Cringe Culture is Making Us Afraid to Try, Says Ocean Vuong

As designed by the supreme power that is the Internet, a lot of things are cringe. Singer-dancer JoJo Siwa attempting to revamp her image by releasing a new music video every few months: cringe. Someone with a conyo accent trying to order food at a karinderya: cringe. Posting a video of you trying out slam poetry at an open mic: cringe. To try and publicly show that you’re trying is cringe with a capital C, and you’d be better off hiding under a rock than attempting to survive the onslaught of hate and hellfire that comes with being perceived as anything less than normal.

This fear is strongest among younger generations like Gen Z and Gen Alpha, whose birth into and molding by the Internet has shaped a fear of being seen as “less than.” “They are more and more self-conscious of trying,” Vietnamese-American writer and professor Ocean Vuong said in an interview with ABC News. Vuong, best known for writing contemplative works of poetry such as Night Sky with Exit Wounds, as well as equally introspective novels like The Emperor of Gladness, has spent the last decade honing his voice as one of the most critically acclaimed authors of his generation. Yet in his role as a Professor in Modern Poetry and Poetics at New York University, Vuong notes that his students often hesitate to reveal the effort behind their craft.

“They say, ‘I want to be a good writer, but it’s a bit cringe,’” said Vuong. “‘I don’t want to be perceived as trying and having an effortful attempt at my dreams.’ They are absolutely scared of judgement.”

“They perform cynicism because cynicism can be misread, as it often is, as intelligence,” continued Vuong, although he noted that his observations were based on his experience with American students. “‘You are disaffected, you are too cool, you have seen it all.’ They pull back, but in fact, they are deeply hungry for sincere, earnest effort. They often do it privately. They don’t want to admit to each other that they’re trying really hard to do what they want to do. I think sincerity is something we deeply hunger for, particularly young people, but we are embarrassed when sincerity is in the room.”

This isn’t to say that there aren’t large pockets of Gen Z and Gen Alpha trying their best to kill the part of them that cringes, to paraphrase authors and chronically online brothers John and Hank Green. The “I am cringe, but I am free” meme has seen hundreds of iterations on the internet, and content creators have embraced it as both a rallying cry and an ironic shield against the vulnerability of self-expression. “You have to sometimes climb up a huge hill of cringe,” comedian Matt Rogers said in an episode of his podcast Las Culturistas, which he co-hosts with comedian and Saturday Night Live cast member Bowen Yang. “Once you can scale that hill — which is, you know, it might be your judgement of yourself, on what you’re doing, it might be everyone saying what you’re doing is cringe — on the other end, you slide down into happiness and nirvana.”

But, as Vuong pointed out, creating space for that kind of sincerity doesn’t happen overnight. Drawing on his 11 years of teaching experience, he stressed the need for intentional effort to build communities where vulnerability isn’t just allowed, but encouraged. “You have to set the tone,” said Vuong, “to welcome them, and not judge them, [so] that they can be sincere and earnest without being condemned or ridiculed for it, that they can try their best without being cringey to do so… then you truly liberate them towards their best selves.”