Millennials are a generation infamous for their love of avocado toast, craft beer, Harry Potter, inventing the idea of a Disney adult and girlboss feminism. For that they’ve been subject to the brunt of our zeitgeist’s wrath in the years since.
Resentful boomers began the anti-millennial crusade. That’s to be expected; older people griping about the kids is nothing new, but rather a rite of passage that signifies a healthy ecosystem within the age groups. Hell, even gen X occasionally joins in on the action.
But now millennials face a brand-new beast of an enemy: their younger, meaner and far more tech-literate younger sibling, generation Z.
It’s not hard to find anti-millennial sentiments on practically every mainstream social media site out there – zoomers are the new apex predator of the internet after all – even coining an antonym custom-fit for millennial uncoolness: cheugy.
I was born at the tail-end of 1997, making me either the most fresh-faced millennial or the oldest gen Z hag, depending on who you ask. I’m otherwise known as a “zillennial”.
So as a generational fence-sitter with a foot in both camps, I reckon that I’m an excellent candidate to unravel this sibling rivalry.
First, let’s point out the obvious: I’m sorry, dear millennials, but you are pretty easy to make fun of. From your bygone affinity for putting moustaches on literally everything, inventing stupid words like “doggo” and letting BuzzFeed control the culture for a couple of years, you really have a lot to answer for.
I’ll be the first to admit I’ve partaken in bullying millennials but I’ve begun to hold back because – let’s face it – it’s pretty mean, and it’s not as though zoomers are that much cooler. Sure, they talk a big game but I don’t think the generation that made Labubus, JoJo Siwa and broccoli haircuts popular has a solid leg to stand on.
Clearly, there is a cringe goldmine to be found in both generations. So why is it that it’s mostly millennials taking the heat?
The truth is, millennials (for the most part) take cringe in their stride. Gen Z, on the other hand, is deeply terrified of being perceived as anything other than a specific type of curated cool.
The poet and author Ocean Vuong spoke to the ABC in July about this phenomenon, saying “cringe culture” is holding young people back from enjoying life and pursuing what they want, whether related to their career, relationships or hobbies.
Both generations share the dismal reality of never owning a home (without parental assistance) and being young under an ever-increasing threat of climate devastation. But while millennials unabashedly cultivated modern nerd culture and weren’t afraid to be seen as sincere online and IRL, gen Z find themselves weighed down by the heavy shackles of irony culture.
Perhaps this type of swagless bravado is the only antidote we have to the hellscape we find ourselves in
To be perceived as earnest is a fate worse than death for the self-conscious, aura-farming zoomer, which leads them to lash out against those who do not follow the rules of their anti-cringe world.
Millennials grew up quite literally alongside the internet, complete with awkward phases, while zoomers have never known a world devoid of near-constant and hyper-polished social monitoring.
The digital landscape once ruled by millennials was “awesome”. Think back to those days when Photoshopped edits of cats in space, AutoTuned news reports and chaotically creative seven-second Vines were commonplace.
Meanwhile, zoomers inherited AI slop, fascist influencers and megalomaniac tech overlords who also play a hand in global politics. How is that fair!?
And while gen Z might be making more money than millennials, they also have more debt, might be having less sex, fewer parties and seem generally unhappier.
We can chalk that up to unease about the state of the world and an unprecedented access to witnessing the successes of their seemingly happier peers. Things that millennials are all too familiar with.
As the saying goes, millennials walked so that gen Z could run … and then make fun of them for it.
I propose that gen Z open up their hearts and see that millennials, despite their cheuginess, share more commonalities with them than differences. Maybe then, after they finally embrace their own cringey attributes, they’d see that their “too cool” exterior is a prison of their own making.
And yes, sure, millennial cringe is sometimes a bit too much to bear – I for one put forward that we completely remove the phrase “but first, coffee” from the lexicon – but perhaps this type of swagless bravado is the only antidote we have to the hellscape we find ourselves in.
To be cringe is to be free. Live, laugh, love.
Besides, gen alpha is steadily but surely on their way to dethrone the zoomers from their top spot, so are you ready to be bullied by the “skibidi toilet” generation with no one there to back you up?
Eleanor Burnard is a production assistant at Guardian Australia
