Grief
Gen Z Grief: The Hidden Grief of a Generation
Grief is the language of a generation in transition.
Posted May 7, 2025 Reviewed by Davia Sills
Key points
- Gen Z is experiencing a unique form of collective grief and intangible loss.
- This grief is often disregarded or unfairly misread as apathy and entitlement.
- When named and shared, grief becomes not just sorrow, but a catalyst for change.
Co-authored with Dr. Daniel Trottier
In a Gen Z-themed online Reddit poll, readers were asked: “You can only bring back one thing—what do you pick?”
The options included:
• “$500/month two-bedroom apartments”
• “Pre-COVID gas prices”
• “Used cars within the $1000s”
Unsurprisingly, the most popular choice was affordable housing.
At first glance, this might seem like a lighthearted way to vent about inflation and widespread economic frustration. Yet, beneath the poll lies something more serious: a hidden, collective grief that often goes unnamed.
This poll reveals a deep psychological yearning for stability, accessibility, and a future that feels increasingly out of reach. It’s not just about gas prices; it’s about the disappearance of what once felt possible.
We typically associate grief with death. When someone we love dies, we have rituals and culturally or socially sanctioned ways to express and process that loss.
Yet, what kind of rituals exist for other kinds of losses and grief? The kind of grief that comes when we can’t make ends meet, when our imagined futures vanish, or when the world no longer feels reassuring. These are intangible losses that are more difficult to name and easier to overlook given their more invisible nature, although they profoundly shape our inner lives and social worlds.
We may grieve the loss of identity, affordability, and a sense of security. Additionally, we can grieve a stable climate, shared public values, and the promise of upward mobility or collective progress. These losses don’t always make headlines, but they are no less real.
What we’re seeing online is a unique form of collective and political grief. This is a normative response to widespread intangible losses that impact entire generations. The social fabric is shifting, and many people, especially younger folks, feel left behind.
There is a growing sense in the younger generation that certain futures, which were once considered developmental milestones in the West, are unobtainable: starting a family, owning a home, or retiring with financial stability. The disappearance of additional cultural anchor points, such as affordable education, a shared sense of truth, and community cohesion, only deepens the distress.
Understanding the Weight Gen Z Carries
These are not small losses. Gen Z is experiencing so much collective grief and pain. Without cultural developmental milestones, younger people feel increasingly isolated, disoriented, and lost.
This form of grief rarely gets identified, but it deserves recognition. By acknowledging the political and collective losses experienced by younger generations, we invite empathy instead of further alienation.
Too often, natural emotional responses to a destabilized world are misinterpreted by older generations as apathy or entitlement. Many young people are unfairly labeled as disengaged or lazy. In response, they may blame older generations for the state of the world, leading to polarized families and communities. But when we begin to understand their experiences through the lens of grief, we can ask more fruitful questions:
- What has been lost?
- What do we fear we may further lose?
- How can we support others in carrying this grief?
This is why grief literacy matters. When we learn to recognize grief in its many expressions, including the invisible or collective experiences of intangible loss, we deepen our capacity for compassion.
We start to understand why people feel so overwhelmed, disconnected, and angry. These aren’t personal failures but are natural responses to a world in flux.
When we validate generational forms of grief, we also gain insight into the harder truths of our era. Furthermore, when older generations name their own sense of loss from a place of empathetic understanding, it opens the door to intergenerational solidarity rather than social division.
Grief, when approached more consciously, becomes more than sorrow: It becomes a portal. By turning toward these feelings rather than away, we begin to relearn how to live in a world reshaped by loss. Grief can support us in beginning to reimagine what is still possible and help support something new to emerge.
When grief and loss are shared, it can also mobilize us and become a force for meaningful collective change. Significant loss reveals what matters the most to us in life, and now is a time for collective action that is rooted in compassionate care.
This article was co-authored by Mark Shelvock and Dr. Daniel Trottier, who is an associate professor of Global Digital Media at Erasmus University Rotterdam. His current research considers the use of digital media for the purposes of scrutiny, denunciation, and shaming. His books include Introducing Vigilant Audiences and Digital Media, Denunciation and Shaming: The Court of Public Opinion.
