GenZ came up with a new and powerful weapon in their arsenal to retort against the Baby Boomers who they perceive as old-school and out of fashion. By utilising social media like Snapchat, TikTok, and Instagram, they put up a pre-emptive strike to dismiss, disregard, and mock the generation born roughly between 1946 and 1965. These memes are generally accompanied by a hand wave, handshake, an eye roll or a combination of all of these.
The trend began in September of 2015 but started gaining momentum in January 2019. The meme is considered to be disrespectful and belittles the millennial predecessors. However, in their defence, they are perpetuating the age-oriented stereotypes they do not want to be labelled by. A generational difference has given rise to prejudices, stereotypes, and putdowns to be expressed without any sign of remorse. While a boomer’s world view is shaped by the Vietnam War, Star Wars and Avengers are what shapes that of GenZ’s. While GenX prefers emails, GenZ is most comfortable with a text.
Cort Rudolph, Ph.D., associate professor of Industrial and Organisational Psychology at Saint Louis University, denies that certain qualities, behaviours, and values that people possess are not based on the time they were born in. He says, “Generations are merely labels that people have artificially put on groups of people of different ages for the purposes of stratification and have no real bearing on actual behaviour, attitudes, or ways of thinking.”
Rudolph says that all the claims about generational differences are flawed fundamentally. He points out how these prejudices can isolate older people and lead to treating them unfairly just for their lack of knowledge about the world view of the younger generation. He says people resort to generational stereotypes to come to quick conclusions and pass unnecessary judgements. He says, “Understanding and making sense of the process of aging and development is a very complicated task and especially so when viewed through the lens of age-diverse social interactions.”
Subarna Basu