We are currently in the midst of a rapid linguistic development: the degradation of the English language through seemingly mindless terms such as “Skibidi” and “Ohio Rizz”. Of course, we can thank Generation Alpha for these contributions, the same generation that was coincidentally raised watching TikTok. It is important to note that Gen Z has also had a prominent role in most of this slang, although they arguably didn’t take it as far as their successors. That aside, Charles Darwin once famously expressed that it is not the most intelligent of a species that survives, but the most adaptable to change. With that in mind, let’s analyze a few Generation Alpha slang words and learn how to apply them in an everyday context.
Starting off with “Fanum Tax”, this phrase expresses the idea of taking a portion of food from another person under some impression that they owe it to you. It’s derived from a Fortnite streamer named “Fanum”, who is known for “Fanum Taxing” the snacks of his friends. The idea of jokingly taxing your friend’s food definitely does not originate from Fanum, although he seems to have popularized the concept among the newest generation. A good context to practice this phrase would be a movie theater. First, invite your friends to watch a movie and let them buy popcorn, do not buy anything yourself. Then, occasionally take popcorn from their buckets throughout the movie, loudly announcing “Fanum Tax” as you do. Everyone in the theater- including your friends- will be impressed by how cultured you are. That being said, you may need to find a new group of friends to practice the next slang words with.
Next, we have the centuries-old word “Ohio”, which has been graciously assigned a new meaning by Generation Alpha. The 17th state of the USA can finally be used as an adjective, just as the founding fathers intended. The new meaning of the word stems from a series of memes that portray Ohio as a bizarre and frightening place, an obvious satirical commentary on Ohio’s reputation of being a boring chunk of dusty land full of potato farmers. As a result, Ohio has become a synonym for the word “weird”. I recommend traveling to Ohio to practice using this word, as the state of being in Ohio may remind you to constantly use the word Ohio in front of every noun. For example, when going into a store, ask where the “Ohio oranges” are and respond to everything with “Only in Ohio”. If the locals seem confused or offended by your unorthodox use of their state name, respond by kindly accusing them of being Ohio.
The word “rizz” is probably the most straightforward of the new slang, simply being a shortened form of the word “charisma”. The infamous word “Skibidi”, however, is much more mysterious in its meaning. The word is derived from the viral song “Dom Dom Yes Yes” by Bulgarian singer Biser King, who used the word as a meaningless sound in his music. A content creator by the name of Alexey Gerasimov made the word even more popular among Generation Alpha by animating a long-necked man inside of a toilet singing a remix of the song. The word is now used in a variety of contexts, its meaning sometimes coming closer to the word “cool” and sometimes to the words “scary” or “evil”. One unique feature of this word is that it is often used to add emphasis to a phrase, working especially well with other Gen-Alpha/Z words. For example, the statement “The rizzler was lowkey slaying at Fortnite, no cap” is slightly less pronounced than the statement “The skibidi rizzler was lowkey slaying at Fortnite, no cap”. I would practice this word by frequently using it in important essays or job resumes in order to bring attention to crucial points; its lack of set meaning allows for very flexible use.
There are many other words to learn in order to keep up with the ever-evolving English language, but given that this is physically painful to type, I’ll leave it up to you to discover and utilize the rest of the Gen Alpha slang words. That, or we could resort back to medieval English.
