Instead of taking their complaints straight to HR—they’re turning to TikTok for advice on ‘protecting their peace’
“Give me your most unhinged toxic job survival hacks,” wrote one user, @lifeandworkbutbetter on TikTok, in a video that’s amassed 6 million views.
“I’m not talking about ‘set boundaries’ or ‘document everything’, I mean the most unhinged, borderline unethical thing you’ve ever done to keep your sanity.”
Gen Z’s most common unhinged hack? Malicious compliance—referring to a viral workplace trend of following instructions exactly as given, even when they know doing so will cause inefficiency or backfire. It’s a form of passive-aggressive protest that’s less dramatic than quitting, but just as telling.
“Once my job made us do ‘productivity’ timesheets and we all agreed to be maliciously compliant,” one user commented. “People were writing, “8:01, hang up jacket, 8:05 took tampon out.”
“[I] Do EXACTLY what my boss tells me. Word for word,” another user wrote. “If it wasn’t spelled out, it isn’t getting done. Malicious compliance.”
Gen Z’s guide to corporate survival: Mel Robbins, fake lawyers and revenge quitting
Other tricks Gen Zers say they’re turning to to survive their “toxic jobs” include leaning on the “Let them” theory from Mel Robbins, the “Gray Rock method” (essentially, disengaging with that job or person) and copying a fake lawyer into emails with difficult clients.
“I tell myself we’re all characters in a sitcom like The Office and that they are the characters meant to be disliked by the audience and I just stare at the camera,” one user joked.
“I started lying about myself lol,” another user commented. “I would give different people different versions of events about myself and when someone confronted me about the stories being different, I knew they were talking about me behind my back.”
Other young workers aren’t passively aggressively expressing their discontent and unhappiness at the workplace; instead, they’re behaving loudly in the face of employers and ‘revenge quitting.’
The online trend reflects Gen Z’s broader discontent with their management in the workplace. With limited job security, high costs of living, and few attractive alternatives, many feel stuck—and these hacks are how they’re making it through.
Though the Zoomer generation may have just gained footing at their 9-to-5s, they aren’t scared to hop off the corporate ladder fast for the sake of their mental health.
For employers, the message is clear: failure to provide flexibility, growth, and respect for personal boundaries that the post-millennial generation strives for is leading to higher turnover rates.
Nearly 60% of Gen Zers described their current role as a “situationship,” a short-term job they never intended to stay in for the long term, according to a recent survey of young workers. Of those planning to leave their roles, nearly half said they expect to exit within the next year, and a quarter said they’re ready to quit at any moment.
Gen Z toxic-coping response could damage their future careers
Ben Granger, chief workplace psychologist at Qualtrics with a background in behavioral science, says that even in toxic environments, some of Gen Z’s coping mechanisms, like passive aggressive behavior or public retaliation, could damage their future career prospects.
The psychological tendency—called the fundamental attribution error—is that people assume someone’s actions reflect their personality, rather than the environment they’re in.
“If they [employers] have that perception, it can really do a lot of damage,” Granger tells Fortune.
As many employers have caught on, Gen Z is often motivated to challenge the status quo and eager to contribute, but when ideas are shut down, frustration can escalate if workers aren’t prepared for the resistance they may face.
Instead, Granger recommends setting realistic expectations during the hiring process and reframing challenges rather than retaliating.
“Those challenges that you’re going through—they might be really frustrating, but there’s a difference between those frustrations and something that’s unproductive for you,” Granger says. “What’s the most productive response? That’s the question I would raise to folks who are considering [retaliating].”
“When you’re applying for a job, they’re not just interviewing you — you’re interviewing them,” he adds. “Start setting those expectations for yourself and for your potential employer.”
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A federal judge on Friday gave the Justice Department permission to release transcripts of a grand jury investigation into Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse of underage girls in Florida — a case that ultimately ended without any federal charges being filed against the millionaire sex offender.
U.S. District Judge Rodney Smith said a recently passed federal law ordering the release of records related to Epstein overrode the usual rules about grand jury secrecy.
The law signed in November by President Donald Trump compels the Justice Department, FBI and federal prosecutors to release later this month the vast troves of material they have amassed during investigations into Epstein that date back at least two decades.
Friday’s court ruling dealt with the earliest known federal inquiry.
In 2005, police in Palm Beach, Florida, where Epstein had a mansion, began interviewing teenage girls who told of being hired to give the financier sexualized massages. The FBI later joined the investigation.
Federal prosecutors in Florida prepared an indictment in 2007, but Epstein’s lawyers attacked the credibility of his accusers publicly while secretly negotiating a plea bargain that would let him avoid serious jail time.
In 2008, Epstein pleaded guilty to relatively minor state charges of soliciting prostitution from someone under age 18. He served most of his 18-month sentence in a work release program that let him spend his days in his office.
The U.S. attorney in Miami at the time, Alex Acosta, agreed not to prosecute Epstein on federal charges — a decision that outraged Epstein’s accusers. After the Miami Herald reexamined the unusual plea bargain in a series of stories in 2018, public outrage over Epstein’s light sentence led to Acosta’s resignation as Trump’s labor secretary.
A Justice Department report in 2020 found that Acosta exercised “poor judgment” in handling the investigation, but it also said he did not engage in professional misconduct.
A different federal prosecutor, in New York, brought a sex trafficking indictment against Epstein in 2019, mirroring some of the same allegations involving underage girls that had been the subject of the aborted investigation. Epstein killed himself while awaiting trial. His longtime confidant and ex-girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell, was then tried on similar charges, convicted and sentenced in 2022 to 20 years in prison.
Transcripts of the grand jury proceedings from the aborted federal case in Florida could shed more light on federal prosecutors’ decision not to go forward with it. Records related to state grand jury proceedings have already been made public.
When the documents will be released is unknown. The Justice Department asked the court to unseal them so they could be released with other records required to be disclosed under the Epstein Files Transparency Act. The Justice Department hasn’t set a timetable for when it plans to start releasing information, but the law set a deadline of Dec. 19.
The law also allows the Justice Department to withhold files that it says could jeopardize an active federal investigation. Files can also be withheld if they’re found to be classified or if they pertain to national defense or foreign policy.
One of the federal prosecutors on the Florida case did not answer a phone call Friday and the other declined to answer questions.
A judge had previously declined to release the grand jury records, citing the usual rules about grand jury secrecy, but Smith said the new federal law allowed public disclosure.
The Justice Department has separate requests pending for the release of grand jury records related to the sex trafficking cases against Epstein and Maxwell in New York. The judges in those matters have said they plan to rule expeditiously.
Mexico’s anti-money laundering office has frozen the bank accounts of the Mexican co-owner of Miss Universe as part of an investigation into drugs, fuel and arms trafficking, an official said Friday.
The country’s Financial Intelligence Unit, which oversees the fight against money laundering, froze Mexican businessman Raúl Rocha Cantú’s bank accounts in Mexico, a federal official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment on the investigation.
The action against Rocha Cantú adds to mounting controversies for the Miss Universe organization. Last week, a court in Thailand issued an arrest warrant for the Thai co-owner of the Miss Universe Organization in connection with a fraud case and this year’s competition — won by Miss Mexico Fatima Bosch — faced allegations of rigging.
The Miss Universe organization did not immediately respond to an email from The Associated Press seeking comment about the allegations against Rocha Cantú.
Mexico’s federal prosecutors said last week that Rocha Cantú has been under investigation since November 2024 for alleged organized crime activity, including drug and arms trafficking, as well as fuel theft. Last month, a federal judge issued 13 arrest warrants for some of those involved in the case, including the Mexican businessman, whose company Legacy Holding Group USA owns 50% of the Miss Universe shares.
The organization’s other 50% belongs to JKN Global Group Public Co. Ltd., a company owned by Jakkaphong “Anne” Jakrajutatip.
A Thai court last week issued an arrest warrant for Jakrajutatip who was released on bail in 2023 on the fraud case. She failed to appear as required in a Bangkok court on Nov. 25. Since she did not notify the court about her absence, she was deemed to be a flight risk, according to a statement from the Bangkok South District Court.
The court rescheduled her hearing for Dec. 26.
Rocha Cantú was also a part owner of the Casino Royale in the northern Mexican city of Monterrey, when it was attacked in 2011 by a group of gunmen who entered it, doused gasoline and set it on fire, killing 52 people.
Baltazar Saucedo Estrada, who was charged with planning the attack, was sentenced in July to 135 years in prison.
European Union regulators on Friday fined X, Elon Musk’s social media platform, 120 million euros ($140 million) for breaches of the bloc’s digital regulations, in a move that risks rekindling tensions with Washington over free speech.
The European Commission issued its decision following an investigation it opened two years ago into X under the 27-nation bloc’s Digital Services Act, also known as the DSA.
It’s the first time that the EU has issued a so-called non-compliance decision since rolling out the DSA. The sweeping rulebook requires platforms to take more responsibility for protecting European users and cleaning up harmful or illegal content and products on their sites, under threat of hefty fines.
The Commission, the bloc’s executive arm, said it was punishing X because of three different breaches of the DSA’s transparency requirements. The decision could rile President Donald Trump, whose administration has lashed out at digital regulations, complained that Brussels was targeting U.S. tech companies and vowed to retaliate.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio posted on his X account that the Commission’s fine was akin to an attack on the American people. Musk later agreed with Rubio’s sentiment.
“The European Commission’s $140 million fine isn’t just an attack on @X, it’s an attack on all American tech platforms and the American people by foreign governments,” Rubio wrote. “The days of censoring Americans online are over.”
Vice President JD Vance, posting on X ahead of the decision, accused the Commission of seeking to fine X “for not engaging in censorship.”
“The EU should be supporting free speech not attacking American companies over garbage,” he wrote.
Officials denied the rules were intended to muzzle Big Tech companies. The Commission is “not targeting anyone, not targeting any company, not targeting any jurisdictions based on their color or their country of origin,” spokesman Thomas Regnier told a regular briefing in Brussels. “Absolutely not. This is based on a process, democratic process.”
X did not respond immediately to an email request for comment.
EU regulators had already outlined their accusations in mid-2024 when they released preliminary findings of their investigation into X.
Regulators said X’s blue checkmarks broke the rules because on “deceptive design practices” and could expose users to scams and manipulation.
Before Musk acquired X, when it was previously known as Twitter, the checkmarks mirrored verification badges common on social media and were largely reserved for celebrities, politicians and other influential accounts, such as Beyonce, Pope Francis, writer Neil Gaiman and rapper Lil Nas X.
After he bought it in 2022, the site started issuing the badges to anyone who wanted to pay $8 per month.
That means X does not meaningfully verify who’s behind the account, “making it difficult for users to judge the authenticity of accounts and content they engage with,” the Commission said in its announcement.
X also fell short of the transparency requirements for its ad database, regulators said.
Platforms in the EU are required to provide a database of all the digital advertisements they have carried, with details such as who paid for them and the intended audience, to help researches detect scams, fake ads and coordinated influence campaigns. But X’s database, the Commission said, is undermined by design features and access barriers such as “excessive delays in processing.”
Regulators also said X also puts up “unnecessary barriers” for researchers trying to access public data, which stymies research into systemic risks that European users face.
“Deceiving users with blue checkmarks, obscuring information on ads and shutting out researchers have no place online in the EU. The DSA protects users,” Henna Virkkunen, the EU’s executive vice-president for tech sovereignty, security and democracy, said in a prepared statement.
The Commission also wrapped up a separate DSA case Friday involving TikTok’s ad database after the video-sharing platform promised to make changes to ensure full transparency.
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AP Writer Lorne Cook in Brussels contributed to this report.
Politics8 years ago