I Love Gen Z ❤️ 💕
And I cannot lie.
As I write this I am supposed to be polishing up my next reading roundup, but I have just finished inhaling another smash hit (viral, maybe?) post authored by someone I assume to be a Gen Z Substacker and I can no longer hold in my love for the entire generation. Taking a page out of Gen Z’s book, I am going to write freely and without much consideration for algorithms, my audience, or anything else supposedly sensible.
I was born in 1987, in India. While I grew up in six countries, before coming to the U.S. for high school and staying—as a child of the ‘90s, and for the purposes of this post—we can assume my cultural vernacular is *quite* American. We also now know, I am solidly, maybe even stolidly, a Millennial.
About five years ago, my run-ins with friends and acquaintances started featuring a few minutes (really more than a few) of Gen Z bashing. I believe this all started with one of my husband’s friends and his wife—both Millennials who then worked in the advertising industry. If I recall, they complained that their Gen Z direct reports were unprofessional, lazy (their words not mine), and “over-woke” (at the time, I genuinely did not think that there was a way to be too aware of one’s own privilege).
I smiled, and I listened. But I also thought about the apartment they had purchased in Williamsburg years earlier as two, white, 20-somethings with no understanding of the history of Brooklyn or, even, passing knowledge of gentrification (and the podcasts that cover it). I thought, somewhat smugly, that their Gen Z underlings would be good for them, good influences—rendering my husband’s friends the right amount of woke, woke-r, if you will.
But, I’m not a monster and I also had empathy for these friends of my husband. I thought that it must be difficult to be in an industry where being au courant is the currency—an industry where the generation coming up behind you will always have more cachet because they are the consumers everyone wants to market to (and the youngsters every one looks to for what is trendy, and hip, and cool).
After the advertising professionals, there was the doctor best friend who felt her Gen Z interns were “soft.” When pushed on what she meant by soft, she admitted they were demanding systemic changes that she had and her cohort had wanted, and failed to (organize to) achieve. Then there were my former colleagues who endlessly complained that their Gen Z junior associates couldn’t write, weren’t responsive, and didn’t understand the gravity of any given situation (really, I think they meant the urgency of client requests).
There were other lawyer friends who had truly alarming stories about Gen Z paralegals who missed filing deadlines and then lied about missing them. There was also a bevy of complaints about Gen Z summer associates posting TikTok stories from the bathrooms of our white shoe law firms—marble floors glittering (and very much against our social media policies). And to be honest, send me to brunch, in D.C., with a few friends and I can probably collect more complaints. Lest you think this panic is reserved for my highly anxious and privileged circle of IRL Millennial friends, The Cut wrote the following of this phenomenon:
For the past five years, millennials have been in a panic over the rise of Gen Z. The particularly anxious even write diss tracks. This panic has been variously parodied by Gen Z — often literal children — becoming a genre of TikTok video and earnest discourse all its own. Some millennial trends, once markers of youth and trendiness, are no longer cool. Instead of aging gracefully and accepting the loss of access to the very cool that once made them the center of attention, some millennials resort to Gen-Z cosplay. All it takes is a buzzy think piece about the differences between the generations to send millennials into yet another existential tizzy.
None of these experiences has been my experience with Gen Z. Instead, my junior associates were whip smart and excellent at setting boundaries. I remember when a first-year associate was on the receiving end of a truly absurd partner request, how deftly she pointed out that she could better help the whole team if the partner slowed down and actually explained the assignment. I remember how openly all my Gen Z colleagues (really, they were my underlings but it feels disrespectful to label them as such) discussed mental health, rest, the importance of in-person interactions, and the shackles of capitalism. I also remember how my Gen Z colleagues slept more, exercised more, and generally did good work—they were mostly uninterested in the performance of productivity that I find to be the hallmark of my own generation.
I now work at a place where I am the most junior lawyer on a 40-person team. I truly miss my Gen Z colleagues (though they do still text me from time-to-time, which is how I know my love is not unrequited). To fill the black hole in my heart, I have been purposefully reading newsletters penned by younger (than I) Substackers. I am truly blown away by the wisdom of
. I’m not entirely sure whether she would label herself as Gen-Z (or, instead, Zillenial) but somewhere in her ‘20s she’s coming up with astute observations such as this:i do not think i am alone in this fear of a lack of self-restraint, i’ve noticed lately an integral form of social currency has been signals of discipline. how little you shop, how much you sleep, how much you save, how many times a week you work out, how many books you read, how miniscule your screentime is. . . . .
. . . . i was talking to a friend who is training for a marathon and having a difficult time adjusting to the schedule, when i asked her why she really wanted to run it (albeit a rude question on my part), she said, “i think i just want to prove to myself i have the discipline to do it”. while i understand this thought process, it makes me question why we feel the need to prove to ourselves we have extreme levels of discipline. why are we not taught to cultivate the trust within ourselves to know that at the end of the day we all have the grit to make our lives the fullest, brightest, bounciness existence possible?
Then there’s
whose post on reading culture I linked above and who writes with brevity and levity on everything from the retreats of the ultra wealthy to North West’s turn in the Lion King. There is also who wrote about the Utopia of Life Online (I mean, the title alone).1I could go on and on but what I’m really saying is that if we (my friends?) paused and thought about it for a moment, many of the great innovations and shifts in culture, of the past few years, originated with Gen Z—a generation that has only been ascendant for a very short while.
Here’s a smattering of the gifts Gen-Z has brought us all:
Quiet Quitting. — “Gen Z entered the workforce with a mind-set that was notably distinct from the millennials who preceded them. . . . .It is this transition that generates much of the angst exhibited in quiet-quitting videos. ‘Your worth as a person is not defined by your labor,’ a defiant Zaid Khan concludes in the original quiet-quitting TikTok. To a millennial, with our work-as-a-means-to-an-end ethos, this statement sounds obvious and histrionic—like something you’d pronounce in a sophomore-year seminar. But, to Gen Z, declaring a distinction between the economic and the personal is a more radical act.”
A Democratic President (whatever your feelings about him). — More than 50% of 18-29 year olds voted in the last Presidential Election, the highest on record. All of this while being fed TikTok videos of car crashes (you will need to watch the linked video for this reference to make sense).
Renewed Vigor For Climate Change Activism. — “Young people are helping organize a climate march in New York next month, during the United Nations General Assembly. And their force is being felt even in deep-red states like Montana, where a judge on Monday handed the movement its biggest victory to date, ruling in favor of 16 young people who had sued the state over its support for the fossil fuel industry.”
Smarter, More Cautious Consumption (than we give them credit for, anyway). — “Despite their reputation as digital natives, Gen Z shoppers still value in-person experiences. Bricks-and-mortar stores are an important component in their fashion and beauty consumption. 74 per cent of Gen Zs think IRL experiences are more important than digital ones (compared to 66 per cent of millennials). 73 per cent of Gen Zs prefer making a purchase in store while shopping, versus the 27 per cent of Gen Zs who prefer to make a purchase on social media. And while online rules for inspiration, 68 per cent of Gen Zs prefer to try before they buy (versus 61 per cent of millennials).” Gen Z is also maxing out their retirement savings, wow.
Changing the Conversation Around Mental Health (and Technology). — “I’m wildly optimistic. Gen Z is not in denial. Gen Z is pretty wise to what’s going on. They’re very aware that they’re in a trap. We don’t have to push them. We just have to give them a way out.” It goes without saying that the mental health challenges Gen Z has had, and continues to face are terrifying.2
Instead of forever linking to the greatest achievements of a much maligned generation, let me instead land this plane, and be explicit about how Gen Z inspires me. While Millennial friends and writers are pursuing glitters, and glimmers, and micro-joys, and trepidatiously pursuing a few minutes of sunshine, in a day filled with work, Gen Z is out in the world living boldly: taking entire mental health days, writing authentically and astutely, saving aggressively, wearing low-rise jeans, daring to dream we can fix the planet, and on, and on, and on.
I’m no cultural anthropologist and so I can’t quite explain why Millennials are so measured and timid, whereas Gen Z is seemingly more authentic and bold. It could be the economic uncertainty that shaped us Millennials, or it could just be that we’re rapidly aging.
Whatever the reason, I implore you, before you sit down at your never-will-be-as-good-as-the-Sex-In-City-scene-you-have-in-your-mind brunch and start launching into your diatribe about the generation that follows, think of this personal essay. Think of me! Draw some inspiration from Gen Z—be a little more authentic, honest, and a little less polished.
And have some gratitude that the youth are out here willing to beat drums, protest, rebel, and vote—because life, capitalism, recessions, children, whatever, has beaten that energy out of me, and maybe you.
If you were expecting bookish content and received the soapbox above instead, mea culpa. At the same time, I would love to know:
I am working on a May reading roundup, which I will have in your inboxes next week. In the meantime, as always, thank you for your time and attention. If you have the bandwidth to like, comment on, restack this post, or amplify my voice by some other means — merci mille fois!
I know all of these Substackers are more than the generation they hail from but allow me a moment to make a larger point.
If any of these writers are actually full-blown millennials, I don’t want to know. I jest. You’re all brilliant.
I will add that while I agree with Haidt’s quote above I’m not sure I will agree with all the takeaways from his book and I am therefore linking to this article on how his book misses the point, as a helpful counterpoint.
This is a tremendous piece of writing, Tara, and I couldn't agree more! I'd love to see more personal essays and culture musings from you in my inbox!!
How am I just seeing this?! Thank you 😭♥️