If your Facebook feed looks anything like mine, you've probably seen this video released by the Family Policy Institute of Washington with the caption "College Kids Can't Explain Why a Short White Man Isn't a Tall Asian Women."
If you haven't, I can summarize. In light of the current transgender bathroom debate, a man went to the University of Washington to interview college students about whether or not he could identify as a tall asian woman or a first grader if he wanted to. The students stumbled over their answers, mostly saying something like, "It's not my place to tell you that you're wrong." The video is meant to point out how ridiculous the millennial generation is for its political correctness and refusal to stand up for plain truths.
But I think the video is wrong, and let me tell you why.
The first problem with the video is its assertion that claiming a false race, age, height, or other physical characteristic is the same thing as the transgender issue of the dissonance between gender and sex.
Let's clarify some terms. Someone's sex is their biological body parts. Most people either have a penis or a vagina which makes their sex male or female. Gender, however, extends beyond just biological sex and has to do with someone's identity which comes from their mind/soul. Transgender people aren't arguing about their biological sex, they're saying that their sex differs from their gender.
Therefore the basis of the video, that millennials, liberals, and transgender people are ignoring basic physical realities in order to appease some sort of liberal agenda, is just wrong. The problem is the physical reality that transgender people want to change, not pretend doesn't exist. It's an irrelevant argument for the video to assert that millennials claim that a physical reality isn't real in order to avoid offending anyone, because that has nothing to do with transgender issues.
The second problem with the video are its intended conclusions. What's interesting is that no one in the video points out the flaw of the premise of the argument. In fact, most people in the video are stumped and sort of go along with what he is saying. So even though the premise is unfounded, there can still be interesting conclusions to draw, even if they aren't intentional.
My conclusion from the video is not that millennials are stupid and have no backbone. My conclusion is that millennials actually take the time to consider what other people are saying.
The nature of these bombard-with-questions videos is to get someone's gut reaction to a topic. What this video actually proves is that millennials don't just go with their gut reaction and stick to it blindly. Instead what most of the students in the video say is that they accept what the host is saying about being Asian or a first grader. In fact one responder says, "I would ask how you came to that conclusion."
If the video taught me anything, it's that millennials are willing to listen and open to things they don't understand. On top of that, millennials take time to think before they jump to conclusions.
I don't think that kind of forethought and empathy makes my generation stupid, I think it makes us amazing.
