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I know that as a tail-end baby-boomer without kids and grand kids, I’m not as tuned in to the Zeitgeist of Millennials and Gen Z’ers as I probably should be. I post links to my articles on Facebook, Substack Notes, Post.News, Threads, LinkedIn and X/Twitter, upload select appearances to my YouTube channel (and website), but otherwise mostly stay away from social media. Heck, I haven’t accessed Instagram in years, and I don’t even have (or want) a Tik-Tok account.
That being said, I understand the compound insults of 9/11, the Great Recession, Black Lives Matter and CRT, political dysfunction mostly of the Trump variety, the pandemic, student debt, housing costs and above all, climate change, has put a damper on the outlook of these generations. Slightly generalized, many believe that the deck is stacked against them, that they won’t be better off than their parents, that racism is endemic, that they will never be able to afford a home, and that the world is quickly reaching a climate tipping point from which there is no return. As a result, pessimism about the future accompanied by cynicism is supposedly deeply ingrained in many Millennials and Gen Z’ers.
I mostly avoid pessimism and cynicism in my writing as I think they are rather impotent tools of the trade. Used excessively, they reveal a deep-seated metaphysical helplessness. While it’s sometimes hard to find a silver lining, I try to be upbeat and look for positives with the ambition to strike an optimistic note. In my experience, it makes readers more inclined to be receptive to the message. My book “Think Right or Wrong, Not Left or Right” fits the bill, benevolently arguing that capitalism as a social system is the socio-political cure for all welfare statist ailments perhaps disproportionately affecting young Americans. But this approach supposedly puts me out of touch with Millennials and Gen Z’ers. Or so I thought.
According to a NYT article about, of all things, the upbeat 1989 Indigo Girls’ hit “Closer to Fine,” the song shouldn’t be a good fit for those coming of age this side of Y2K, yet it’s prominently featured in the recent hit movie “Barbie”
...[the Indigo Girls’] music —songwriterly, acoustic-forward, aggressively emotional—hardly seems a good fit for our strange and cynical times. They are, as the kids would say, cringe.
Cringe: the ultimate insult of our era. It implies a kind of pathetic attachment to hope, to sincerity, to possibility.
I didn’t know cringe was a thing, which I guess proves the point of my out-of-touch-ness; I didn’t know that my naïve optimism, my “pathetic attachment to hope, to sincerity, to possibility” is cringey. However, the author of the NYT article, Lydia Polgreen, is after all a Gen X’er, so I thought perhaps I should take her insights about later generations with a grain of salt. But then I came across a Rolling Stones article by Millennial journalist Taylor Lorenz “Am I Cringey? Yes. Do I Care? Absolutely Not: Inside Gen Z’s online pivot from irony and sarcasm to optimism and sincerity” arguing that
For much of the internet’s history, “cringe” has been an insult. But now, a shift is underway. The deep nihilism that defined the internet from 2018 to 2022 has been replaced with outright optimism. And rather than shy away, Gen Z creators are embracing it — and amassing millions of fans in the process.
If Ms. Lorenz is right, some Gen Z trend setters have embraced “cringe” with great success as a counter-reaction to the cynicism and sarcasm of Millennials. Apparently, there’s a thirst—and an emerging market—for optimism, earnestness, and authenticity. I don’t want to overstate my case, but my cringeyness may be a strength. Maybe I’m more in tune with, at least, Gen Z than I had thought. And perhaps Millennials will take a cue from their younger sisters and brothers that things are looking up, broadening my appeal even further? Now, two swallows do not a summer make, but I’ll take it. And come to think of it, this world is full of cringey characters and organizations some of which I’ve written about here and here. Their—and my—message may be ripe for younger, disillusioned generations.
So, if you have a Gen Z’er in your life who is into cringe, by all means share this article, and even better, give them a copy of the book. Mark my words, it’s destined to become a cringe cult classic. And if you are a Millennial or Gen Z’er, I’d love your thoughts in the comments.
Apparently, I've been cringeworthy for my entire life.
Unfortunately, you are still stuck with this baby boomer who is older than you. I'm so out of touch, I have never heard of 'cringe' used as a derogatory social condition until 5 minutes ago. I was always out of touch with my baby boomer brethren as well, so it is no surprise that I am equally out of touch with every generation since. So much so that I long ago stopped worrying about generations. The ONLY thing truly worth considering, to me, is how much you want to enjoy and thrive in this life and are willing to grant EVERY other person the right to pursue that happiness as well. If you do, then I'm a thousand percent behind you. If you don't, then please don't rain on my parade. Enjoy your misery without my participation. I find my kind of people (too few, unfortunately), in every generation. Short of the remaining idiots finally destroying the world, we are the ones who will ultimately win in the end - and have a hell of a time doing it. If that makes us 'cringe', or whatever the latest generational word for optimistic, life-serving, rational, freedom lover is, then by all means tag us with it. We will proudly wear it.