A Youth-Culture Obsessive Explains Kids These Days
Casey Lewis, author of the Substack After School
By Leslie Price
There are only a few newsletters I always open, and Casey Lewis’s After School – a daily download on what’s happening with young people these days – is one of them. Lewis, who has a day job and does the newsletter as a side project (how?!), is an avid reader and consumer of culture news, and has an enviable ability to curate it into interesting, snackable bits of info. She’s also making news herself these days as an expert on viral trends and other youth culture developments.
I spoke with her about being a not-young covering the youngs, what to think of the stories about Sephora teens and TikTok, Gen Z in the workplace, and more.
I read a lot of “kids these days” stories in a sort of reflexively negative light (this is old grump behavior). I don't know how else to describe it. But you manage to present information about youth culture without it feeling doom and gloomy.
Yes, we should approach innovation with a healthy sense of skepticism. But the thing about TikTok and the stories of 11-year-olds having skincare routines is that it really doesn't seem to be so different from how I felt as a 10-year-old reading Seventeen. I got so much from teen magazines, but also [came away with] a lot of baggage. We almost had it worse because everything was so polished.
With social media, you see a candidness that we did not grow up with. Like Alix Earle – not that she's the best example of everything – has been outspoken about dealing with an eating disorder. People weren't honest about that when we were growing up.
There can also be a bit of an “old person discovers thing” bent to these stories. Like, I saw three TikToks and therefore this is a trend.
Publications need to hit their traffic goals, therefore they're turning any sensational, trending TikTok into a headline with no actual reporting. We've seen it again and again, like with the Tide Pod thing. It’s upsetting because then a less-discerning person is like, wow, the young generation is fucked up.
Anybody who spends time on TikTok knows that one viral TikTok does not a trend make. With these TikTok trend stories, no one's doing actual reporting on Gen Z. There's no analysis or understanding.
One other classic genre I see a lot is generation-versus-generation clickbait. Like a piece featuring a few millennials who are mad because their boomer parents won’t provide childcare. Then the message is “boomers are so selfish.” What do you think of this sort of generational reporting?
When you're doing this sort of research, generalizations aren’t terribly helpful. The Gen Zers who are the tippy top of Gen Z were maybe at their first jobs when Covid hit, compared to the Gen Zers who were in, I don't know, fifth grade. They have nothing in common, and Covid will only amplify their differences.
Gen Alpha's parents are mostly going to be millennials. We can make some guesses about Gen Alpha based upon that fact. But at the end of the day, the pitting of generations against each other is silly because every generation is different and multilayered. You can't put that many people into a bucket, even though it's tempting to.
One of the things that drives me crazy is the whole Gen Zers in the workplace and how millennial bosses don’t know how to deal with them. I've seen Gen Zers in the workplace who are terrible, but I've also seen some who are really hard workers. We’re all just people.
Throughout your career, you’ve focused on youth culture and elevating younger peoples’ voices. Where do you think this interest comes from?
Growing up, I was obsessed with teen magazines. When I was in college, I interned at Teen Vogue. I was also working for YPulse, which was an OG youth consumer-insights [company].
Interesting things happen with young people because they're figuring themselves out and trying on different identities. When it comes to adults, [we can be] a little less adventurous. But when you're young, you have to keep up.
How does it feel for you to report on and focus on a younger demo while you age out as well? Millennials aren’t the hot thing, Gen Z is.
There was an article in Business Insider about “millennial core” [featuring] a bunch of Gen Zs mocking millennials for how cringe they are. I went down a real rabbit hole into millennial-core videos on TikTok and it was the first time I was sort of like, wow, I'm old.
But tracking, reporting on, and thinking about these trends makes me so happy to be at my stage of life. I'm not constantly bombarded by ads or brands trying to woo me over. My sense of style is pretty set, and that feels like a relief, honestly. Every once in a while I'll buy something that I see on TikTok, but for the most part, I feel no pressure to engage myself. That is such a freeing thing.
I do think that more brands are going to start trying to go for the 35-year-olds, the 40-year-olds, and the 50-year-olds. There's such a big market opportunity there. They have so much money. I think that brands are finally understanding that they actually do need this consumer base.
Will you share a few of the millennial stereotypes? I'm just curious.
Oh my gosh. [That] millennials are more earnestly enthusiastic. I do feel like I'm an earnestly enthusiastic person. Or silly phrases, like dad jokes. It’s mostly a painful earnestness, although obviously many millennials don't at all relate to that.
When younger generations make fun of older generations (obviously a time-honored tradition), the older you are, the less cool you are. Which is totally fine! You can be cool, but you're not cool to a high schooler. But I see people [online] getting upset about being made fun of for styling their socks the wrong way, or not wearing flared leggings or whatever. I find that to be very strange because if you spend any time around teenagers, they’re all wearing the same thing.
They're fitting in. So why, as an adult, are you taking style advice from someone who's desperately trying to fit in? Don't you remember what that was like? You're past that now. There's something about the digital connection and the fact that culture has changed and now we're all in these online spaces together… But no, you don't have to take the advice of that high schooler.
Yeah, I was thinking about that recently too. I was feeling self-conscious that my jeans were not baggy enough. And then I was like, this is a crazy thought. My jeans fit me perfectly. I love these jeans. They're just 501s. When I was in high school, did my mom wear the same jeans I was wearing? Hell no. She didn’t, because she was an adult. Why would she do that? I live in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, so I do [see] young people in cool clothes. But I try to quiet that voice as much as possible.
What do you make of younger generations seemingly idolizing the nineties and the aughts?
On one hand, this is what fashion cycles or trend cycles do, right? Things come back. There is something to make of young people's obsession with nostalgia, but at the same time, hasn't that always been the case? Young people are nostalgic, they're introspective, they're longing for a different time in life, an analog moment.
I am endlessly fascinated by every single damn trend coming back, from butterfly clips to low-rise jeans.
What are some things that give you hope when it comes to younger generations?
Young people are much smarter than we give them credit for. They're really funny, too. And very online. It makes me excited from a creativity perspective, because young people have been exposed to so much.
I think about the idea of paying one's dues and my work hours at Condé Nast. I loved it and I wouldn't have traded it, but I also was hardly paid anything. It was not sustainable. And maybe that's okay. But I am glad that [younger generations are] pushing for better workplaces and work-life balances, especially because so many companies are making money on young people's creativity and brains.
Also: I was diagnosed with anxiety when I was in high school, and I thought it was so fucking weird to have anxiety and to be on anxiety medication. [But now] mental health has become such an enormous thing, and it's such a priority for young people.