I have something pretty interesting I've been thinking about for the past year or so. My cousin (who is male and the same age as me, also the same one who told me I looked like death in the chapter about things that happened on campus) and I actually had a conversation about this at like 2am while in his dorm before Covid struck in February 2020, and tbh I've been thinking about it ever since.

So. I, as well as the majority of people on here, am a part of Gen Z. For those of you who aren't aware, Gen Z starts with people born in 1995 and allegedly ends with kids born in the early 2010s. Personally, I think this is way too long for a single generation, and you'll see why as I move along.

What defines a generation? Most often, people look for common life experiences, which is pretty hard to do when a group of people is so young. For Millennials, the biggest definitions are: being old enough to remember the events of the attacks on the Twin Towers and Pentagon on September 11, 2001 and, for Americans, entering the workforce and/or starting college/graduating high school as the economy crashed in 2008. I'm not sure what the defining characteristics are for each individual country, but since September 11th changed the entire world and air travel itself, that may be why it's such a broad event.

Like Gen X, Gen Z doesn't have a separate nickname as Baby Boomers or Millennials do. There was a debate about calling them the "iGeneration," which I think is stupid for a number of reasons.

Let's try to organize my thoughts. First, why do I think the early 2010s are way too late to end what is considered "Gen Z"? Here's why: I may not have siblings, but my aunt has 8 kids and I spent literally every single day (except weekends) at her house during the summer and after school as my parents worked. All 8 kids are older than me, with the youngest being 2 years older than me. Because of this, I nearly spent more time with people older than me than with people younger than me, and I believe it's safe to say that early 2000s kids and late 90s kids have way more in common than early 2010s kids.

Even kids born in 2010 would only be turning 11 by now. Compared to someone who is 24 right now, that is a huge age gap. Experiences are completely different, as are world views. If it were up to me, I would personally make Gen Z last exactly a decade: 1995 to 2005. Why? 1) it's easy to define, and 2) looking at the advances in technology, people born in 2005 would still have memories of not having their lives consumed by smartphones, tablets, and the like. I used the release of the iPhone in 2009 as a comparison.

For example, when I was younger, my dream phone looked like this:

My mom had this exact model but in red instead of blue and I thought it was the shit. It was released in 2010 and I remember thinking having an actual keyboard on a phone was so cool. I also remember having no games to play on my parents' phones except Snake.

Here's a glimpse of my childhood (the shows are largely American, but this is just stuff I found from my childhood board on my WeHeartIt account):

(If you remember when Dora started like that, with the green computer and everything, I'm impressed, and also Rolie Polie Olie was the reason why I drew my women's dresses in the shape of triangles throughout my childhood. ALSO YEAH, IT WAS PLAYHOUSE DISNEY, AND IT WAS WHAT DISNEY WAS CALLED IN THE MORNING, NOT DISNEY JR. And Nick Jr. was called Noggin. Pour one out for Moose and Zee.)

Also, in my DVD of Cinderella, I have an extra with the Disney Channel stars singing "A Dream is A Wish Your Heart Makes" and it's like a portal back in time. RICKY ULLMAN, MY FIRST CELEBRITY CRUSH. THE SPROUSE TWINS BEING TINY BABIES. RAVEN. ALY MICHALKA.

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These are different things that were popular across a generation (for the shows, maybe mostly in the US, and since I'm curious, what were some of your favorite childhood shows if you live outside the US? Are any of these the same?). If I had randomly stood on a hallway at my high school and shouted, "NOBODY CALLS ESTEBAN JULIO RICARDO MONTONYA DE LA ROSA RAMIREZ A THIEF!" I can guarantee that at least thirty people would have chimed back, "NO ONE'S GOT THE TIME!"

But when you look at recent years, those similarities start to blur. I have some younger cousins who are 7-10 and let me tell you, our childhood experiences were completely different. However, with the current definition of Gen Z, we would be considered the same generation because they were born in 2010, 2011, and 2012. Aka "the early 2010s."

This is the generation that I would consider the iGeneration ("i" for "internet"). They were either born after the invention of smartphones/tablets or too young to remember a time without them. They grew up being handed phones or tablets to play games on to pass the time instead of coloring books or nothing but their imagination. Instead of having to do a high-speed sprint to the bathroom during commercial breaks like they were training for the Olympics before a show came back on, they can just rewind and catch whatever they missed.

The thing in particular that my cousin and I were talking about is how there are so many children's programs for kids to choose from these days instead of the limited collection we had as kids. This is largely due to streaming services and YouTube. Two of my younger cousins don't watch normal kid's shows; all they watch is people playing video games on YouTube.

Personally, I think it would be interesting to see how this affects them as they grow up. Children's shows aren't just about entertainment— they teach valuable life lessons, even if we don't realize it. They teach kids how to work with others, empathy, how to deal with change, how to problem-solve, critical thinking, etc. A 30-minute stream of absolute nonsense going on in Roblox is not going to teach them that.

If you gather a bunch of kids and put them in a room together, then ask them to name their favorite show or one they've been watching recently, what would the odds be that two of them name the same show? Or that the majority of them have even heard of the show another one mentions? Because before streaming, you may have seen a show while you were flipping through channels but never watched it. The probability of that happening now is a lot lower.

Maybe I should switch my major to psychology because I'm actually really interested in this LMAO.

And I think the emphasis on technology is so important because technology advanced rapidly in the span of just ten years— 2000 to 2010, and even more after that. In 2010, my dream phone would have been the Samsung Intensity II that I included a picture of, but by 2014, when I was an early teen, my first phone was the iPhone 5c (which was already a generation behind the current newest iPhone, the 6). If you had given 2010 me an iPhone 5c, I wouldn't have known what the heck to do with myself. I probably would have just gone into shock and then dropped it and shattered the screen.

Kids nowadays are experiencing these fast-paced technologies during their most crucial developmental periods. It's difficult for them to imagine when phones didn't have all the features they do now. Apparently, they brought Tamagotchis back, but now they're freaking huge, can do so much more than they used to, and they're in COLOR??!! I tried to explain to my little cousin, who has one, how they used to look and she was absolutely blown away. Like she couldn't even fathom them looking how they did when I was her age.

So, yeah, 2005 would be the cutoff year for me. After that, the similarities in childhood experiences start to fade and blur. I sometimes even find it difficult to relate to some of the high schoolers in my comment section. They reference the Disney movie Descendants and I'm like ????? I was too old for that when it came out. I didn't watch Liv & Maddie. Wtf is a Bizaardvark??? I know Zendaya from Shake It Up, not K.C. Undercover (I literally did not know that was a thing until like... last year). But largely, our experiences would be the same.

Also, 2006 would be around the time it would be more common for a kid to be the child of a Millennial, whereas most of Gen Z's parents are Gen X or above. Not saying this is the case for everyone, that's why I said "more common."

So yeah. I wanted to talk about this because I find it interesting, but also because I get sick of the Adults™ who are like "You kids were raised on iPhones!!!" like no Karen I was in middle school by the time iPads were popular and I was raised on flip phones and box computers/televisions. I remember when YouTube was invented. Bitch.

Side note, we literally got rid of our MASSIVE box television last year. In the year of our lord two thousand and twenty, we finally got rid of our TV that was as old as me, almost as tall as me, and looked like this:

And we still have this one in our "game room" (we don't have a basement because I live on a canal and it would flood, so our house has a bonus room that we call the game room) that is also as old as me but still works like a charm:

Side note/funny story: I was at my best friend's uncle's cottage two years ago and they found this type of TV in the basement. The adult men were trying to figure out how to set it up to HDMI so they could watch a sports game but none of them could figure out how to work it. I was like, "Oh, I know how to do it, we have this TV at home!" and NONE OF THEM BELIEVED ME ??? They were like "Kristyn this TV is probably as old as you" and I was like "Yes and??? It still works, therefore my Dad will not buy a new one until it dies."

Anyways. What are your thoughts? Is this just me being bitter because I'm at the end of my teenage years? Am I old? Are my points valid?

One of the YouTubers I like, tiffanyferg, has a series called Internet Analysis and she has a great video on generations, though hers touches more on the aspect of "cuspers" than what I'm talking about, which is opposite (people who SHOULD be younger than Gen Z).

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Also this is so random but when you ask a child what their favorite Disney princess movie is, why do they ALWAYS SAY FROZEN??? BITCH, HAVE SOME TASTE??? It seems like the Youths are less likely to know about stuff before their time, whereas young adults would be more likely to say Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, or others that came before them. Aladdin came out in the early 90s and it's always been my favorite. Jasmine is the bomb.

Ok bye, Frozen is overrated in my opinion and it makes me mad. At least say Moana you uncultured, sticky demons.

NO WAIT I'M ALSO MAD AT THE YOUNG TEENAGERS WHO ARE SAYING THAT SKINNY JEANS AND HAIR PARTED TO THE SIDE IS OUT OF STYLE??? WHAT ???

OK NOW I'M DONE