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As long as youth culture has existed, adults have been mystified, perplexed, and even threatened by it. At least once a week I think about the scene in A Hard Day’s Night, a film released in 1964, in which the Beatles are being interviewed by clueless older journalists. (“What would you call that hairstyle you’re wearing?” “Arthur.”)

But even seen against the long history of grown-ups not getting it, the culture of Gen Alpha — kids born between about 2010 and 2024 — feels especially hard to pin down. It is famously fragmentary — the monoculture is dead, and if adults aren’t all watching the same shows anymore, a lot of kids aren’t even watching shows. They’re watching short-form video on their phones, sources of entertainment (or personality erosion) so limitless that every kid in the world could, in theory, be consuming a different piece of content right now.

Given all this, every time I hear a claim like “Gen Alpha doesn’t laugh at farts,” I’m tempted to ask whether Gen Alpha collectively laughs at — or cries over, or has any sort of aesthetic experience with — anything. Is there a mass culture for kids and teens today? And if so, where does it come from, and what does it look like?

When I posed these questions to people who study kids and culture, the answer I got was that while young people probably aren’t watching the same things, a lot of them are craving similar experiences from the culture they consume, whether it’s movies, YouTube, or, increasingly, video games.

They want to feel safe, they want a sense of community, and they really, really want adults to leave them alone.

Kids “are still participating in culture,” said BJ Colangelo, a media theorist and analyst who has spoken about Gen Alpha trends. “They just are making their own, and they’re........

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