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Over the last few decades, people have begun to pay closer attention to the differences in behavior and upbringing between each generation.
After all, as technology shifts so quickly, so do the small things that end up totally shifting generational perspectives and beliefs on everything from work, to music, mental health and more.
Someone asked, “What scares you the most about the next generation?” and people shared the potentially toxic traits and behaviors they had noticed.
So get comfortable as you scroll through, upvote your favorites, and be sure to comment your thoughts below.
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
I don't know. On one hand, I think younger folks are more open to talking about mental health. This is good, and sure beats my parents "just bury it so deep in your soul it never comes up" strategy.
On the other hand, it seems like kids today are way more sensitive about things. Sorry, but arriving too late to a sold-out movie or an airline losing your bag isn't a "genuine mental health trauma". No, that waiter isn't give you "microaggressions"... he's just in a f**king hurry because, if you look around, this restaurant is slammed.
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#2
The sheer ignorance. So many don't read books. They have limited vocabulary. I don't speak to many who seem to think critically. They are raised to take standard tests and consume content, rather than analyze and contemplate. It's terrifying.
#3
How big the gulf between educated, critical thinkers and reactionary illiterates will be. And how the latter will significantly outnumber the former.
kansasmagic 1 year ago
That's what scares me about the past, present, and future generations. Ignorance is not generational.
#4
Their inability to function when things get tough. I work with many 18-25 year old, and the second something becomes too difficult or they get told something they don't want to hear, they sit on the floor and refuse to do anything. Or they stomp around crying out how we're all "toxic and abusive towards them."
I see it other places as well. Part of life is, unfortunately, challenges, and things won't always go your way. The reactions they have are just downright frightening.
#5
They CANNOT use a computer. They can surf the web, but cannot do anything useful. Many of my students are worse than my parents at doing simple things like attaching documents to emails or understanding the file path.
Luke Branwen 1 year ago
It's because they constantly use a phone and have zero experience with desktops / laptops. They can't use anything that's not an app.
#6
Increasing lack of critical thinking and the inability to differentiate truth or reality compared to what they are spoon fed by various types of media that don’t care about people’s best interests.
We have already seeing the increasing consequences of that over the past 20 years, and it will only get worse.
#7
Their arrogance and misusing buzzwords out of online YouTube therapy sessions, f.e. they were "traumatized" after that last math class. Their self centered behaviour will be trouble for us all down the road.
troufaki13 1 year ago
And the entitlement! Just because you ask doesn't mean you will receive.
#8
I teach young kids (so Gen Alpha). A lot of them can’t persevere through a challenge without going to pieces. And it’s not like “I’m crying because I can’t find my notebook because I’ve had a rough day and this is just the final straw.” It’s “I’m crying because I can’t find my notebook and no one is coming to rescue me despite the fact that if I looked in my desk for more than .5 seconds I’d find it.”
They have no understanding of their actions having consequences. My class was out of control in the lunchroom (running, pushing, throwing food) and went all surprised Pikachu that the teachers supervising lunch kept them in for recess.
They’re also lazy. We’re just starting to learn how to answer a question in a complete sentence and use evidence from a text to support our idea. I’m not asking for a ten page thesis, I’m asking for “I know the boy is happy at the end of the story because he said ‘This was a great day!’”. I model the skill, I give them sentence starters, and they still can’t even just complete the sentence starter, so they’ll just write “he’s happy” in their notebook and expect me to be like “Perfect, this is wonderful”.
A lot of it is bad parenting. It’s not just the iPads and TikTok. A lot of parents will step in before a kid is ever even challenged by something and fix it for them so they don’t learn to problem solve. They expect me to spoon feed them answers and refuse to do anything that takes more than a minute of thinking. They also make excuses for their kids’ behavior and don’t discipline them (I had a parent this week try to explain to me that the problem isn’t that their daughter talks in class, the problem is that other kids are talking to her when she talks to them). I don’t foresee these kids being able to function in any career that expects them to do anything other than exactly what they want to do and that asks nothing of them.
Bartlet for world domination 1 year ago
Different generation, but of the four 22-25-year-olds my company hired in the past few years, three didn't understand the concept of 'work'.
#10
Their inability to think for themselves. They need to be told what opinions to have by whatever are the dominant ones on social media.
iseefractals 1 year ago
This has been a growing problem for 20 years. Everyone has broken off into their respective "teams" parroting whatever the party line happens to be on any and all given subjects. Anyone that doesn't subscribe to that party line is immediately painted as the "opposition" Critical thinking, and objectivity are antiquated concepts for most people these days. "If you don't agree with me about everything, than YOU are part of the problem" It's exhausting.
#11
That they're inheriting a dying planet and student loan debt, low wages, and rising housing costs mean they're basically serfs with the illusion of freedom.
Abdullah Abd Rahman 1 year ago
Student loan debt is a massive issue among the graduates in ultra-capitalistic US, supposedly the richest country in the world - where free or state-supported education is villified as "socialist" or "communist". It's not as big an issue as in many countries where education is free or subsidised by the Government - like in the UK ,much of Europe and many developing countries, like Malaysia.
#12
That they are so anxious, need constant outside validation and tend to be afraid to do things on their own.
#13
Nowadays attention spans have gotten so short , so many of them can’t sit through a book if they tried. It is sad i hope books don’t ever become a thing of the past
Becky Samuel 1 year ago
And yet the statistics show that adults under 30 are more likely to have read a book in the past year than any other age group. Just because the media keeps telling you something doesn't mean that it's true.
#14
I see a general lack of empathy and so much social anxiety . Sometimes i am sure my grandkids would rather text people than have a face to face conversation... even with their friends.
#16
Nonexistent reading comprehension
There’s story after story of teachers who teach upper middle school with kids who can’t point out the main character of an elementary level paragraph story, or find the theme of a simple passage. It genuinely scares me that next election, some of these “covid babies” who had critical learning year(s) robbed from them will be voting based on what people tell them to think because they don’t have the mind to research for themselves.
#17
I’m a high school nurse and this is what I see:
- They have no patience and expect things to happen instantly. They don’t understand that there is no instant cure for things. For example: They think I’m crazy because I want them to sit for 10 minutes with ice on an injury.
- they can not handle being uncomfortable at all. They want to call their parents and go home for everything.
- anxiety. So much of it. They come in to the clinic freaking out because they can’t breathe, shaking, limb numbness, panicked look on their face, etc. I ask them if they could be having anxiety about something and they tell me they aren’t anxious about anything. But it’s pretty obvious they are. It just comes out of nowhere and for no particular reason. I deal with so much mental health. These poor babies.
Tyranamar Suess 1 year ago
I love all the obviously very anxious people I see who tell me they're fine. Um...you don't look fine. Some genuinely don't know what anxiety is. It's very interesting.
#18
Now think about writing. They can't use a stop. It's sentence after sentence after sentence nonstop.
#19
They believe that they can demand high starting salary without working experience. Totally amused me.
Damned_Cat 1 year ago (edited)
Ugh, yes! I used to have new staff in their early twenties constantly questioning why someone in the same position that had worked there for 8 years was making more than they were.
#20
Lack of coping mechanisms. I don't understand why, I am not a parent. But a lot seem to be unable to cope when things go awry, and very keen to claim a label which excuses/explains their total inability to cope. This is not criticism of those with genuine issues, I'm talking about the self-diagnosed.
Damned_Cat 1 year ago (edited)
I worry about the young people who are so quick to label interpersonal issues as "toxic" and "red flag" and are so quick to advise others to dump a relationship, get a divorce, or go no contact with their families over common issues. They advise young teenagers to save their money and move out when they turn 18 (please tell me in what country that is even possible). They have no emotional intelligence and see no value in trying to resolve issues with anyone that causes them stress. They can't see the long-term damage cutting contact can do. I agree that there are times that a person does need to walk away, but it's not always that easy and it's not usually the first solution to a problem.
#21
The thing that scares me the most about this new generation is that they are so reliant on technology. They are growing up in a world where they can't imagine life without the internet or their phones, and I think that's really dangerous. These kids are going to be adults soon and they're going to be completely unprepared for the real world if they can't function without a screen in front of them.
Susie Elle 1 year ago
To be honest, not having internet access CAN be a genuine problem, if you look at how many things are done via the web nowadays. I'd have a proper issue if I lost my phone if only because of the freakin' sign-in confirmation app codes I get sent for every freakin' account I need to make for everything.
#22
The sexism of some young men. It seems like they also don’t question sources and fall easily for propaganda pushed through social media.
#23
Cheating their way through school. These are future doctors or nurses.
#24
That they will have a much lower quality of life than previous generations. Too many people and not enough fresh water.
Becky Samuel 1 year ago
So sad that this is buried under a heap of "the youth of today.." and "we were all so much better behaved/smarter/tougher/just all round better in my day".
#25
I mentioned it elsewhere in response to how tariffs might impact my work:
But I’m a biochemist and I often oversee the hiring process at a biotech company I’m at…. I HAVE NOT HAD AN AMERICAN WITH A GOOD COMPETITIVE RESUME SHOW UP IN MY INBOX FOR A WHILE. Even for your garden variety RA roles, almost nothing…
so when I hear from teachers that “the kids are getting worse,” I DREAD what it’s gonna be like for Americans trying to break into tech constantly having to compete with nations that have their academic s**t together (China, South Korea, lots of EU countries, etc).
#26
Their sadness. Young people seem so sad - and a bit depressed too. Sad people tend not to move things forward - they just try to survive. We took all the reasons they had for optimism, hovered over their every move, and now they seem to feel resigned and sad :|.
Luke Branwen 1 year ago
Then again... is there anything to be optimistic about? Climate change, the uprising of fascism, end-stage capitalism, unchecked "AI", nonsense "culture wars"... they'll grow up just in time to experience the fallout.
#29
No respect for the authority - kids today don’t pay any respect to elderly and not even their parents. They will grow up careless of other people, no empathy for anybody, just looking after themselves. There are exceptions of course, but majority of kids today are like this.
troufaki13 1 year ago
It's ok to question authority, but don't make it your life's mission to destroy it.
#30
Teacher here... the issues that worry me:
* Cell phone addiction. Teenagers in class: head down. Teenagers at the bus stop: head down. Walking across the street, riding a bike, walking: head down. It makes me sad.
* Inability to focus: brain rot, meme culture, short form content equates to everyone having the attention span of a goldfish.
* Complete lack of any understanding of finances, lack of any aspiration, no interest in developing job skills that can help them in the future. This generation is going to be shocked when they find out how hard their parents work and how much it costs to live in their home town.
* Complete lack of any knowledge or understanding of the forces that brought us to our current political environment that they are about to stroll into as voting age adults in a few years. The state of things will be taken for granted, resigned to fascism or openly embracing it. The will to enact change for the better is gone, seen as futile. It saddens me to my core.
This isn't all the young people I see but I would say it's over 50% at least. There are many that give me great hope. The bright, intelligent, creative and deep feeling students I have will be the only forces holding back the ugly in the future. I hope that the value of empathy, self reliance and intelligence gains a resurgence among the youth. It makes me happy to see young people discovering older technology. I hope they someday realize the value in rejecting the need to be connected to the internet every single second of every single day of their entire lives. There is SO much more to enjoy in the world than your cell phone. I understand for many teens it is the only escape in their lives, I hope they can escape the grip of technology as well somehow.
Scott Rackley 1 year ago
The second point is what I call "sound bite mentality". Really, son, you can sum all that up in 140 characters? Brevity might be the soul of wit, but it is frequently the source of dumbass.
Trista JW 1 year ago
Having one's head down does not indicate anything cell phone-related. The inability to focus isn't an inability, they just don't want to. They don't pay attention to finances because they don't want to. They don't have real-world job goals because they want to be internet famous. It's nothing but self-entitled laziness.
#31
They have to "think" in a group, but that thinking is always vibes and feels and not facts and data.
I am confused as to how when I was a child, we all thought the information age would be one of intelligent beings who could decisively act on data. If that data is not there, then how to find it and ingest it and comprehend it. Now, their decisions and ideas are fed to them, they outsourced their thinking to someone else. Even here in South Africa, our election cycle was full of comments about how lacking the youths are. Election campaign influencer videos would have comments "thanks for this, I might not have gone to register to vote" or "ilysm I will register too".
Even juniors who come out of university, taking on development internships, are shocking. Mentoring becomes torture. I would understand if they were a first year student, but how they make it past graduation and into the workforce (so I'm actually convinced it because they all just used generative AI tools).
There is no individual anymore, and the hive seems a combination of stupid rather than smarts.
Listening to them read should also be included in the Geneva Conventions.
Chicken Mitten 1 year ago
It's like no one ever read George Orwell and we're all shocked! We were warned.
#32
As a teacher I have a lot to say about this. I'm GenZ, and many of my students are also GenZ. I have a mutual understanding with them and work very well with them. We understand each other's lingo, our interests are similar. I understand my GenZ students and can see myself in them every day, from my best ones to worst ones.
Things are very different for the Gen Alpha kids. I don't teach any this year, but I did supervise them on a field trip the other day. They are so different it's quite scary. No attention span, strange sense of humour, extreme social awkwardness, no individuality. These students are difficult to talk to and they have no social queues.
Maybe i don't understand them because I didn't grow up in the same era as them, but what I see are children who have had their brains melted by tiktok and other similar media, all the students show symptoms of autism and Ironically the students of the same age in the autism class are far more polite, understanding and socially aware.
I'm scared of a generation that is shaped entirely by the Internet and serves at the whims of whoever the algorithm chooses to push. Gen Alpha should be called Generation Algorithm.
Tyranamar Suess 1 year ago
I think COVID impaired a lot of kids social skills. My son didn't even see other people's faces for 2 years bc everyone was wearing masks. So he was terrible at reading facial cues. And he wasn't able to play with other kids during that time either. He's been diagnosed with autism but I think a lot of it is bc critical brain structures weren't being developed while my child sat around only interacting with me or people in masks.
#33
The reliance on computers and an all electric system with batteries. If we get a bad solar flare it's the stone age.
Susie Elle 1 year ago
I get what you mean, but this 'one bad day away from total disaster' thinking goes for everything. If we were to rely solely on manual labour, we'd be one bad epidemic or a war away from the stone age.
#35
I'm a Gen Z, and I'm afraid that Gen Alpha won't do as well in school because their parents (not all of them, of course) keep placing them in front of tablets.
#38
1. Tendency toward collectivism and failure to value individualism
2. Lack of resourcefulness and of the innate need to “make do” for themselves
3. Lack of curiosity
4. Obsession with and confusion of appearance versus true experience.
5. Lack of reading skills—comprehension and ability to read through anything more than 2 sentences or five bullet points.
6. Abject lack of resilience in the face of adversity or challenge
7. Lack of future time orientation.
8. Financial illiteracy
9. Ignorance of and lack of curiosity about history and humanities
10. Self-centeredness.
troufaki13 1 year ago
Also the amount of people that get offended on behalf of others while those others don't even care.
#39
Their relationship to the Internet. How much time they spend on it vs. in-person activities. How it’s been used as a babysitter for them. How protections for children on it are a joke. How creeps and bullies freely use it to prey on children. How very little guidance is given to kids in schools to be able to suss out what’s real or fake, and how propaganda, botting, and algorithms work.
#40
Like someone once said about Margaret Thatcher, they have no hinterland, no sense of history, or more accurately, they aren't being provided with a proper sense of historical context. They think the world didn't exist before they got here and won't exist after they're gone. They (and not just them, to be fair) don't understand where the dominant ideologies today came from or how they evolved, or how the technologies they use evolved with and are dependent on interconnected systems of commerce and exchange, or how political power circulates throughout the world. It's no wonder that they feel so much unfocused anger and disillusionment; it's an understandable response to constant bewilderment. To them, things just seem to happen, and happen again, for no discernible reason.
#43
I read comments on a space focused Snapchat and kids were saying stuff like “why do we waste our money sending stuff into space? We knows it’s all empty” and “Waste of tax $s we should just spend it on the military” and everyone and was agreeing with him.
#44
They are socially broken. All they do is consuming yt/ticktock content without needing for self-improvement. They don't want to read, draw, solve puzzles, even play games that teach being creative. Kids stopped having critical thinking and their opinions are based heavily on dumb edits. They don't respect elders and want to be treated like royals.
I know same can be applied to Gen Z, but we weren't exposed to brainrotting shorts. Videos had more meaning put to them, could teach things and give food for thought (aside from elsagate, but most fellas just refused to watch it in pretty short time).
I can't comprehend what society will become when kids are old enough.
kansasmagic 1 year ago
"Their social media addiction is horrible, not like our social media addiction because our social media *meant something* man!"
#45
They are going to have to confront things that no other generation (in living memory) has ever had to deal with. And we prepare them for this by mocking their fears and the pain they feel about the future that awaits them.
That kind of thing will test the resilience of the strongest souls, let alone a generation of gaslit, scapegoated & terrified individuals.
athornedrose 1 year ago
this is so crucial to me. the idea that older generations see all these complaints about the younger ones as things to mock and scorn as though they have nothing to do with it and are "helping" with "tough love" by putting them down. each new generation faces challenges the previous ones couldn't have imagined at the same age. cruelty, mockery, and dismissiveness of that has never helped the situation.
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Casey Payne 1 year ago
"I don't foresee these kids being able to function in any career..." because of their behavior in elementary school? So kids between the ages of diapers and puberty don't have the skills or emotional stability to be a corporate employee? That's outrageous! I remember when I marched out of my mother's uterus on the day of my birth, I was given a shovel, a hunting knife and toenail clippers and told that I was on my own to survive. Then they kicked me out the door and locked it. Ah, sweet freedom. But these... these 'children' have to be educated and nurtured in order to survive? The horror. What is the world coming to? We should send them to school or something.
S. R. 1 year ago
I acutally quit my job as a tutor because I cannot educate children whilst walking on eggs as not to hurt feelings because maths isn't mathing or because they make mistakes. I had one student break down in tears for a full half an hour because of her hair color. She gaslighted everybody insisting her brown hair is actually blonde... and why couldn't we just agree on that.
Sera 1 year ago
Why on earth were you arguing with a child about something that was presumably wholly unrelated to the work you were supposed to be doing?
Load More Replies... Grenelda Thurber 1 year ago
"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers." -- Socrates
El Dee 1 year ago
Most of this sounds like 'old people' ie people my age, saying 'The young people of today' in EXACTLY the same way that my parents and grandparent's said about my generation said about mine. After what I saw during the pandemic I can confirm that the 'Young People of Today' are the best we've ever seen. They stepped up, took the front line and took care of us all. They do this with MUCH less bias and prejudice against color, religion, sexual orientation etc. So stop whinging oldies!!
Earonn - 1 year ago
Couldn't finish this, all this dribble that is literally just the modern version of what we all heard in our childhood. Don't read this, what kind of haircut is this, they are all weak and overly sensitive, bla bla bla. Add the hypergeneralisations "all of them", "they always", gosh, it's so stupid. Dear teenagers and young adults: it's fine. You have your weaknesses, yes, and so do we oldies. It's because we're human beings. Try to find the ones among us who aren't old farts and be our mentees (and, in one way or another, mentors).
Susie Elle 1 year ago (edited)
I trend I see amongst my students is that they less and less seem to feel the need to show up, and on time at that. They do wet-work during their thesis with me, but for some reason they come and go whenever they please outside of that, even after I told them that if I don't see them, I have zero sense of what they're up to and how they're doing (not that I micromanage). Not being on time, not communicating clearly and just not being there gives an impression to the people who ARE here, and for some reason they also don't see that an impression, sometimes, matters a lot, and that people won't always bother with trying to see past that impression. On the other hand, with today's housing market and the state of the world, I'd probably stop caring about my impression on other people as well.
Dirk Daring 1 year ago
People in the US are diving deep into Cult of Personality. 20 years from now I won't be too surprised when reading about whatever stupid and insane thing President Kardashian is doing.
Ellinor 1 year ago
Can people stop insulting the Kardashian every chances they get, even when it's not even remotely close to the subject ???
Load More Replies... Casey Payne 1 year ago
"I don't foresee these kids being able to function in any career..." because of their behavior in elementary school? So kids between the ages of diapers and puberty don't have the skills or emotional stability to be a corporate employee? That's outrageous! I remember when I marched out of my mother's uterus on the day of my birth, I was given a shovel, a hunting knife and toenail clippers and told that I was on my own to survive. Then they kicked me out the door and locked it. Ah, sweet freedom. But these... these 'children' have to be educated and nurtured in order to survive? The horror. What is the world coming to? We should send them to school or something.
S. R. 1 year ago
I acutally quit my job as a tutor because I cannot educate children whilst walking on eggs as not to hurt feelings because maths isn't mathing or because they make mistakes. I had one student break down in tears for a full half an hour because of her hair color. She gaslighted everybody insisting her brown hair is actually blonde... and why couldn't we just agree on that.
Sera 1 year ago
Why on earth were you arguing with a child about something that was presumably wholly unrelated to the work you were supposed to be doing?
Load More Replies... Grenelda Thurber 1 year ago
"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers." -- Socrates
El Dee 1 year ago
Most of this sounds like 'old people' ie people my age, saying 'The young people of today' in EXACTLY the same way that my parents and grandparent's said about my generation said about mine. After what I saw during the pandemic I can confirm that the 'Young People of Today' are the best we've ever seen. They stepped up, took the front line and took care of us all. They do this with MUCH less bias and prejudice against color, religion, sexual orientation etc. So stop whinging oldies!!
Earonn - 1 year ago
Couldn't finish this, all this dribble that is literally just the modern version of what we all heard in our childhood. Don't read this, what kind of haircut is this, they are all weak and overly sensitive, bla bla bla. Add the hypergeneralisations "all of them", "they always", gosh, it's so stupid. Dear teenagers and young adults: it's fine. You have your weaknesses, yes, and so do we oldies. It's because we're human beings. Try to find the ones among us who aren't old farts and be our mentees (and, in one way or another, mentors).
Susie Elle 1 year ago (edited)
I trend I see amongst my students is that they less and less seem to feel the need to show up, and on time at that. They do wet-work during their thesis with me, but for some reason they come and go whenever they please outside of that, even after I told them that if I don't see them, I have zero sense of what they're up to and how they're doing (not that I micromanage). Not being on time, not communicating clearly and just not being there gives an impression to the people who ARE here, and for some reason they also don't see that an impression, sometimes, matters a lot, and that people won't always bother with trying to see past that impression. On the other hand, with today's housing market and the state of the world, I'd probably stop caring about my impression on other people as well.
Dirk Daring 1 year ago
People in the US are diving deep into Cult of Personality. 20 years from now I won't be too surprised when reading about whatever stupid and insane thing President Kardashian is doing.
Ellinor 1 year ago
Can people stop insulting the Kardashian every chances they get, even when it's not even remotely close to the subject ???
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