It is apparently a subtle fact — probably unbeknownst to most of us — that those born between the late 1970s and mid-’90s reek of entitlement. When I discovered this claim, I was quick to dismiss it. Sure, my peers and I are ambitious, hardworking and more than optimistic.

Yes, we do excel in comparison with our parents’ generation, but then again, we were raised in the technological era. What is so wrong with wanting to succeed in everything we do?

Just because we expect greatness, it doesn’t mean we’re a conceited herd of robots. But under the shield of those thoughts, I stumbled onto the highly publicized face of one Rachel Canning.

Let the shame begin.

Upon first hearing her woeful story, I thought it sounded like soap opera nonsense that couldn’t happen in reality: girl sues parents for college tuition. After watching her appearance in court on television, her blank expression and schoolgirl persona made me question everything I once believed about the world in which I grew up.

The thought of Canning and I being in the same sphere made me nauseous until I wondered what the rest of the populace thought.

It brought me to one anxiety-riddled question: Is this how they see us? By “us,” I mean the rest of you hanging your heads at Canning’s catastrophic misrepresentation of our age bracket. We can’t possibly appear that entitled.

However, according to The Huffington Post, we do.

“Baby boomers all around the country and world told their Gen Y kids that they could be whatever they wanted to be, instilling the special protagonist identity deep within their psyches,” according to The Huffington Post.

The illustrated article goes on to say that “the career goals of Gen Y as a whole have become much more particular and ambitious,” and the reasoning for this is because we were told we were “special.”

While this may have some truth to it — I do recall being told I was “special” — the finger-pointing is wholly unwarranted. Although we may be particularly ambitious, the world we’ve been brought into, inherited and now claim for ourselves is unrecognizable compared to what it was for our parents.

According to Businessweek, last month’s unemployment-to-population ratio for teens was at 25.8 percent.

In an interview with Peter Coy, Andrew Sum, the head of Northeastern University’s Center for Labor Market Studies, said that for young job-seekers, “it’s worse than the Great Depression.”

Concerning Rachel Canning, the media unfairly generalizes when it accuses the Y generation of believing a college education paid for by parents is an entitlement. If debt is any indication, many, if not most, of the generation works to pay their college tuition.

At the end of 2013, U.S. students’ debt totaled an unthinkable $1.08 trillion, a 300 percent increase from 2003.

Chris Rong, a 23-year-old dentistry student, told Time’s Sam Frizell, “If the money weren’t a problem, I would live on my own.” At New York University’s College of Dentistry, Rong moved back in with his parents, and by graduation, he’ll have $400,00o in student loans to pay off.

“I’m taking that all on myself,” Rong said.

Spoiled or not, we are still reaching beyond the limits set forth by our elders. We are still embracing a land of much less opportunity and much higher expectations. So let us be optimistic and driven. The “entitlement” brand needs to go.

Opinion columnist Alex Meyer is a creative writing freshman and may be reached at opinion@thedailycougar.com

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“Entitled individuals like Rachel Canning give Generation Y a bad name” was originally posted on The Daily Cougar