Unusually for me, I feel like I should come to the defence of Gen Z.

These are the kids aged 14-29. We complain a lot about them, about how soft they are, how they lack resilience, and what a bunch of complainers they are.

The latest to join in this week was Michelle Obama, who said they aren’t developing the resilience they need because of a culture of instant gratification. And then told them they need bad bosses and boring jobs if they want to be successful.

Now, Michelle Obama is right. We’ve all had to pass through the boring jobs. For me it was the drive through at McDonalds in Bombay.

We’ve all had to be paid poorly – $32,000 a year is what I started on.

We’ve all had to have the awful boss, or bosses.

Gen Z is only experiencing what we all did, and like we also did, they have unrealistic expectations about how awesome and fantastic life is going to be as soon as they get their first paycheck.

And sure, some of them do have a lack of resilience. That’s what happens when your parents are Gen Xers and millennials who helicopter parented you and gentle parented you and you never learned how to feel properly sad or uncomfortable.

But they are also, I think, better at setting boundaries than any of us before.

And some of that is what we’re seeing and calling "complaining" and "a lack of resilience".

We put up with demands to do extra work, unpaid. They know that’s a rort.

We went to parties and get-togethers we didn’t want to just because we thought we had to. They say no.

We allowed our bosses to give us zero pay rises while inflation shot up. They know that’s basically a pay cut.

I think it’s two sides of the same coin.

And again, we probably have gentle parenting to thank for teaching them to use their words and set boundaries in a way that most of us never learned.

So next time we hear criticism of Gen Z, and trust me they’re annoying so it will happen, it might pay to ask; is this a lack of resilience, a lack of toughness, or is it just that they know how to say no?

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