What is the 'millennial optimism' era on TikTok – and did it ever really exist?

TikTok has found its latest generational obsession, and (for a refreshing change) it isn’t Gen Z. The app is now fixated on the so-called 'millennial optimism' era, a nostalgic era that feels both remembered and imagined.

For anyone not chronically online, the trend features people posting early-2000s throwback snaps set to 'Blood' by a band called The Middle East. Think moustache mugs, Apple Photo Booth selfies, owl-print tops and grainy house-party photos, unfiltered, unedited.

It was very much a you had to be there era when performative hipsters were at their peak.

In one clip, one Gen Zer quipped: "Every day I'm faced with the sad reality that performative millennial hipsters from 2005-2012 really did have it so much better."

Another humoured: "Millennial optimism era really had me thinking I could make a living as a part-time barista and live in a six-bedroom house with all my friends."

However, while it all looks like fun and games, some millennials have stepped in to dampen the nostalgia, pointing out that the era wasn’t quite as idyllic as TikTok makes it seem.

One person by the username @neek4freaks suggests the TikTok trend is "missing the mark," explaining: "I assure you that during the early 2010s-late 2000s, I was the most pessimistic that I've ever been in my life."

He went on to express his confusion over the "iTunes commercial" backing track, which he suggests reduces the era to a "commercialised TikTokable moment".

The comments from fellow millennials soon backed his points, with one writing: "The music was great, the times were hard."

Another added: "It wasn't labelled 'recession pop' for no reason! We were all depressed, anxious, and just holding onto Obama's hopey changey message to make it through those years."

Meanwhile, a third chimed in: "They also think hipsters were popular when nobody liked hipsters…"

Ouch.

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