Have you been the victim of a gen Z stare? Maybe you have but didn’t realise, because you didn’t know it existed, so let me explain: gen Z, now aged 13 to 28, have apparently adopted a widely deplored stare: blank, expressionless and unnerving. The stare is often deployed in customer service contexts, and many emotions can be read into it, including “boredom, indifference, superiority, judgment or just sheer silliness”, according to Forbes, whose writer described his unease in Starbucks when faced with a “flat, zombie-like look that was difficult to read”.
Hang on, aren’t oversensitive snowflakes supposed to be younger people, not journalists my age? Has a generation ever been so maligned as Z? Probably, but I’m mortified by the mutterings about gen Z, when they are so self-evidently at the pointy end of older people’s poor past (and present) decision-making. They don’t get jobs, homes or a livable planet – but we’re getting huffy about their “rudeness” and “lack of social skills”? Anything short of blending us into their protein shakes seems fair to me at this point.
