this post was submitted on 18 Nov 2024
161 points (92.1% liked)

News

23320 readers
3314 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

"In fact, Gen Z might just be the most risk-averse generation on record. Fewer Gen Zers got a driver’s license, drank alcohol, or had sex as teenagers than their parents did. The same young adults now report skyrocketing rates of anxiety and other mental illnesses, with some estimates finding that as many as 1 in 5 18-to-24-year-olds have been diagnosed with depression. Timidity—not to mention self-conscious neuroticism—is increasingly the norm.

"An ongoing study from Montclair State University argues that some of this risk aversion is due to the current political climate—or perhaps young people’s perception of it. “Gen Z’s mental health has deteriorated due to a worldview that the society and environment around them are crumbling,” writes justice studies professor Gabriel Rubin. “Rights are being taken away, the Earth is burning, maniacs could kill you with a gun, and viruses could shut down society again.”"

See also, for counterpoint: https://www.forbes.com/sites/markcperna/2024/06/18/gen-z-thriving-entrepreneurship/

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] randon31415@lemmy.world 2 points 9 minutes ago

Driving cost money (remeber used cars selling for more than new?). They use to get drivers license to hang out (and have sex) with their friends. Now everything moved online.

Alcohol decreases where marajuana is legalized, a safer alternative.

Women saw the right to an abortion disappear- and more than half of gen Z men support it. That plus sex ed leads to low levels of sex.

But, no, it is because all of Gen Z is "Timid".

[–] seth@lemmy.world 8 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

I'm surprised only 1 in 5 is depressed. Oh, diagnosed, got it.

[–] whotookkarl@lemmy.world 9 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

What age is it okay to walk a couple miles from your house these days?

[–] lousyd@lemmy.sdf.org 6 points 1 hour ago

18, with a license to do so

[–] Sentau@discuss.tchncs.de 7 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

I urge people to please read the article. When you read it properly, you can see that it mentions that Gen Z are emotionally risk averse but says nothing about their risk taking in other avenues like finance, entrepreneurship, career direction, etc.

In fact, the Forbes article clearly shows how Gen Z are taking more risks in entrepreneurship and work related activities.

[–] ZeffSyde@lemmy.world 1 points 15 minutes ago

It seems like the generation may be more willing to take risks when safe at home behind a screen.

[–] Spacehooks@reddthat.com 5 points 3 hours ago

"Careless mans careful daughter."

See parents be dumb sometimes leads kids to not want to be like them.

[–] bokherif@lemmy.world 2 points 3 hours ago

We don't need to take risks, our circumstances are taking all the risk for us.

[–] ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca 122 points 19 hours ago (15 children)

18-to-24-year-olds

Weird grouping with Gen Z being 3 years older than the max

But the way they use the computer and internet shows they aren’t risk adverse, just different risks

The anxiety is probably because like millennials, they’ve been told the world is ending their whole lives and instead of doing anything about it we’ve just made the middle class poor

[–] Fiivemacs@lemmy.ca 31 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

Don't forget the rapid fire misinformation they are addicted too. Manipulation is off the charts

[–] xmunk@sh.itjust.works 30 points 17 hours ago

People like Tate and Peterson have done immeasurable damage to Gen Z... Instagram was deeply damaging to women's mental health but the manosphere has done damage that will probably never be undone.

load more comments (14 replies)
[–] Nuke_the_whales@lemmy.world 14 points 13 hours ago

I can attest to this. My kids and nieces/nephews are all reaching high school and they are so chill compared to my generation. They're not interested in booze, sex, drugs or being out all night. They're happy at home gaming together online or coding or something. It's good really, we were not risk averse enough

[–] reddig33@lemmy.world 34 points 18 hours ago (3 children)

I hate these articles that try to paint entire generations of people with the same brush.

[–] ayyy@sh.itjust.works 4 points 12 hours ago

All the pussies from that generation are too scared to be older than about 25. They’re all too lazy to be born before around 2000-something.

[–] shoulderoforion@fedia.io 31 points 18 hours ago

I don't think any article about generations is doing that when they point out percentages vs other generations. Groups exist, generations are a thing. It's gonna be ok buddy.

[–] xmunk@sh.itjust.works 11 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

I think there are some things we need to learn about people that grew up on the unregulated internet. I normally hate generation generalizations but Millenials (at least us 80s kids) were the last people who got to grow up without the internet being omnipresent in our lives before we hit puberty.

[–] reddig33@lemmy.world 6 points 17 hours ago

You make an excellent point.

[–] Halcyon@discuss.tchncs.de 4 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

There's nothing like "Gen Z" or "Gen X". Stop this bullshit that's not more grounded than astrology. There's cultural development in society, but it's not restricted to an age cohort.

[–] lousyd@lemmy.sdf.org 4 points 4 hours ago

Perhaps "young people are statistically risk averse. more so than people older than them" would be better.

[–] 01011@monero.town 3 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

Is this another one of those articles where gen-xers and boomers blame the kids for the inevitable downfall of "western civilization"?

[–] NobodyElse@sh.itjust.works 3 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Hey, don’t lump gen X in with the boomers. We’re their original victims.

[–] 01011@monero.town 2 points 3 hours ago (1 children)
[–] nomous@lemmy.world 0 points 3 hours ago

"Thought terminating cliche"

[–] beliquititious@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 10 hours ago

Interesting. There is a strong correlation between social media use and mental illness. I wonder if maybe there is some link at play here.

Unlike Millennials, gen z had social media as soon as their parents let them. I wonder if the social pressure of trying to maintain a presence on socials might be influencing the risk aversion.

[–] gibmiser@lemmy.world 15 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

People love to scapegoat the parents of the prior generation but I believe we're gonna find out the plastics or some other environmental toxin had a substantial impact and causal Relationship with this sort of thing.

[–] WoahWoah@lemmy.world 17 points 16 hours ago

Yes, or it could be the incredibly obvious fact that it's a generation that grew up on media and technology that amplified fear and anger for profit and with corporate powers leveraging the most advanced technologies in the world to seek, compete for, gain, and hold attention as much as possible in almost every waking moment.

[–] Cris_Color@lemmy.world 2 points 12 hours ago

Hey look, it's a description of me! 🙃

[–] Kolanaki@yiffit.net 12 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 19 hours ago) (2 children)

Well if that's true, I sure hope they don't become leaders in creative industries. There's already a lack of risk taking in favor of bland bullshit that tries to have mass appeal.

[–] cybervseas@lemmy.world 12 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

Sorry to say that from the Gen Z I know they're even more into big brands and "collabs". It's disheartening how much more deeply they've been sucked into the big corporate marketing machine.

[–] user224@lemmy.sdf.org 4 points 14 hours ago

Oh, hell, and you'll be judged if you don't conform. No other shoes than Nike, no other phone brand than Apple, no other earphones than AirPods, hell, I even got made fun of for my choice of wireless carrier (I went for the cheapest - rather than one providing unlimited data for apps like TikTok and SnapChat plus 5GB for other traffic for €17/month until the EU banned that crap, I chose 300GB for €12/month. But, it was the cheapest, so...)

[–] perviouslyiner@lemmy.world 6 points 18 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago)

There's a big difference between not wanting to be a (teenage) parent and not having any imagination?

[–] lousyd@lemmy.sdf.org 8 points 19 hours ago (3 children)

Maybe that's why so many American young people voted Red in this election.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 38 points 19 hours ago

Keep them scared, keep them voting Republican.

[–] hmonkey@lemy.lol 28 points 18 hours ago

In normal circumstances I'd understand that, but describing Trump particularly as risk-averse is kind of an interesting take imo

[–] shoulderoforion@fedia.io 6 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

and here the rest of us thought the tumblr "guess i'm gonna die" memes were just silliness. guess they meant it, huh.

[–] Enkers@sh.itjust.works 5 points 18 hours ago

As the saying goes, there's a grain of truth in every joke.

load more comments
view more: next ›