A new article from the Wall Street Journal claims the tuna industry is in dire straits. The reason for their woes? That millennials “can’t be bothered to open and drain the cans, or fetch utensils and dishes to eat the tuna.”
Andy Mecs, vice president of marketing and innovation for StarKist Tuna, told the Journal:
“A lot of millennials don’t even own can openers.”
Late night host Jimmy Kimmel wanted to put this theory to the test. Taking to the streets, Kimmel presented millennials with a can of tuna and a can opener and asked them to do what comes naturally. The results were cringe-worthy.
Twitter users were pretty embarrassed for the struggling millennials.
The world is in trouble
— Warren Hallmark (@6thstringQB) December 11, 2018
I'm a Home Ec Teacher in Massachusetts. FIRST thing I teach to my high school students. They don't even know what it is, when I show it to them.
— Adrienne Donovan (@MsDFamConSci) December 11, 2018
4 years ago I helping host a set of college student workshops on business skills and the most attended was "dining". Absolute truth, most of them had zero idea on manners and how to eat at a table with others. Most of the kids had grown eating fast food from a bag.
— Marsh Mouse (@savethemouse) December 11, 2018
There were also plenty of millennial jokes to go around.
Is it gluten-free vegan tuna?
— Joel Rivera Schoenbach ???????? (@JoelSchoenbach) December 11, 2018
I see cats going starving everywhere.
— David Tibbitts (@DJTibbitts) December 12, 2018
Don't you squeeze it like Popeye?
— Mira A (@midiel) December 11, 2018
Others stood up for the youths in the video.
If only the industry could invent a solution pic.twitter.com/jNpsEoptV5
— friends of friends for a reason (@samizzzdat) December 11, 2018
I think I've found a solution ???? pic.twitter.com/Glh9uEMQEF
— La Pancera Rosa (@LaPanceraRosa) December 11, 2018
You know some millennials are 37 right?
— Drew Sozio (@Soz86) December 11, 2018
Maybe… just maybe… there are other reasons for the failure of tuna?
We get it,
As a younger Millennial I totally accept my role as Scapegoat for the failing of several industries. Never mind the failing economy the Baby Boomers handed us, regardless of our lack of money we should totally be buying Tuna.
— Serena Amathyst (@SAmathyst) December 11, 2018
I believe several companies manufacture electric can openers. Maybe millennials just don’t like processed fish packed in oil.
— MGC54 (@Michael31193545) December 11, 2018
No millennial has ever walked past the tuna and wistfully sighed “I wanna eat some. If only I knew how to open the can.” Those who don’t know how simply haven’t had the need to do it much or at all. Probably because they don’t want tuna.
— AiasIRL (@AiasIRL) December 11, 2018
At least, at the end of the day, there’s one thing we can all agree on:
tuna is nasty always has been always will
— shorty (@shortyluv1435) December 11, 2018
