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Editor's note: Samantha Allen is a journalist and author of the books "Real Queer in America: LGBT Stories from Red States" and "Love & Estrogen". The opinions expressed in the article are those of the author.
(CNN) - Together, the most important words of 2019 - those designated by the main dictionaries as their “words of the year” - spin a story. On Tuesday, Merriam-Webster selected the non-binary pronoun “they” (they), which had been added to the dictionary only in September, citing an increase of 313% of queries. Dictionary.com chose "existential" (existential), inspired by climate change, armed violence and comments by former Vice President Joe Biden on President Donald Trump as "an existential threat to the United States." Meanwhile, Oxford chose a phrase as its word of the year: “weather emergency”, which was “100 times as common” this year as in 2018.
What do these words tell us? That now the world belongs to Generation Z, and if it is not yet, it should soon be. Generation Z, defined by the Pew Research Center as those who are currently between 14 and 22 years old, inherits a world that approaches “its point of no return” from generations that did not solve generalized (even “existential”) problems as Climate change and armed violence. According to a recent Pew study, 70% of Generation Z wants to see the government "do more to solve the problems." A majority, 54%, believe that human activity is causing climate change, compared to a minority, 45%, of baby boomers born between 1946 and 1965. Generation Z also believes, to a large extent, that Diversity "is a good thing for our society" and almost a third of them personally know someone who uses neutral gender pronouns.
- 2019 has not been easy and the word of the year proves it
For many in Generation Z, it seems, the debates that have divided the previous generations look much more like settled issues: climate change is real. Protections against weapons are necessary. LGBTQ equality? We must not even think about it. It is no coincidence that the Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, 16, has been chosen as the Person of the Year from Time magazine, or has collided with the 73-year-old President of the United States, who cruelly mocked she on Twitter (although she made it clear that she can take care of herself and even Michelle Obama backs her up). Could there be a more crude demonstration of where our world is now when a teenager who advocates for the survival of our species must avoid criticism from a world leader who called climate change a "hoax" and withdraws from the Paris Agreement? Generation Z wants to save the planet. If at least we let them do it.
Each of the words of the year in 2019 can be seen through that lens: according to Dictionary.com, “existential” describes “the sensation of fighting (literally and figuratively) for the survival of our planet, our loved ones, our lifestyle". Generation Z has been fighting for its own survival from an early age, performing "active shooter" drills in its classrooms and hallways. It was designated the "generation of emergency closure." A report from the US Psychological Association He has identified gun violence as a serious problem for Generation Z, as 75% say mass shootings are "a significant source of stress." No one with a heart could blame them: since 2009, as CNN reported, there have been more than 177 shootings in American schools. Meanwhile, gun legislation remains paralyzed in Congress.
Oxford selected "weather emergency", noting that this year it became "the (type of) emergency that was written the most by a wide margin." That is largely thanks to the way the lucid Thunberg was able to excel to give voice to a really existential problem. It is no coincidence that the most influential climate crisis activist today has not yet turned 18: Thunberg grew fully aware of the impending emergency, frustrated by the lack of action of her elders, who became entangled in insignificant tribalisms. In September, when she said at the UN Climate Summit that if world leaders did not act, "we will never forgive them", she did not speak in her name but for "all future generations," as she stressed. The same sentiment expressed it more briefly - and sarcastically - last month with "Ok, boomer", the New Zealand parliamentarian Chlöe Swarbrick in her unforgettable reply to someone who interrupted her speech on climate change. (Swarbrick, 25, is a little older than Generation Z, but that is the case).
And while a singular gender-neutral pronoun like "elle" may seem at first glance to have been taken from a different cultural thread than "existential" or "climatic emergency," the words have more in common than one might think. Even when Generation Z has turned its attention to more urgent problems such as gun violence and the climate crisis, it has been stereotyped by some as "too liberal" or "too awake"; Too worried about matters that don't really matter. (Transgender issues are often cited as proof that it is entangled in nonsense or inconsequential issues.) But whoever thinks so does not see the obvious: for Generation Z, LGBTQ equality issues are not a niche or special concern; They are an indispensable part of who we are.
The millennials are already identified as LGBTQ in greater proportion in history, and for now, everything indicates that the proportion of Generation Z will be equal or greater: a study by a British market research company came to suggest that only two thirds of Generation Z is identified as "exclusively heterosexual", although we will have to wait for larger datasets to confirm it. (We know from the Pew data that only 23% of Generation Z believes that society "accepts too much" to non-binary people, compared to 41% of respondents of the silent generation. Those arguments of "too awake ”Have an expiration date).
- Turismophobia, bitcóin, machoexplicación, destripe: the nominees to the word of the year 2017
In addition, it is not that older generations have expressed themselves more than Generation Z on political issues ostensibly more serious than climate change or armed violence. Apparently young people can walk and chew gum at the same time. They can support LGBTQ equality and try to stay alive. Generation Z knows what is real: the threat of global warming, the lack of strong protections on weapons at the federal level; and what is not: the socially arbitrary gender roles that many of them refuse to accept.
The words and phrases that caught our attention this year arose from the cultural collision between a younger generation that calls things by name and older generations who turn to Google to catch up. For Generation Z, "change" is a term that is too neutral to describe what is happening with our climate: it is an "emergency." For them, the idea of being shot at school is not a matter of political debate; It is an "existential" threat they feel every day. For non-binaries of Generation Z, "elle" is about personal recognition but it is also a powerful statement: they refuse to accept the formal notions of gender that older generations try to inherit.
Generation Z is not changing the way we talk about the world; The world is changing, period. The words of the year are the test.
Translation of Mariana Campos