These Youthful Trends Have Left Older People Baffled
It's a tale as old as time: older people being completely dumbfounded over new trends that emerge in younger generations. Most of us - if we live long enough - will experience this phenomenon from both sides, as we set trends in our youth and grow somewhat out of touch as we age.
A lively r/AskReddit thread asked commenters just what in the youthful zeitgeist they couldn't get their heads around - and the answers were equal parts hilarious and illuminating.
Skincare is next-level.
"I guess there's like elementary schoolers with a skincare routine now?? That’s nuts…"
"I saw some people in the skincare addiction sub today recommending that a 17-year-old get Botox and retinol for the lines on their forehead. Insanity."
When you need the big screen, not just the small screen.
"I use my phone a fair bit, but it's really hard to imagine it being my only computer. I need at least 20 inches of screen, a trackball and a keyboard with physical buttons just to think properly."
"I don't want to budget my battery to last all day in case an important text comes through. I want my internet signals sent over a hard wire. When my computer stops working, I want to open it up and swap the broken part with a better one."
Capitalization should be fundamental.
"I've trained 3 early 20s co-workers now that don't use the Shift key to capitalize letters. They hit caps lock, type the letter to be capitalized, then hit caps lock again."
"I can't wrap my head around it."
Willing participation in a surveillance state.
"Allowing every one of their friends on Snapchat to know their location at all times. Like seriously. My 23 year old coworker and her friends are constantly revoking and then reinstating their visible location depending on if they're happy or mad with each other."
"If someone notices that they can't see where another person is, they'll actually bring it up, wondering what they did to upset them."
Prank culture goes too far.
"The popularity of 'nuisance streamers' with younger folks. I don't find being a public nuisance even a little bit entertaining or funny, especially when it's being filmed."
"Also just in general the trend of filming, photographing and trying to make "content" out of their entire life in some vain hope of becoming internet famous. I don't get it. Last thing i'd ever want to do is have my entire life posted on the internet."
History repeats itself.
"Becoming addicted to nicotine. I thought younglings would be a little less stupid than us."
"Yeah maybe if the vape companies didn't flavor all their products like candy (just like they sold us candy cigarettes as kids) this wouldn’t be a thing."
The sock wars continue to rage.
"Making fun of kids for 'no show' or 'ankle' socks. WTF is that about?"
"So I read this is cause when millennials grew up, our elders used to wear longer socks so we associated that with older folk"
RIP attention span.
"Binge watching short videos compiled so you never watch anything with a plot or storyline. Just tons of 10-60 sec videos and most of them suck."
"Remember how exciting 'movie day' was in school?? My middle school students moan and groan when I tell them we're watching anything longer than five minutes. Doesn’t matter if it’s educational or Pixar."
At least they can still read.
"Being unable to read beyond sight words. Like they CAN read, but not the same way you and I assumably can."
"I worked as a teacher and this past year I've been hearing more and more complaints from the higher grades/up even into highschool that their students by and large aren't able to sound out words/read like we were taught to."
Haircuts will always be weirdly divisive.
"I run a restaurant, and employ a bunch of young people. EVERY dude under 25 has bangs, some significantly longer than the rest of their hair."
"I call them Flock of Seagulls. They don't get the reference."
Drinking vessels are trendy now.
"Obsession over the infamous, Stanley cup."
"Before that, the hydroflask. I don't really care what sort of beverage conveyance my students use… or how their parents want to waste money… but somebody NEEDS to invent one that doesn’t scare everybody when the kid knocks it onto the floor."
Going digital-only.
"Not being taught to tell time by where the hands are on a clock."
"The adults who are complaining that kids these days don't know how to read a clock are the same adults who never bothered to teach their kids how to read a clock."
Sometimes the world is scary.
"I find many younger people to be very fearful. Hyper fixating on the worst possible outcomes even though the actual chance is so low its not worth worrying about."
"Those people are gonna get older and be hit with many regrets"
Doing it for the content.
"Literally committing crimes, recording them in the act, and then posting it online for clout."
"Then, when their recordings are played as evidence, they're all looking like shocked Pikachu."
Texting is a lost art.
"I knew some people that would say things like, 'How u typ so fast with punc n full wyrdz.'"
"I literally just told them it took more effort for me to dumb myself down to that level of writing than it did to write correctly."
Something something glizzy.
"Skibidi toilet."
"I mean... I can only speak on Millennial stuff, but we had the Badger song, Charlie the Unicorn, ASDF movies, Banana Phone, Magical Trevor, The End of the World, Llamas With Hats... So we're not much better."
Social media used to be fun.
"One thing that baffles me about the younger generation is their reliance on social media for validation and self-worth. It's puzzling how much their mood and self-esteem can hinge on likes and comments, creating a constant need for online approval."
"It seems like a stressful way to navigate life."
Confidently incorrect.
"The hyper reaction crowd. They focus on a single sentence or concept and jump to virtue signaling on issues that are either none of their business, or they're unqualified to speak about it."
"This loud minority is so confidently incorrect that they're basically boomers at this point."
Labels for days.
"Any non perfect event in childhood becomes 'trauma', virtually everything mildly unpleasant is a 'trigger'. All parents seem to be 'narcissistic', any disagreement is 'gaslighting.'"
The widespread misuse of these labels without understanding of the correct use is problematic. Labels are used to assign blame and remove responsibility from the individual for their behaviour ."
Antisocial media.
"For a generation that loves social media, we are very anti-social. Lots of us cannot hold conversations or try to avoid them entirely. Another thing is how terrible literacy is amongst this generation while also loving social media."
"Cell phones have caused pure brain rot as people cannot function without them at all which baffles me."
Who needs a real doctor?
"It's the self-diagnosing for me. I think it's great that there is less stigma around mental health issues and neurodivergency."
"However, it being a trendy thing, and people just thinking that they can diagnose themselves and spread information is so harmful. I don't understand it."
It used to be a rite of passage.
"Refusing to learn to drive. I absolutely understand not wanting to, preferring to live places where you don't have to because of good walkability/transit/bikability, etc."
"But just being unwilling to learn at all? It's an important life skill and there might be an emergency where you have to!"
Pick your battles.
"How sensitive some Gen Z has gotten."
"I'm a Gen Z, and maybe it's because I was raised by boomers, but just because someone has a different opinion or doesn't agree with you does not mean they are being offensive or trolling."
There's a time and a place.
"Wearing earbuds at work during a shift on an active, collaborative team. (I think earbuds aren't a problem at all for quiet, focused work, or work where there's not much need to speak with others at a moment's notice.)"
"I understand that many of them can easily hear things, but in my brain, earbuds carry a strong "do not talk to me" message that makes it hard not to see them as inappropriate at work unless someone is hunkering down for a longer, quieter solo task."
Just sign with an X.
"It's what they aren’t doing that’s absolutely baffling. We recently hired a young kid right out of college and he doesn’t know how to sign his name. No joke."
"He signs his papers in block letters. He can’t read cursive and has no signature. The supervisor was pissed and made him figure out a signature for himself to be professional. He was on YouTube looking at cursive letters."
Setting high standards.
"Today on reddit one told me they refuse to show up to an initial job interview that is in person."
"They demand the employer use zoom to interview them. It was baffling. Check my history of comments to see the conversation."
Smartphones were a mistake.
"I'm not really too baffled, I just see a lot of worrying trends."
"The main thing that concerns me is the steep decline in mental health among young people since smartphones went mainstream and we got the internet in our pockets. I'm not shocked at all to see it but it is very bad."
When everyone's a part of the convo.
"Not sure it's just the younger gen doing this now but I’d hazard it’s come from them."
"Communicating on mobile phones by having it on loud speaker and holding it like a walkie-talkie. We all have to listen to conversations we want no part of."
Becoming robots.
"When I see a kid out to dinner with his family and he has headphones in, a tablet, and a smartphone. Watching YouTube shorts and playing a game on a tablet."
"Barely looked away from his screens all dinner and headphones did not come off. Absolutely baffles me, they're becoming more tech than human."
I mean, they might not be wrong.
"Giving up. I work with some twenty-somethings, and many of them are completely defeated. They don't think they'll ever own a home or have a meaningful career or get out of debt."
"They just throw up their hands and resign themselves to a life of drudgery, bills and the occasional weekend bender."
