Older People Are Exposing The Most "Out Of Touch" Things Young People Have Said To Them, And It's Pretty Embarrassing For Anyone Under 30

Buzz Feed

07-04-2025

Gen Z'ers and Gen Alpha: can we get real for a sec? As people who grew up with the rise of technology, it's hard to imagine what life was like for other generations. And that can make us a liiiiittle bit entitled sometimes.
1. "A young guy told me he wanted to become a farmer because that seemed like a 'chill easy job.' I think his only experience was from playing Farmville on his phone."
— Psychotic_Jester
2. "'I voted for Trump as a joke because I didn't think he'd actually win.'"
"Her name was Emily and we're both sophomores in college."
— therooster45
3. "'Aren't you a bit too old to have a grandma?' A neighbor when I told her my grandma just passed away."
— shooklady
4. "I asked an intern to help me enter data into spreadsheets for an environmental project we had due soon. This was at an environmental consulting firm. They replied: 'I am going to pass on that work task because I don't see that as something I need to do within the realm of what I plan for my career path.'"
— FlowingNotForcing
5. "When I was a step-mom to a teenage boy and caught him stealing money from us, I got his dad to take his phone away for a period of time. He flipped out before going to school one day and said, 'What am I supposed to do in class?' I said, 'IDK, learn? Listen to your own thoughts?' He said, 'YOU TRY LISTENING TO YOUR OWN THOUGHTS!'"
"Actually, now that I'm saying this, at this stage in the game, that's pretty freaky 😂"
— potsandpole
6. "The girl that thought a credit card was 'free money.'"
— UrbanCyclerPT
7. "'I guess there are poor people in Jamaica, but they are so happy! They're used to being poor. They're not hungry. They can always just eat a coconut!'"
"We were both around 19 years old and I was at a party at her house. We had just met. After we were done talking I wasn't invited back, which was fine by me!"
— No_Goose_7390
8. "My 16-year-old niece saw my CD collection and asked why I had so many vintage music discs."
— Naughty-Sweetheart
10. "I've worked in education since 2008. The number of kids who literally think they're gonna make it to the NFL or be a TikTok star is mind-blowing."
— 544075701
11. "I had to stop using cursive at the last place I work, because most of the staff who were all under the age of 25 didn't know how to read it."
— spytez
12. "When I was young, I refused a lot of opportunities because I wanted to do a certain job. I was so clouded with my own understanding of how the world worked that I sabotaged myself. I could have easily made good money in my early 20s, but I had this mindset on how I wanted to do things and how I wanted things to happen. I was out of touch."
— TheCoffeeManLife
13. "It just blows my mind how many people under 30 complain about feeling old and used up, or they feel like it's too late to find another path in life. Apparently feeling old is something for young people to do. I'm 40+ and feel like my life has just begun."
— Historical_Guess2565
15. "In college, I had a friend who was looking for apartments near our campus and she came across multiple listings that were close by and under $1000. While showing me pictures, she said, 'Wow, look at this: $800 for this whole house.'"
"At first I thought she was joking, because I thought there was no way in hell she could think that a 4-bedroom, 2-bath, newly-built townhouse would be $800. I calmly explained to her that these listings were for bedrooms with shared common spaces around the house.
She looked distraught and disgusted by the fact that people would 'lie' on the internet and 'lure people in with photos of the entire house, making them believe they could have it all.'"
— Adventurous-Run-5920
16. "Overheard from my 19-year-old coworkers: 'I think I'm going to wait to get botox until I'm old — like 25.' I'm not sure what they think is going to happen in six years, but if they lay off the tanning beds and the vapes they shouldn't be needing botox."
— censorkip
18. "'Millennials never take responsibility for anything — the housing market, the environment, the economy. They blame everything on boomers.'"
— Asherwinny107
19. "'I don't go to the doctor or dentist, so I don't need health insurance.' Said by my 25-year-old stepdaughter when I advised her that legally at 26, she'd need to have her own insurance."
"To give more context, we were talking about therapy, which she wanted to do after a long discussion. But she didn't want to pay for it and we, her parents, offered to cover what wasn't covered by insurance.
For the first couple years of college, she'd have visits for healthcare when she came home, until she said she didn't want to go anymore and refused. As a legal adult we can't control whether or not she goes for healthcare."
— FruityStrawberry3119
20. "'If the lottery system has so much money, why can't they just cut everyone a big check instead of making you pay to play?'"
— Nothing-tralala
21. "He thought because I didn't pay to listen to music I was pirating it, even though I clearly told him I watch music videos on YouTube or listened to the radio. He didn't understand that musicians distributing music in that format got their money from advertisers rather than from subscriptions."
"The whole thing would have been hilarious if it hadn't been so sad that the younger generation thinks the only legit way to consume content is through subscriptions. They have no clue how to be frugal and find free and completely legal means to listen to their music."
— mekat
22. "A 15-year-old told me she wanted to join the army when she was older because she didn't like being told what to do."
— Ok-Masterpiece-4716
23. "'I wanna go back to an easier time like the '50s or '80s when things like this didn't exist.' Ignoring that a lot of people didn't have civil rights spanning those decades."
— SeeYouInTrees
24. "A teenager once told me, 'I don't understand why you don't have TikTok.' I explained that I prefer to spend my time reading books, and they responded, 'But...why?' The sheer lack of understanding of alternative interests was pretty out of touch."
— WestCaterpillar6623
25. "'You guys need to learn to adapt.' A new colleague said this to us during a staff meeting about her atrocious work ethic."
— 1whoisconcerned
26. "I was debating my cousin's in-laws, who were high schoolers, at a Christmas party. I was stating facts and frustrating them, and their epic comeback was, 'You don't know anything — how many Instagram and TikTok followers do you have?'"
"So my points were invalid because I have 100-ish followers on Instagram, all of which I know, and they have thousands of followers liking their thirst-trap photos."
— throwthatoneawaydawg
27. "'What do you mean you don't have summer off? They make you work during summer?!?' Yes, child. Adults don't get summer break."
"You know when you go to the grocery store or the movies all summer? Those people are working. I have to work just like them.
The child was 17. Their mind was blown."
— Low_Effective_6056
28. "'I don't care if I get COVID.' Until she did — and she regretted it then."
— South_Hedgehog_7564
29. "'I'm NOT taking a job at t…I have a college degree!' — said an unemployed, recent psych undergrad with restaurant and retail experience."
— Creepy-Floor-1745
31. "I had a new temp tell me he doesn't get why I wouldn't give my social security number on the phone to the power company in the staff break-room. He laughed at me and said I was being too paranoid and no one cares what some government number is."
— Pm_me_clown_pics3
32. "I told a couple of 18-year-olds that I don't have Instagram. They called me a liar and said if I didn't want to be friends, I should just say so."
— jarboxing
33. "'Helen Keller wasn't both blind and deaf. How did she learn to speak?' Girl, there are several movies and books and articles and chunks of history about this."
"Damned TikTok. Oh yeah, and she was also in nursing school."
— carolinethebandgeek
34. "Told me that he will never go to work and will instead make money by investing. I asked where he will get the money for investing a large enough sum to live off of it."
— tommykiddo
35. "My 12-year-old nephew said, 'You don't need to get me anything at all for my birthday! We can go shopping at the mall or you can give me money.'"
"Like, bitch...have you been taught what 'anything' means?"
— Aggravating_Sun4359
36. "I was asked if I wanted the senior discount at 36 years old. Yes, I took it."
— Beautiful_explosion_
38. "Just about everything a person under the age of 18 has ever said to me about politics has been pretty much nonsense, no matter what side it aligned with."
"You don't pay taxes, you don't have a job, you don't have responsibilities, statistically you probably didn't even vote in the one election you were old enough for, and all of your info is from TikToks by an equally unqualified teenager. I don't give a shit what you think about pretty much anything.
I have one little cousin who's obsessed with Andrew Tate and Elon Musk, so he's immediately tuned out, and another one who says she has 'time blindness' so she'll be on disability forever and we need more support for people like her. I don't need their input."
— Dissapointingdong
39. "Little cousin thought fast food jobs were easy. Then he got one to make his own money. He quit in a week."
— Sharpshooter188
40. "'You're old. You don't need more money.'"
"If they only knew."
— jtd0000
41. "We had a young guest speaker at work who was there to speak to us about mental health. She advised us that if there was a task that we weren't up for, to tell our bosses that we weren't mentally equipped to complete that task that day."
"For the record, we're teachers. And her examples were tasks such as lesson planning, grading, and talking to students — the main point of our jobs."
— IllustriousCabinet11
42. "'$100,000 isn't a life-changing amount of money.' Boy, shut up and do your homework."
— TempAcc64
43. "Kid in the shop at work said he'd gone to the strip club and a stripper hung out with him all night, dancing for him, talking to him and 'I gave her my number — I think she really likes me!' When we all laughed, he said, 'Yeah, I know that's what everyone says, but, guys, seriously, this one is different!'"
"She didn't call."
— bluediesel