Open Letter to Millennials, Gen Z, and Your Parents

Dear Millennials, Gen Z, and your parents,

Responding to the Coronavirus in a responsible way is not optional - it's your moral duty. While the virus has now reached over 21,000 cases in the United States - 266 deaths, many (not all) of you Millennials and Gen Zers - with the support of your overly-indulging parents - have ignored pleas to postpone travel plans and practice social distancing. Instead, you've packed the beaches, stamped your passports, and unabashedly replaced the “Me Too” movement with the “Me, Myself, and I” generation. As your friends and neighbors are getting sick, losing jobs, closing their small businesses, struggling to feed their families, and trying to survive a pandemic, your greatest concerns are how much sun tan lotion to use, how many countries you can hop to before your spring break comes to an end. or escaping your locked-down state.

News flash: You're not on spring break - you're vacationing your way through a pandemic. And your self-absorption is only rivaled by many of your parents' unyielding indulgence in it, before you head back to visit them and risk spreading the virus.

Character does not change in difficult times: Difficult times reveal one's pre-existing lack of it.

The U.S. Surgeon General pleads with Americans to act as if they have the virus. Borders between nations are closed. Deaths in Italy have reached 4,032 out of 47,021 cases. France is issuing fines to citizens not social distancing. The Spanish military is producing hand sanitizer and America’s military is speeding to set up field hospitals. In America, schools and restaurants are closed, sporting events are cancelled, and people are working from home - if they're even working at all. While responsible Americans listen to the CDC's warnings to avoid large crowds and leisure travel and work together to slow the spread of the virus, an alarming number of twenty-something-year-olds are drinking margaritas on Panama City beach and posting selfies from South America. Those doing this, including those over age thirty, appear not to care that you are selfishly abandoning families and fellow Americans, as we fight to slow the spread of the Coronavirus. Your reckless refusal to practice social distancing is putting the rest of us at risk. Your utter disregard for your fellow citizens is shameful and speaks not only to your morality, but to any parent who supports you.

Character matters. Right now - lack of character can kill.

As parents, we must require our children to do the right thing and not look away when they don't. Some argue parents no longer have influence over the choices their adult children make - I disagree. If you're contributing in any financial way to their education, car payment, car insurance, rent, health insurance, or cell phone - then you do and you know it. You should be telling your kids to stop acting like the World revolves around them (a flaw you created Mom and Dad) and to get their entitled rear-ends back from unnecessary vacations and start social distancing. Again, this does not apply to all kids or all parents: Most of us parents raised our children to respect the welfare of others.

But those of you who didn't, it's time to be a role model - not a co-signer to their ignorance.

Reports coming out of both Italy and Spain are now showing a rise in the number of critically sick 20-30 year olds. The CDC is now warning us that 40% of those sick enough to be hospitalized are between the ages of 20-40. Nobody is immune - neither to the virus nor to their moral obligation to care about their fellow man. As parents, our job is not to make our children like us - it is to raise good humans. If our children are not being good humans and we do nothing about that- we are not being good parents.

I want each of you non-social-distancing individuals, who think the Coronavirus does not apply to you, to think of someone you love. Maybe you’re thinking of your Grandma - good - let’s stay here for a minute. For argument’s sake, let’s say you get the Coronavirus while you’re eating tamales in Peru. You have little to no symptoms. You ignore social distancing orders from the CDC and visit your Mom and Dad. Then, you fly back to your own town or drive back to your apartment. Two weeks later, you get a call that Grandma is in the hospital, on a respirator, and has the Coronavirus. Turns out, you gave the virus to your Mom during your visit and she gave it to her Mom - your grandmother. Now kiddo, everything really IS all about you. YOU selfishly ignored the warnings to not travel. Your parents recklessly allowed YOU to visit. YOU and your parents ignored the pleas for social distancing. YOU gave your beloved grandmother the Coronavirus that took her life.

And YOU - if your parents didn't appease you - could have totally prevented that.

Character matters. Not having it - kills.

On behalf of all grandmothers, grandfathers, and other fragile Americans at the highest risk from the Coronavirus, please stop selfishly taking unnecessary risks with their lives. Adhere to the guidelines by the CDC and our elected officials: Avoid leisure travel, no groups over ten people, work from home if you can, no hand shaking, wash your hands, don’t touch your face, if you feel sick stay home, and engage in social distancing. The Coronavirus doesn't take vacations, but it loves to travel and have dinner with your family.

Do your part. Starve the virus.

Because if you don’t, YOU could be the reason there is one less seat at your next family gathering.

Please share.

Gigi McGrath is the mother of three grown children, one of whom serves in the United States Army Airborne Division. All of her children are engaging in social distancing. None of them are vacationing or visiting relatives. All of her children understand how serious the Coronavirus is, care about their fellow citizens, and thankfully pay for their own health insurance, cell phones, and vehicles. Because . . . . character matters.