Growing up, you probably heard your parents and other adults say things that dated them or made them sound ridiculous many times. When they weren’t around, we would roll our eyes and laugh about those things.
Now we’re the parents.
What are the kids making fun of us for?
Talking About Life Before the Internet
Many of us did grow up, at least for a portion of childhood, with clunky computers and no internet. At least we had computers, though; Gen X and older had to explain typewriters to their kids, who didn’t care.
And Life Before Cell Phones
All but the very youngest of us had to make do without cell phones as we grew up. When they did come out, they weren’t close to what today’s smartphones are. We had flip phones, and, if you remember, the Blackberry.
Raising Kids on Devices
During the 80s, the term “latchkey kids” caught on, and it was a disapproving swipe at parents who let their kids return from school to empty homes. Now we’re guilty of handing devices to our kids and letting them be virtual parents and babysitters. Could that be just as bad?
Quoting The Simpsons
A lot of us have fond memories of the show, especially the classic early seasons. Our kids don’t think we’re being funny or cool when we quote the show; they think it’s weird or lame or whatever their current slang for those words is,
Communicating by Memes
Somewhere along the line, we discovered memes and took great pleasure in sharing them. Kids today have a different understanding of what memes are and think the ones we like to use are pretty pathetic.
Unease About Interracial Relationships
On the whole, we’re a pretty tolerant group, but when we were growing up, it was still pretty rare in a lot of places, and even looked down upon, to date someone of a different ethnicity. Most kids today don’t think twice about it, so when we comment on it, we sometimes unintentionally come across as racist.
Not Getting AI Relationships
We’re at a stage where you can now have “close” relationships with artificial personalities. We think it’s strange and sad, but who’s to say that our kids won’t find this completely normal and maybe even gratifying?
“Back in My Day” Stories
You hated hearing your parents, grandparents, and teachers do this to you. Now you’re doing it to your kids. And they will do it to theirs. This cycle is never going to stop.
Having Experienced Affordable Housing
Having affordable housing seems like a myth from the past to young people today. A lot of factors have caused housing costs to skyrocket, and we shouldn’t tell our kids that things will cool down. Most likely, they won’t.
Not Understanding Gender/Sexuality Issues and Language
We’re pretty open-minded and tolerant on the whole, but there have been a lot of changes in recent years that we’ve struggled to grasp. One of them is the terminology around gender and sexuality.
Even worse, if you ask someone to explain it to you, there’s a good chance you’ll be branded as a bigot who’s challenging those things, not seeking to understand them. So you can’t win.
Not Addressing Climate Change
It’s not our fault! A lot of pressing issues are unaddressed at high levels because the Boomers have clung to power way past the time they should have passed the torch along. They never stopped fighting the culture wars of the 1960s.
Not Addressing Income Inequality
This is another major challenge that our kids are going to blame us for when we mostly haven’t had the opportunity to do anything about it (see above). By the time our kids realize this, we might be gone, so that will provide no comfort.
Trying To Act Young
You remember this. One of the worst things adults could do was try to act younger and cooler, especially by mimicking the way you and your friends talked. When you do this now, your kids think it’s just as pathetic as you did back then.
Reading Instead of Watching
Since we didn’t have the internet growing up, we didn’t have the option of watching videos when we needed instructions for something. Maybe that’s why many of us still prefer printed instructions and grumble about scanning QR codes to access instructional videos.
Dumb Names
For some reason, our generation abandoned traditional names, or at least a lot of us did, and assigned our kids names that are, to put it nicely, “interesting.” Why did we do this to them?
19 Cultural and Behavioral Differences Between Gen Z and Millennials
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Following are some notable examples.
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