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Chapter 1: Why is Gen Z's mental health a crisis?
And I think that this is probably the trend with Gen Z that I just hate the most because it's not just that Gen Z has retreated inward or failed to fly out of the nest in the first place. They are turning away from human connection on a whole for something that is far more superficial and a lot more selfish. Welcome back to another episode of The Brett Cooper Show.
Today, I'm excited to talk about one of my favorite subjects. This is a subject that obviously means a lot to me. We need to talk a little more because I talk about it all the time, but we need to talk a little more about Gen Z. I know we always say the Gen Z is a very, you know, unique generation.
We have all these struggles and problems, but if we're being honest, what generation does not have struggles and problems and unique quirks? That's why we have generations. That's why we are divided in that way. Every generation goes through different things in history. But what I will say is the Gen Z's struggles are
a little bit different because Gen Z's growth coincided with the growth of technology and social media in our lives. And our parents and our educators, to be honest, just didn't know how to deal with that. They didn't really know the impact that that would have on our lives, our adolescents and how we were being raised. And it obviously has caused Gen Z a slew of problems.
One of the primary ones being our mental health. That is something that we talk about in regards to Gen Z constantly. We are so mentally ill. We are depressed. We are anxious. All of these things. We are gender confused. And we can talk about these diagnoses all day long in Gen Z, self-diagnosing and how that is represented in our society and yada, yada, yada.
But I think to get to the root of the problem, to actually understand Gen Z and what is driving us and driving so many of these problems that make us so unique, we have to go beyond that and we have to talk about Gen Z loneliness because I think that that is what is actually behind all of this.
And of course, if you want ad free episodes, if you want a weekly Dear Brent advice video, if you want an exclusive newsletter from me, check out Cooper Confidential. We will link it in the description below. That is my subscriber only platform for unfiltered access. Hope you guys love it. Now, it's ironic that I just did a pitch to my Cooper Confidential platform because one of the things
that I love so much about that platform is that it gives you guys the opportunity to connect with each other and you can comment back and forth on the newsletter and when you're submitting your questions for the Ask Me Anything. And so it's ironic that I pitched that and now we need to immediately dive into loneliness.
But again, like I said, I really do believe that that is at the root of Gen Z's issues. Just a couple of weeks ago in January, a new study from Kitty Bingo found that 72%, 72% of Gen Z experience regular loneliness, which is a huge, huge leap from previous generations. And guys, these numbers have been consistent for years. This was happening well before 2020.
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Chapter 2: How does loneliness contribute to Gen Z's struggles?
I think they're very aware of it, and I think a lot of them are trying to rebel against those stereotypes. I've seen that on a lot of music subreddits, too. People are like, hey, I'm going to this concert tonight. Can I meet up with someone? Because people don't want to be alone, but they do have this craving for human connection, but nobody knows how to go about it.
to make a move in a way for a platonic human connection. That's why there are things like Bumble BFF that people are using now to try to connect to people in a way.
So again, they know that this is a problem. They're trying to heal and rebel, as Alex said. So what are they tangibly doing about it? Well, they are trying organized socialization. And I say organized because Gen Z, I think, has looked down on, you know, book clubs and joining pickleball leagues and that kind of thing. It's like, no, I shouldn't have to do that.
I shouldn't have to go join a group to make friends as a young adult. But in 2025 with Gen Z, you do kind of have to. You have to move past the cringe because where else are you going to meet people when your entire life has been online?
Business Insider covered this this past summer, and they wrote, While some young people are willing away their hours at home, many Gen Zers have had enough of their own company. In every part of their lives, the internet native loneliness generation is making an effort to step outside of their comfort zones and create their own. Third space is separate from work and home.
Gen Z is driving a book club attendance, fueling a surge in running clubs, flooding gyms and workout classes, and shilling out for social clubs, all in the name of making friends. Given the pandemic stole some of their prime years for socializing, Gen Z is going out with a vengeance and flipping the script on the loneliness crisis, which is what I love to hear.
And I think the most important line in that entire article is when they said that Gen Z is stepping outside of their comfort zone. Because this is completely outside of Gen Z's nature. We didn't grow up around run clubs or supper clubs or bowling leagues or anything like that. This is all totally new for all of us, as Alex covered.
There's this kind of, I guess not like taboo feeling attached to it, but like maybe shame because it's like, oh, like... I don't have a friend for this event or I don't have this connection. Like I'm this weirdo who's now like on Reddit or meetup.com. You know what I mean? That it's not really normalized, but a lot of people are in that boat, unfortunately.
And so because of all of that, it has been, and it would still be very easy for Gen Z to turn their nose up at this and say, no, I don't want to do that. That's weird. I don't want to join a club. That's odd. That's foreign. I've never had to do that. I shouldn't have to do that. but instead they are leaning in.
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