When we talk about Gen Z, or any generation who are currently 13-28, it’s so often in the same way. They speak a weird language, they’re lazy, and don’t know how to behave at work. Their values are up the spout and they won’t amount to anything. They will usher in the destruction of the world.
“The young people of today think of nothing but themselves. They have no reverence for parents or old age. They are impatient of all restraint … As for the girls, they are forward, immodest and unladylike in speech, behaviour and dress,” said Peter the Hermit in 1274.
People were aghast at the flappers of the 1920s, the long-haired hippies of the 70s, the punks of the 80s. 90s teenagers were apathetic and constantly drunk. I was born in 1980, so fall between the two stools of the hosewater-drinking headbangers of Gen X and the hand-wringing snowflakes of the Millennials.
It all begs the question, is there actually something wrong with the much-maligned Gen Z – or do we just hate young people?
Millennials earned their reputation as being flailing cry-babies because they were dealt a series of horrible hard knocks: the internet, 9/11, the banking crisis of 2007, online dating. They were having to battle through all this on the frontline, naively saying dumb things on group chats and sending nudes in good faith.
Gen Z is lucky, in a way. As “digital natives”, they don’t have to navigate all this fresh. They know all about cat-fishing and doxxing. They know about mental health and “touching grass”, about core strength and the danger of UPF.
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There’s that old trope that young people “think they know everything”. The gutting thing about Gen Z is that they actually do know everything. And anything they don’t know, they can find out more efficiently than you. They can find instructions to make a really good Mee Goreng from scratch this afternoon; they can research and fully understand most aspects of the First World War in one weekend, from bed, effortlessly sifting sensible fact and opinion from AI slurry.
The internet has made so much frictionless: communication, buying stuff, information, travel, that practicalities are no longer a barrier to anything. The issue for Gen Z is only: what do they want?
Well, let’s look at what they actually do: there has been a surge in popularity among Gen Z of crafting classes such as knitting, pottery, and crochet. They flip out for 5-A-Side and live events.
There has also been a 39 per cent increase in National Trust membership for 18-25 year olds. That means a staggering 40,000 in this age group joined in the last financial year. Forty thousand! I wouldn’t have been seen dead in a National Trust property when I was 21.
See, that’s the other thing. Pre-internet might have been a simpler time, but you had to take what you were given. God help you if you were into Cottage-Core in 1996. In the 90s there were a limited range of styles it was okay to copy. If everyone at school listened to RnB and rap, then that’s what you listened to as well – even if you hated it. You were far more at the mercy of trend-setters and classic, popular mean girls.
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The internet has spawned a gigantic, international super-culture: Gen Z is not just influenced by its peers and whatever is on TV, it is influenced by YouTubers from Arizona, crafters from Kyoto, and soap-boxers on Reddit and Tumblr. It has meant death to the traditional counter-culture of any current young generation. Niche things are no longer that hard to find, and so have less value. The Gen Z identity is made up of tiny bits and bobs, gathered from around the place, which I consider to be a more authentic way of going about life than just picking a ready-made identity, like “Mod”, “Rocker” or “Indie Sleaze”.
Gen Z chooses various things it likes from a huge menu of options, which aren’t mutually exclusive. My children, (who are both Gen Alpha, but only just), have music playlists that look totally random: Maneskin sits next to Mozart, sits next to Regina Spektor, sits next to Aphex Twin. The only time I have seen my children’s peers pick a side is in the Drake vs Kendrick Lamar drama.
We are still in the throes of the digital Industrial Revolution, sure, but Gen Z are the post-revolution future. They know more than you think they do and with the world in its current state, they’ve got a hell of a job on their hands.
So give them a break.
Esther Walker’s debut novel, Well, This Is Awkward, is published by Bedford Square
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