By Bowen Fernie,Emily Sundberg
Copyright gq
In the early days of 2025, there was a formula that every publication I read seemed to follow on their homepage: photo of young men + MAGA hat, cowboy hat, or lost stare into the distance + headline along the lines of: “Young American men are angry, MAGA-fied, entering the manosphere, antifeminist, addicted to their phones, and not okay.” “Is your son ‘Dark Woke?’ ” “Is Joe Rogan replacing church?” “Is your masculinity toxic?”
I’m not an expert on men, but I am married to one. When we go back to each other’s East Coast hometowns, we often reminisce on how boyhood played out around us. Broken bones and blood watered down with Miller High Life and backyard DIY video projects. Hiding trash bags full of red cups before someone’s parents got home, and the pain that comes with friendships shifting in college. When I saw those headlines about Gen Z men, I wondered if those guys were developing the same memories.
One thing that became evident through the 21 conversations I conducted recently with American college men—about dating, partying, AI, MAGA, and the greatest misconceptions about their generation—is that there is very little room in their life for low-stakes mischief. “Everyone has receipts now. I see surveillance culture leaking into nondigital interactions. You can’t even sneak out of your house now because your parents have you on Life360.” It was in this conversation with Kunsh, a 22-year-old rising senior at Ohio State, that I learned about Life360, the location-sharing app mainly used by families to track one another’s whereabouts. The company made over $371 million in revenue last year.
Nolan, a 22-year-old rising senior at Purdue, shared a similar concern. “There’s a fear of being seen as, or being, cringeworthy, and then getting posted for all the internet to see. It’s like, ‘If I approach this girl, how is it going to be seen in a group chat with all of her friends?’ ”
These conversations didn’t center around surveillance, but the more the topic came up, the more suffocated I felt for young men in this country. Does the inability to pool-hop without being caught by an Amazon Ring camera or get tongue-tied while texting a new friend without being screenshotted have long-term effects? I don’t know. “The biggest problem with surveillance is that no one wants to genuinely be themselves,” Damola, a 21-year-old rising senior at Michigan, told me.
The question we should all be asking isn’t “Are today’s young men okay?” (Because: Were the men around you in college okay?) The much more interesting question to me is what a generation growing up in the glow of blue lights will say when given the opportunity to be unfiltered.
Alex McIntosh
Hometown: New York, NY
College: Amherst College
Major: Philosophy, Law, and the Environment
On male vs. female relationships: “I end up in a lot of mostly female spaces at college. I was talking to my friend about why that is, and she was saying that the way that men interact with each other is sitting side by side. We’re watching something. The way that women interact is in front of each other, sitting at a table across from each other. And I really like that as a model of why it’s so much easier to get closer.
“Male relationships in that way can be very easy. It’s just, Let’s go do this activity together, let’s watch this thing together. But I think that that’s a little less fulfilling. And I mean, I think there’s a lot of guys, who I would consider myself to be quite close with, who I don’t think I could sit in front of and talk to for an hour. Whereas there are women I’m much, much less close to for whom that’s the case.”
On fucking around and finding out: “I see something online that’s, like, our parents’ generation and my grandparents’ generation was the fucking-around generation. Now we’re the finding-out generation. And I think there’s a lot more of a feeling of: It’s all going to be found out.”
Jakale Watson
Hometown: Forney, TX
College: Baylor University
Major: Neuroscience
On group texts and friendship: “Most of my group texts died down…. Group texts always lead to separate group chats. It kind of hurts if you’re the one not in the other group chat.”
On social media presentation and Instagram anxiety: “I think one thing that might go through my head is: Has this been on my feed a lot? Have I worn this a lot on my feed? If people are like, ‘Oh, he wears that a lot. This is the only thing he has.’ ”
Jhan Setthachayanon
Hometown: West Chester, PA
College: Yale University
Major: Urban Studies
On the supposed decline of partying: “We’re seeing the use of screens and different kinds of socialization. It’s no longer needed for you to go to a house, say, a housewarming or a mixer, to meet new people. You can do that online.”
On ‘the establishment’: “There’s a very strong narrative towards ‘We don’t care about the established system’…. By which I mean government, the capital-B bureaucracy—this big, icky, mucky, slow-moving organism. Which it is.”
On voting: “There’s a very real sense of, like, ‘Oh my gosh, everything is so crazy all the time. I’m not going to care.’ And that not-going-to-care sense can kind of vary from a very much needed break for mental health and to disconnect to ground yourself, which I’m sure that in some small ways everybody does. But then there’s also a larger scale of ‘Oh, I don’t care. My vote doesn’t matter, right?’ Like, ‘Oh, I’m not going to care about voting because the system’s so far gone. There’s no point.’ Which I feel is kind of a misguided thought.”
Kunsh Puranik
Hometown: Cleveland, OH
College: Ohio State University
Major: Logistics Management
On MAGA support from Gen Z men: “What I’m noticing is a lot of those groups come together because—it’s not only about the ideology, even, but more so a desperate need of community and this feeling of, Okay, if I believe in this, if I dedicate myself to this cause or if I support this, I feel some sort of togetherness or camaraderie, and that plays into making yourself seem like a better, more accomplished person.”
Henry Galicıch
Hometown: St. Paul, MN
College: Colgate University
Major: Sociology
On who he looks up to: “I would say my dad, because I can’t think of any pop-culture people right now. My dad is super empathetic, he’s a surgeon. And so just growing up with him being in the medical field, it’s just total care for patients and everything. And so I feel like that has really informed how he is and how he has raised me and my siblings.”
Khail Andrei Fabi
Hometown: Scranton, PA
College: Berklee College of Music
Major: Songwriting
On the biggest misconceptions about his generation: “There is the whole thing of Gen Z not being as sociable, the Gen Z stare, and older generations saying that we don’t know how to communicate. COVID definitely changed that, but I think it’s also just an exhaustion…. It’s chaotic all the time. The job market right now is horrible. Eggs are like $12. No one can afford a house.
“Our generation has been told our entire lives that we’ve always had it easy. We’re lazy, we don’t know how to socialize, we don’t pick up on certain social cues, we don’t have any manners. And if we’re fed that our entire lives, that is all we’ll ever know. We’re so defeated that why would we step outside?”
On role models: “I remember there was this quote Ocean Vuong said in an interview where he likened the rules of life to a guardrail where if you’re driving down a road and you’re following the guardrail, you’re just going to end up somewhere that’s already discovered on a map. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing, but sometimes you sit down and you’re like, this road wasn’t paved with me in mind, and I don’t think I want to end up at this destination and I just need to jump over the guardrail and find something else. And I remember hearing that, and I think it altered my brain chemistry. There are really no rules to life besides living it.”
Nico Weisberger
Hometown: Brooklyn, NY
College: Swarthmore College
Major: Environmental Policy
On Gen Z masculinity: “On one hand, there’s this idea of Gen Z as super-duper woke and all that. And then there’s this idea of young men being so Andrew Tate, MAGA masculinity. And neither of those ideas are wrong, but I think that the two have clashed into each other in a really strange way, so that my generation is full of men who are embarrassed about their masculinity, but also insecure in it, and so really need to own it. And so it’s this clash of ‘Oh my God, I’m a man. That’s not cool these days. That’s not chill.’ And also, ‘It’s so not cool for me to not be a man. I have to be so masculine and so perceived as a guy doing “guy” correctly.’ Plus it has to be nonchalant. You can’t be trying ever, you’re not allowed to try, and you have to not care about your masculinity or about lack of it.”
On being trans: “I hate to say this in GQ, but I’m not a man, right? I am, but I’m also nonbinary. I think that I don’t believe in gender in this really stark-contrast way. I don’t think that it’s real. And so I think that my interaction with it has always been a little bit more playful. It’s never felt to me I have to be this one thing in my life in all facets of it.”
Elliott Ingram
Hometown: Toronto, Canada
College: New York University
Major: Drama
On Gen Z partying: “We definitely still party. Our generation has a strong desire to be more social right now. I think since COVID, everyone I’ve met has been a lot more interested in actually getting to meet people we’ve never met before. Sometimes going into a party with basically no one; I see a lot of people my age doing that, which is against what the media is putting out of our generation’s loneliness.”
Jaden James Jenkins
Hometown: San Antonio, TX
College: Baylor University
Major: Data Science
On self-expression: “We’re allowed to cry, we’re allowed to express, because it is not good to keep that emotion built up inside of us.”
On Gen Z partying: “We literally just go over to each other’s houses, get food, chill, and then start doing homework and studying. Sometimes we actually just want to stay home.”
On curating an online persona: “I’m not photogenic. I really don’t care if I have my presence known. I just be staying out the way.”
Hometown: Alameda, CA
College: San Diego State University
Major: Marketing
On social media addiction:“It’s almost not a choice at this point with (1), how addictive it is, but (2), also just if you’re not on your phone, then it’s like you’re not connected to people. If you meet someone at school and you’re like, Oh, this school person is cool, let’s connect, it’s like, Okay, what’s your Instagram or what’s your Snapchat? And I’ve noticed, I genuinely feel naked or like something’s wrong if I don’t have my phone on me.”
On whether his friends read books: “Some of them do. It’s just a couple friends I have that, we’re kind of on the same wavelength where it’s like we’re trying to better ourselves and get smarter and stuff. I really like having people like that around me. And I had one friend from school who we didn’t know what to do one afternoon, so we got a Zipcar and went to a bookstore. Like a cool bookstore.”
Hometown: Indianapolis, IN
College: Purdue University
Major: Business Management
On expectations for men: “The expectations for men have gotten higher, and I think that’s fine. But I think there’s some statistic about women doing better in general, just in terms of the workplace, mental health. They have more community. Another thing that I’ve noticed just being in college is that girls have so many more friends and have the capacity to be more vulnerable with them and, just, guys don’t have that avenue. I think that’s a major part of everything, where there’s a lack of meaningful community for guys. But, and I think that kind of goes back to the point where the expectations are higher and women don’t necessarily need a guy, a man, because they’re doing so well, they’ve been able to provide for themselves. So I think that’s a trend that we’re heading in.”
On partying: “I am not a huge drinker. If I go to a house party, I can get alcohol for free most of the time. I will say I’ve noticed a trend with my friends. It’s a lot of edibles, Zyn, and then their choice of a weed pen.”
On role models: “Between me and my friends, a lot of podcasters and influencers. Scott Galloway is a big one, especially with finance bros on campus.”
Anthony Cox
Hometown: Detroit, MI
College: Michigan State University
Major: Apparel and Textile Design
On grindset: “The grind, the hustle factor, and everybody obsessed with Joe Rogan and stuff. Being from Detroit, I feel like the hustle factor has always been embedded in me. At the same time, as a Black man in today’s day and age, I feel like expressing my emotions is key to me moving on in life.
“My mom and my dad were a huge factor in me owning my own success. And I feel like one thing I will say about my generation is we tend to grasp onto the fast-money aspect and getting somewhere fast-tracked, and that’s not everything. I feel like the long game is the best game because you get to sit back, relax and, say, if you meet a roadblock, you can tend to those roadblocks at your own pace instead of somebody else’s pace. And I feel like that really helped me out, especially being from Detroit. I love talking about Detroit because Detroit is, it’s my city, but also, too, I wouldn’t be who I was if I didn’t grow up with that Detroit culture.
“Anywhere I go, including New York, I feel like the hustle factor will always follow me.”
On partying: “We still hang out in person. I just feel like we are at that point where we don’t need to go out to a club or a bar to have fun. I mean, I do like going out to the club and stuff, but we can do other things. There’s this one place in East Lansing, it’s called Community Darkroom 517, and they do darkroom stuff and they also do photo walks. They teach you how to develop film and stuff. It’s really sweet.”
Hometown: McLean, VA
College: University of Southern California
Major: Architecture
On friends who voted for Trump: “I do have friends that voted for Trump, but they’re also really creative and it’s kind of hard to deal with that. Take a cool creative guy, but he also has a weird belief I don’t agree with, but it doesn’t mean that he’s an evil person or that he shouldn’t have a girlfriend or shouldn’t have a normal life. I think it’s always best to try and understand someone else or just not let something prevent you from having a connection.”
Khari McDowell
Hometown: Brooklyn, NY
College: Howard University
Major: Biology
On what motivates him: “I’m halfway inspired by some of my peers. I went to a party in Queens not too long ago, and some of my friends who I played basketball with in high school were there. I was outside in line at the party and my father always would tell me—he was in the music business—‘You got to figure out how to not wait in lines, and basically walk right in. Don’t got to pay or nothing like that.’ And so I heard him, but I wasn’t really listening to what he was saying.”
“As I’m standing in line at the party, some people I’m cordial with were getting security to clear the way for them. They’re in college now. They’re getting the NIL deals and money. They got security and big chains. And it was one of the basketball players’ birthdays, so he had rappers and content creators there.”
“So I’m waiting. And then some of my peers, their security is clearing me out the way and they got all everything that I pretty much dreamed of type of thing.”
“So that also is motivating to me.”
Ricky Valente
Hometown: Cedar Falls, IA
College: New York University
Major: Film and Television
On his generation’s fears around dating: “I think the fear of rejection is definitely there. Because you’re constantly being surveilled, even in public. You can be photographed or videoed anywhere. It almost seems like we’re all just policing each other now. It’s impossible. I’m policing myself online. It’s this constant. It’s like a surveillance society.”
On the craziest thing he’s turned to AI for: “I don’t even know if it was a breakup, but I’ve drafted something that would be private. So probably a breakup or there’s some issues going on in a relationship. It’s like, Okay, here’s this text I’m going to send. You can shit on it, but honestly, sometimes it’s nice to have a non-subjective opinion.”
On his idols: “GOAT Bourdain. Love Anthony Bourdain. My whole summer I’ve been reading all this Hunter S. Thompson stuff, and I’m very much going through that vibe of Hunter S. Thompson, Hemingway, that kind of classic male archetype. But I think my friends and I see it with a little more nuance where it’s like: Okay, they’re fucking crazy alcoholics.”
Jon Kuperschmid
Hometown: East Hampton, NY
College: Duke University
Major: Political Science
On partying: “One of my friends in college freshman year had to go home because he had brain cancer. And he got back and he went out so much and we were like, ‘Okay, what’s going on?’ And he was like, ‘You know what? This is a celebration of life. You never know what’s going to happen.’ And I think that, it sounds kind of dumb, but I think that is a generally very valid way to look at it. So much socially was taken from really formative years of our youth. And I think that the opportunity to be with your friends and dance and celebrate when there’s so much crazy shit going on is not taken lightly by my generation.”
Elijah Hurewitz-Ravitch
Hometown: Brooklyn, NY
College: Yale University
Major: History
On AI: “I go to one of these schools that’s supposed to be supersmart—and everyone uses it. Not everyone, but so many people are deeply reliant on it.”
On MAGA friends: “One of my best friends is kind of like a die-hard MAGA. It’s very fun and appealing to rebel against what you’re being taught. If you’re hit over the head with something in high school, it’s naturally going to turn people in the opposite direction.”
Cyrus Noushin
Hometown: Hamden, CT
College: Southern Connecticut State University
Major: Chemistry
On originality and surprise: “Not as many people are having original ideas anymore. Everything is from an Instagram algorithm or TikTok, and everyone knows everything too. News stories and stuff. I’ll tell my parents a news story, some random thing, or my boss at work, and they’re like, ‘Oh yeah, I already saw that.’ I’m like, ‘How did you see that? That was two hours ago, and it’s something that happened in some random state.’ Just little things, and everybody knows everything.”
On partying less: “Our definition of a good time now is going to one of our friends’ houses and buying some nice steak or lamb or some chicken and just making some good food and just hanging out.”
On role models: “Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner…they’re the model for masculinity. They’re so humble, they show emotion, they’re not cocky…. Carlos lives at home with his mom and dad and loves his mom’s cooking.”
Matt Tierney
Hometown: Castle Rock, CO
College: Georgetown University
Major: Psychology
On therapy: “I can think of a few girls I’m friends with that talk about it, but I think a lot of people my age sort of hit the other end of it, where there was such a therapy craze among people a little bit older than us that a lot of people my age, both girls and boys, are a little bit turned off of therapy. I’m a psych major and I thought that the psych major would sort of make me believe in therapy. Or I would learn even more benefits of it. Obviously, therapy is good and it can be very helpful, but I think people treated it as if it was the only tool. I think a lot of young people are a little more agnostic.”
On reading books: “I was talking with my friend yesterday about how we’ve been good about reading this year, and I started reading consistently again in the last year. Anyone a little bit older than me has probably read triple. I think my friend group kind of does, whether it’s performatively or in real life, we’re reading, which I think is, no matter why you start doing it, it pays off.”
On role models: “I’m a big How Long Gone head.”
Hometown: Brookfield, WI
College: Indiana University
Major: Nonprofit Management
On the biggest misconceptions about his generation: “Some would say that Gen Z is fragile and flaky. In reality, we have had to hard reset—as hard, if not harder, than other recent generations. People misunderstand our sense of responsibility—built through a global pandemic, the emergence of artificial intelligence, and the increasing fears of unsustainability in world economies.”
Damola Olaiya
Hometown: Fort Wayne, IN
College: University of Michigan
Major: Biochemistry and Economics
On the biggest misconception about his generation: “The biggest misconception in my mind is that we’re not hardworking. Men my age really are more hardworking. It’s just on stuff that’s not necessarily seen on the surface.”
On online presentation: “I really care about how people perceive me on the internet. Your internet personality says a lot about you. That’s the first place people look at you these days—it’s the first impression.”
Emily Sundberg lives in New York and writes the “Feed Me” Substack.
A version of this story originally appeared in the October 2025 issue of GQ with the title “What Everyone Gets Wrong About Our Generation According to 21 College Kids”
PRODUCTION CREDITS:
Photographs by Bowen Fernie
For McDowell, Andrei Fabi, Kenny, and Valente: Hair by Yuhi Kim at Bridge using Bumble and Bumble
Grooming by Barry White for barrywhitemensgrooming.com
Set design by Joonie Jang
