Gen Z Worries It's Old After Failing to Understand Gen Alpha's Memes

After years of mocking millennial humor as "cringe," Gen Zers are complaining about feeling "old" and "outdated" as Gen Alpha starts to create its own memes.

Much of the internet loves to hate on other generations. So far, Gen Alpha, which encompasses those born between the early 2010s and mid-2020s, has mostly managed to avoid being dragged into discussions about generational differences.

But with the oldest members of Gen Alpha becoming tweens, this seems to be changing.

One of the emerging trends causing confusion among members of Gen Z is based on the popularity of "Skibidi Toilet," an animated YouTube series about singing and dancing toiletlike creatures that want to take over the world.

Its creator, who goes by the YouTube username "DaFuq!?Boom!," has over 22.6 million YouTube subscribers, and most of their "Skibidi Toilet" videos have between 20 million and 46 million views. Meanwhile, their TikTok account has over 1.9 million followers.

The first episode of the series was posted as a YouTube Short in February. This episode, and the rest of season one, shows the toilet creatures causing confusion in public places, including in what appears to be a cafeteria.

The soundtrack of each episode is a snippet of "Dom Dom Yes Yes" by Biser King. The song went viral on TikTok and became a meme at the end of last year after the Turkish creator Yasin Cengiz, who goes by the username @yasincengiz38, combined the song with videos of himself dancing next to plates of food, while moving his midsection in time to the music.

One Twitter user referred to the sketches as "Gen Alpha's Slenderman," a character that became an internet meme after it was created in 2009 by a user on the then popular comedy forum Something Awful.

"Skibidi Toilet" seems to be going down the same route, becoming a sort of meme on TikTok and YouTube Shorts as users insert the character into sketches based on "Minecraft" and show it interacting with internet figures such as MrBeast.

Many Gen Zers appear confused about the memes, which have become associated with Gen Alpha.

One Twitter user who said they're 15 tweeted that they'd overheard their sister who was born in 2013 calling Gen Z "old and stupid."

"Please help me," they wrote, begging for an explanation of "Skibidi Toilet" before adding: "I feel old."

To try and clear up some of the confusion, one TikTok user posted a video of her younger brother trying to explain "Skibidi Toilet" to her, seemingly to not much success.

Many users commented that they now understood how their parents felt when they were trying to explain bizarre references to them when they were younger.

In another TikTok video, a user who goes by @thehannahmichelle wrote that Gen Z was "the next cringe generation on the chopping block," suggesting that Gen Alpha would begin mocking Gen Z for its sense of humor in the same way that Gen Zers mocked millennials.

In the caption of her video, she referred to "Skibidi Toilet" and said that she didn't understand it.

The video, which has been viewed over 5.6 million times, has sparked discussion among viewers.

Like wtf is a skibbidi toilet i dont understand 😭😭😭😭

Several people referenced the "Skibidi Toilet" videos and said that they did not understand them, either. One person joked about future "Skibidi Toilet nostalgia posts" that they said they believed would become a part of internet culture for members of Gen Alpha.

There were also many comments from viewers expressing their fears over the passage of time.

"Please I'm only 19 I can't be old yet," wrote one viewer. Another wrote that they felt "outdated already" and that they were "horrified" by the idea of not being a teenager next year.

Born between 1997 and 2012, Gen Z is often perceived as the most online generation. In recent years, Gen Zers have created trends that are directly opposed to those embraced by millennials in the past, making everything from skinny jeans to emoji use and work culture outdated.

Gen Z has also witnessed millennials grapple with being overtaken as the "it" generation, which may have made them more sensitive to something similar happening to them. While Gen Alpha is becoming increasingly interesting to marketers, the oldest member of their generation is still only 10 years old, so Gen Zers can rest assured that they still have awhile before they're no longer the youngest adults in the room.