I’ll admit it. I miss dabbing on the haters. I miss hitting the woah. I miss the Hype House. New TikTok dances and trends are honestly stupid, and we need to go back to the prime TikTok era.

I honestly believe that no one actually likes the scuba. Does something smell bad? Why are we dancing like that? It’s just stupid.

We need to go back to the days when we “hit the quan.” When everyone was cringy, and there was no such thing as Sephora kids.

My cringy phase in middle school is what makes me funny now. Saying “boi” to people and dabbing in every different way is what my humor was built on. Do I think some of the current trends are funny? Yes. Do I still make “6-7” jokes? Yes.

But that doesn’t mean we can’t bring back the old trends.

Life was better when I could dab without shame.

Aren’t we all nostalgic for our childhoods anyway? That means we’re also nostalgic for the cringiness of our childhoods. Being able to go back to playing in the sprinklers on a summer night also means bringing back dabbing and woahing.

I think part of what made our childhoods so great was the fact that we could be weird. Kids now feel like they have to act nonchalant and think they aren’t allowed to have a personality.

Even now, we feel like we have to fit in. That’s probably why we’re all doing the scuba and not saying a word about how embarrassing it is. When everyone was dabbing and hitting the woah, we knew how embarrassing it was, but we didn’t care.

It’s deeper than just being able to dab again without shame. I want to be able to live my life and do whatever I want, even if it’s embarrassing, without shame.

Sure, bringing the dab back would make me the happiest person on Earth. But it would also remind me that I can be myself, and that I don’t have to fit into people’s preconceived notions of me.

Even clothing trends now make us feel like we can’t be ourselves. Everyone’s wearing a Parke sweatshirt and leggings with their hair in a half-up, half-down claw clip. I genuinely believe that if we bring back old trends, like dabbing, we will be confirming that we can be individuals. That means we’ll be able to dress how we want.

If you actually think Parke sweatshirts are cute, I’m not judging you, but I think a lot of people are tricked into thinking something is cute when it’s not, just to feel like they fit in.

Bringing back old trends will help us remember that it is OK to be ourselves, and that it’s okay to wear clothes you really like, and act how you really act.

I know it might seem like I’m saying all of this just so I can dab in public again, and maybe I am, but that doesn’t mean it’s not true. We should bring back old trends so that we can bring back individuality.