Can we agree that 1965-1989 was the best years ever?

[Mayne]

No cell phones made all the difference. We had to talk to other people, to find people. We had to write things down, we had to walk because no Uber. We lived in the moment and always had something to celebrate. I graduated in 1988. I was just a kid in the 70s but still remember those days as well, disco and funk was big, love songs and Johnny Carson. Best years of all time were between 65-89. The girls were so much more like, well girls. Most of us all had jobs trying to emulate our parents.

 

[BurnItDwn]

from 1965-1979 I did not exist, so , clearly, those were not great years.
1980-1989, yea, I miss my grandpa, he was around at that time.

 

[ImpulsE69]

No, I was only in part of the 70's and I don't remember enjoying them. The 80's weren't much better. I didn't actually start enjoying life until late 80's- early 90's. I do agree things have gotten worse since then. Technology held so much promise, and while there are amazing uses coming out every year, they are dwarfed by the sheer stupidness of the bulk of humanity.

 

[Mayne]

from 1965-1979 I did not exist, so , clearly, those were not great years.
1980-1989, yea, I miss my grandpa, he was around at that time.

but your grandpa was having a good time during that decade you weren't born.

 

[nakedfrog]

Know how I know you're old?

 

[Rifter]

I would go back to the pre smartphone days in a instant.

 

[dainthomas]

No, I was only in part of the 70's and I don't remember enjoying them. The 80's weren't much better. I didn't actually start enjoying life until late 80's- early 90's. I do agree things have gotten worse since then. Technology held so much promise, and while there are amazing uses coming out every year, they are dwarfed by the sheer stupidness of the bulk of humanity.

Back in the 80's many thought that technology could create a utopian society (like Star Trek) where everyone was valued and could pursue any dream they wished unhindered by the need to scrounge for resources. Instead it's only magnified our collective idiocy. Where one moron yelling on a corner can be ignored, a million morons on the internet can get one of their number elected president.

 

[Mayne]

Back in the 80's many thought that technology could create a utopian society (like Star Trek) where everyone was valued and could pursue any dream they wished unhindered by the need to scrounge for resources. Instead it's only magnified our collective idiocy. Where one moron yelling on a corner can be ignored, a million morons on the internet can get one of their number elected president.

Its a Utopia

 

[BurnItDwn]

but your grandpa was having a good time during that decade you weren't born.

He woke his ass up early every day, took the train to work, worked late, took the train home, and more or less busted his ass until he retired around 1990. He really enjoyed the 90s and the early part of the 00s when his health was still strong quite a lot. He went with my grandma on at least 100 cruises, and they retired to a nice Wisconsin house on lake Michigan.

 

[Mayne]

but I listen to a scottish singer like this and hope for the best.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RwFbxpJcSo

 

[Zeze]

I only see old farts complain about smartphones.

No the world isn't getting gonna end. We live in the most prosperous and safest time in the WORLD. This is a hard fact backed by tons of statistics. Less war, death, genocide than ever before.

People interact and socialize just fine. Dont be so...typically old.

 

[Mai72]

Nah, 1589 was the best.

 

[ultimatebob]

Yeah... something tells me that black folks and people who were drafted into the Vietnam War don’t share your glowing opinion of the late 1960’s and early 1970’s.

 

[dr150]

Mayne, I agree!

We could also drink from the garden hose without panicking.

We actually knocked on neighbor's doors to play with their kids.

Porn was the soft core stuff on HBO and that was more titillating than the "anything goes" junk of nowadays.

Fights were just fist fights--not guns or knives.

Music was 10 million times better and involved actual talent instead of machines/DJs........Movies weren't sequels--much more original content.

Weather was predictable--not armaggedon type events. Winters were winters. Summers were summers.

Drugs were generally "normal" marijuana and considered edgy and forbidden. Today, drugs are designed to destroy you like Opiods.

And politicians, media, people were more civil to each other instead of the vicious, manipulative aggression of today.

 

[Mayne]

good old days.

 

[snoopy7548]

90s were better.

 

[Andro Boy]

I wasn't alive during those years, but doesn't every generation say this? I'm 25 going on 26, and I'll probably say the same about my formative years in a couple decades if not sooner.

 

[Muse]

'65 was about when things really started looking up. I know, I was there. There was an explosion of culture and it was dynamic and seemed self-perpetuating. The 70's were a disappointment to me, it seemed that the dominant culture attempted to absorb and coopt the dynamism of the late 1960's. True of disco and to a lesser extent, Motown. The 80's, well, my GF was of them and told me she was simply ashamed of her generation, the Me Generation, and they were just unconscionable.

Technology is amazing but I agree that today, stupidity is rampant and technology just can't save us if we aren't willing to save ourselves. Myriads of people live in denial and worse... they are trying to squash those who do not.

 

[Muse]

good old days.

I've never believed in that. It's just bullshit.

 

[ondma]

I wouldn't make that as a blanket statement. There were good and bad times in that period. There were strides in technology, civil rights, and the fight against poverty. But there was also the Vietnam war, the oil crisis, the aids epidemic, and recessions.

 

[Zeze]

good old days.

Wake up. It's nostalgia. It's good to be romantic about it (I miss my late 80s/90s). But don't let facts fool you.

 

[Zeze]

Technology is amazing but I agree that today, stupidity is rampant and technology just can't save us if we aren't willing to save ourselves. Myriads of people live in denial and worse... they are trying to squash those who do not.

I hate this whole prior generation always thinking we're getting stupider trope. What do you base this on?

We have youngest entrepreneurs than ever before. People are independent (living on own, pursuing career, etc) younger than ever.

Legit stupidity is a failure of our abysmal rural south education system.

 

[zinfamous]

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/07/23/are-things-getting-better-or-worse

 

[zinfamous]

I hate this whole prior generation always thinking we're getting stupider trope. What do you base this on?

We have youngest entrepreneurs than ever before. People are independent (living on own, pursuing career, etc) younger than ever.

Legit stupidity is a failure of our abysmal rural south education system.

Those "entrepreneurs" are making garbage penny apps on a garbage app store or youtubing/instagramming themselves. All of this, the world now has "so many entrepreneurs!" is just misleading claims confusing "Self-employment" with entrepreneurs. And even the legit ones, they offer very little serviceable or worthwhile content. Most of them are just self-aggrandizing asshats that wouldn't give two dicks about humanity.

why? because people don't exist. We now have an entire generation of humans, for the first time on this planet, that will effectively progressed through all primary stages of cognitive development, barely having interacted with actual humans, in the ways that humans evolved to interact with each other, thus forming the basis for civil life. I'm not saying we're doomed--it's possibly just a new paradigm--but this is thoroughly upending millions of years of behavioral evolution that formed the foundations of human interaction and life. That's definitely "a thing."

Also, there are plenty of abysmal rural northern, midwestern, western, and urban education systems. It's both abysmal and great in the same places, throughout the country. Sure, it isn't as great as it used to be, but we're actually still doing pretty good compared to most other countries. The absolute last thing we need here is the shit-ass structure of the Japanese/Korean/Chinese systems that produce nothing but automatons, completely incapable of creative thought. This is why the Chinese can only copy, never develop. (I only mention this, seemingly un-prompted, because that is the popular comparison to the "failing US education system," and it's a shit comparison. We definitely do education better than those countries, we're just shit at ensuring that everyone has access to it.). For the most part, parents have gotten lazier and often confuse their complete lack of engagement in their children's education with some teacher that isn't doing the 6-7 jobs that are now, preposterously, assigned to them. Oh right, 8: now some asshats want them to be armed bodyguards.

 

[ImpulsE69]

I hate this whole prior generation always thinking we're getting stupider trope. What do you base this on?

We have youngest entrepreneurs than ever before. People are independent (living on own, pursuing career, etc) younger than ever.

Legit stupidity is a failure of our abysmal rural south education system.

I'll be the first to admit as kids we all did dumb things, but you CANNOT deny there is a considerable difference and larger number of 'stupid' people out there today. Sure it's a population and availability(access to internet) thing, but it doesn't make it not true. People are willfully ignorant these days.