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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 watchin

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