While largely spot-on, this essay overcomplicates supremacism. When a conservative in the tribal loyalist mode views you as part of their ingroup, they cannot comprehend why you’d do anything besides seek greater connection within the tribe. You don’t have to put up with those lesser outsiders. You are invited to the inner ring. What’s wrong with you, if you won’t accept? There must be some underlying betrayal.
When the "disagreement" is that your nosy Boomer Karen coworkers mis-gender you or disapprove of the way you live your life or think it's NBD that by the time you're their age we're going to be in the "find out" phase of the biggest disaster to hit Earth's biosphere in 65 million years, the problem isn't really with Gen Z.
Considering everyone who saw the headline and didn’t read the article jumped into the comments talking about Boomers being transphobic, racist, or science deniers, I actually am not surprised at all by the article (which is, of course, generalizing an entire generation and therefore erroneous, but not entirely without merit).
It’s not about the topics they’re disagreeing on, it’s about the ability to disagree congenially and effectively, which is an extremely important skill in any workplace.
You aren’t going to change any minds by saying, “You’re wrong. I’m right. I’m done talking to you about this.” You also aren’t going to have your mind changed if you’re wrong, as is very common in a workplace. My solution to a problem isn’t always the right one. Other times it is. I need to know how to disagree and have constructive discussions about topics I disagree with others on to reach the best solutions.
This is one of the reasons diversity is important to businesses. Diversity of thought and constructive disagreement leads to improvement. But if we outright reject those who do not think like we do we all stagnate in our respective bubbles.
Sure this can be applied to good faith dialogue on larger, more important topics as many here seem to be assuming, but it is essential on day-to-day smaller issues that people face in the workplace.
We will never know what OP was talking about because the article intentionally left out examples..
What are some current topics that are not up for debate? I’ll list some:
-The right claims climate change isn’t real despite evidence and block efforts to prevent the extinction of our species.
-The right wants the history of black people to be removed from our schools and to ignore the systemic racism that exists to this day.
-The right wanted us to ignore epidemiologist and go about our lives as if there wasn’t a pandemic.
-The right wants us to ignore income inequality so they can pass more tax cuts for the rich and leave us without the basic resources we need to survive.
-The right wants to push lies about election fraud and take our democracy from us while suppressing voter rights.
These are just a few topics off the top of my head. There are many more. All of which are hot button issues between the right and left.
The article intentionally leaves out which topics are not up for debate so they can frame it as if the next generation isn’t willing to debate about work related topics. Which doesn’t make any sense if they have nothing to do with politics.
The problem is that the things they “disagree” about are sometimes basic scientific facts, like climate change, or beliefs which strongly affect people’s lives negatively, such as racism, anti-lgbt bigotry, or economic views like “it’s just fine to pay people such low wages they can barely afford to live and will never be able to buy a house”.
And why are these politics an issue in the workplace?
I’m 52 and have worked a wide variety of jobs. Nowhere I have been employed was it acceptable to talk politics, except on the down-low with people you knew well. If there was a political discussion where two people disagreed, they either agreed to disagree, or it was quickly dropped.
Because those aren’t politics. These are peoples lives. There’s no such thing as agreeing to disagree about if people get to have basic rights. What’s been labeled as political now is denying people the ability to live as they want, ironically taking away the freedom one side claims to love.
Think you’re going to win hearts and minds by arguing at work? No, you won’t, you’ll only hurt yourself and cause the opposition to double down, lose more than you gain.
Worse if you’re young and confronting an older coworker! “See, I knew these kids were full of shit. There goes another one.” Counterproductive, ain’t it?
And no, just because one side holds heinous beliefs does not make those beliefs apolitical. Fair definition I found:
the activities associated with the governance of a country or other area, especially the debate or conflict among individuals or parties having or hoping to achieve power
May I invoke Godwin’s Law? :)
Hitler believed Jews were pests that should be exterminated. Many people agreed then and now. Of course that’s a vile position. But it’s still a political position because it guided governance.
Saying, “My opinion is morally correct and that absolves it from the politics descriptor.”, is unhelpful at best. At worst makes the speaker harder to engage.
Why would I have a conversation with someone like that? Sounds like a conservative talking to me. Comes off like, “I’m morally superior and if you disagree, it’s not ‘mere politics’, you are scum unworthy of engaging.”
One more thought for y’all: You can, and should, push back on regressive opinions. But there are plenty of ways to say, “I’m not interested in hearing that bullshit.”, without literally saying that. It’s a social skill, and isn’t the lack thereof among Gen Z the topic at hand?
(Here’s something plain crazy; I’m upvoting your comment for adding to the conversation, even though I disagree.)
Because whether some people are allowed to exist is politics now, and gen z and others aren’t going to quietly let bosses/coworkers banally brutalize people anymore without pushback.
The workplace is steeped in politics, like every other part of your life. The discussions dont have to be about politics day in day out, but somethings have to be addressed directly, work or not.
Basically, if youre workplace is fair and decent, then you likely wont hear anyhting about politics. if it’s full of bigots/abuse, well, people arent putting up with it anymore.
Because scientific facts, or social and economic issues (that definitely affect and belong in the workplace) are not “politics” regardless of how much you’d like to label them as such so you can shove them under the rug and forget about them, you retrograde fossilized lich, and because “agreeing to disagree” with assholes who hold harmful opinions only serves to empower them and enable them to keep causing harm.
Go ahead, pick fights at work. See how that works out for you. According to the story, it ain’t working out.
My current company is a Seattle based software dev, about as liberal as it gets. You come talking politics and arguing with people, even though you’re on the “right” side, and you’re fucking fired. Bye.
Like you, I've moved around the US quite a bit have have worked at a variety of companies. But I noticed that the article mentions Miami University, which is in southwestern Ohio. People around here have an odd idea of what constitutes rudeness or what should not be discussed at work.
They are ALL IN on politics.
Visitors to our work's Ohio location (from out of country or out of state) are completely freaked out by it. Locals have no idea that their behavior might be considered rude or inappropriate.
Long story short, I'm not even remotely surprised that a local school is trying to teach people manners.
I’m not really sure what the person in the article means. It says something about “lockdown-era students can’t hold down a heated discussion”… but why would they be having heated discussions? It also says
Miami University even organized a dinner with senior leaders in order to teach proper mealtime etiquette, such as how to engage in conversation on neutral topics.
which makes it sound like it’s older people who bring up inappropriate political topics in an inflammatory way.
That may be! But again, I have never seen anyone, of any age, bringing up politics. (EDIT: Didn’t mean to say “never”. Very rarely is more true.
In any case, if a coworker is being an argumentative ass, it’s on the listener if they choose to fight back, be the bigger person. A workplace political disagreement doesn’t rise to the level of being punched in the nose, you don’t have to fight back. :)
The issue is that conservative, bigoted people don’t view their hateful ideologies as political. They speak negatively of marginalized groups as if their opinion is banal fact instead of inflammatory hatefulness. I’m a middling Millennial and I’ve had Boomer and Gen X managers that spout misogynistic, homophobic, transphobic, and racist bullshit like they’re talking about the weather. Sometimes I called them out, and other times I kept my head down and just got out of the situation, but the steadfast way they hold on to their bigoted beliefs leads them to see their opinions as non-political and any disagreement as obscene and unacceptable.
But social media tells me, over and over again, that liberal ideas are simply “right”, and are in no way political? I’m not about to “both sides” general politics, but yeah.
And where the hell have you worked that managers speak like this? I’ve had bottom-of-the-barrel shit jobs, and damned good jobs, mostly in highly conservative regions.
Hell, one place was owned and ran by conservative evangelicals. I can count twice that a superior brought up politics, and both times the topic was approached like, “Shalafi, you’re liberal. What do you think of $X?” And we had a solid discussion. Also, no one questioned my religion or lack thereof. (I admit, that was probably an outlier of a company.)
I’ve pushed back a time or two over 30+ years, but I’m having a hard time getting my head around the idea that bigotry is a common workplace experience. I’d jump that sinking ship with the quickness. Those sorts of businesses tend to torpedo themselves, especially now days.
There are tons of liberal ideas that are considered political. But there’s also a ton “liberal ideas” that should just be the standard.
For example, the very idea about not talking politics could be considered PC culture. Working together with people you disagree with is considered woke. Same with not being allowed to tell racist, sexist, homophobic jokes. These are only “liberal ideas” because conservatives made those topics political by being against them.
It was in the Bay Area in tech jobs. They would very casually be derisive about trans gender identity, calling it “attention seeking” and “a mental illness”. The racist statements mostly came in the form of offensive stereotypes and deferential treatment of those that they did not think less of for their race. To them, it was normal behavior and casual conversation. They were more likely to get heated about their sports team than they would about acknowledging the intrinsic value and human rights of other people. It makes it very hard to call out when they say horrible things in casual, laid-back tones. There was no anger or passion in these statements, it was just a matter of fact that trans people aren’t real, that women are inferior, that certain races are dirty criminals… like they were talking about how it was a cloudy or sunny day.
I’m the same age as you, so I’ve seen the same social and political changes as you have over the last 20 years or so. Some “politics” are just negative moral stances about other people. If your political/moral views make people feel excluded and you make sure we all know your views, whether through explicit political conversation or implicit comments, we are not going to “agree to disagree.” We will be telling the shithead to STFU, and if they don’t, we will be getting HR involved. We can’t and won’t tolerate intolerance in the workplace.
In my experience, in the 80s and 90s, intolerance was pretty commonplace, and racial and moral minorities mostly just had to suck it up. What’s changed is that liberals have “woken up” to that long-standing intolerance, while conservatives want things to stay the same. Up until about 2016, the majority of these conservatives hid their intolerance. Little did we know that they were just seething inside. Then Trump made it okay to be vocally hateful again, and that seething mass of conservatives exploded into public discourse again.
I don’t think Gen Z is incapable of disagreeing with their co-workers in a respectful way. I think they are seeing angry, usually older, conservatives raging about moral issues that they thought were already resolved. Or, they see boomers still denying climate change, which is a real slap in the face for the younger generation who will face the consequences long after those boomers are dead. It is very disconcerting and depressing for Gen Z, and as the father of a couple of Gen Z kids, I’m proud of them for taking a stand.
they are seeing angry, usually older, conservatives raging about moral issues
Where, outside social media, is this happening? Worked all sorts of positions over 30+ years and the times I’ve heard politics in the workplace are memorable because they’re so rare.
Maybe I’m out of touch, but I rarely saw it in the past, and even less so now that we’ve been so politically polarized. And I notice none of the younger folks are chiming in with their own anecdotes, just the assumption that Boomers are the badies, spouting bullshit in the workplace.
Millennial here. I hear a lot more anti woke, PC, LGBT, etc talk than I would like. Both the Bud Light and Target “controversies” I heard about at work because people were apparently enraged by it.
I envy you. I work for a university. I started in 2017 and it took about 30 minutes for my conservative lab mate to start talking to my Mexican ass about how “we need to build the wall.” That’s just one of the many times this person went on racist rants, unprompted. Though to be fair they were not a boomer, so it’s a problem that spans generations.
I’m an older millennial, mid 80s birthday, and I hear at least one GenX or Boomer make jokes about how they ‘can’t make jokes anymore’ or ‘uh oh the woke police we’ll get me if I say that’ or ‘everyone’s so sensitive these days’ or ‘that’s probably not politically correct’ a week. I’ve had more than one boss in my life talk about ‘welfare queens’ and ‘ObamaPhones’ and another that outright denied climate change. One of my co-workers was recently talking about how ‘slavery has been everywhere throughout human history, so why are the US so evil for it still?’. Had another one ask me if the neighborhood of the city I live in is safe now that we’ve ‘defunded the police’ which no we haven’t.
I’ve encountered people talking politics everywhere I’ve ever worked in my 15-year career in tech over 4 different companies, 3 in the Fortune 500. It’s not always from boomers, but it is always something along those same beats of either complaining about how things have changed, and they can’t say whatever they want to whoever they want, some bullshit right wing talking point, or concern over non-existent crime.
In my case, we had a very religious guy in the office. Elder Gen X, not quite a boomer. He was very open about being evangelical and morally conservative, which was perhaps irritating to some, but tolerable. But then Trump and COVID happened and he went off the deep end, spouting COVID conspiracy theories and talking about supporting Trump and the Bible and the end-times. We eventually had to fire him.
The problem since 2016 is that people don’t have to be explicitly “talking politics” for their intolerant views to be known. Trump isn’t really a “conservative” in any traditional sense. He is a crass hate machine, and that is his overwhelming brand. So, if you support him, you are pretty much advertising that you are intolerant. It isn’t hard to see how that would be hostile to young people who have been raised to be tolerant above all else.
If you remove the gen z distinction: yeah. People have lost the ability to acknowledge there are other world views than their own.
Sometimes it is a good thing. “Agree to disagree” on a person’s fundamental right to existence is one of the may things that has made the world so fucked up.
But also? People in general spend so much time surrounded by The Algorithm and having every aspect of their media and news consumption catered to them that it makes a massive disconnect. When youtube or even lemmy/reddit always shows you what you want to hear, someone doing the opposite is not only a personal insult: it is an attack on your very reality.
And while it likely impacts gen z and younger millenials more: one of my co-workers is a boomer ass boomer who was mostly hired as a favor to an influential person at one of the companies we are trying to get as a client. And it feels like every other sentence out of his mouth is “you are being intentionally obtuse” because he cannot fathom a world where he is not right and an expert in everything he thinks about.
And you can see it in most threads where people have an actual discussion. People LOVE to say “I think you are being disingenuous” or “you are being argumentative” because it is easier to call someone else a liar than it is to realize they came to a different conclusion.
Yeah I agree and think dismissal of perspectives and even dehumanization of people you disagree with is definitely a big problem right now.
There are even folks that do this and try to prop themselves up as “intellectuals” by citing various “fallacies” – like the straw man fallacy – without knowing what they’re talking about. I’ve only bumped into it a couple of times but it’s annoying when it happens.
You don’t have to agree with a perspective but to refuse to humor a perspective… to even try and understand where that person is at so there’s any hope of building a bridge… that’s deeply problematic.
If the social contact was the same as it was when today's old people were young, then today's young people would be much more willing to put up with shit.
Take the world’s Big Four consulting firms, for example: Deloitte, PwC, KPMG, and EY are all offering incoming junior hires soft skills training, including lessons on how to speak up in meetings.
Thats how you het taken off the fucking assignement.... Jfc
Calling highers ups on what is likely purposeful corruption is no way to move up lol
Eh, this generational conflict stuff is nonsense. For years I’ve run teams of boomers, X, Y, and now Z. Have I had to punt some younger folks because they couldn’t work past some not-work-relevant difference with someone else in the office? Sure. But that’s not a Z thing at all.
Anyone who can’t check their personal baggage at the door and get work done as part of a team ends up being shown to the sidewalk. There’s no generational component to this, it’s happening to everyone of all ages.
It’s fucking hilarious seeing a bunch of septics in here without a scooby about Channel 4 deciding it must be full of bigoted managers that the gen Z won’t tolerate. When it’s always been one of the most progressive channels in the UK and has been allowing diverse voices to shine for years.
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