If you've been around a tween to teen lately, you've probably noticed them strategically positioning their phone in some totally random place to video themselves for brief snippets of time.
They're dancing, lip-syncing, doing ridiculous things...
Welcome to TikTok.
It's the bane of any parents' existence, a series of songs, dances, monotonous clips that somehow dig into your brain and make you want to beat your head against a wall...all while your kids seem to find it perfectly acceptable to repeat the exact. same. song. and. dance. for the 498th time.
Then something happened.
Our daughter had a competition this weekend that gathered athletes from across the country on a National level. You can imagine the intensity, stress and focus that came along with the levity of it all. You can also imagine the amount of cell phones and AirPods abound, while athletes either tried to distract themselves and/or become mentally prepared.
Deciding to take a break for a minute while our daughter was warming up, Adam and I sat on a bench in a hall to wait for her performance.
I couldn't help but hit my forehead against his shoulder when I heard the song, "Renegade" play, which is a popular song/dance on TikTok. A group of girls randomly and with Ninja speed gathered together out of nowhere in front of a random wall behind us where they'd propped a cellphone against. All of them were in sync, every move and motion together, then they started laughing as they leaned forward to replay the clip and set it up again to record...you guessed it..."Renegade".
Jesus take the wheel.
This is where something unexpected happened. On their second rendition of the exact same song, another spontaneous combustion of Ninjas appeared from literally out of nowhere. It was like a beacon, honing in groups at a time. The amazing part however, these different groups were literally from different parts of the country. One team from California appeared as a team from Texas laughed and hugged their TikTok co-horts, then left. Florida, met with Carolina. Teams that were rivals put aside their differences for fifteen TikTok seconds to laugh, dance and connect with each other. The same exact moves, even freakishly down to the same facial expressions. It was a unified language, communicated across boundaries and differences for but a second. If all of these kids were on their individual cell phones, they wouldn't have spoken to each other, connected with each other or even looked at each other. The athletes who were competition would've remained the competition and the nerves would've remained sky high.
Truth be told, we had to get up and leave before our heads exploded, but nonetheless, I had a new appreciation for the app I've so despised.
As universally annoying as it is, it is universal. Anything that can bring strangers, even rivals together, is something to consider. As with anything in this world, there is bad with the good and I know there are too many horrible TikTok clips to count. For one minute though, one painfully obnoxious "Renegade" minute, I understood why it's so popular.
Connection.
For their generation to be so critically disconnected from each other on their devices, it was good to see kids actually come together to laugh and have fun.
The competition went well, everyone is home safe and sound and I've learned to try to become more tolerant of the teen things that make me crazy.
I can't begin to imagine what the next fad will be, but here's to hoping it won't include the song, "Renegade" for every mom's sanity to remain intact.
They're dancing, lip-syncing, doing ridiculous things...
Welcome to TikTok.
It's the bane of any parents' existence, a series of songs, dances, monotonous clips that somehow dig into your brain and make you want to beat your head against a wall...all while your kids seem to find it perfectly acceptable to repeat the exact. same. song. and. dance. for the 498th time.
Then something happened.
Our daughter had a competition this weekend that gathered athletes from across the country on a National level. You can imagine the intensity, stress and focus that came along with the levity of it all. You can also imagine the amount of cell phones and AirPods abound, while athletes either tried to distract themselves and/or become mentally prepared.
Deciding to take a break for a minute while our daughter was warming up, Adam and I sat on a bench in a hall to wait for her performance.
I couldn't help but hit my forehead against his shoulder when I heard the song, "Renegade" play, which is a popular song/dance on TikTok. A group of girls randomly and with Ninja speed gathered together out of nowhere in front of a random wall behind us where they'd propped a cellphone against. All of them were in sync, every move and motion together, then they started laughing as they leaned forward to replay the clip and set it up again to record...you guessed it..."Renegade".
Jesus take the wheel.
This is where something unexpected happened. On their second rendition of the exact same song, another spontaneous combustion of Ninjas appeared from literally out of nowhere. It was like a beacon, honing in groups at a time. The amazing part however, these different groups were literally from different parts of the country. One team from California appeared as a team from Texas laughed and hugged their TikTok co-horts, then left. Florida, met with Carolina. Teams that were rivals put aside their differences for fifteen TikTok seconds to laugh, dance and connect with each other. The same exact moves, even freakishly down to the same facial expressions. It was a unified language, communicated across boundaries and differences for but a second. If all of these kids were on their individual cell phones, they wouldn't have spoken to each other, connected with each other or even looked at each other. The athletes who were competition would've remained the competition and the nerves would've remained sky high.
Truth be told, we had to get up and leave before our heads exploded, but nonetheless, I had a new appreciation for the app I've so despised.
As universally annoying as it is, it is universal. Anything that can bring strangers, even rivals together, is something to consider. As with anything in this world, there is bad with the good and I know there are too many horrible TikTok clips to count. For one minute though, one painfully obnoxious "Renegade" minute, I understood why it's so popular.
Connection.
For their generation to be so critically disconnected from each other on their devices, it was good to see kids actually come together to laugh and have fun.
The competition went well, everyone is home safe and sound and I've learned to try to become more tolerant of the teen things that make me crazy.
I can't begin to imagine what the next fad will be, but here's to hoping it won't include the song, "Renegade" for every mom's sanity to remain intact.
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