Words like “lit,” “slay,” “cringe” and “brat” seem to be everywhere lately – from national news stories to the presidential campaign. 

That’s thanks to today’s tweens, teens and young adults, whose love of the slang terms is bringing them into the lexicon.

But we at Senior Times wondered just how far they’ve reached, so we took an informal poll at Active 4 Life’s 29th annual Senior Community Picnic.

The verdict? The slang doesn’t exactly slay with the more seasoned crowd.

Chuck Porche, 80, of Pasco, shook his head when we showed him our list of Gen Alpha lingo that included lit, slay, brat, rizz, cringe, bussin’, bet and skibidi. He didn’t have the first clue what they meant.

Chuck’s wife, Gwen, 76, was in the same boat. A few words looked familiar, but she wasn’t sure about their current usage.

That was a common refrain. Most seniors we chatted with said they weren’t up to speed on tween and teen vocab, even though their grandchildren and great-grandchildren might sometimes toss the words around.

The Porches, who’ve been married 57 years, said times have changed since they were growing up in Louisiana – back when “cool” and “far out” were the slang of the day. The world back then “was still crazy, but not as crazy as today,” Gwen told the Senior Times. “It was more fun.”

In Chuck’s view, “it was more family orientated.”

It was also safer, he said – or at least it felt that way.

“When we’d go out, we wouldn’t lock our front doors,” he said.

They feel for kids today who live in a world dominated by electronics.

That was another common refrain – seniors at the picnic talked about how they didn’t have to contend with online bullying when they were growing up.

“I think there’s a lot more pressure today – peer pressure – with social media,” said Betty Rose, 78, of Pasco. 

“We were talking about it last night, (asking) do you remember being bullied?” she said, adding that the answer was “no.” 

Instead, “you’d just tell them to shut up and go away,” Rose said.

She was visiting vendor booths at the senior picnic with Sandy Coe, 85, of Pasco. Coe is a former teacher, and she spotted “brat” on the slang list and joked that she used to deploy that word from time to time.

In its new meaning, brat is a compliment that means someone or something is confidently rebellious, playfully defiant and bold, in the words of Forbes.

Another word on the list proved particularly confounding to seniors: skibidi.

Part of the reason could be that it doesn’t have any particular meaning. 

It can mean a lot of different things.

In that way, “(it’s) like ‘uff da’ in Norwegian,” said Ginger Fields, 80, of Pasco.

Of all the seniors polled, Arlette Cavender, 72, of Pasco, seemed most open to the slang. When given the definition of “brat,” she embraced it.

Bold, rebellious – “that could be me, in my heart,” she said.

And rizz, which refers to charm and the ability to flirt?

“That would definitely be me,” she said.

And what about the nebulous skibidi? “Pretty cool” was her verdict. She’d use that word if she were a teen today, she said.

Cavender did offer some advice to tweens and teens today.

Being an adult is full of responsibilities, she said. It isn’t always fun.

If you can, Cavender said with a laugh, “don’t grow up.”