Each generation is characterized by something, and the networks are there to remember it. The millennials they have a perfect command of technology, while their parents need to have the brightness of the screen and the dimension of the icons of the applications to the maximum in their mobiles. Some have traveled around the world before they turned 30, the others had a permanent contract and owned a house even before reaching this age. The new against the old, but also the new against the newer still, like the centennials, the youngest of the cataloged generations. This difference between age groups is one of the issues that gives rise to memes on the networks, especially on TikTok, the platform used by the majority of the GenZwhere the famous meme was born okay boomer.
A lot of humor, but also an avalanche of stereotypes that increasingly widen the generational gap in networks: half of the videos published on TikTok about the children of the baby boom reinforces the characteristic features, both negative and positive, of this generation, according to a newly published study.
“The results are overwhelming. We have found a clear trend towards ageism, and this is very worrying, since we know that this directly harms the mental health of those who suffer from it”, says Reuben Ng, a researcher at the University of Singapore and co-author of the study. After analyzing more than a thousand videos with the hashtags #Boomer and #OkBoomer, a series of recurring negative stereotypes have been identified that researchers consider problematic when it comes to bringing this segment of the population closer to social networks: being slow, incompetent with technologies, but also holding outdated values and suffering from poor health.
Although the term baby boomers It has been used for more than half a century to identify the generation of those born after the Second World War. It was only in 2019 that it became considered an insult, when TikTok was filled with videos of teenagers who with a simple “OK, boomersThey put an end to their parents’ sermons. A blunt phrase, capable of expressing the discomfort of young people towards a generation that they consider privileged, far from reality and even the cause of all their problems, from the decline of the economy to climate change.
“At the age of 20 I had already bought a piece of land,” says a boomers still GenZ in a video by Mexican tiktoker Brandon Bryler, who satires the generation gap in most of his posts. “Your land cost what a kilo of eggs costs today,” the young man replies. “Pay rent [alquiler] it’s a waste of money,” insists the adult. “Right? It’s not like we’re doing it because you bought all the houses and sell them at Ferrari prices, ”answers the boy, who gives up further arguing once his father asks him when he is going to have a child.
The values and beliefs of adults and antagonism with the youngest are the most present stereotypes in the application of short-form videos, according to the study of this university. Although most of this content lacks evil, it does not mean that it cannot have negative consequences on users, whether they are boomers either millennials. “When young people watch videos that ridicule ageism and demonize the habits of the elderly, this has an impact on their health. After all, we are all destined to grow old. The millennials of today are the boomers in the morning,” explains Ng. On the other hand, if the elderly do not find content that reflects their reality, they will continue to feel out of place on TikTok, and, therefore, they will not be present on it, further increasing the generational conflict on the platform.
The humor to question power
What both social groups understand as a sense of humor is key to deciphering the tension in networks between different generations. “Currently three humorous cultures coexist. The oral medium, represented by jokes; the graphic, such as bullet posts; and the digital, where the humor of this generation is inserted. What TikTok does is incorporate all these features and create transmedia humor, which on many occasions does not reach adults”, explains Carles Feixa, a social anthropologist at Pompeu Fabra University.
The older generation understands the communicative intent behind these videos, but not always. There is, in fact, a whole subcategory of videos of children showing a meme to their mothers, who don’t get the humor of the content and feel offended. “For them it is like learning a new language that is not their mother tongue. So sometimes they think that young people are insulting them, when all they are doing is expressing themselves,” says Feixa.
More than conflict, the professor recognizes the existence of a gap that prevents effective communication between two or more generations, and that in the case of the youngest is expressed through humor. “Historically, it is a way of questioning power. The new generations feel totally outside, they feel that all the political, economic and academic power is in the hands of the boomers. And since they cannot question it through other means, they use humor, and they do it on a site that belongs to them, such as TikTok,” he adds.
This does not mean that the networks are the cause of this friction between different age groups, according to Mariano Sánchez, director of the Chair of Intergenerational Studies at the University of Granada. “Conflicts between generations have always existed. But they hide a trap, since they start from the assumption that the categorization of generations is closed, and it is not. We are all multigenerational, there is no one who can be defined only millennial, boomers or Z”, admits Sánchez.
In fact, the reality is very different from the world that TikTok paints. “Studies and surveys carried out with representative samples show that the population does not perceive this conflict. Although it cannot be denied that there is frustration on the part of the youngest, who feel different from the rest of the population. But this has always been the case, it is not limited to networks. The only thing that has changed is the diffusion and scope that these contents have today”, concludes this expert.
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