Jamie Naylor: I hear that quite a bit. Especially from older generations, not necessarily millennials as much. I don’t think that’s true. A lot of young people in Gen Z, they’re going to college, they’re working, sometimes more than two jobs. When they’re in college, they’ll be part of student organizations, being really active on social media and starting social movements and advocating for the causes they believe in. So I don’t think Gen Z is as lazy as often perceived. So that seems to indicate that Gen Z has a different value system, or maybe they look at things a little differently.
Karsen Rhoades: I think Gen Z might have a little bit of a different take on things. Maybe they don’t want to go to college straight out of high school and they want to take a different route. And I think that can be perceived as lazy, although maybe they get a job in construction or they go down a trade path, and I think that can be perceived as a really easy route. Why would a job be perceived as lazy? Karen Rhoades: I just think that college is like this big thing that everybody must go to college and that is if you don’t go, it’s like you don’t want to put the time into school or work. I just think that college is not for everybody and they’re just going into the workforce.
Jamie Naylor: I think it’s more on the underachieving aspect. If you also look at values of previous generations, they may not have had a lot of access to college, especially women and minorities, but now that it’s more accessible. I could see a lot of older generations being like, ‘Oh well you have college,’ you have this great opportunity. You should take it’” If you’re not taking that opportunity, if you’re choosing more of a career path, they might perceive that as, Gen Z not taking their opportunity and not meeting that full potential.
Gen Z seems to have a lot of interest in climate issues, racial justice issues, gender justice issues. Which issues are you most interested in? Karsen Rhoades Gender issues. I say that just because I think that a lot of people can be judgmental towards any gender but especially women. I think that there’s still a big gap between men and women, and I’m not a fan of that, being a woman myself, so I find that to be important.
Jaime Naylor: I’m interested in the social aspects, LGBTQ+ rights and women’s rights. I belong to those communities. I’m in a very professional setting at my job, and I still see a lot of issues with sexism and the like. ‘Oh well, you’re speaking to my male colleague, but you won’t speak to me?’ There’s also kind of a lot of double standards for women still.
So having strong women in your life is important.
Jamie Naylor: A lot of the people I know that I look up to, like my sister or my boss, are strong women and just talking about the issues that we face and talking about feminism and patriarchy and all that. So I just think I’m one in that community.
A number of people in Gen Z say they are politically active. What does that mean to you?
Jamie Naylor: Political activism takes a few different routes. We see a lot of political activism and social media. I know TikTok has been a big platform for that, along with Twitter and Facebook. Someone could be tweeting about their beliefs in support of a cause. I know there has been a lot of social media activism regarding the “Don’t Say Gay” bill that’s currently going on in Florida. I also think Gen Z is more likely to vote and to encourage others to vote. And I think data from the past election of 2020 would show that. So yeah, I just think being politically active means being out and being active and being vocal, but also participating in our democratic process.
What do you wish people knew about your generation?
Karsen Rhoades: I think our generation is pretty open minded more then the older generation. I’m not saying everybody’s that way, but I have a few people in my life who were just very close minded. I wish that people knew that we were open minded and not being judgmental.
So in other words, these are folks, who have made up their mind about whatever the issue is, and they’re not really interested in debating about it.
Karsen Rhoades: Right.
What do you wish people knew?
Jamie Naylor: We’re not as lazy and selfish and self absorbed as people may think. If you just sit down and have a conversation with us about what we’re going through, about how we see the world, about our struggles growing up in this world, and being young in this world, you might find that we are actually good, caring human beings, just trying to get by.
Do you find the older generations tend to dismiss Gen Z as either being not savvy or worldly enough?
Karsen Rhoades: Some people think that we are not very well educated on the topics that they believe we should be educated on. So I think we’re kind of looked at as dumb and maybe uneducated on certain topics.
Well, is it that you’re dumb, or is it that you don’t agree with them?
Karsen Rhoades: I think it could be a little bit of both. If you don’t agree then there’s no point in even expressing how you feel because they don’t want to hear it anyway. And that probably goes back to being close-minded.
Jamie Naylor: I think it’s more that they just don’t agree with us. They don’t agree with our values and my beliefs. And they can’t really understand our values or beliefs because I think the generations are so defined. They can’t even fathom my side if that makes sense.
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