Why TikTokers are talking about being in “Group 7,” a decrease in the number of young people self-identifying as trans and nonbinary, and what it means that over half of the internet’s articles are now written by AI. But first:
Resource of the Week: Conversation Kit on Miracles
If you’ve ever struggled to explain what a miracle is, wondered if God still uses miracles, or even prayed for a miracle that didn’t happen, this five-part video series is for you. Our first video Conversation Kit in two years walks through the questions about miracles that so many of us have. If you are one of the readers who answered our survey about miracles a few months ago, you might even recognize some of the content! Check it out here, and let us know what you think.
And now for our three conversations..
1. You Are In Group 7
What it is: Singer and TikToker Sophia James posted a series of videos, segmenting viewers into groups. For whatever reason, the seventh and final video struck a chord.
What it means: “If you’re watching this video, you are in Group 7,” James says in the video. “I don’t know what that says about you, but, you’re in Group 7. Welcome!” While originally designed as a way to hack the algorithm into spreading her new song “So Unfair” (which is playing in the background of all seven videos), the trend plays off of the idea that TikTok’s algorithm knows you, and that what it shows you has real significance for your identity. Viewers of the Group 7 video immediately turned the group identity into a source of pride, so much so that James even decided to host a Group 7 meetup tonight in London at 7pm.
Continue the conversation: Can you explain to me, in your own words, what it means to be in Group 7?
2. Reversing the Trend
What it is: New data suggests that the number of young people who self-identify as transgender and nonbinary declined in 2024.
What it means for the next generation: According to analysis by Dr. Twenge (who we interviewed here about technology), the population numbers of those experiencing gender identity confusion may have passed their peak. As she wrote in her newsletter, Generation Tech, “Americans born in the early 2000s were more likely to identify as transgender than those born before or after them. That was also true for identifying as nonbinary, though with a less pronounced up and down pattern.” It is too early, and the data set too limited, to draw much of a conclusion beyond this observation, but it does suggest that younger people are starting to feel differently about gender.
Continue the conversation: Do you think people your age are more or less likely to identify as trans or nonbinary?
3. Slop City
What it is: A report done by search-engine-optimization firm Graphite and summarized by Axios found that about half of articles on the internet are the product of generative AI.
How to translate the data: As we adjust to a world with AI-generated content, it’s not entirely possible to know how much content is truly created by the machine. Even Graphite admits their AI-detection tool was wrong just under 5% of the time. Still, it’s important for teens and their parents to approach internet content with the idea that it could be just copy-pasted from AI. Graphite also found that, “the proportion of AI-generated articles has plateaued since May 2024.” Meaning, even though half of the internet’s articles are now generated by AI, the percentage doesn’t seem to be increasing beyond that. However, there’s another, related concern about AI-generated content, which has just as much to do with humans interacting with AI as AI interacting with itself.
Let’s translate this one further…
It’s the height of “spooky season”—but you already knew that. Macabre lawn ornaments, like 15-foot skeletons, ghosts hanging from trees, and zombies crawling out of gardens, are everywhere. While many people (my mom included [hi mom]) don’t appreciate these visuals, they remind me of an even creepier possibility: the dead internet theory. Maybe we’ve been interacting with a zombie internet for years.
The basic idea is that the internet has become a bot echo-chamber, with modern AI only speeding up this process. Bots like AI-generated images, comment things like “Don’t you just love his content?” with obviously AI profile pictures, and reply to each other in forums. To give one potential example, last year, a strange trend of combining an image of Jesus with a giant shrimp took off on social media. These images got thousands of likes and bizarre comments like “Amen 🙏”.
It makes you question how much of the “engagement” online actually represents warm-blooded people looking for connection—and whether social media can actually provide that connection, especially considering the hordes of bots and AI-generated content.
In Jeremiah 2, the prophet calls out the people of God for rejecting the living water, choosing instead to drink from cisterns hewed by their own hands. Cisterns were often a last-ditch, emergency measure for a city besieged. The water in them was stagnant and lifeless.
Whether or not the internet is dead in the water, our culture continues to drink from cisterns instead of vibrant, flowing water when it comes to community. While Jeremiah is specifically speaking of God as the living water we should drink from (a metaphor of which Jesus was fond), I do think our spiritual community—our church—is another life-giving way we encounter Jesus. And this sort of community isn’t something we can outsource to AI or do over Zoom or via Instagram comments. It requires physical presence. It’s showing up at the hospital after the accident. It’s celebrating the birth of that miracle child. It’s the knowing look, the big hug, the smile across the room, the squeeze of the hand. It’s the ways we show a little of Jesus’ love to one another.
For more context and nuance, check out our Roundtable podcast on Spotify, Apple, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen to podcasts. In the meantime, here are three questions to help you continue the conversation with your teens:
- How do you know for sure that something on the internet was created by a human? What about AI?
- Have you heard of the “dead internet” theory? What do you think of it?
- What’s something you appreciate about being with your friends in person?
Parenting together,
CJ Fant and the Axis Team
PS: On your way out, here’s a quick survey of some of the rest of the cultural landscape:
- Colleen Hoover, the #BookTok author of It Ends With Us, has another movie adaptation coming out this week called Regretting You.
- Twitch streamer Emiru was forcefully grabbed by a large man at TwitchCon, and has sworn off future participation in their conference because of how Twitch handled it.
- The massive power outage at AWS (Amazon Web Services), impacting the functionality of apps, banks, and alarm clocks (just to name a few), is sparking new conversations about the potential dangers of tech monopoly.
- MrBeast reportedly filed a trademark application for “MrBeast Financial,” leading many to suspect that Jimmy Donaldson’s newest stunt might be starting his own bank.
- A trending meme uses a drawing of the White Rabbit (from Alice in Wonderland) pointing at a clock to joke about how much time people do (or don’t) have left.
Know someone who could use our conversation starters with their teens? Share the CT with a friend!