Homer Simpson informed his daughter in 1995: “Lisa, if you don’t like your job, you don’t strike! You show there every day and perform your duties with minimal effort. This is the American manner!”
This year, the term “silent quitting” was coined to describe an employee practice as old as employment itself.
It appears to have originated from a March TikTok video uploaded by Brian Creely, a career consultant with 119,000 YouTube subscribers. He displayed a story written by senior correspondent Aki Ito for Insider. The headline stated, “Fed up with lengthy hours, many employees have decided to take it easy at work instead of quitting their jobs.”
Creely summarized the report and labeled the video, “More people are ‘quiet resigning’ instead of quitting their jobs,” defining the practice as “kicking back and taking it easy at work.” The great majority of the nearly 100,000 likes and over 4,000 comments on the video describe the advantages of performing “the bare minimum.”
But TikToker @zkchillin made the word popular by defining it in a July-posted video “Not quitting your work outright, but abandoning the notion of going above and beyond. You are still doing your responsibilities, but you no longer subscribe to the hustle culture belief that work must be your life – in reality, it is not.”
The video earned approximately 500,000 likes and 3.5 million views. #quietquitting has been seen 159 million times on Twitter.
Since then, “quiet leaving” has dominated the internet, where people argue vehemently about whether it’s a trendy new phrase for sloth or a method to strike back against capitalism gone too far. However, some TikTokers are already questioning the phrase’s usage. The platform has been inundated with videos from users who refuse to claim the term “silent resigning,” arguing that branding it as a new Gen-Z TikTok concept divides workers against one another and puts disadvantaged people at risk.
TikTok, the platform credited with popularizing the term, is now opposed to it.
According to TikTokers, the term “silent quitting” has been misconstrued.
Following Creely’s popular video, much of the coverage of “silent quitting” has portrayed the behavior as a new phenomenon, largely driven by Gen-Z workers who are less productive and dedicated than millennial or Gen-X workers. However, many TikTokers are challenging this narrative.
TikTokers have voiced displeasure with the manner in which the trend has been discussed, claiming that it pits workers against each other and unfairly portrays Gen Z as more entitled or slothful than other generations.
Creely told Insider that there is a misunderstanding about what silent resignation actually entails.
“It’s not laziness or poor work,” he stated. “Quietly leaving a job involves reestablishing a healthy balance between your career and work. In other words, you are performing your duties and establishing clear boundaries.”
Eve Livingstone, work-culture columnist and author of “Make Bosses Pay: Why We Need Unions,” concurs that society is moving away from “hustle culture,” which refers to a state of relentless overwork and professional overachievement, often at the expense of a work-life balance, and which dominated the narrative in the 2010s.
“Over the past few decades, living costs have steadily risen and the rich have gotten richer, while the wages of ordinary workers have remained stagnant and their rights at work have been eroded,” Livingstone told Insider, adding, “it’s no wonder that people are exhausted, fed up, and unmotivated at work.”
TikTokers are eager to point out that Gen-Z did not develop this concept.
There is evidence to suggest that the concept of employees withholding labor is not novel on a global scale.
The BBC reported in 2021 that in China, where competitive overwork is prevalent, the trend “tang ping” – lying flat or taking a break from overwork — took off. As previously reported by Insider, some BIPOC workers have been “quiet quitting” long before the term was coined as a way to push back against the expectation that they must do more than their white colleagues. However, Tiffany Jana, the CEO of TMI Consulting, hypothesized that the term has gained popularity because it affects white people.
Thea de Gallier, a writer and TikToker, shared a video about a recent article she wrote for the British news website I News, saying that she had been “quietly quitting” owing to chronic weariness for years. It is “capitalist gaslighting” and ableism, she added, to frame it as a new, negative trend. “People with a chronic illness, a handicap, or a mental health issue cannot always work at full capacity. It is simply not physically or intellectually feasible “She stated,
Many other TikTokers have pointed out that attributing the concept to the app is incorrect. One user, “Millennial Ms. Frizzle,” who has accumulated 30,000 followers on the app by posting about life as a teacher, stated in a video that she has heard from teachers who have adopted this mindset for 30 years, adding that Gen Z may be more vocal about their mindset on TikTok, but it is not a new concept.
Manu Murano, who operates a social media consulting firm, also released a video on TikTok regarding the alleged trend, in which he stated, “2014 me would laugh out loud if I heard that Generation Z originated the concept of silent resignation.”
Actively advising against the potential pitfalls of “quiet resigning”
Insider discovered that despite a number of news publications saying that TikTok is promoting the practice of “silent resigning,” many app users were actually discouraging others from doing so.
A former employment attorney, Ashley Herd, has posted two videos about silent resignation that have received almost 2.5 million views combined. She stated in her videos that while confining work to the job description is acceptable, doing so “quietly” can be negative.
“If someone is feeling stressed, they should feel comfortable discussing it with their management,” she said.
Other TikTokers contend that “silent quitting” is not a term exclusive to a given generation, but rather to a certain level of privilege.
A TikToker and consultant known as “The HR Queen” uploaded a video with the headline “Minorities should be cautious about quietly resigning.” She remarked in the video, “Unfortunately, minorities are held to a different standard in corporate America. We are viewed differently, and unconscious bias persists, therefore we must go above and beyond to achieve success. We cannot risk being perceived as “underperforming.””
Over 100,000 viewers viewed it, making it one of her most popular uploads. The sentiment was shared by another TikToker identified as Stephanie Perry.
In her TikTok video, she stated that for Black women, quitting quietly is not a viable option due to the societal expectation that they will supply their labor to whatever extent is required. Instead, she asked her followers who are financially able to quit immediately. “Do you need your job? This is a more crucial question than “what do you need to do the most at your job?” “She stated,
In recent weeks, TikTokers have begun warning employees that a “silent resignation” might result in a “quiet dismissal,” a new “workplace trend” The phrase represents the time-honored practice of constructive dismissal, which entails creating a hostile work environment in order to avoid having to fire an employee. Creators are garnering hundreds of thousands of views with posts about “silent firing” and shaming managers who engage in the practice.
Unaffected by the TikTok debate, however, long-term quitters are not expressing regret.
“Take a nap, call in sick, or take the day off,” de Gallier advised her followers. “This constitutes self-care.”
Check out the coverage of Insider’s Digital Culture team for similar articles.