But after driving past King Edward Park (big park in Newcastle) yesterday on our way home from an Australia Day BBQ, I was ashamed to be in the ‘category’ of a Gen Y Australian.

The park was beyond dirty. There were masses of young people, and masses of rubbish. Australian flag cape wearing, beer drinking young Aussie’s who have no respect for the surrounds that they were inhabiting for the day, and no doubt thought that someone else would clean up after them.

It is these people that end up spoiling things for the rest of us. The Newcastle foreshore yesterday was an alcohol free zone “from sunset today, Monday 25 January until sunrise on Thursday 27 January” according to the council website: www.ncc.nsw.gov.au. Furthermore activities were to finish at 6pm and there were NO fireworks.

Why? Because there are people who decide that Australia Day is a great day to get, like, totally pissed, and be a public nuisance, therefore ruining it for well behaved other people to, say, have a BBQ in town on the foreshore, have a few beers, and play a bit of cricket. Aussie? Too right.

But no, you weren’t allowed to. Yep that’s right unless you were in the comfort of your own home having a BBQ, you couldn’t have a beer or an alcoholic drink of any description for that matter if you had a BBQ on the Newcastle foreshore.

I’m the first to bang on about the minority spoiling it for the majority, but after seeing the disgrace that was King Edward Park yesterday, is this getting pissed in public and carrying on business the majority? All I can say is, I really hope not.

It really pains me to ask what the hell this Gen Y thing is that they think they shouldn’t have to clean up after themselves. And if the alcohol ban was all along the Newcastle foreshore then why wasn’t it extended to the park as well? Yes it would have prevented other non flag cape wearers from being able to enjoy a beer, but it sure would have prevented that disgusting disrespectful mess that SOMEONE ELSE had to clean up.

Because at the end of the day despite what some Gen Y-er’s think, getting trashed, wearing a flag as a cape, causing trouble in public and expecting other people to clean up their shit, is totally UNAUSTRALIAN.

So, I’ve written a few times about Generation Y and people’s perceptions, opinions, and generalisations, most of which I have disagreed with. But today, low and behold I’m going to babble on for a bit on a Gen Y ‘trait’ that I actually agree with and can totally relate to.

No, it’s not walking around saying ‘fully sick’, but living my life online. I have no trouble in putting my hand up and saying I don’t think I would survive without my computer, or my iPhone now for that matter.

I email clients instead of calling them, I text my friends and family instead of calling them, and when my mobile rings, I barley recognise my own ringtone. Why? Because I tend to use my iPhone more as a computer than a phone!

I sit at my computer for 8 hours a day at work, I have my email open, client documents open, and the Internet open with about, oh you know 13 different tabs. I’m on Twitter, Facebook, here of course is my blog. I comment on other blogs, I read the news online. A newspaper? What is that?! Yes, I am without a doubt an online Gen Y kinda girl.

I wouldn’t go as far to say that I’m tech-savvy and up on all the widget and wiki jargon, but I can find my way around most things digital and like most of our generation it’s all about trial and error. You try something and if it doesn’t work you hit undo and try something else. Something I think older generations tend not to do. Or oops was that too much of a generalisation!

Anyway, so for all the bagging that Gen Y cops, you know those great phrases like “Oh I don’t know the youth of today and all their fancy gadgets”, I’m proud to be part of the Gen Y online kids and wonder what life is like without constant communication?

Maybe it’s boring? Or maybe we’ve all got the wrong idea and it’s quite peaceful!

Anyway, I’m off to tweet, facebook, google and whatever else it is that we Gen Y’s do all day!

Don’t worry this is going somewhere.

What I am actually genuinely fascinated with is other people’s perceptions of my generation. I’ve written about it before, you know those lovely things called generalisations, like we’re all selfish, lazy, obsessed with technology, don’t work hard, don’t work at all, all those things.

So when I read an article on SMH.com.au titled “When is an employee too old to work” all my Gen Y defending mechanisms kicked into gear again.

Here’s how the story goes:

Karen, 62, and Bryan, 57, have decades of experience. They say they rarely get interviewed by the actual person for whom they’ll be working. Instead, they’re interviewed by meddlesome middlemen in their 20s from recruitment agencies who aren’t interested in older folks. Karen’s been looking for work for three years. She’s just given up. Bryan’s been unemployed for a year and is still searching for a job.

Michael, 58, was made redundant when his employer went into receivership. He’s since applied for several jobs that he’s qualified to do, but was disqualified for a government job even though he scored higher on the test than the other applicants. He missed out in favour of a younger candidate. Discrimination was too hard to prove.

A quarter of Australians will be aged over 65 by 2047 – double the current level. This will keep employees in the workforce for longer, as will the lift in the pension age to 67. If Tony Abbott’s proposed increase to 70 comes through, as it should, then managers will have even more older workers working for them. Despite popular opinion, I think older people will be happy to continue contributing in some capacity. As George Burns said, “I’m very pleased to be here. Let’s face it; at my age I’m very pleased to be anywhere.”

This brings us to the imbalance in today’s workplaces, where there’s too much of a focus on Generation Y. Older workers might not use terms like “LOL”, “sweet as”, and “fully sick”, but all generations generally want the same thing. Everyone wants a work/life balance. Everyone wants to use their talents. Everyone wants to have close relationships at work. The only difference is that Gen Ys demand these from their employers, while older generations have become accustomed to putting up with whatever they get.

Gen Ys are as loyal to employers as Elizabeth Taylor’s husbands. Older workers, on the other hand, hang around for as long as Elizabeth Taylor herself. The world needs to move on from Gen Y. It needs to embrace the grey matter of the grey generation. This means seeking older employees’ opinions and suggestions; respecting and harnessing their experience; being patient, especially when skilling them up on new technologies; and being sensitive to their possible discomfort at having a young boss.

I am all for keeping older people employed, but sometimes they aren’t willing to keep up with the times, well actually more specifically the technology times. Many ‘older’ people carry resentment at the ‘youth’ of today for our ease at picking up new things, but unfortunately for them that is just the way of the world.

I do not envy employers when often faced with decisions between maturity and experience, versus eagerness and the ability to pick up things quickly.

What do you think? Do the mature workers get a raw deal or is all fair in LOL and war?

Now it seems that the generation gap has expanded through all aspects of life.

Instead of just punching out some random opinions I thought I’d tell you a story! So here’s how my generation story goes!

Being referred to as Gen Y was never really a part of my life until I met Andrew.

Andrew is an old school friend of my partner John’s. He is extremely funny, very quick witted and seems to be fascinated with the whole Gen X, Gen Y thing!

While there is a 12 year age difference between John and I, I never really categorised us into different generations…. until I met Andrew!

So what or who are Gen X and Gen Y? In the UK the term Generation X was first used in a 1964 study of British youth where the study revealed a generation of teenagers who “sleep together before they are married, don’t believe in God, dislike the Queen, and don’t respect parents”.

There are a few differing opinions on who actually falls into the category of Gen X ranging from 1961-1981 and 1965-1978.

Generation Y (apparently also referred to as Millennials) also has differing opinions surrounding the years of birth ranging from 1977-1995 and 1982-2003. Either way I definitely fall into Gen Y and my other half and Andrew definitely fall into Gen X.

So how has the generation gap spread across all aspects of life?

Firstly to properly understand how a Gen Y mind works you need to understand what was happening in the world when we were born/growing up.

We Gen Y’s came of age during a time when technology was rapidly growing, (faster than anyone could have imagined), and was becoming extremely popular.

I believe that more was expected of us because of this rapidly changing technology that meant we were expected to become more efficient, smarter and faster in everything that we did. This could therefore explain some of the characteristics that are associated with Gen Y: tech-savvy, achievement-oriented and attention craving! Where it has backfired is the unflattering associated characteristics of lazy and spoilt.

So while Gen X decided to rebel, according to the UK study, Gen Y developed a reputation for basically being spoilt, not wanting to work as hard and expect everything to be handed to us on a silver platter.

Enter the workplace argument. In relation to employment the generation gap now means employers don’t understand why twentysomethings straight out of Uni expect a high salary, lots of benefits and holiday time.

Employees under the age of 29, (yes Gen Y), expect their employers to provide more benefits and other perks than their older counterparts, according to a new survey from CareerBuilder.com and Harris Interactive. Gen Y workers want better pay, a flexible work schedule and company-provided BlackBerrys, mobile phones etc.

This is a regular sore point with John and Andrew as they whinge about up and coming Architects and Lawyers (John is an Architect, Andrew is a lawyer) expecting to walk into high paying jobs straight out of Uni. I can hear the conversation in my head, “When I was in my early 20’s I started on $19,000 after 5 years at Uni and I still managed to have a great life, go away on trips and still pay my rent and eat”.

So while the cost of living has increased over the last 20 years as well as Uni fees etc, are our Gen Y expectations really that unreasonable and who is to blame? This goes straight back to the time in which we Gen Y’s were born.

Yes, I can hear the comments now that these are just excuses for lazy kids. But as with any stereotype, they are all very big generalisations. For every lazy/spoilt Gen Y kid surely there would be at least 3 Gen Y kids who worked their butts off to achieve what they have today.

So for all you lazy/spoilt/ungrateful Gen Y’s out there put your iPhone down, pull your finger out, work hard and stop giving the rest of us a bad name!

Check out Mia Freedman’s blog for a great post on Gen Y chicks earning as much as the Gen Y guys: http://tinyurl.com/dx9577