Generation Z’s don’t watch network TV. At all. Crazy, right? Maybe since they’ve grown up in a YouTube, Instagram, Snapchat world, they will not tolerate a single commercial. I don’t know. But they’re over on Netflix watching The Office. The older ones, born in the early 1990’s, may be watching Friends, too. The Office is not all they watch on Netflix but I’m fascinated by their near religious fanaticism over this show and exclamations that it’s “just so damn funny.”
Is it? I never thought so when it first ran on network television 19 years ago. I don’t know how it lasted nine seasons, finally going off the air in early-2013, when many Generation Z’s were in elementary school. Five years later, The Office became the most-watched series on Netflix.
What’s so funny? The oldest Generation Z kid is 24. She has barely graduated college, if she decided to go. And if she found a job, she’s only been at it for a little over a year, at best. So it can’t possibly be that the viewers relate to the antics inside the office world. Most of them haven’t graduated from high school yet, much less worked inside an office. So what is it?
Maybe The Office provides an outlet for them. They can laugh at political incorrectness, things they are not allowed to say. Because this show is insanely politically incorrect. The examples are in every episode. Michael’s assumption that Stanley is good at basketball because he’s black. Jokes that Oscar wouldn’t mind prison because he’s gay. Dwight’s assertion that to build a business, you had to get the black people to do it so the white people would do it, then get the black people to stop doing it. Kevin saying it would be hilarious if Angela had a black baby. Darryl saying “more hilarious than if she had a Chinese baby?” Kevin responding, “Yeah, a little bit.” The episodes are filled with dialogue no one is allowed to say in an office environment today. Yet the GenZ’s love it.
The Millennials (Gen Y) established safe spaces. These are places in which a person or category of people can feel confident that they will not be exposed to discrimination, criticism, harassment, or any other emotional or physical harm. Millennials got us used to the word “trigger” as in having an emotional reaction, to some type of disturbing content in the form of media or spoken words about sexual assault, violence against marginalized groups, or other inflammatory content. We have to be careful to avoid their triggers. Movies come with warnings about emotionally disturbing content.
The Office’s popularity feels like a reaction by GenZ against safe spaces, triggers, and political correctness. The show has cult-like status. Even Billy Eilish, wildly popular with ZGens, has parts of an episode in one of her songs. I’m pretty sure kids will make sure their parents have The Disney Channel as The Office moves there in 2020.
I listen to teens laughing out loud to The Office episodes and wonder if the pendulum is swinging to where political correctness is despised. We’ll see how Generation Z changes real office culture a few years from now.
Copyright 2019