Introduction

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In middle school, I was obsessed with climate change, I was stressed and anxious about my carbon footprint, devoting hours upon hours to doing research on global warming, and telling everyone how many credit cards of plastic we ate in a week. In high school, this worrying vanished as I had other things to do aside from saving the planet; I had classes, band, clubs, etc. It seems in this day and age, Gen Z, the generation who was supposed to save everyone else from World War lll and prevent mass extinction, has given up on our prophecy.

As we struggle with worldwide conflicts, climate disasters, widening wealth gaps and outlandish politicians, it seems Gen Z has decided to devote itself to memes and jokes that minimize the crises around us. In this article, we will investigate the psychological fatigue that comes from easy-to-reach news coverage and the phenomenon of making jokes about hard-to-reckon—with world events.

Everything Everywhere All At Once

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Like the award-winning movie, our lives seem to be constantly bombarded with new tragedies, trends and things to do. A constant flow of news—thanks to new technology such as cell phones—has made it more difficult to get away from all of the violence and chaos happening around the world. This has resulted in Gen Z feeling apathy towards people who are struggling and giving up on climate action. This ‘I don’t care’ attitude can be dangerous.

Apathy, by definition, is the loss or lack of concern/enthusiasm, generally used when discussing social issues. Many members of Gen Z’s level of empathy has decreased because of the isolating event of COVID-19, along with the judgmental environment of social media. This is replaced by apathy. Apathy is worrisome in a generation because it leads to a collective lack of action towards government overreach/government corruption and a general disregard for those suffering around the world.

Apathy has been found to have been caused by traumatic events in someone’s life. Whether it’s a dog dying or witnessing a car accident, traumatic events deeply affect a person's ability to handle more loss and pain. That’s why soldiers who have gone into combat can seem to be in a daze or speak cruelly to members of the public—they’ve just seen to much. It seems that Gen Z is going through generational trauma caused by the knowledge that our planet is heating up and that there are billions of people suffering due to poverty, war, or famine.

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Meme Teens

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From Springfield eating cats and dogs to JD’s visit to the deceased Pope, it seems young people can’t get enough of political comedy. Whether or not this is healthy can be debated, but it seems there’s a level of ambivalence in the mindset of young adults that hasn’t been seen in years.

Jokes, memes, and even slang about world events have become more prevalent in these last few years, whether about 9/11 or mental disorders such as ADHD and autism. This joking around may seem cruel to the older generation and a bit rude to those who actually experienced the events; however, the comedy seems to be a coping mechanism.

Studies and personal experience show that laughing about unusual or traumatic events can help people cope with them and even make peace with whatever has occurred. It seems that Gen Z is collectively using this coping mechanism to deal with the chaos of the constantly changing world.

Conclusion

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It seems the 'savior generation,' which has also been called ‘generation screwed’, has lost the bandwidth to care about events both big and small. Whether it’s the president declaring tariffs on the EU to famine in Gaza, it seems Gen Z is content living in the bubble of the internet. A generation that was believed to be the key to solving climate change has since concluded that it isn’t their problem. In the end, it seems that Gen Z has collectively given up on caring simply due to the level of unprecedented news and the massive changes that have affected us as a society.