Editor’s note: The following article is an op-ed, and the views expressed are the author’s own. Read more opinions on theGrio.
I must admit that at first, I was enraged when I saw the wave of “We’re done with the ’90s” TikToks. It’s one of the hottest trends on the app right now. It’s young men from Gen Z making whole videos arguing that Michael Jordan was actually not that good at basketball. (It’s really hard for me to even write that sentence.) They show clips of Michael Jordan failing to score or losing the ball and they say, see, he’s actually trash. It took me a minute to understand what was really going on.
I now see this as intergenerational psychological warfare. The young guys are rejecting the basketball God that Gen X anointed long before they were born. This is a way of saying, screw you old heads, get off our lawn. They’re hyper-trolling the older generation and getting clicks through rage bait.
It’s also about generational pride and a belief that human progress means everything now is better than it was years ago.
It’s also about elevating LeBron over Jordan. That’s the real subtext of saying Jordan is trash. It means LeBron is the GOAT. For decades, Gen X and millennials argued over Jordan and LeBron, comparing numbers and nuances to craft arguments about who’s the best ever. Gen Z has crashed into that debate like Bill Laimbeer attacking Jordan as he flew through the lane. Just like Laimbeer deserved technical fouls for that so does Gen Z deserve a tech for this garbage opinion. But I understand and support their subcutaneous intentions.
For sure the kids knew Gen Xers would be enraged by this. Jordan is, as far as athletes go, a sort of god. To watch them cherry-pick clips of Jordan and scream “trash!” while he misses a shot is hurtful. I watched Jordan’s entire career, from his championship-winning shot at UNC to his championship-winning shot in Utah. (The whole Wizards thing did…
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