The Shock of the Scroll: Gen Z’s Defining Moment

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On April 4, 1968, a shot rang out in Memphis. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. collapsed on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel, and the sound reverberated through the hearts of a young America (King Institute, n.d.). Fifty‑seven years later, on September 10, 2025, another shot cracked across an outdoor courtyard at Utah Valley University in Orem. In front of roughly 3,000 people, Charlie Kirk slouched and fell silent. Almost immediately, millions more witnessed the moment on their phones (Reuters, 2025a).

The events are eerily parallel, but they are not the same. Both men were political activists. Both were passionate. Most importantly for this analysis, both spoke directly into the formative years of the youngest cohort coming of age. 

In fact, the assassination of Charlie Kirk may be a defining political moment for Gen Z, not just in America, but around the world. The timing is significant. 

Why? Researchers Gelman et al., in their 2021 study of U.S. presidential voting, explained that the most formative years for establishing lasting political allegiances are roughly ages 14 to 24.

Approximately 40.7% of Baby Boomers were ages 14 - 24 at the time of the assassination of MLK—an undeniably defining moment in US history, politics, society, culture, and that generation.

But nearly 2 out of 3 Gen Zers, 63.4% of the cohort, were ages 14 - 24 at the moment of Kirk’s death. 

This is a cultural marker. It’s a generational moment. And one we will explore in more depth.

Parallel, Not the Same

Let me be clear: I am not equating King and Kirk as individuals or in their politics. I am comparing the generational imprint of losing movement leaders at the most malleable life stage of a given generation. Malcom Gladwell famously talks about tipping points. While he brings in copious amount of sound research across his two books on the subject, I think it is important to note that this moment is a generational tipping point. 

Social science research shows that once roughly 20 – 25% of a population aligns around an idea or experience, it can catalyze a tipping point in collective behavior (Centola et al., 2018; Rogers, 2003). In raw numbers, that translates to more than 10 million Gen Zers currently in their formative 14 – 24 window, and well over 16 million across the generation as a whole, a critical mass large enough to shape lasting generational memory. This has undeniably defined a generational moment. 

King spoke to a coalition of students, clergy, and young organizers. The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and campus audiences were integral to his strategy (Pew Research Center, 2023). Kirk spoke directly to Gen Z through campus tours and social media; his events routinely targeted high school and college students, and his audience numbered in the millions across platforms (Reuters, 2025a). In fact, as I was fact-checking this essay, I noticed that Kirk’s Instagram following alone increased from about 10 million to 12.3 million, and it’s still climbing. 

The point is not to equate the men. The point is to understand a generational pattern that will impact leaders for decades to come. Both spoke directly to the young. Both imprinted a generation during its most malleable years. 

But first, A Brief Acknowledgment

Every loss of life is tragic. This essay is not meant to be a comprehensive analysis of all news events as they are too vast to begin to recount their significance in our conversation of generational leadership. From the viral light‑rail stabbing of Iryna Zarutska that drew national attention to the  Evergreen High School shooting, which unfolded approximately five minutes after the shooting in Orem (ABC News, 2025a), there has been no shortage of disturbing headlines. 

Not to mention, there have been other recent assassinations, attempts, and attacks on public figures. Those conversations matter. 

Looking back to the 60s there were also key assassinations, including but not limited to Malcom X and JFK. For this piece, I’m narrowing the focus on what movement leaders with large followings mean for the generations they imprint. Further, the approach I take, should be able to give you the tools and frameworks to assess the wider breadth of impact of similar events.

The Generational Prism: Age · Moment · Label

To help us understand just how formative the events may be on the future of Gen Z, we must view the events through the Generational Prism. This is a key framework I used as we analyze generational development. As an adaptation of the popular age-period-cohort methodology, the Generational Prism has three sides: age, moment, and label. 

We will not fully grasp the impact of a day like September 10, 2025 for years, just as MLK’s assassination is still shaping culture more than half a century later.

Part of leading across generations is learning to see all three sides of the prism and how events refract through the prism and shape a generation. 

Age. Look at the life stage. When King was killed in 1968, Baby Boomers (born 1946–1964) were roughly 4 – 22 years old. When Kirk was killed last week (2025), Gen Z (born 1997–2012) were ~13 – 28. Both eras, the shock struck young people precisely as their worldviews were congealing. While Gen Z trends older at this moment, it’s important to note that two thirds of the generations are in their most formative years. As stated in the opening, two out of every five Boomers were in the politically formative years at the time of the MLK assassination, and nearly 50% more Gen Zers, almost two out of every three, are currently in their prime formation years. 

Moment. The media environment is the hinge. In 1968, grief moved at the pace of anchors and afternoon editions; images were limited and mediated. By 1966, public sentiment around King was polarizing 63% unfavorable in Gallup’s last pre‑assassination reading (Gallup, 2006). Fast forward to recent history: in 2019, Ipsos found that 90% of Americans had a favorable view of MLK, and YouGov, in 2021, similarly found that 89% of Americans held a favorable view. That is a stark contrast and a dramatic reversal that evolved over nearly 60 years. 

In 2025, grief moved at the speed of push alerts and autoplay. Within minutes of the Orem shooting, graphic footage saturated social feeds (Reuters, 2025a). Today, 52% of TikTok users and 59% of X users say they regularly get news on those platforms (Pew Research Center, 2024b). The medium of memory, broadcast then, algorithm now, shapes how the shock imprints

Label. Even before “Boomers” had their formal name, cultural labels swirled: hippies, yuppies, feminists. These were shorthand for youth identity amid the civil‑rights struggle, Vietnam, second‑wave feminism, and the sexual revolution (Pew Research Center, 2023; Gallup, 2006). Gen Z’s labels are different: digital natives, aloof, anxious, chronically online. Labels are crude, but they signal how cohorts are seen in the moment. The label can also be viewed from a macro lens. Simply put, we are examining Boomers and Gen Z. 

The Shock of the Scroll (A Personal Interlude)

I was bombarded by the headlines in USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and CNN. They rang in chorus with several text messages, “did you see...” Each alert illuminated my phone in rapid succession. Then I opened X.

Without warning, the video appeared. Kirk’s microphone dipped away from his mouth as he finished answering a question. Suddenly, he jolted. His head slumped slightly to his left. Two angles, a split‑screen video on autoplay, before I could even process what I was watching. Gobs of blood pulsated out of the side of his neck. 

I hadn’t turned the sound on; maybe the gunshot would have alerted me to scroll away. Instead, the images imprinted instantly. Saving Private Ryan suddenly felt tame compared to the uncensored clip in my hand.

Unlike the 1960s, social media exposes us to trauma we would otherwise never encounter: delivered raw, unfiltered, and inescapably intimate. In the same feed, I watched influencers sob in real time, while others laughed or applauded. The machine amplified both.

Echo Chambers and the New Public Square

In 1968, if you wanted to argue, you went in person to marches, meetings, classrooms, churches, and kitchens. Communities were imperfect echo chambers, but they were physical. You still ran into your neighbor in the grocery store; you had to share space with those you disagreed with.

In 2025, the echo chamber is algorithmic. It sorts, narrows, and accelerates the extremes. In the hours after the Orem shooting, reports of a suspect being in custody circulated; officials later clarified no suspect was in custody that day, and people detained were released (Reuters, 2025a). Two days later, a 22‑year‑old suspect was arrested after tips from family (KSL, 2025). 

This echo chamber could not be more real. On one of my platform feeds, I was flooded with right-wing sympathy and sadness. An outpouring of support for Charlie Kirk and his family and a condemnation of anyone who thought differently. As I switched apps, on another, I was met with tones of praise or celebration or condemnations for hypocrisy from the left. They condemned Kirk for his homophobic and racist tendencies, among other things. As one friend so eloquently put it when referring to the side opposite his, “they are cherry-picking the message.” And quite frankly, with these two parallel feeds I have running, I would argue there is some of that on both sides. What’s most frightening to me is that it is likely not even representative of the majority of one side of the argument, but it is in fact, what the algorithms are perpetuating because they know the power of a visceral reaction. 

To this day, my one feed is filled with one perspective, and the other feed is filled with the other. It’s fascinating because in and of themselves, each feed is an echo chamber spewing vitriol or overflowing with sympathy. 

Leaders must take note. 

We are polarized. 

The Moment We’re Living In

Zooming out, public trust is fragile: in May 2024, only 22% of Americans said they trust the federal government “just about always” or “most of the time” (Pew Research Center, 2024a). At the same time, a non‑trivial minority tells pollsters that political violence may be justified “to save our country” 23% in PRRI’s 2023 American Values Survey, remaining elevated in 2024 (PRRI, 2023; PRRI, 2024). Wordings differ across surveys, but the core signal is steady: low institutional trust plus rising tolerance for political hostility is the water Gen Z is swimming in.

When a movement leader is killed at the exact age window where convictions set, the imprint is profound. That was true for Boomers in 1968. It is true for Gen Z in 2025.

Memory, Markers, and What Leaders Should See

Last week, we remembered 9/11, another generational marker. That tragedy unfolded at a different pace. News came through television, radio, and word of mouth, stretching across days and weeks. People processed it together in classrooms, workplaces, churches, and living rooms. 

Contrast that with today. The assassination in Orem was witnessed in near-real time on millions of screens, unfiltered, algorithmically amplified, and instantly polarizing. Instead of neighbors in conversation, we have echo chambers dividing our youth, and quite honestly, our world.

Utah’s Governor Spencer Cox put words to the danger after Kirk’s killing: “To my young friends… You are inheriting a country where it feels like rage is the only option. That’s the problem with political violence. It metastasizes.” (Salt Lake Tribune, 2025).

Martin Luther King Jr.’s impact is still unfolding fifty-seven years later. The same will be true of this moment. Leaders, parents, teachers, and employers: pay attention. This is a generational marker. If we miss what it does to Gen Z’s sense of truth, authority, and authenticity, we’ll miss what history is already writing in real time.

Closing Thoughts

Leaders cannot shield their people from generational markers, but they can shape how those markers are metabolized. That’s our responsibility in this moment.

We live in a world where cultural trauma arrives through a scroll, often without warning. For many in Gen Z, Charlie Kirk’s assassination was experienced alone at a desk, in a classroom, on a bus, with autoplay delivering something they can never unsee. That isolation is new. And it’s dangerous.

At the same time, their feeds may be telling two entirely different stories: one of grief and sympathy, the other of anger, hurt, frustration, and celebration. Both are real. Both are incomplete. Leaders must foster dialogue that moves offline, into embodied spaces, where nuance can survive.

This generation, Gen Z, already longs for authenticity and truth. It is that desire that likely skyrocketed Charlie Kirk to internet and campus stardom. The problem is when truth itself feels fractured, and when even authentic community becomes a target for violence, trust erodes even further. In those moments, the best thing leaders can do is anchor people in mission, values, and purpose that don’t swing with the headlines.

There’s risk in reacting too quickly, and there’s risk in responding too slowly. The line between them is thin. Sometimes the wisest move is to acknowledge uncertainty out loud: “We don’t have all the facts yet. But I know this moment matters. And I know we can walk through it together.”

If there’s one takeaway, it’s this: Gen Z doesn’t need leaders who have all the answers. They need leaders who see the weight of the moment, who ask good questions, and who help them build resilience in the middle of uncertainty.

Let me take a brief aside here. For many in Gen Z, Charlie Kirk was instantly recognizable, whether from his Instagram clips, TikTok debates, or campus rallies. Older generations, less present on those platforms, were less likely to know of him until headlines broke. There’s also an interest barrier: people tended to know him if they aligned with his values or if they strongly opposed them. We need to compare that to the way news was delivered and media was consumed in Martin Luther King Jr.’s day. I would hypothesize MLK was more universally recognized across generations simply because there were fewer options: a handful of radio stations, a few TV networks, and the major newspapers. If someone appeared in those spaces, they were likely recognized broadly across society. That reality matters for leaders: some of your people experienced this as the loss of a familiar figure, while others encountered him for the first time through breaking news and both perspectives shape how this moment will be processed across generations.

Leaders, this is your invitation. Don’t add to the noise. Don’t retreat into silence. Create spaces for dialogue. Anchor people in what’s true and lasting. And remember, history is already being written in real time.

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