I remember reading that when national parks tried to make a 'bear-proof' trashcan, they found that there was a larger overlap between the smartest bear and the stupidest human to make a viable product.
I feel like it's a similar situation here. The smartest kid and the stupidest adult are far more similar than we'd like to admit.
Tbh I find it much more surprising that there's an overlap of bears and stupid people than I do smart kids and dumb adults.
I've met an unfortunate amount of people that would struggle to dump water out of their boots with the instructions written on the bottom of the sole.
Bears can be trained to drive cars and communicate through various means, it's thought they may be as smart as great apes like gorillas. This is why they were a choice circus animal for a long time.
Yes, this should be terrifying information.
They also shit in the woods & wipe their asses with bunny rabbits.
DON’T BELIEVE THE CHARMIN PROPAGANDA
is that a point for or against bears?
Depends on your bunny rabbit stance, I reckon.
bunny rabbits are a renewable resource.
Unfortunately for the bears, it's duck season, not wabbit season!
I mean… a kid would probably do the same, given the chance, right?
A bear on my road has learned to open cars by using the door handle. Pretty amazing. It got into mine, ate something sugary, and left with no damage other than mud absolutely everywhere.
Now I lock my car doors at night with respect for this boss bear.
Very confidently wrong, poor reading comprehension, poor grammar, limited vocabulary, emoji gore, catch phrase/pop culture quotes/talking points repeated with no comprehension of what they're saying, clearly not aware of how many things in life work, religious regurgitation while being surprised everyone doesn't agree with them. Very easily impressed with basic factual statements, clearly thinking confidence is the main thing that makes someone correct. Thinks their mom telling they they are handsome is a valid point. Idk, that's all I got.
Depending on what you meant by "very easily impressed with basic factual statements" it could go either way. I'm an adult and I'm happy to admit I don't know a lot things, sometimes I've been stunned that what I believed was totally wrong and all it took was some to give me a basic fact to make me realise.
+1
Ever since I was a wee flipflop I always liked to learn from my friends (and yes I was that gullible naive friend) but now even in my 20s it’s still fun to learn outside a classroom. I don’t have to worry about my terrible memory not keeping all the info, if it sticks it sticks
This is like reading a reverse horoscope - you've just thrown as many negative traits as you could think of at the wall, knowing at least a few will stick.
Nothing on your list couldn't also apply to an adult, especially those most privileged and entitled in society.
Extreme/insane positions on everything. Not just one or two insane positions, not just political extremism; when I say everything I mean EVERYTHING. No nuance allowed. And it has to be fully sincere, otherwise you are dealing with a Jreg.
There are milder versions of this, but I have rarely met a child that didn't have a strongly held insane belief formed from their limited experiences. My favorite was a kid who told me that eating pasta supports fascism because it comes from Italy, so loving Italian products means you support Mussolini. Pizza is fine, though, because that's American.
I'll bite. What's a Jreg?
A youtuber who was relatively popular with enlightened centerists around 2019. Links so you can look on and cringe:
Uuuuuugh. I remember being so black and white, there wasn't any middle ground on anything. It was exhausting.
I'm just glad I decided to go full moral relativism right away back then. It was a good way to speedrun maturity, although I did maintain some kooky beliefs into early adulthood such as
"if you are not multilingual you can't be a good person, and the more languages you speak the better of a person you are"
"The Democratic party is a puppet of the Republican party, and in reality the U.S. is only pretending to be a two-party state"
"The age of consent should be 25."
"Evil people can be good functioning members of society, so we shouldn't discriminate against people who hold evil beliefs as long as they are nice to others."
It was exhausting. Opposite reason from you, there was only middle ground, no black and white allowed. But it came from the same mental place. Pride, arrogance, nieveté.
I don't think there is a "dead giveaway". Plenty of kids can pass as adults online and plenty of adults seem like kids online. And sometimes with stuff like word usage/grammar/etc you can't tell if it's a child or someone who doesn't speak English very well or maybe an English-speaking adult who happens to type like that. There's a lot of different people in the world.
Yeah seriously, every time someone makes a generalization online "that subreddit is all 12 year olds anyway", "r/teenagers is mainly grown me", it really bothers me because no, you're just overconfident in estimating people's ages from text
I imagine that part of it comes down to motivation. I pretended to be an adult on a special-interest forum when I was twelve years old because I needed an escape from my miserable existence. At that time, I had no control over my life and every morning I woke up meant I had a new chance for traumatic shit to happen. I desperately needed to be someone else, so I took my time, researched shit, and avoided any conversation where I might be outed. I'm sure I didn't fool everyone, but I got some shocked responses when I went back as an adult and owned up to it.
Kids doing it for the authority boost or just as a childish fancy will be easier to spot. Kids doing it as a coping mechanism for their horrible lives will probably blend in a lot better.
I can't get over ironically using stupid lingo, without being good at presenting it as ironic use...so I often seem like a child. I am certainly bad at forming sentences that are not stream of thought (with weird punctuation like parentheses containing clarification...like this...and overused ellipsis...)
"Redditors of Reddit, how do you sexily sex the sex out of sexy sex???"
Serious response: you can't really make a very general rule. There are a lot of people who write quite maturely since their teens, and a lot of people who are morons since their teens and have endless dedication and determination to remain in that state for as long as they breathe.
I do remember some posts on r/sex back in the day that were absolutely kids (teens) and you could tell by how
Freaked out they were about totally normal stuff.
Excited they were about how great sex is.
I remember there was a funny day when there were two top upvoted posts on r/sex (probably in like 2017) where one was like
It turns me on when my boyfriend masturbates to me, am I normal?
And the other one was like
I (female bodied, they/them / nb) am a furry and my wife and I like to pretend that I'm a wolf and I'm hunting and eating her. What can we make that will look and feel like real organs I can "rip" out of her stomach and eat, and what could we use for fake blood that would be the easiest to clean up?
People kept linking the second one in the first one and reassuring this poor girl that she's totally normal.
I (female bodied, they/them / nb) am a furry and my wife and I like to pretend that I’m a wolf and I’m hunting and eating her. What can we make that will look and feel like real organs I can “rip” out of her stomach and eat, and what could we use for fake blood that would be the easiest to clean up?
Absolutely based, all the rest of us plebs just need to learn about the depth and power of their kinkiness. Cheers to their banquet.
When they're adamant that voting third party in the United States will be useful in some capacity, I assume they're 13
The youngsters are downvoting you, but what you're saying is sad but true. It's the reason Bernie never ran as an independent, he knew it would hand the victory to republicans on a silver platter.
I don't assume they are 13, but they at least aren't old enough to remember what happened in 2016.
Conversely: when they say this is the most important election of "our lifetimes", and the world will end if we lose.
(Doesn't mean they're wrong)
I know a full grown adult that does that in every election. Local elections, sure, I can understand, but he does that with all of them, Basically a card carrying communist that's a useful idiot for right wing politicians.
You would need some real insurance that others were commuted to vote 3rd party no matter what. Otherwise the real benifit is just getting to that 5% mark where third parties get some bennies like federal funding and automatic ballot access in some places. Which is minor vs say stopping a campaign of vengeance from a candidate who has acted feloniously already and has abused his position to black bag political opponents before.
Why not vote 3rd party in states that only go one direction? Take NY for instance. What the fuck harm comes from voting 3rd party assholes for president? One time the state elected a republican candidate and it was (still is I think) the largest landslide in history. I'm 36 and have always hated the 2 party system. It's been easier and easier as I got older too with increasing political polarity.
Because if enough people do that, it actually can result in that state not "doing what it always does."
Assuming voting for X is going to result in Y getting elected over Z "anyways" is not a good strategy for getting what you want.
Not understanding the difference between pre and post 9/11 politics
Hate to break it to you but people born in 2006 are turning 18 this year (and are technically considered "adults").
Having just turned 43, I can tell you that I don’t think I became an adult until my early/mid 30s.
This is a truth that everyone under 30 denies until the day they turn 30. It’s like a magic spell is suddenly broken, and you realize you’re alone in an aging meat husk that now knows the glory of back pain.
I know a young person will read this and think this won’t happen to them. To that person: I am you from the future. Remember us as we were.
I know a young person will read this and think this won’t happen to them.
I rather thought "Huh, 30s is still young."
I have no illusions anymore that this pattern won’t repeat. I enjoy my back pain for what it is: the pre-hip pain era.
That assumes you live in one of a small number of countries for which politics significantly shifted after one of those countries was attacked.
And also that you're at least old enough to have had a reasonable mature understanding of the political landscape before 2001, so as to appreciate how things changed. Let's assume that'd make you at least 20.
...So, we have to be at least 43 years old, and American, or you'll assume we're children?
To actually understand you'd have to have been following politics pre 9/11, which would make you probably 16 at the time. That means 39 right now. That's a lot of adults you're ruling out.
If you want to say understand society pre and post 9/11, then you're probably talking 12 at the time, so 35 right now. Still a lot of adults you're ruling out.
Bad assumption, a localized event doesn't affect everyone in the world equally.
I'm actually gonna give the benefit of the doubt and assume this is actually a grown idiot lol
This 'compress' everything is such a waste of CPU and energy. Plus "oops, all your files are gone, tee hee". GZ everywhere is fucking stupid. More complexity for zero benefit.
Found the thread and wow, this person goes on to desperately defend this dumb stance...
Hackers mad
Hackers mad
Hackers mad
I still stand by full disk encryption accomplishing almost nothing for the average user but separating them from their own files
If you don't have data on your PC that someone might be willing to kill you for, you probably don't need it, and Microsoft enabling it by default for Win11 installs is crazy
I mean, I think it's a good idea to enable it on a laptop.
I mean if someone steals your laptop they can access all your files without it, and even though 90% of files may be useless there's always chances to find passwords (often reused, even if encrypted can be decrypted if they aren't strong), bank details, documents, etc oh and cookies for your browser sessions etc etc. If I were a laptop thief (which I'm not) I'd probably look for those too before formatting everything, that could be extra money.
That's why I encrypt my laptop's drive. That way even if it's stolen the only thing I have to really worry about is not having a laptop anymore.
Specifically in games: constantly repeating the flavor of the month insults. Typically some influencer comes up with a funny insult then for the rest of the month some kids use that one singular insult for every situation
Quit yapping 💀
I don't know about you all, but I have been posting as an adult human male for a numbers of years now despite being a 4 year old Alaskan Malamute. No one seems to notice or care.
I don't really know, but when they have weird illogical views that they defend with trump like arguments, I think they are kids. They might not be 10.
Some people's bodies continue to grow well after their brain stopped developing.
Yes, but it's a little worse than that. One might take that to mean environmental, congenital, or even genetic factors. But there's more. Consider the role that trauma has to play here as it can directly cause arrested psychological development:
Assuming that getting married means you'll never masturbate again.
Well. I was married to someone that thought it was disgusting, hated that I masturbated, and did her level best to shame me out of it. She also hated sex. (Well, with me; she suddenly liked sex once we were separated and she was dating.) And many fundamentalist religions do teach that no one should ever masturbate, and that women should always be sexually available to their husbands, no matter what. (Oh, and women don't have sexual needs or desires of their own, they just exist to fulfill male needs.)
Once yearssss ago I dated a girl who was one of those uber conservative types, and early on tried to set a rule that I wasn't allowed to masturbate as that was cheating in her eyes. I remember just laughing in her face and my response was a firm "no". I can tell this annoyed her, but quickly realized this wasn't an argument she was going to win and quickly dropped the matter. Anyway I guess I dodged a bullet with that one.
It's a wakeup call for a lot of young people when they start to recognize the absurdity of anti-communist propaganda, but a lot of kids swing too far the other direction and figure all the bad things they've ever heard about history's worst communist leaders are lies.
It doesn't mean that Communism is uniquely bad, but these men were violent tyrants who don't share values with most mainstream western leftists today.
Some never grow up and say dumb shit like that radical gender expression was common in the USSR or something...
Larping as a tankie is definitely a thing of immature, terminally online kids, but I wouldn't throw Lenin in the bunch. While Stalin is mostly condemned as a reactionary psychopath by pretty much everybody except a few leftist basement-dwellers, Lenin is still read and taught throughout the world. Nothing edgy in reading Lenin.
Edgy kids on the internet worship other psychopaths like Pol Pot or Hoxha.
Stalin maybe. Lenin? He was a hero to the working class. I'd really like to see your sources on how Lenin was one of "history's worst communist leaders".
I can't say there is one. Every time i think to myself something like "goddamn, this person is immature" I remind myself that there's a high number of immature adults in the world including myself, so...?
A lack of understanding interpersonal interactions.
And it’s more of a feeling than it is any single behavior. You just… know it when you see it.
They simplify too much, think values/morals/rules are shared, obvious, and uniform, and that getting along with others happens solely on their terms. They kind of act like everyone but them is an NPC - not realizing to everyone but them, they’re the NPC.
That sounds like an adult with a social and/or psychological issue.
lol. While writing that out, I had that thought too, but decided that saying it was more of a feeling was vague enough that I could hide behind that when someone inevitably pointed out it could apply to some adults, too.
I do feel it’s noticeable - an adult that has some sort of social struggle vs a kid. But it’s like… A kid seems to make statements that come from a place of naïveté, whereas an adult seems to make statements that come from a place of ignorance. Adults seem to couch their words in defensive language, while kids seem kind of blindly assertive. It truly is more of a feeling, I think.
This is the best way of describing it. Assertive statements with very naive foundations. I can recognise some of my own thought patterns from when I was young in some of the things they say.
Tomato Tomato
uh, you got them backwards, it sounds all weird that way. I think you meant "Tomato Tomato"
No, it's definitely "Tomato Tomato"
my mistake. I thought they'd said "Tomato Tomato" but now I understand I misread it and it's "Tomato Tomato". I ought to be more careful.
Might add lack of general understanding but it's pretty much what you said, like physics, math, nature and society.
They simplify too much, think values/morals/rules are shared, obvious, and uniform
A adult would usually understand enough to at least recognize there is always consequences to a lack of knowledge.
I'm 62. I'm accused of being a kid all the time.
62 sounds like the kind of random age a kid would say they are. Found 'em!
Damn it.
And I would have gotten away with it if it wasn't for you meddling adults. I gonna go eat my Kraft mac & cheese.
Fuckin hell I'm 52 and haven't had cereal since 1984. I get called a kid by 30/40 year olds that still eat sugar for breakfast 😂
For me personally the first tell is when they are morally loading every statement in an argument and are unable to engage with a topic directly. Adults should be able to discuss or debate certain topics on the value of the arguments alone without feeling pressured to include a declarative virtue signal in every clause.
I don't know. I've had this issue with some adults as well.
Me too. But in my view they are not fully developed adults and still have some emotional intelligence left to grow.
"debate me" kids are another stereotype on the internet though. The idea that ideas should be entertained and discussed for the sake of it and come without implications attached is just another form of edgyness. It's another thing that often goes away with age or with touching grass. I know because I was one of them. Now I understand that the fact itself of discussing something publicly has moral implications.
Yea, I agree. That's why I used the word discuss because when the debate-bro mindset kicks in you're definitely dealing with an angsty teenager (also the constant invocation of logical fallacies).
It's important to differentiate it from like. Having extreme opinions. There are plenty of adults with extreme opinions and they are a whole other conversation. -- But only people under a certain age (not strictly kid, mind, though most people have shaken this off by their mid 20s) have a penchant to arrive at extreme opinions specifically because they are "edgy" and "cool".
This tends to also come with a particularly needless hostile attitude, where they very quickly and easily start with the verbal abuse.
Reminds of the dead baby jokes from my day. Like why? Too horrible to be funny.
When someone asks what’s a dead give away someone is a kid, it tells me they’re not old enough to remember the ASL days.
ASL
13647/F/a weird anime
Hot. PM sent.
I wrote a whole goddamn novel-sized autorespond in Polaris that triggered on an asl. I was a 96 year old tibetan yak farmer who was allergic to wool and hated the local monks. I used to pee in their milk until one day the abbot found out and beat me with his hat.
Either that or it started screaming about asexual lizards
I'm not impressed. Come back when you reach triple digits!!
Bonus points for quad digits.
That’s nothing, I met a guy who said he was a Brazilian.
I'm on Lemmy.world because it's the only instance I could make a account on the day Reddit shut down the API. All of the other popular instances had account creation stopped because of the flood of people.
I could probably make an account on another instance, but I'm pretty lazy. I honestly don't know what the benefit of using another instance would be.
Asking basic questions that can usually be answered with internet experience ("how do bans/kicks work", or "what is an administrator", "what is LAN" etc.)
Flaunting "new" features that existed on older products. ("This game let's us upload our own music to soundtrack!", "I've never seen a platformer like this" etc.)
Did you know that you can download podcasts and play them without internet?
This one got me the other day.
Really? What's next, podcasts delivered over airwaves?
It’s called WiFi smh
Their gamer tag includes "Killer".
They've never heard the terms "gamer tag" or "handle".
Using a year as an extremely long period of time, never uses "talk it out" as a solution to anything, mentions a YouTuber you've never heard of as if they're a global celebrity.
Also related to the first point, losing their mind over something that delays their education/life plans by 4 months or more.
All I'm learning from this thread is that no one can tell any consistent signs.
Schrödinger’s Thread - there’s an equal chance you’re either a child or a bear until proven otherwise.
We should all be learning that we're all children. Some of us, over time, gain a lot more baggage and issues, but that shit just layers right on top of the "child" parts so we're all just basically children with complex problems.
The brain doesn't "prune" itself. The brain you had when you were 12, you have that same damn brain. It doesn't change. Stuff just gets added to it.
slang mostly, I mod a strictly 18+ space and recently someone used the word "skeet", and would you believe it, they were a minor
Skeet? Really? Lil Jon's "Get Low" came out 22 years ago.
Now if they had said "Skibidi" that would be a different story.
Tbh, no. I expected they would be about 32 using the word "skeet." I'd expect the youth of today to say "cummies" or some other abject disgrace of a word lol.
I'm approaching 30 and will gladly use all of those both ironically and unironically.
Approaching 50, use SUS regularly, skibidi usage is dropping off, I'm aware of rizz but don't really use it.
Sus is actually a really old word.
Maybe I've just been hanging out in the wrong places but I have never heard any of these terms used except by previous generations mocking what they think gen alpha is like
I haven't heard rizz, but working in an elementary school, sus has been around for awhile, and skibidi was just starting to get frequent enough to be super annoying towards the end of the school year.
Excessive swearing, as if they just learned how to say “fuck”.
Not that any damn amount of fucking swearing means they are are a young fucker, but you can fucking tell when you read that shit and they manage nine goddamn swear words in one fucking sentence you know they’re a young bitch who aren’t allowed to swear any other damn time.
Mother damn, that's a shitting good point my bastard
Fuck you, I'm in my forties
Yeah, what's this fucker on about? I'm an adult that doesn't even get carded at the liquor store anymore, I fucking swear whenever I damn well please and as often as I give a shit to. Nothing wrong with some cursing, especially at those young fucks that won't stay off my goddamned lawn. Shit, they're at it again.
Crypto bros who follow ultra distorted stoicism (the only good philosophy is the ones made when slavery was normalised) that believe everyone else is unaware of what very basic knowledge they world they just learned that day.
::: spoiler lethal amounts of cringe
idk man frfr ong. thats not skibidi rizzler fanum tax of you to assume im a younger and have L rizz, im no cap a sigma fr. anyway im finna dip and be like an alpha. 💀
:::
This bad boy was THE bane of one of my teachers. On her defence, she was old, probably over retirement age, but she just could not make this thing work. Ever. She usually turned it on, but left the cover closed. Or tried to turn it on while AC cable was unplugged. Or turned it on, but put everything in it mirrored. Or turned it on, placed everything right, but fucked up focus so it was blurry. It just never ever worked out for her...
Have you ever been in germany? Everyone knows these things because there's always this one almost retired teacher that is in love with the overhead projector
I'm a gen-z-er and I remember those. Relatively poorer area though so it may be related
Writing in short form where a lengthier reply would work better and when confronted with such a reply some form of "not reading all that" or other thought terminating clichés.
I've found that as arbitrary as it is - the ability to read a lot of information works pretty well as a mark of mental maturity. Also links to Twitter or Tiktok as discussion points. No one over the age of 19 browses TikTok lol.
Writing in short form where a lengthier reply would work better and when confronted with such a reply some form of "not reading all that" or other thought terminating clichés.
Ouch, I think I'm a kid in my 30s
To take it to a logical extreme, it frustrates me when a post that considers both (or more) views and is a well thought out post, is met with a single world reply - as if it's some sort of "gotcha" or the fact that a single ambiguity in a largely solid argument somehow usurps the entire point.
I tend to think they're either young or generally underexposed to how human interaction works.
Agreed, it can be very frustrating - and is often used for that very purpose, to let the person know they just wasted x amount of time to compose a message no one is going to even read let alone take seriously. But I do not think this is really a good indicator for someone being a child, it's just intentional insult.
I tend to think they're either young or generally underexposed to how human interaction works.
There's a lot of us who are not very great at communications for various reasons. I personally might just lose interest in conversation and can't get myself to put in the effort to actually contribute value to it and just phase out, and same happens online in a way. As fucking annoying it might be for the person I'm conversing with, it's not intentional nor meant to insult
I'm almost 40 and I use TikTok every day. It's literally amazing and I'm always surprised by how many people mock it while using hot garbage like yt shorts or ig
Not sure if it's the case anymore, but strong opinions were matched with EQUALLY STRONG STYLISTIC CHOICE!!!!!!!, often coupled with poor grammar/spelling, and a tendency to lean more towards rehashing the same opinion rather than making a rational argument for it.
I dunno, I get this as much from old people too. I think it's less an indicator of age and more an indication of people who aren't great at thinking.
Could it be more of a "new to the internet"-thing, maybe?
Probably just internet slang and the skull emoji. That and poor grammar are (possible) indicators.
It might disappoint you to learn that among american english speakers, literacy isn't a good indication of maturity by age. Barbara Bush made a literacy initiative that's still around, the One Good Thing(R) left over from the bush regime. The site has a handy map to show you the 40-60% adult literacy rate counties spread all over the states. It definitely helped me come to terms with the fact that sometimes a kid who is trying is gonna be more eloquent than an adult repeating the same tired take they've been rebutted for a thousand times.
It's easier for me personally to gauge age as it scales up when anonymity is involved - referential humor, recognizance of the ancient runes (Duckroll, Bill Murray's face with only the jaw moving), and informed chitchat about presidential behavior predating Bush SR are all dead giveaways that a user is older, but with younger users you have a lot of hobby/interest overlap going all the way up to people in their 40s. You can't look someone in the eyes and see if the light of youth has gone out yet on forums and imageboards.
The Amber Alert going nationwide is also Bush era. But I don't wanna detract from the remainder of your comment.
When they start calling people "jr" or implying anyone who disagrees with them is too young to understand.
Yup, I immediately assume these people are children, because it likely comes from their own experiences being dismissed due to their age.
Generally when people bring up some personal detail, my immediate reaction is to assume the opposite. Especially if it begins with "as a." For example: "as a woman," this person is a man. "As a black person," this is the whitest person you will ever meet. "As a 60 year old," definitely ten.
Unable to understand and/or admit that both sides can be bad.
It's ok to admit the "your team" did some nasty shit and it doesn't in any way cancel out what the other "team" did.
Also,
Winning an argument doesn't in any way make you a winner. Actually, an argument that someone "won" often doesn't lead to a change for the better or even make anyone convinced that your arguments were valid.
I wish there were dead giveaways. It would be helpful to know if I'm talking to a teen or an adult cuz my attitude in delivering how wrong they were would definitely change. Certainly i can recall some truly boneheaded beliefs i have discarded through the decades so im more forgiving if i know they're young.
On the other hand if they're pretending to be an adult they ostensibly want to have their opinions considered on equal terms, as peers; basically to not be preached to. If that's their goal then isnt it kinda the point to treat their ideas as if they were offered by one? If we think of it like that, maybe it's not super important to know someone's age. It's definitely helpful of course to know who youre dealing with but the downside of anonymity is also its upside. ideas are ideas no matter how old the brain is what thinks em.
The thing with a lot of the methods mentioned is that I've seen both teens that are more mature than me, and people in their thirties that should probably have their internet privileges revoked.
I've read the lemmy.world responses, and they're all predictably trash. The real answer is there's no good way to tell if someone's a kid because they're plenty of mature 12 year olds and plenty of dipshit adults with poor writing skills (ie boomers). To rephrase the question, what is a dead giveaway that someone is actually not a kid?
They talk about mid- to low-tier shows that your average zoomer wouldn't know about. So someone talking about The Simpsons or Batman: The Animated Series doesn't mean much, but someone talking about Biker Mice from Mars or Extreme Dinosaurs means they're some millennial.
They namedrop social media sites that no longer exist. Remember Xanga and Vine?
They complain about body problems. Knees that feel funny before it rains. Bad back. Nose hair that never stops growing. And so on.
They demonstrate an understanding on how old and obsolete technology works (typewriters, payphones, VCR, floppy disks, Limewire, DOS, modems, Blackberries). Like, average zoomers don't know how to use those map guides that are in the form of a book.
They remember how the pre-modern web was like or life before the web was like. Someone who's <18 years old was born after 2006, when the modern web was still being build.
They remember ancient memes and fads that are obscure enough that it isn't some zoomer looking up random memes on knowyourmeme.
They're horribly out of touch with what kids enjoy. Notice this is different from passing judgment on what kids enjoy because they're plenty of things I thought was stupid when I was a kid. But when you say shit like "only 13 year olds like Tiktok" or "only kids like Minecraft" yeah you're just out of touch.
Also Minecraft is old as shit, I remember when it was just creative mode, no crafting as an early beta on a web page back in like 2009. That’s 15 years ago, Minecraft is almost old enough join the British army!!
Ask them if they think that the movie "The Wall" is a good representation of the song.
I remember reading that when national parks tried to make a 'bear-proof' trashcan, they found that there was a larger overlap between the smartest bear and the stupidest human to make a viable product.
I feel like it's a similar situation here. The smartest kid and the stupidest adult are far more similar than we'd like to admit.
Tbh I find it much more surprising that there's an overlap of bears and stupid people than I do smart kids and dumb adults.
I've met an unfortunate amount of people that would struggle to dump water out of their boots with the instructions written on the bottom of the sole.
Bears can be trained to drive cars and communicate through various means, it's thought they may be as smart as great apes like gorillas. This is why they were a choice circus animal for a long time.
Yes, this should be terrifying information.
They also shit in the woods & wipe their asses with bunny rabbits.
DON’T BELIEVE THE CHARMIN PROPAGANDA
is that a point for or against bears?
Depends on your bunny rabbit stance, I reckon.
bunny rabbits are a renewable resource.
Unfortunately for the bears, it's duck season, not wabbit season!
I mean… a kid would probably do the same, given the chance, right?
I’m going with For, definitely a point For bears.
A bear on my road has learned to open cars by using the door handle. Pretty amazing. It got into mine, ate something sugary, and left with no damage other than mud absolutely everywhere.
Now I lock my car doors at night with respect for this boss bear.
It's less idiocy and more laziness. Any amount of inconvenience is too much for a lot of humans, unfortunately.
I love that analogy and need to commit it to heart. XD
Why does dumping water out of boots have instructions? Isn't it like dumping water out of any other container?
It's just a common way to call someone an idiot where I'm from 😅
I think it's more like: the maturest kids and the most immature adults.
Side note: the National Park Service has an awesome team running their social media accounts. Their posts are always hilarious and informative.
Funny, I came here to make the exact same analogy. I totally agree - a mature kid and an immature adult have a lot of overlap.
Nice try little Timmy, but I won't be telling you how to pass as an adult.
Because you are a kid and you don't know but are pretending to be an adult. Nice try!
That's what a kid pretending to be an adult would say.
When I was your age, no kids did that, 'cause we had no damn internets back then. We had to actually walk outside to talk with others.
Tell me more about this "outside". Can I get it on Amazon?
Yep: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B09C937K7Y
Everyone knows you hop on another kid's shoulders and put on a trenchcoat, fedora, and sunglasses and gave the name Robert Businessman.
Very confidently wrong, poor reading comprehension, poor grammar, limited vocabulary, emoji gore, catch phrase/pop culture quotes/talking points repeated with no comprehension of what they're saying, clearly not aware of how many things in life work, religious regurgitation while being surprised everyone doesn't agree with them. Very easily impressed with basic factual statements, clearly thinking confidence is the main thing that makes someone correct. Thinks their mom telling they they are handsome is a valid point. Idk, that's all I got.
Depending on what you meant by "very easily impressed with basic factual statements" it could go either way. I'm an adult and I'm happy to admit I don't know a lot things, sometimes I've been stunned that what I believed was totally wrong and all it took was some to give me a basic fact to make me realise.
+1
Ever since I was a wee flipflop I always liked to learn from my friends (and yes I was that gullible naive friend) but now even in my 20s it’s still fun to learn outside a classroom. I don’t have to worry about my terrible memory not keeping all the info, if it sticks it sticks
Happy Cake Day!
🧐
Bonus: can also be applied to boomers.
Boomers are just decrepit toddlers at this point anyway
Could be a new gameshow: Boomer or Toddler
Huh
Hexbear is an 8/10 on this scale
By these standards, most of my adult relatives are actually children.
This is like reading a reverse horoscope - you've just thrown as many negative traits as you could think of at the wall, knowing at least a few will stick.
Nothing on your list couldn't also apply to an adult, especially those most privileged and entitled in society.
So every boomer on facebook. Got it.
Extreme/insane positions on everything. Not just one or two insane positions, not just political extremism; when I say everything I mean EVERYTHING. No nuance allowed. And it has to be fully sincere, otherwise you are dealing with a Jreg.
There are milder versions of this, but I have rarely met a child that didn't have a strongly held insane belief formed from their limited experiences. My favorite was a kid who told me that eating pasta supports fascism because it comes from Italy, so loving Italian products means you support Mussolini. Pizza is fine, though, because that's American.
I'll bite. What's a Jreg?
A youtuber who was relatively popular with enlightened centerists around 2019. Links so you can look on and cringe:
He also would attend rallies and spout political gibberist
jreg is pretty based i think. His content is satire, for sure. A lot of his recent stuff has been delving into more philosophical shit though.
Dude literally doxxed himself and asked people to kill him (in lore)
jreg is a youtube who (ironically?) claims to be anti-centrist, meaning taking an extreme stance on everything, regardless of which extreme.
Found the adult
Uuuuuugh. I remember being so black and white, there wasn't any middle ground on anything. It was exhausting.
I'm just glad I decided to go full moral relativism right away back then. It was a good way to speedrun maturity, although I did maintain some kooky beliefs into early adulthood such as
It was exhausting. Opposite reason from you, there was only middle ground, no black and white allowed. But it came from the same mental place. Pride, arrogance, nieveté.
Ha ha that's hilarious 😂 such a cherry pick too
yeah pretty much this. Dealing with one right now, people are funny.
I don't think there is a "dead giveaway". Plenty of kids can pass as adults online and plenty of adults seem like kids online. And sometimes with stuff like word usage/grammar/etc you can't tell if it's a child or someone who doesn't speak English very well or maybe an English-speaking adult who happens to type like that. There's a lot of different people in the world.
Yeah seriously, every time someone makes a generalization online "that subreddit is all 12 year olds anyway", "r/teenagers is mainly grown me", it really bothers me because no, you're just overconfident in estimating people's ages from text
frfr m8
No cap
I imagine that part of it comes down to motivation. I pretended to be an adult on a special-interest forum when I was twelve years old because I needed an escape from my miserable existence. At that time, I had no control over my life and every morning I woke up meant I had a new chance for traumatic shit to happen. I desperately needed to be someone else, so I took my time, researched shit, and avoided any conversation where I might be outed. I'm sure I didn't fool everyone, but I got some shocked responses when I went back as an adult and owned up to it.
Kids doing it for the authority boost or just as a childish fancy will be easier to spot. Kids doing it as a coping mechanism for their horrible lives will probably blend in a lot better.
I can't get over ironically using stupid lingo, without being good at presenting it as ironic use...so I often seem like a child. I am certainly bad at forming sentences that are not stream of thought (with weird punctuation like parentheses containing clarification...like this...and overused ellipsis...)
I aint reading allat💀💀💀💀💀💀💀
Like if gay is bad and u a sigma (YT shorts raised me)
👇
Nice yap sesh
Bro is fluent in yappanese 💀💀💀
They're getting private messaged by YouTubers
💀
💀
Or a twitch streamer who designed his look off of the weird pedo dude down at the Batting cages.
"Redditors of Reddit, how do you sexily sex the sex out of sexy sex???"
Serious response: you can't really make a very general rule. There are a lot of people who write quite maturely since their teens, and a lot of people who are morons since their teens and have endless dedication and determination to remain in that state for as long as they breathe.
I do remember some posts on r/sex back in the day that were absolutely kids (teens) and you could tell by how
I remember there was a funny day when there were two top upvoted posts on r/sex (probably in like 2017) where one was like
And the other one was like
People kept linking the second one in the first one and reassuring this poor girl that she's totally normal.
Absolutely based, all the rest of us plebs just need to learn about the depth and power of their kinkiness. Cheers to their banquet.
It really sounds like you're 14.
Skibidibi toilet
When they're adamant that voting third party in the United States will be useful in some capacity, I assume they're 13
The youngsters are downvoting you, but what you're saying is sad but true. It's the reason Bernie never ran as an independent, he knew it would hand the victory to republicans on a silver platter.
I don't assume they are 13, but they at least aren't old enough to remember what happened in 2016.
Conversely: when they say this is the most important election of "our lifetimes", and the world will end if we lose.
(Doesn't mean they're wrong)
I know a full grown adult that does that in every election. Local elections, sure, I can understand, but he does that with all of them, Basically a card carrying communist that's a useful idiot for right wing politicians.
You would need some real insurance that others were commuted to vote 3rd party no matter what. Otherwise the real benifit is just getting to that 5% mark where third parties get some bennies like federal funding and automatic ballot access in some places. Which is minor vs say stopping a campaign of vengeance from a candidate who has acted feloniously already and has abused his position to black bag political opponents before.
Why not vote 3rd party in states that only go one direction? Take NY for instance. What the fuck harm comes from voting 3rd party assholes for president? One time the state elected a republican candidate and it was (still is I think) the largest landslide in history. I'm 36 and have always hated the 2 party system. It's been easier and easier as I got older too with increasing political polarity.
Because if enough people do that, it actually can result in that state not "doing what it always does."
Assuming voting for X is going to result in Y getting elected over Z "anyways" is not a good strategy for getting what you want.
Not understanding the difference between pre and post 9/11 politics
Hate to break it to you but people born in 2006 are turning 18 this year (and are technically considered "adults").
Having just turned 43, I can tell you that I don’t think I became an adult until my early/mid 30s.
This is a truth that everyone under 30 denies until the day they turn 30. It’s like a magic spell is suddenly broken, and you realize you’re alone in an aging meat husk that now knows the glory of back pain.
I know a young person will read this and think this won’t happen to them. To that person: I am you from the future. Remember us as we were.
I rather thought "Huh, 30s is still young."
I have no illusions anymore that this pattern won’t repeat. I enjoy my back pain for what it is: the pre-hip pain era.
They are technically, but not actually adults.
That assumes you live in one of a small number of countries for which politics significantly shifted after one of those countries was attacked.
And also that you're at least old enough to have had a reasonable mature understanding of the political landscape before 2001, so as to appreciate how things changed. Let's assume that'd make you at least 20.
...So, we have to be at least 43 years old, and American, or you'll assume we're children?
To actually understand you'd have to have been following politics pre 9/11, which would make you probably 16 at the time. That means 39 right now. That's a lot of adults you're ruling out.
If you want to say understand society pre and post 9/11, then you're probably talking 12 at the time, so 35 right now. Still a lot of adults you're ruling out.
Bad assumption, a localized event doesn't affect everyone in the world equally.
I'm actually gonna give the benefit of the doubt and assume this is actually a grown idiot lol
This 'compress' everything is such a waste of CPU and energy. Plus "oops, all your files are gone, tee hee". GZ everywhere is fucking stupid. More complexity for zero benefit.
- CTO at my previous company
Found the thread and wow, this person goes on to desperately defend this dumb stance...
Hackers mad
Hackers mad
Hackers mad
I still stand by full disk encryption accomplishing almost nothing for the average user but separating them from their own files
If you don't have data on your PC that someone might be willing to kill you for, you probably don't need it, and Microsoft enabling it by default for Win11 installs is crazy
I mean, I think it's a good idea to enable it on a laptop.
I mean if someone steals your laptop they can access all your files without it, and even though 90% of files may be useless there's always chances to find passwords (often reused, even if encrypted can be decrypted if they aren't strong), bank details, documents, etc oh and cookies for your browser sessions etc etc. If I were a laptop thief (which I'm not) I'd probably look for those too before formatting everything, that could be extra money.
That's why I encrypt my laptop's drive. That way even if it's stolen the only thing I have to really worry about is not having a laptop anymore.
And even then i prefer to encrypt only the folder, less hassle that way.
Sounds like the whole hard drive recovery industry is about to go poof.
Specifically in games: constantly repeating the flavor of the month insults. Typically some influencer comes up with a funny insult then for the rest of the month some kids use that one singular insult for every situation
Quit yapping 💀
I don't know about you all, but I have been posting as an adult human male for a numbers of years now despite being a 4 year old Alaskan Malamute. No one seems to notice or care.
Moon moon?
Men come in all shapes and sizes.
I don't really know, but when they have weird illogical views that they defend with trump like arguments, I think they are kids. They might not be 10.
Some people's bodies continue to grow well after their brain stopped developing.
Yes, but it's a little worse than that. One might take that to mean environmental, congenital, or even genetic factors. But there's more. Consider the role that trauma has to play here as it can directly cause arrested psychological development:
https://psychcentral.com/ptsd/signs-trauma-has-you-stuck
I don't know
Edit: thanks for all the likes! I never got 100 before!!! 💀
Kids care too deeply about the most shallow things
Shut up you care about the most shallow things!!!
Only kids? I know some very shallow grown folks with kids of their own.
Assuming that getting married means you'll never masturbate again.
Well. I was married to someone that thought it was disgusting, hated that I masturbated, and did her level best to shame me out of it. She also hated sex. (Well, with me; she suddenly liked sex once we were separated and she was dating.) And many fundamentalist religions do teach that no one should ever masturbate, and that women should always be sexually available to their husbands, no matter what. (Oh, and women don't have sexual needs or desires of their own, they just exist to fulfill male needs.)
Once yearssss ago I dated a girl who was one of those uber conservative types, and early on tried to set a rule that I wasn't allowed to masturbate as that was cheating in her eyes. I remember just laughing in her face and my response was a firm "no". I can tell this annoyed her, but quickly realized this wasn't an argument she was going to win and quickly dropped the matter. Anyway I guess I dodged a bullet with that one.
They like people like Lenin and Stalin.
It's a wakeup call for a lot of young people when they start to recognize the absurdity of anti-communist propaganda, but a lot of kids swing too far the other direction and figure all the bad things they've ever heard about history's worst communist leaders are lies.
It doesn't mean that Communism is uniquely bad, but these men were violent tyrants who don't share values with most mainstream western leftists today.
Some never grow up and say dumb shit like that radical gender expression was common in the USSR or something...
Larping as a tankie is definitely a thing of immature, terminally online kids, but I wouldn't throw Lenin in the bunch. While Stalin is mostly condemned as a reactionary psychopath by pretty much everybody except a few leftist basement-dwellers, Lenin is still read and taught throughout the world. Nothing edgy in reading Lenin.
Edgy kids on the internet worship other psychopaths like Pol Pot or Hoxha.
Stalin maybe. Lenin? He was a hero to the working class. I'd really like to see your sources on how Lenin was one of "history's worst communist leaders".
I can't say there is one. Every time i think to myself something like "goddamn, this person is immature" I remind myself that there's a high number of immature adults in the world including myself, so...?
One was fucking president of USA
A lack of understanding interpersonal interactions.
And it’s more of a feeling than it is any single behavior. You just… know it when you see it. They simplify too much, think values/morals/rules are shared, obvious, and uniform, and that getting along with others happens solely on their terms. They kind of act like everyone but them is an NPC - not realizing to everyone but them, they’re the NPC.
That sounds like an adult with a social and/or psychological issue.
lol. While writing that out, I had that thought too, but decided that saying it was more of a feeling was vague enough that I could hide behind that when someone inevitably pointed out it could apply to some adults, too.
I do feel it’s noticeable - an adult that has some sort of social struggle vs a kid. But it’s like… A kid seems to make statements that come from a place of naïveté, whereas an adult seems to make statements that come from a place of ignorance. Adults seem to couch their words in defensive language, while kids seem kind of blindly assertive. It truly is more of a feeling, I think.
This is the best way of describing it. Assertive statements with very naive foundations. I can recognise some of my own thought patterns from when I was young in some of the things they say.
Tomato Tomato
uh, you got them backwards, it sounds all weird that way. I think you meant "Tomato Tomato"
No, it's definitely "Tomato Tomato"
my mistake. I thought they'd said "Tomato Tomato" but now I understand I misread it and it's "Tomato Tomato". I ought to be more careful.
Might add lack of general understanding but it's pretty much what you said, like physics, math, nature and society.
A adult would usually understand enough to at least recognize there is always consequences to a lack of knowledge.
I'm 62. I'm accused of being a kid all the time.
62 sounds like the kind of random age a kid would say they are. Found 'em!
Damn it.
And I would have gotten away with it if it wasn't for you meddling adults. I gonna go eat my Kraft mac & cheese.
Fuckin hell I'm 52 and haven't had cereal since 1984. I get called a kid by 30/40 year olds that still eat sugar for breakfast 😂
What an odd thing to be proud of.
For me personally the first tell is when they are morally loading every statement in an argument and are unable to engage with a topic directly. Adults should be able to discuss or debate certain topics on the value of the arguments alone without feeling pressured to include a declarative virtue signal in every clause.
I don't know. I've had this issue with some adults as well.
Me too. But in my view they are not fully developed adults and still have some emotional intelligence left to grow.
"debate me" kids are another stereotype on the internet though. The idea that ideas should be entertained and discussed for the sake of it and come without implications attached is just another form of edgyness. It's another thing that often goes away with age or with touching grass. I know because I was one of them. Now I understand that the fact itself of discussing something publicly has moral implications.
Yea, I agree. That's why I used the word discuss because when the debate-bro mindset kicks in you're definitely dealing with an angsty teenager (also the constant invocation of logical fallacies).
Username with a year that tracks as a kid.
42,069 AD
Enthusiasm.
Will to live lol also they don't write lol
Trick question: assume everyone is a child until proven otherwise.
I thought everyone was a dog until proven otherwise.
Excessive edginess
It's important to differentiate it from like. Having extreme opinions. There are plenty of adults with extreme opinions and they are a whole other conversation. -- But only people under a certain age (not strictly kid, mind, though most people have shaken this off by their mid 20s) have a penchant to arrive at extreme opinions specifically because they are "edgy" and "cool".
This tends to also come with a particularly needless hostile attitude, where they very quickly and easily start with the verbal abuse.
Reminds of the dead baby jokes from my day. Like why? Too horrible to be funny.
When someone asks what’s a dead give away someone is a kid, it tells me they’re not old enough to remember the ASL days.
ASL
13647/F/a weird anime
Hot. PM sent.
I wrote a whole goddamn novel-sized autorespond in Polaris that triggered on an asl. I was a 96 year old tibetan yak farmer who was allergic to wool and hated the local monks. I used to pee in their milk until one day the abbot found out and beat me with his hat.
Either that or it started screaming about asexual lizards
I honestly can’t tell. Whenever I see a dumb outrage for video games, I tell my self that it’s a kid, but deep down I I really don’t know
As an adult, I have smart outrage over video games.
Their usernames are the random ones proposed by the platform, such as Lazy_Platform_34.
bots.
I use diceware and random number generators to create my user names.
or a randomly generated string of 5-6 letters, such as lseif
The neat thing about anonymous discussion on the Internet is that it doesn't matter. What you have to say is all that matters.
I don't know anything about anyone and that's great.
They are on TikTok and not Lemmy
They are a lemmy.world user
Heyyyy I'm at least double digits in age.
I'm not impressed. Come back when you reach triple digits!!
Bonus points for quad digits.
That’s nothing, I met a guy who said he was a Brazilian.
I'm on Lemmy.world because it's the only instance I could make a account on the day Reddit shut down the API. All of the other popular instances had account creation stopped because of the flood of people.
I could probably make an account on another instance, but I'm pretty lazy. I honestly don't know what the benefit of using another instance would be.
I don't know how to change it in Sync :(
30 btw
You have to create an account on another instance.
I never would have guessed.
This gives me the same feeling as being carded at the grocery store
Fr fr bussin no cap the rizzler is mewing
Asking basic questions that can usually be answered with internet experience ("how do bans/kicks work", or "what is an administrator", "what is LAN" etc.)
Flaunting "new" features that existed on older products. ("This game let's us upload our own music to soundtrack!", "I've never seen a platformer like this" etc.)
This one got me the other day.
Really? What's next, podcasts delivered over airwaves?
It’s called WiFi smh
Their gamer tag includes "Killer". They've never heard the terms "gamer tag" or "handle".
Using a year as an extremely long period of time, never uses "talk it out" as a solution to anything, mentions a YouTuber you've never heard of as if they're a global celebrity.
Also related to the first point, losing their mind over something that delays their education/life plans by 4 months or more.
Alpha / Beta male noise. Ok kiddo we get it, you're insecure
Erm, no, that was popularized by Millennial PUAs, who are all solidly middle aged now.
Fuck you we're not middle age we're upper aged young adults./s
My general metric:
Hahaha = gen x
Lol = older millenial
Lmao = younger millenial
💀 = Gen z
I'm Gen Z and use all of them
For me its moreso about what the older gens won't use than what the younger ones will
Most Gen Z aren't children though
When i figure out what gen a's 'funny' synonym is I'll update the list
This is at least true for me as I'm an xennial or whatever and i use both lol n haha depending on my mood but never lmao. Lol
The skull thing is pretty dumb.
All I'm learning from this thread is that no one can tell any consistent signs.
Schrödinger’s Thread - there’s an equal chance you’re either a child or a bear until proven otherwise.
We should all be learning that we're all children. Some of us, over time, gain a lot more baggage and issues, but that shit just layers right on top of the "child" parts so we're all just basically children with complex problems.
The brain doesn't "prune" itself. The brain you had when you were 12, you have that same damn brain. It doesn't change. Stuff just gets added to it.
Vertical filming, putting music into videos when you could just use silence
Poor grammar/orthography
What do birds have to do with anything?
Dunno, better call in an etymologist to study what bugs the birds are eating.
"Ahh no see, you wanted entomology man, which coincidentally means study of bugs"
Looks up
Everything!
Puts on foil hat
Nice try, kid
Extensive use of emojis and abbreviations is a good indicator.
I wish this were true, but not really. I've seen 40+ year olds doing exactly this. Why, you may ask? They grew up with Nokia phones.
T9 gang where your hands at
slang mostly, I mod a strictly 18+ space and recently someone used the word "skeet", and would you believe it, they were a minor
Skeet? Really? Lil Jon's "Get Low" came out 22 years ago.
Now if they had said "Skibidi" that would be a different story.
Tbh, no. I expected they would be about 32 using the word "skeet." I'd expect the youth of today to say "cummies" or some other abject disgrace of a word lol.
Awww skeet skeet mutha fuckaaaa
"skibidi" "rizz" "sus"
I'm approaching 30 and will gladly use all of those both ironically and unironically.
Approaching 50, use SUS regularly, skibidi usage is dropping off, I'm aware of rizz but don't really use it.
Sus is actually a really old word.
Maybe I've just been hanging out in the wrong places but I have never heard any of these terms used except by previous generations mocking what they think gen alpha is like
I haven't heard rizz, but working in an elementary school, sus has been around for awhile, and skibidi was just starting to get frequent enough to be super annoying towards the end of the school year.
Sus isn't even that new. Been using that since gmod ttt
That may be a better way to weed boomers from Gen X. Especially SUS, among us had a very wide appeal to multiple age ranges.
"im 9 btw"
Excessive swearing, as if they just learned how to say “fuck”.
Not that any damn amount of fucking swearing means they are are a young fucker, but you can fucking tell when you read that shit and they manage nine goddamn swear words in one fucking sentence you know they’re a young bitch who aren’t allowed to swear any other damn time.
Mother damn, that's a shitting good point my bastard
Fuck you, I'm in my forties
Yeah, what's this fucker on about? I'm an adult that doesn't even get carded at the liquor store anymore, I fucking swear whenever I damn well please and as often as I give a shit to. Nothing wrong with some cursing, especially at those young fucks that won't stay off my goddamned lawn. Shit, they're at it again.
Brb, gotta yell at some asshole kids.
Crypto bros who follow ultra distorted stoicism (the only good philosophy is the ones made when slavery was normalised) that believe everyone else is unaware of what very basic knowledge they world they just learned that day.
::: spoiler lethal amounts of cringe idk man frfr ong. thats not skibidi rizzler fanum tax of you to assume im a younger and have L rizz, im no cap a sigma fr. anyway im finna dip and be like an alpha. 💀 :::
This bad boy was THE bane of one of my teachers. On her defence, she was old, probably over retirement age, but she just could not make this thing work. Ever. She usually turned it on, but left the cover closed. Or tried to turn it on while AC cable was unplugged. Or turned it on, but put everything in it mirrored. Or turned it on, placed everything right, but fucked up focus so it was blurry. It just never ever worked out for her...
Have you ever been in germany? Everyone knows these things because there's always this one almost retired teacher that is in love with the overhead projector
I'm a gen-z-er and I remember those. Relatively poorer area though so it may be related
Writing in short form where a lengthier reply would work better and when confronted with such a reply some form of "not reading all that" or other thought terminating clichés.
I've found that as arbitrary as it is - the ability to read a lot of information works pretty well as a mark of mental maturity. Also links to Twitter or Tiktok as discussion points. No one over the age of 19 browses TikTok lol.
Ouch, I think I'm a kid in my 30s
To take it to a logical extreme, it frustrates me when a post that considers both (or more) views and is a well thought out post, is met with a single world reply - as if it's some sort of "gotcha" or the fact that a single ambiguity in a largely solid argument somehow usurps the entire point.
I tend to think they're either young or generally underexposed to how human interaction works.
Agreed, it can be very frustrating - and is often used for that very purpose, to let the person know they just wasted x amount of time to compose a message no one is going to even read let alone take seriously. But I do not think this is really a good indicator for someone being a child, it's just intentional insult.
There's a lot of us who are not very great at communications for various reasons. I personally might just lose interest in conversation and can't get myself to put in the effort to actually contribute value to it and just phase out, and same happens online in a way. As fucking annoying it might be for the person I'm conversing with, it's not intentional nor meant to insult
I'm almost 40 and I use TikTok every day. It's literally amazing and I'm always surprised by how many people mock it while using hot garbage like yt shorts or ig
not reading all that...tldr?
\s
Not sure if it's the case anymore, but strong opinions were matched with EQUALLY STRONG STYLISTIC CHOICE!!!!!!!, often coupled with poor grammar/spelling, and a tendency to lean more towards rehashing the same opinion rather than making a rational argument for it.
I dunno, I get this as much from old people too. I think it's less an indicator of age and more an indication of people who aren't great at thinking.
Could it be more of a "new to the internet"-thing, maybe?
sounds indistinguishable from talking to right-wingers tbh
Similar mental capacity probs.
Was gonna say, that just sounds like some boomers I know.
Quick to call other people kids as an insult.
This one has been easy for me lately: They spell 'lose' as 'loose'.
I know far too many people in their 40s who do this.
The way I try to reinforce the difference with people is this mnemonic device:
You don't want a loose noose - or you might lose the extra 'o'.
I do this. All. The. Time. Did it today. I tend to notice it and fix before send.
Probably just internet slang and the skull emoji. That and poor grammar are (possible) indicators.
It might disappoint you to learn that among american english speakers, literacy isn't a good indication of maturity by age. Barbara Bush made a literacy initiative that's still around, the One Good Thing(R) left over from the bush regime. The site has a handy map to show you the 40-60% adult literacy rate counties spread all over the states. It definitely helped me come to terms with the fact that sometimes a kid who is trying is gonna be more eloquent than an adult repeating the same tired take they've been rebutted for a thousand times.
It's easier for me personally to gauge age as it scales up when anonymity is involved - referential humor, recognizance of the ancient runes (Duckroll, Bill Murray's face with only the jaw moving), and informed chitchat about presidential behavior predating Bush SR are all dead giveaways that a user is older, but with younger users you have a lot of hobby/interest overlap going all the way up to people in their 40s. You can't look someone in the eyes and see if the light of youth has gone out yet on forums and imageboards.
The Amber Alert going nationwide is also Bush era. But I don't wanna detract from the remainder of your comment.
When they start calling people "jr" or implying anyone who disagrees with them is too young to understand.
Yup, I immediately assume these people are children, because it likely comes from their own experiences being dismissed due to their age.
Generally when people bring up some personal detail, my immediate reaction is to assume the opposite. Especially if it begins with "as a." For example: "as a woman," this person is a man. "As a black person," this is the whitest person you will ever meet. "As a 60 year old," definitely ten.
Unfaltering loyalty to the Chinese Communist Party
They’re the ones who are not obsessing over children’s toys or saying “adulting is difficult!”.
skibidi toilet
"Arguing" by listing a long list of fallacies that they don't really even understand.
Fallacy fallacy!
When someone explains something everyone knows or is obvious as if they just thought of it for the first time in human history.
Just assume everybody is 12 and you'll be good.
when you see this: skibidi gyatt rizzler sigma grindset cap fr fr
Biologically a kid or adults too?
Unable to understand and/or admit that both sides can be bad. It's ok to admit the "your team" did some nasty shit and it doesn't in any way cancel out what the other "team" did.
Also, Winning an argument doesn't in any way make you a winner. Actually, an argument that someone "won" often doesn't lead to a change for the better or even make anyone convinced that your arguments were valid.
I wish there were dead giveaways. It would be helpful to know if I'm talking to a teen or an adult cuz my attitude in delivering how wrong they were would definitely change. Certainly i can recall some truly boneheaded beliefs i have discarded through the decades so im more forgiving if i know they're young.
On the other hand if they're pretending to be an adult they ostensibly want to have their opinions considered on equal terms, as peers; basically to not be preached to. If that's their goal then isnt it kinda the point to treat their ideas as if they were offered by one? If we think of it like that, maybe it's not super important to know someone's age. It's definitely helpful of course to know who youre dealing with but the downside of anonymity is also its upside. ideas are ideas no matter how old the brain is what thinks em.
The thing with a lot of the methods mentioned is that I've seen both teens that are more mature than me, and people in their thirties that should probably have their internet privileges revoked.
I fucked their mom
They don't remember what life was like before Google.
Why does he look so much like Pete Davidson
Kids Next Door on some recon huh
Takes things personally right away and isn't yet very good at sarcasm or snark. But you know, that could just be and awkward adult too
References TikTok as a source of knowledge
💀
the only dead giveaway is if they get doxxed
They don't drink at all and they think consent is literally impossible after any amount of alcohol.
They keep talking about how much they like turtles
Wait! I thought there were no kids on the internet. Men are men, women are men, kids are FBI?
Too much emotion in their writing. Personal attacks. Doubling down in the reply. Support for the Chinese Communist Party.
Lol, comment removed. It ended with, "...support for the Chinese Communist party" as a way of finding out someone is a child.
Which was then removed in a, dare I say, childish act of moderation.
(Which is fine, the folks at .ml are welcome to censor as they see fit, of course, and I'm sure this comment isn't long for this world.)
if you wanna tell apart american gen z from gen alpha, ask them if they know what this is:
gen z used these smartboards and the teacher always made someone recalibrate the touchscreen to the projection when it was off
afaik the new spoiled shits all get these in every classroom, they were rolling em out when i was graduating:
at least in places that can afford it. this might be more true in a few years
AIs are eagerly scooping up this as a source lol
since 2008 (the artilect wars) or the third "a.i." winter?
I've read the lemmy.world responses, and they're all predictably trash. The real answer is there's no good way to tell if someone's a kid because they're plenty of mature 12 year olds and plenty of dipshit adults with poor writing skills (ie boomers). To rephrase the question, what is a dead giveaway that someone is actually not a kid?
They talk about mid- to low-tier shows that your average zoomer wouldn't know about. So someone talking about The Simpsons or Batman: The Animated Series doesn't mean much, but someone talking about Biker Mice from Mars or Extreme Dinosaurs means they're some millennial.
They namedrop social media sites that no longer exist. Remember Xanga and Vine?
They complain about body problems. Knees that feel funny before it rains. Bad back. Nose hair that never stops growing. And so on.
They demonstrate an understanding on how old and obsolete technology works (typewriters, payphones, VCR, floppy disks, Limewire, DOS, modems, Blackberries). Like, average zoomers don't know how to use those map guides that are in the form of a book.
They remember how the pre-modern web was like or life before the web was like. Someone who's <18 years old was born after 2006, when the modern web was still being build.
They remember ancient memes and fads that are obscure enough that it isn't some zoomer looking up random memes on knowyourmeme.
They're horribly out of touch with what kids enjoy. Notice this is different from passing judgment on what kids enjoy because they're plenty of things I thought was stupid when I was a kid. But when you say shit like "only 13 year olds like Tiktok" or "only kids like Minecraft" yeah you're just out of touch.
Also Minecraft is old as shit, I remember when it was just creative mode, no crafting as an early beta on a web page back in like 2009. That’s 15 years ago, Minecraft is almost old enough join the British army!!
Ask them if they think that the movie "The Wall" is a good representation of the song.
what's hilarious is dudebro adults still dress that way
They post memes to Lemmy
🔥b00bs🔥 feel like bags of sand 💯
Many people wouldn't know I'm not a kid if they spent all day interactively standing behind me in a queue.
Short of a birth year in their username, I'm not sure there is one. Almost everything in this thread is something millennials inflict on me daily.