“The Daily Show” correspondent Grace Kuhlenschmidt took to the streets of New York City to ask Gen Z if they were outraged by billionaire social media owners publicly aligning with President Donald Trump. But after everyone agreed, she asked the real question — are they enraged enough to delete their apps?
Presumably in response to the row of billionaires including Meta owner Mark Zuckerberg and X boss Elon Musk sitting behind Trump at his inauguration, one viewer flatly said, “That actually made me so mad.”
“Mm-hmm, you seem pissed,” Kuhlenschmidt joked in Wednesday’s segment.
One girl was quick to say it “just feels very propaganda,” while another added, “And to see it so blatantly broadcasted, that like … the combined wealth of like a trillion dollars sits right in front of the cabinet next to the president.”
In a follow-up question, the “Daily Show” correspondent asked if the anger towards the social media owners is justified. After a round of unanimous “Yes’s,” TikTok, Instagram and X were all named.
“Would you be like, ‘OK, I have to get off this app?’” Kuhlenschmidt inquired.
“When I am opening Instagram, I am not being run by Mark Zuckerberg,” one interviewee responded defiantly. “I am just, like deciding, all right I am going to go on here. And yeah, kind of finding more cooking things.”
“So if it is an amazing one-pot pasta recipe, it is actually fine that this is being monetized to Trump,” the comedian then joked.
So what would it take to delete the app? Many of the Comedy Central participants hesitated — with one girl admitting she had deleted Instagram previously. “I will probably delete it again. We do not need it,” she added.
“But you do say you keep redownloading it,” Kuhlenschmidt pressed. “So what do you think Mark Zuckerberg could do to make you kind of kick it out?”
She immediately responded with a sigh, “He has probably already done enough.”
After agreeing to delete an app, two different interviewees hesitated, saying that “people get FOMO from not being on social media, but then they get FOMO from real life from being on social media.”
In another funny moment, one girl offered to only delete the AirBnb app. When pushed to actually delete one of the apps, even Kuhlenschmidt could not manage to go through with it, with one interviewee calling her a “coward.”
“It is not cowardly!,” Kuhlenschmidt responded. “You do not understand the addiction. I am addicted to it and I cannot get off. Cut the f–-cking cameras.”
