Few days pass on the modern college campus without seeing a vape. Youth nicotine use, which declined by as much as 50% in the early 2000s, has seen a massive resurgence. Just last semester, The Student Life posted an opinion piece practically endorsing the addictive habit.
Our generation could have kicked the habit for good, but two harbingers of doom conditioned our generation to be vulnerable to this new addiction. You may cry hearsay razor, but I believe that the modern climate crisis, coupled with the invasion of Iraq, caused the modern vaping epidemic among Gen Z.
We know that vaping is bad for us; we know that it causes lung complications and carries with it long-term health risks. But we still do it. Experts have identified peer pressure, exposure to e-cigarette marketing and fun flavors as the drivers. But I don’t think this is the entire story. A modern epidemic can not be explained by “Watermelon Strawberry Ice.”
Now, I do not believe that every time a teen hits a Geek Bar, they do so with the Iraq War and climate change in mind. That’s ridiculous. Rather, what I am arguing is that these two events have shaped what it means to grow up as Gen Z, and that they have engineered the conditions necessary to cause the vaping epidemic.
In a survey conducted by Common Sense Media, one-third of Gen Z respondents aged 12 to 17 said that their life was going well. Compared with other generations, Gen Z is less likely to rate the prospect of their future lives highly.
It’s no wonder, then, that a generation that feels as though the world is falling apart around them turns to the quick gratification granted by vapes, regardless of the health risks.
This level of dread can be, in my eyes, directly correlated to climate anxiety and the level of despondency associated with the Iraq War.
More than half of Gen Z believes that humanity is doomed as a result of climate change. Thus, a generation that feels betrayed by its political leaders, with their futures sold out for immediate profit, looks for easy and quick ways to escape those feelings. With the existential threat of growing global temperatures, forced migration, mass extinction and rising sea levels, young people are more comfortable opting for vapes.
Any instincts for self-preservation have been kicked to the side.
The fact that Gen Z has never seen a moment in which the U.S. was not involved in war in the Middle East has cemented a dissatisfaction and overall disillusionment with the government.
The U.S. government going to war under shoddy pretenses is not a new concept — think of Vietnam. Gen Z was taught young, early and often who the government prioritizes.
During the Vietnam War, drug addiction shot up among both soldiers and those at home, a parallel to the Iraq War that should not be ignored. When governments place people’s lives at risk for little to no actual gain, our population suffers.
The Iraq War dominated the news cycle from 2003 to 2011 and provided a constant backdrop of warfare and despair for Gen Z’s childhood. Having been disillusioned with the prospects of the future, we are filled with a level of existential dread that encourages a habit that slowly kills us.
The politics of the 21st century have been stained by death, creating the perfect conditions for such a deadly emergence.
Growing up with endless war and climate devastation, the end of humanity seems to be approaching at an increasingly rapid rate. In 2020, the Doomsday clock — a device used to warn the public about how close we are to human-made global catastrophe — jumped 20 seconds closer to midnight, an indication of the threats posed by climate change and modern warfare. This is not a normal perception of current events. The prospects of our future have been fundamentally mutilated.
Gen Z is the unhappiest generation ever, and whether that unhappiness is justified or not, this has led to an embrace of sweet-flavored vapes. This is not a novel concept, as dropping mood levels and addiction have been frequently linked. But we must examine this generational depression as causal to an epidemic that has led to addiction and poor health outcomes for many — regardless of emerging information about the real dangers they pose.
The idea that these larger-than-life political phenomena breed a new addiction within Gen Z may seem speculative; however, by placing this seemingly unexplainable habit among its contemporary backdrop of climate issues and global wars — the defining features of the 21st century — one can draw a clear connection and offer more robust explanations for vape addiction than peer pressure and tasty flavors.
This is why Gen Z must resist vaping. Not only is it a detrimental habit, but it is a political imperative not to vape. A generation that has given up on themselves, through an embrace of nihilistic habits because of nihilistic thought, cannot aptly stand up for their own futures. Vaping is waving the white flag, embracing trepidation and gloom, when we must fight back against it.
In order to address the forces that compel us to vape, we must first put down the vape.
Alex Benach PO ’28 is a first-year at Pomona from Washington, DC. He argues that quitting vaping is the first step to fighting fascism.
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