Born between 1997 and 2012, Gen Z makes up a massive portion of Pakistan's population, with estimates suggesting they are around 60-65% of the population, making them the world's largest Gen Z group, significantly influencing culture and consumption, despite facing economic challenges like unemployment. However, these youth are fiercely authentic, audaciously ambitious and too self-aware for their own good. They make a strong voice against the abuse of power, authoritarian governance, incompetent rule, elite privileges, nepotism, corruption, rising inequality and joblessness amid deteriorating economic conditions. But, one disturbing thing about them is that they are unnecessarily averse to the older generations. In this piece, the writer has shown Gen Z the reality they must reckon with.

If we do not belong to Gen Z, does it mean that we, the people from earlier generations, are no longer allowed to think? Or, are they now expected to think only what Gen Z wants them to think? Reflect for a moment: was it not our own Generations X and Y that created the opportunities through which Gen Z was able to free itself from the dominance of the Boomers? Was it not these very generations that initiated the journey toward all the facilities and freedoms Gen Z enjoys today? It was our way of thinking that aimed to push the world rapidly toward progress and advancement.

Today, when Gen Z laughs at the thinking of earlier generations; those earlier generations are smiling quietly in return, saying to themselves:

“Jin patharon ko ham nay ata ki thi dharkanain

un ko zuban mili tu hamin par baras parry”

(The stones we endowed with beating hearts … once granted speech, turned and showered upon us.)

It is an undeniable truth that no one's thoughts can be restricted. However, assuming that only one's own thinking is correct is itself a sign that one may never find the right path. Every generation has an equal right to express its abilities and to think and decide in its own way.

It is also absolutely true that making right or wrong decisions does not require belonging to any particular generation; it requires the proper use of the mind. Otherwise, what we have often observed is that the thinking Gen Z proudly assumes to be its own is, in fact, implanted by earlier generations.

This brings us back to the fundamental question: which generation truly possesses the ability to make the right decision at the right time according to its intellectual capacity? So far, the answer history provides is that Generations X and Y have demonstrated their ability to translate ideas into action by rapidly advancing the world, while Gen Z has yet to emerge with the same momentum.

Gen Z appears to be trapped in confusion. They claim to speak blunt and unfiltered truth, yet they do not seem to follow any principles with consistency. Instead of principles, their decisions appear to be governed by personal likes and dislikes, which they mistake for wisdom.

When Gen Z hastily declares a single statement from an opponent to be wrong, but then offers justifications for the same wrong statement when it comes from someone they favor, the Boomers quietly laugh, because this very method was pioneered by the Boomers themselves. Ironically, these are the same Boomers whom Gen Z dismisses as outdated.

With few exceptions, the majority of Gen Z has yet to prove itself credible. It is moving forward by absorbing the very flaws of previous generations. Apart from being bold in expression, often dismissing opposing arguments outright and resorting to verbal abuse, something that was never a defining trait of earlier generations, Gen Z has little to show.

Even today, Gen Z promotes ideas originally introduced by Generations X and Y, while simultaneously labelling those same ideas as obsolete. In psychology, philosophy, history and other disciplines, Gen Z still relies on the intellectual work of earlier generations and has not managed to move beyond imitation.

The first cohort of Gen Z, born around 1997, has now become parents to Generation Alpha. Will they present the achievements of earlier generations to Gen Alpha as their own? For now, most of Gen Z has proven to be all talk. Despite having access to vast amounts of information, they remain tools in the hands of Boomers or earlier generations.

In politics, they are still puppets controlled by them. So the question remains, which ideology does Gen Z itself truly stand for?

A generation as capable as Gen Z should have stood firmly on principles and demonstrated to earlier generations that life can indeed be lived by principles. Instead, many have begun to treat hypocrisy itself as a principle, declaring their own ideology's wrong as right, and another ideology's right as wrong.

This, Gen Z, is precisely the mindset Boomers wanted to teach you, something Generations X and Y tried to protect you from. They made you bold so you could speak freely, without fear. They wanted to give you a world in which you would not become puppets, as they once were.

They succeeded in giving you a new world, but perhaps they failed to teach ethics, or to fully protect you from the Boomers. Perhaps the generation now being raised by Gen Z will do better. Perhaps Generation Alpha, free from the weight of the old century, will deliver a clear message to the world: whoever stands with truth is right, whether friend or foe.

Only then will matters be decided purely on principles.

Gen Z, we are proud of you for being able to speak loudly and fearlessly. If only we had also been able to give you the courage to listen. Had that been the case, you might have been the greatest generation of all.

Amir Muaan

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