Trust me, many teens do not want to talk about Tik Tok this Christmas
By: Georgie Eatherington
Tags: Teenagers, Christmas, Politics

This Christmas is going to be strange. There is absolutely no doubt about that. The festive season has been battered and bashed from all angles due to the fluctuating situation and, dare I say it, the complete and utter incompetence of the Tory Party.

But, politics aside, this is the situation we have ended up in this year. Just one precious day to spend with our loved ones. For many people this will be the only time this year that they will have been able to meet up and rebuild the bridges that lock down burned to the ground.

So it’s important to do it right.

You want to say the right things, avoid serious arguments and make sure that everyone is as involved in the conversations as possible. You want to make every moment count.

I’ve seen countless posts on Facebook of older (50+ year old) people asking for advice on how to talk to teenagers this Christmas. After all, it’s been a long but pretty uneventful year in that there were no concerts to go to and discuss, no foreign holidays unless you were one of the idiotic few who decided to venture away in the crack of freedom that was August. But the comments under these posts are other middle-aged people rather than teenagers (the ones who actually know what they would want to talk about). In all honestly, I can’t fully blame them; they posted on the hive of middle-aged activity that is Facebook rather than venturing into the modern technologies of Instagram or Twitter.

So, for those anxious few looking to get Christmas conversations right this year, here are my tips about conversations with teenagers, from a teenager who hates conversations.

Don’t talk about Tik Tok

I am a frequent user of Tik Tok (though I’d never make a video in my life). I love the unique content you can get on it, the sharing of stories and art and singing and an endless pool of wonderfully comical and entertaining content. There are, of course, downsides to Tik Tok as there are to every app, however it doesn’t deserve that poor rep that it seems to have acquired.

However, for many teenagers, Tik Tok is just not their thing. To them, they find it incredibly embarrassing to talk about and, if you aren’t a frequent watcher of Tik Tok and haven’t been keeping up-to-date with the trends, when you mention Tik Tok and the odd video from it that you’ve seen floating around Facebook, you are likely to get some very strange looks from your teenagers. If you are absolutely desperate to talk about Tik Tok with your family, I would highly recommend downloading the app for yourself and having a go at navigating it and understanding what it is, how it works and maybe saving a couple of your favourite videos to show them.

To learn how to set up a Tik Tok account, click here.

Unless you have similar political views, don’t bring up politics unless they do

And I know what you’re probably thinking right now. I’ve heard it all before. “But freedom of speech!” or “If they can’t handle the truth then they shouldn’t get involved!” or “Gen Z are just a bunch of snowflakes!”

There are many things to unpack here.

Firstly, let’s establish what I mean when I say “political views” here. In context I mean mentioning and discussing subjects of interest such as JK Rowling and her transphobic tweets, climate change, Brexit, or the recent US elections.

The reason for this is to keep conversations at Christmas civil. It is easy with topics such as those listed above to spiral into deeper conversations about political correctness against racism/sexism/homophobia/etc.

Statistically Millenials and Gen Z are more likely to be left-wing, with voting intention data on the 2019 general election showing that 78% of aged 18–24 year old’s would vote for a left-wing party (Labour/Green/SNP/Liberal Democrats) and only 21% would vote for a right-wing party (Conservatives/Brexit Party).

In contrast, those aged 70 and over only showed 26% voting left-wing and 72% voting right-wing. These patterns are clearly visible through analysing the data given and shows extremely consistently throughout the set of data.

Therefore, if you want to keep Christmas dinner argument-free it is advisable that you don’t bring politics or perceived political views into the conversation. Find something else. Please.

Then what can I discuss?

Excellent question, I’m so glad you asked. It’s almost like the entire article has been leading up to this question and you’ve asked at precisely the right time! It almost seems scripted(!)

Christmas Music: discuss your favourite Christmas songs! When do you allow yourself to start listening to Christmas songs? Have there been any new Christmas songs that you like or are you a stickler for the classic carols? Can you believe that the King of Christmas himself, Michael Buble, has never had a single Christmas number one?

Regular Music: have you discovered any new artists this year? What do you think about Taylor Swift’s album Folklore? Harry Styles, yes or no? My advice here would be to give those artists a listen to as well as Billie Eilish, Ariana Grande and Beyonce a listen to!

TV: talk about what shows you watched when you were little or shows you remember your children watching when they were tiny little toddlers. I can guarantee that this will spiral into a conversation about CBeebies or CBBC that your teenager used to watch. And, as much as I (personally) hate talking and having awkward conversations, a bit of nostalgia is always fun.

And don’t forget that you can also have great fun doing things that aren’t necessarily having direct conversation such as online pub quizzes like Jay’s Virtual Pub Quiz that takes very little technological know-how to set up.

And as I said…

Christmas is going to be astronomically different this year so don’t worry too much if everything’s very tense over Christmas dinner, it’s been a very stressful year.

Remember to keep safe, wash your hands and stay six feet apart where possible. Hold on in there, it’ll be over soon and I’m so proud that you’ve battled this year as you have.

That’s all for now.

Georgie Eatherington.