Let's Blame Stephen King For Gen Z Being So... Gen Z

Stephen King 's books have been around for quite some time now, creating fans of his work across several generations. But maybe some of them discovered the King of Horror when they were a little too young.

As one Reddit thread suggests, a lot of Gen Xers found themselves learning a lot of things they probably weren't ready to know.

And now that they have kids, they wonder why Generation Z is so screwed up, according to them. Oh boy, what could be the reason?

Those were the simpler times, when parents didn't really pay attention to what their kids were reading, and it's debatable whether that was for better or worse.

Before the Internet and cell phones, parents were happy to buy books or take their children to the library, where young readers would stumble upon the gems of horror.

One user recalls how, at the age of 10 or 11, they read a scene from Cujo where the protagonist's affair partner broke into her house and, well... spilled his bodily fluids on her bed. Certainly very appropriate material for a child of that age.

"My mother handed me Cujo when I was 7. I was a Jack Kjelgaard fan. My mother saw the snarling, drooling dog snout on the cover of Cujo & says, "you like books about dogs, right?"," Reddit user hypothetical_zombie said.

Others bring up the novel It, when after defeating Pennywise for the first time as kids, each member of the Losers has intercourse with Beverly to "bring unity back to the group." Yikes, maybe the movies cut that scene for a reason.

The recurring theme in all of these confessions is that the parents apparently had a blind spot for literature compared to, say, movies.

If they'd known what kind of books their kids were reading, the kids would have been grounded forever.

Of course, this is all just a joke, every generation is different, and every new one is considered "spoiled" or "messed up" by the previous one.

But as you know, there is truth in every joke.