At a buzzy nightclub in downtown Los Angeles, Gus Rosas, 32, met a new friend on the dancefloor — a 23 or 24-year-old female model, he told Insider.
Rosas, who is gay, said they had an instant connection, and so she playfully teased him and offered him some advice about his dance moves. "She was like, 'You know what's giving away your age?" he recounted to 2.1 million viewers on TikTok earlier this week. "You keep putting your hands up."
Rosas had a bit of an existential crisis, tagging his viral TikTok "too old for the club" and "millennial pause," referring to how millennials instinctively pause after pressing record on a video.
But many commenters rushed to his defense — igniting serious pushback against Gen Z from millennial viewers who name-checked songs that specifically told them to put their arms up. Many also puzzled over what dance moves Gen Z defined as trendy.
Rosas, for his part, considers himself "a millennial with a Gen Z spirit," he told Insider, and "prefers to be in the younger crowd." He says he has a 15-year-old sister and admires her carefree, unfiltered attitude.
"Millennials have grown to just care too much and be too sensitive and worried," he said.
He acknowledged his new friend at the club was probably right, but he couldn't stop himself. "My mom does that," Rosas said on TikTok, explaining he kept putting his arms up and she kept pushing them down. "I'm too old to be in this club."
Generational dancing differences are ripe for discussion on TikTok. But in this instance, most viewers actually rushed to Rosas' defense.
"Sir, I can not shake it like a polaroid picture with my hands glued to my sides," one commenter quipped, referencing the 2003 Outkast song, "Hey Ya!" Another said, referencing lyrics to the Notorious B.I.G. megahit "Big Poppa" from 1994: "But how will anyone know if I'm a true player if I don't throw my hands in the air?"
Many viewers slammed Gen Z, as some wondered whether their dancing involved an emphasis on the lower body. "So they're just out there river dancing?" one asked. "So glad I'm not part of the Gen Z dance police. Live freely, raise those hands baby," another said.
One millennial commenter said Gen Z may be too intentional and serious with their dance moves these days.
"What I noticed in the generation they don't seem to be having fun when they dance," they concluded. "We had fun not caring what people saw!"
