‘Six-seven’? The viral slang that has a premier baffled
Got kids of a certain age? Or maybe it’s grandchildren. Either way, you might be all over the latest slang phrase that seems to be everywhere.
Source: Vibe Creators Records / TikToK
For the rest of us the “six-seven” trend is simply quite baffling.
And if it still means nothing, then lucky you – although Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan might have put it on a wider radar this week.
She used the phrase while announcing the long-awaited opening of Melbourne’s $15 billion rail tunnel project – to much confusion among gathered Labor MPs, party faithful and assembled media.
“Six-seven,” she s aid in response to one question – which was met with some puzzled faces.
“What does it actually mean? It actually means nothing, it’s six-seven.
“Everyone with kids of a certain age … It doesn’t mean anything, that’s the point.”
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The apparent meaninglessness hasn’t stopped the phrase sweeping the internet and storming into the vocabulary of generation Alpha (those born between 2010-2020) and some younger gen Zs.
It’s said with a particular rhythm and accompanied by a gesture of two cupped hands.
But, despite the words, the answer isn’t 13 and there’s no maths to it.
It appears to have originated with rapper Skrilla and his song Doot Doot. Released in December last year and sweeping TikTok and Instagram in the months following, it features the lyric “six-seven”, thought to be a Philadelphia street reference.
It also has an association with American basketball star LaMelo Ball, who is six feet, seven inches (two metres, here in metric-land) tall. One TikTok video featuring the song over a commentary of Ball on the court had more than 9.6 million views in two months.
US TV hosts Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos were also schooled on the phrase last week. During an episode of Live with Kelly and Mark, Consuelos asked Ripa if she had “heard this new thing that kids are saying”.
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“This slang? Six-seven?” he said.
Ripa replied: “Oh yeah, six-seven. I don’t know what it means.”
Consuelos sought out a young member of the studio audience for an explanation.
“You’re smiling. Do you know what six-seven means?” he said.
“It’s the height of a famous person,” the boy replied.
“But it doesn’t mean anything, right?” Consuelos clarified.
“It’s just a height,” the boy confirmed.
So the phrase doesn’t really refer to a song or a star basketballer. Or, indeed, much at all.
It’s more of a casual descriptor for something that’s “so-so” – how someone’s day went, what they want for dinner. It can also note someone who is tall, or even a joke without a punchline.
“There’s literally no circumstance where a kid might not say, ‘six seven,” TikTok “OG student translator” Lindsay Sped said.
If you’re just catching on, then it’s worth knowing the phrase is already evolving with the addition of “sendy” – which has its own hand gesture of appearing to dunk a basketball shot.
Combining “six-seven” and “sendy” may sound like “six-sendy,” or “6-7endy”. Good to know then, that like “six-seven”, it also has hardly any meaning.
