When Did ‘Wholesome’ Become a Gen Z Compliment?

“Millennials were more nihilistic, but Gen Z prefers to be inane over straight bleakness,” Finessa continues. “If you want to wear black and be cool and macho, cool, go to a techno party. But, if you think that looks a bit ‘silly’, come to the silly party.”

It makes sense that norms are shifting in this direction as Gen Z’s influence spreads. Raised on social media, with access to once illicit bad-taste touchstones like Rocky Horror just a click away, they’ve largely replaced IRL subcultures with a constellation of aesthetics—cottagecore, dark academia, Y2K—to be performed, then discarded or demoted t... See more

Invoke the brat as your muse, it seems, and she’ll dilute the politics of your book down to a mix of provocativeness and uncertainty. Something like “The system is gross, but the people who want to resist or improve it are cringe. And some aspects of the system, like online shopping and racism and fatphobia, might actually be OK? Just kidding! Unle... See more

There is a growing desire among Gen Z to reclaim their autonomy from their phones and remove themselves from what Shaz describes as a passive state of being. Last year, anti-tech activist and writer August Lamm predicted that abstention would be the next big thing. On X, she wrote: “I’m calling it right now, abstention is the new big thing; sobriet... See more

“Gen Z gamers view the metaverse as a safe place to freely express themselves, experiment with identities, establish friendships, and ultimately create a world they want to live in. It’s important that brands don’t dismiss the metaverse as a passing fad, but view it as a paradigm-shifting trend that’s just getting started.”