'I Had This Z-Splained To Me': Older People Are Sharing Things That Are Seriously Confusing About Younger Generations

It’s a tale as old as time: Every generation is different from the one that came before. Older members of the BuzzFeed Community have shared many things that confuse them about their younger counterparts. Here’s what they said about some of the most baffling generational differences.

1. “Taking fake candid photos. Instead of actually living in the moment or immersing in an experience, Gen Z seems to fake it for the photo op to post on social media and move on. I don’t understand how they miss the irony in this.”

—Anonymous

2. “Using words like toxic, narcissistic, etc., they are buzzwords that have lost all meaning and completely undervalue how complex people are.”

—Crizzy444

3. “Rather than having an actual conversation, all you ever see is the younger generation scrolling on TikTok at any get-togethers, numbing their brains. They can’t live for five seconds without looking at their phones.”

—Liz, 30

4. “I work in healthcare and make a lot of phone calls. Whenever I call a client younger than 20 for work, they don’t know how to answer the phone. They will pick up and wait for you to say something first. There’s always a temptation to yell, ‘You’re supposed to say hello!’”

—angrygoose50

5. “I just don’t understand the fascination with watching people’s morning and evening routines on TikTok. It’s enough for me to look at my own puffy, sleep-ridden face in the morning. Why would I want to watch someone else’s?”

—natalias48cc3635c

6. “My 20-year-old daughter takes selfies of her face or sometimes just her forehead and snaps them to people she’s not close with or even texts regularly in real life, but she’s friends with them on Snapchat and needs to keep a ‘streak.’ So, every day, they make all this effort for people they