I, like many other people my age, have seen the bad press about Generation Z. We are afflicted with non-existent attention spans, unwavering gazes locked on phone screens, a vocabulary of filler words and reactionary exclamations, like the comment section of an Instagram post. We are, the critics write, the generation that has lost the ability to read deeply.

So, when I joined a book club in Evanston, I was wary of being dismissed, of my opinions being viewed as flimsy and impatient. But I had missed the back-and-forth of a conversation over a complex, slightly divisive book. The monthly meetings at Booked, an independent bookstore on Main Street, could present the opportunity to rediscover that feeling.

But reading the book we would be discussing, Kiley Reid’s new novel “Come and Get It,” only exacerbated my anxieties. The novel is a shifty social satire-cum-thriller set in a transfer residence hall at Arkansas State University.

As I read the first few pages, it became apparent that Reid had decided these young women must speak in non-words, in perpetual questions. “Oh my god,” they say, to everything. The word “like” is virulent in the dialogue between these characters. Phones and texts infiltrate every scene.

Admittedly, the claim that we are unable to withhold attention is not unsubstantiated. I see people brushing their teeth while scrolling on Instagram and eating in dining halls curved over the phone in their hand.

As for the linguistic fodder that Reid writes into the dialogue, it is not an original stereotype. Gen Z’s disintegrating eloquence and intelligence seems to be the perpetual subject of global media. I am in constant contact with articles about our superficial, fluffed thinking. Older generations bemoan our incapacity for deep thinking.

But then why, I wonder, as I read line after line of this book, do these characters feel like caricatures? I walk into Booked, slightly late and Kindle in hand, ready to argue against the unjust representation of Gen Z in the novel to older, erudite book clubgoers.

A small group of people form a ring around a snack-adorned table — a smattering of millennials, a handful of Gen Xers and baby boomers. They take in my arrival with surprised but friendly expressions. “Hello,” I warble, like a newly hatched chick. As I take my seat, the discussion surges back to life after the momentary intermission of my tardiness.

However, as the night trundles up, I start to connect with my bookclub companions. They turn to me increasingly, with gentle curiosity. “Are you still in college?” they ask. When I affirm, someone quips, “Well then you get to tell us if it’s really like this!” When the evening concludes, I am told, gleefully, by everyone, to come back next time. That they need young people in the mix.

With retrospect, I feel capable of confronting the defensive surge I felt while reading “Come and Get It.” When the world seems to be constantly lamenting young people’s plummeting character traits, it is sometimes difficult to imagine that older generations do not see us as half-formed individuals that are more ChatGPT than human, limbs twitching to the beat of a TikTok dance.

There is a cognitive dissonance that I feel because of this representation. I find my generation self-aware, considerate, resilient and capable of nuanced and complex thinking. When the COVID-19 pandemic raged, withering away months of life, we came into adulthood. I am wary of singing praise for a group that I am by default a part of, but I think it is necessary to point out the many things about Gen-Z that are often overlooked, like our penchant for social change.

It seems that the societal instinct to pit generations against one another and decide a victor, a bearer of better habits, is so often fruitless. It is becoming tedious. I think we should let people curate the life they want for themselves. Adopt routines and habits and lifestyles that may complement or contradict each other.

“Come and Get It” does nothing new by writing its young characters as scrambled and impressionable. Perhaps the depiction of Gen Z in films and books is simply in the spirit of entertainment. As for Gen Z’s trajectory of doom that the media continues to trace, it is beginning to feel patronizing. Perhaps while the world is busy predicting a disaster, it will miss the moment where we landed on our feet.

Devaki Jayal is an exchange student from University College London. She can be contacted at [email protected]. If you would like to respond publicly to this op-ed, send a Letter to the Editor to [email protected]. The views expressed in this piece do not necessarily reflect the views of all staff members of The Daily Northwestern.