painful as comments about a person's ethnicity or sexual identity. If millennials are striving to be the generation without judgment, where everyone is accepted for who they are, they have a long way to go.
