During the TikTok ban panic leading up to the roughly fourteen-hour blackout in January, I, like thousands of others, started to move content over to Instagram reels. While I had used Instagram for photos and videos since 2014, reels was a place I had never ventured and it is safe to say that the transition was not a smooth one. During the period of reuploading videos from my cosplay TikTok page to preserve the work I had done over the years, the delete comment button became a close friend. I began to wonder, in a time where accepting our peers is preached constantly throughout childhood, why is it that, in an attempt to reconnect with the community I built during my years on TikTok, I am met with a comment section full of people who have no interest in sharing a kind message.
Cringe is a word thrown around constantly within Western internet communities that gained widespread popularity during the 2010s. An influx of hate-fueled compilation videos flooded places like YouTube and Instagram, typically targeting individuals part of marginalized groups, such as women, people of color, individuals within the LGBTQ+ community, fat and disabled individuals, all expressing themselves unabashedly. Having passions outside of those that were widely acceptable and were shared in a public manner was regularly made fun of.Â
Enter COVID-19. Illness became rampant, and more and more social opportunities were no longer possible. By 2021, the peak of COVID-related lockdowns, social media, particularly TikTok, became a key part of maintaining social connection when face-to-face conversations had become a thing of the past. With algorithms as smart as ever, communities that previously had been scattered on message boards and platforms long abandoned by the masses were now brought together in one place.Â
When surrounded by like-minded people, sheltered from those who would openly oppose activities popular in a group, it is easy to enjoy and produce content without fear of harassment. Statements like “cringe but free” became badges of honor. Thanks to advancements in algorithmic technology, you would only be shown content that holds your attention, forming a type of echo chamber. Once a sense of security was formed, an idea began to pop up all over the culture commentary sphere in response: cringe culture is dead.
But how dead can something be when video compilations making fun of people are still being made? When comment sections are flooded with comments such as “Go girl, give us nothing,” “Are we in the original,” “It’s not that serious” and other phrases repeated en masse to convey that something is clearly wrong with the content or poster. It is hard to deny that cringe culture has had its helpful moments in refining what is created and allows us to understand what is acceptable to share online however, it is being pushed in a manner that does in fact do harm. Â
As life began to return to how it had been pre-pandemic, so did “acceptance tolerance” or, the amount of patience one is willing to show an individual expressing themself in a manner unfamiliar to what the viewer may be used to. Communities that were previously thriving during the pandemic began to shrink. Less active content producers meant less active viewers and therefore less revenue for the platforms that had relied on it. Thus, “cringy” content began to be rolled out to those who had never shown interest in it before, exposing individuals with less tolerance and passion for the topic at hand.Â
While the phrase cringe has mostly fallen out of style except for select areas of the internet, a new verbal trend has emerged: being nonchalant.
Youtuber Doothi points out this trend in an essay about the death of personal passion within Generation Z. Doothi explains that there is an apparent fear of having a history of personal passions while batting with the new social ideal of nonchalance, the idea that no one really cares about what others do or think. In falling into this very cycle in an attempt to free ourselves from constrictions of the past, we have become the most “chalanced” we could be, limiting ourselves from enjoying hobbies, and as a result, tearing down those who do.Â
Where does that leave us? Caught in the crossfire.Â
When it comes to how we should progress with this knowledge, strides should be made despite it and not because of it. We need to push ourselves to open up to the idea of being cringy and that cringiness may not be such a bad thing. When surrounded by increasingly judgmental people, embracing passion is the most potent weapon against the perpetuation of judgemental notions. The more individuals that embrace cringe, the less power that being seen as cringey holds.Â