TOONSTACK: PANDERING TO GEN-Z

Hey there, fellow kids! Jason Katzenstein here. I’m a millennial and I’m here to talk to Gen Z. Zoomers. Kids these days. They don’t remember Napster, waiting hours for a song to download, that song being “Will the Real Slim Shady Please Shut Up?” and how that was the height of comedy. For zoomers, I think comedy is a dubstep hyperpop remix of the Phineas and Ferb theme song mixed with the loud guttural cries of hyenas in a slow motion black and white tiktok? I’m trying to keep up. We all are! And this Toonstack is our attempt. I gotta go because my back hurts and my credit is bad. 

Ellie Black

This is where I seize the opportunity to smugly remind everyone that I am, by some estimations, a "zillenial." '95, baby! Everything I DO is pandering to gen Z! 

I am usually in the weird position of consuming content made by people younger than me while writing for people older than me. The easiest ways to bridge that divide are usually cell phone jokes or jokes about how society is collapsing. This cartoon exemplifies the latter. Younger folks can relate to the struggle to make ends meet, and older folks have probably read a New York Times article about it.

Amy Kurzweil

In a mortality-induced panic in the face of this cool, smooth-skinned topic (will I have to make references to popular culture? Is everyone hanging out making references to popular culture without me??) I texted my youngest friend, Mia (18), who shared some insight: 

Mia then regaled me with a list of Gen-Z vibes: snacks, hashtags, women’s empowerment, catastrophizing... These all sound like Millennial Vibes, I thought and then texted (because are you really a Millennial if you don’t text your every thought?) which inspired an exuberant digital dialogue on what Mia called “The Narcissism of Small Differences.” These are arbitrary distinctions designed to separate us and sell us deodorant! Generations aren’t real! 

But a few days later Mia texted me again:

My Gen-Z insider is a Millennial in Gen-Z clothing! But check me out: is there anything more Gen-Z than a screenshot of a screenshot?  

Kendra Allenby

Here is a cartoon that people either see themselves in, or don’t get. I will not be explaining it here. Is it about Gen Z? Absolutely. And also, absolutely not. All sorts of generations are talking about all sorts of things all the time and lots of the time I have no idea what they’re talking about and honestly, it doesn’t bother me one bit.

Jason Adam Katzenstein

I don’t have or understand TikTok, but if you were born after 1999 please tell me if this is funny. TY.

Ellis Rosen

What's more pandering to the young than to make fun of the old? I have drawn several such cartoons, so no one will ever suspect me of actually being old, which to Gen Z I very much am. Toons like these are my very own personal Youth Potion from Death Becomes Her, which as we all know worked out well for everyone.

ToonStack NewsStack

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