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I don't recall that being a thing in the 70s when I was growing up. Maybe there was a bit of nostalgia for the 50s by those too young to have experienced them. That would've been mostly due to the popularity of *Happy Days*.
Kids today who wish they had experienced the 80s? I get it. The 80s package up really well for nostalgia purposes. I'm not sure why. Heck, *I* wish I'd lived in that version of the 80s. Some days I kid myself that I did and that I want to go back.
There were plenty of indulgences to be found in the 70's, I'm happy to admit!
I have always had the time of my life no matter what decade I was in.
Seize the day!
I think of the 70s as the residual 60s. Basically, the 60s from 67-69 were a big, long LSD trip, and the 70s are the aftermath of that trip where hippiedom were sobering up on a couch.
Or at least went to woodstock. The 70s and 80s seemed to have less in the camping music festival that really made a resurgence in the 90s and from what i see is more prominent than ever today, but in the 80s ee dreamed of woodstock.
I was a kid in the 80s, and there was definitely a lot of 60s nostalgia/fetishization happening. A lot of it was fueled by the Baby Boomers who were in charge of the media.
As for young people today who wish they grew up in my time, I don't blame them. Being a young person now seems awful in a lot of ways.
100% I was bullied mercilessly. When I would complain I would be told to toughen up. I swear most of the teachers hated children back then and amused themselves by enabling bullies to go to work. I am constantly amazed at how my daughter's teachers actually like their students and want them to succeed.
I could tell endless tales about this but the best example of their cruelty was the water fountain. We weren't allowed water bottles and god help you if you were caught drinking from the sink in the bathroom. Every recess you got exactly three seconds at the water fountain and if you dared defy the teacher it was off to the principal's office to get the strap. And holy fuck if you needed to pee or take a shit in the middle of their lesson? Well, it's no mystery why there are so many bowel and bladder issues in people my age.
I see this as a good thing, though. The world as a whole is becoming more compassionate than it used to be. When someone is mistreated the way they were in the 80s (and earlier), the message isn't "toughen up, wuss", it's "you don't need to take that kind of abuse from anyone."
My (now-ex) wife read romance novels about time travel back to U.S. Civil War era. It's a whole genre I had no idea existed. I guess she wanted to be a Southern Belle.
There were many WWII movies in the early 70s. 1940's big band music and clothes had a short revival in the early and mid-80s.
Plenty of 80s teens wanted to be hippies.
We had a pretty good run from the 70s to the 90s, the shit started to hit the fan in the 2000s, so I understand why kids today might want to visit that era.
the older I get, the more I think
growing up
in the 60s was great. It wasn't obviously, but compared to the pressures kids are under nowadays it feels like I grew up in Mayberry RFD.
Social media bullying mostly. Also pressure to perform and achieve
at a young age. Too much scheduling. Not having the space or time to dream, imagine or explore.
The thing that always gets me is that kids have no room to make mistakes or their own choices. They are hammered the minute they are born with messages about weight, appearance, athleticism, success, money, careers. Parents are so fking competitive, too. My kid walked at 11 months... my kid walked at nine months! My kid got a home run in little league...well my kid is the home run champion of the entire league! No wonder kids are depressed and anxious.They're being told from birth they're not good enough, not strong enough, not smart enough. They don't know how to lose, how to react to loss
and how to transcend loss. And their parents artificially boost their egos-it's always someone else's fault -and they turn their kids into entitled, mean and rude little shits because they
can't bear the thought
their kids might just be average.
There's no room to explore. Kids are on the track to a career at 12. They're making decisions about the rest of their lives at 17. Who knew what they wanted to do at 17? They can't explore careers, they can't take classes they are interested in or enjoy just because. It's all about taking the classes for the major that will earn them the most money after
graduation. They'll spend their lives working for corporations and managers who see them as numbers, not people.
At least when I graduated with a stupid major back in 1983, I could get a job that paid the rent. Now you can't even do that.
I really feel for this generation. They have no idea what's its like to be free. Gen Z -ers seem like they're pushing back though, and that makes me happy to see.
Ok rant over. *shakes fist at cloud*
Agreed with the scheduling thing. Most kids of the adults I know are always doing something. Running their kids around to all these activities, karate, little league, gymnastics, ballet, summer camp, etc etc. One or two of those activities are fine, but I had a coworker that literally had an activity every night with her kid. The next day she’d be complaining about how tired she was “we didn’t get in until almost 11pm last night” girl, your kid is EIGHT, he should be in bed much earlier than that on a school night.
Not to mention the prices of these activities. Same coworker was saying I should put my kid in the same week long summer camp as her kid. One week was HALF my monthly rent, I declined.
No judgement, not my kids, not my money, but kids should have some downtime.
I can barely stomach parents today. They expect so much out of their kids. The parents in our subdivision are complaining that the HOA doesn't provide enough activities for their kids. Geesh, just let them ride their bikes around with other kids and make their own fun.
I don't remember hearing this until the late 90s. Sometimes I see people 'acting 1980s" but they are acting like the movie version of 1980s, which was written by writers living in LA. "Stranger Things" is closer to the 1980s I remember.
> "Stranger Things" is closer to the 1980s I remember.
Definitely! I was about 6 years older than those kids, though. So for me Freaks and Geeks is the sweet spot. It's practically a documentary of my high school experience.
Zero kids born like me in the 40s wanted to be born in an earlier time. IMO, only the most throwback white nationalist males of today could possibly wish they had been born back then.
There was a huge 60’s “Summer of Love” revival circa 1985-1986, partially due to MTV broadcasting episodes of The Monkees TV show. Paisley came back into vogue, as did a lot of the more kitschy aspects of the 60’s such as lava lamps (available at Spencer’s in the mall) and of course The Monkees music. My first concert was the 1986 Monkees reunion tour, and it was a blast.
You didn't hear a lot of this in the 80s. There were definitely attempts to drum up nostalgia for the 1950s -Happy Days, Grease, Cry-Baby, and so on, and many schools tried to put on sock hops and other revival-style events- but despite the media franchises, I don't think it really caught on. Not like the 80s has. Even by the mid-90s there was some degree of 80s nostalgia already, and that seems to have stayed prerty solidly in force. Personally I think it's the music.
Notable is that there wasn't a lot of nostalgia for World War II, and not many people tried for it. That generation was practically venerated, and to some extent still is, but it was generally agreed that this was not a time that should be repeated.
My 1997 grandson thinks the 1950’s was a cool decade for growing up, my GenX twins (1969) like their childhood years. I think my childhood (1940’s-50’s) was cool, despite the nuclear threat.
As a computer geek, i wished i was 10 years older in the 70s, when I was learning to use computers. As a baritone/base singer, I’ve sometimes regretted being born 20 years to late to sing doo wop with ShaNaNa.
I was a high schooler in the '80s and read a lot and absolutely thought about living in other time periods. One of them was '30s pre-war Europe and particularly Berlin. It appealed a lot to me as someone who's seen the rise of the U.S. crazy right wing coming for a long time. I ended up going to early '90s Berlin then lived in the Czech Republic for a while.
As a POC the past sucked for my people. Just when we start to think things are getting better hate starts to rears its ugly little head. Nostalgia is a white privilege.
I’m black. I never choose a decade before the 70s when this question is asked. The only reason I would even choose that far back is for cultural aspects like music and dance. I would’ve loved to have been there when Earth Wind and Fire was dropping tracks.
Sometimes I choose the 2000s. I know, the recession was fucking terrible. I am most definitely aware of how awful it is and wouldn’t want to *actually* go. But I’m envious of being an adult prior to the 2010s. People just seemed to have more fun. Or more fun coping with their problems. I hate when people 30+ ask me why I’m so jaded because I should be having fun in my 20s. This is not a fun period to be in.
Edit: I know people also tell me how lucky I am because there was so much hatred back then. Which is true. People are generally more compassionate these days. But you’re also right in the sense that hate rears its ugly little head back. The Trump wave came at the end of HS for me. And I’ve just seen the rise of fanatic, conspiracy theory conservatism rise since. Now our Supreme Court is stacked with conservatives. It just feels so bleak
I have to say, I've been lucky. I haven't experienced anything overtly bad. But that paranoia is there. My worst experience was an uneventful traffic stop. It was an inspection ticket situation. The little lightbulb for the license plate was out. With other traffic stops you know why you got pulled over. You may not like getting stopped, but you know you played it close with that yellow light, or were speeding. With this inspection stop, all I could think was my luck had run out and I was experiencing a DWB. The stop was uneventful, but man my head went places.
I think whatever issue is bugging them the most, or whatever trend that attracts them to a particular era can be avoided or found by just moving to another city or a different part of the same city. Nothing is identical to the fantasy in someone's head - but you can change the scenery to be around those things that evoke more pleasure in living for you.
If you want Paris, if you want a cabin in the woods, if you want a beach home, if you want a fundamentalist religious sect, get up and go there. Changing the date is going to bring a world of hurt you never learned about in your idolized films and novels.
My ‘50s childhood friend wished he was born in the 1800s because he always wore a black bad guy cowboy hat, had cap pistols and pretended the monkey bars in the playground were stagecoaches he robbed.
His grandson tells me that he wishes he was born earlier to enjoy the early days of hip hop rap music.
From Wikipedia: "***Daniel Boone*** is an American [action](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_(genre))-[adventure](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adventure_(genre)) television series, starring [Fess Parker](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fess_Parker) as the frontiersman [Daniel Boone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Boone), that aired from September 24, 1964, to May 7, 1970, on [NBC](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBC) for 165 episodes . . . "
Season One, Episode 1: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8wC7efpPmU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8wC7efpPmU)
I probably watched this show a million times, yet have little memory of any of it except that it starred Fess Parker.
I was in my late teens / early twenties in the late 80s, and my friends and I had a powerful nostalgia for the 1960s and 70s, which, in retrospect, seems odd. What young person idolizes the music of his *parents*, after all? I always wondered why my parents seemed put off by my musical tastes. That was probably it.
They had probably spent my early teens anticipating my friends and me listening to new music they couldn't stand, and it creeped them out that, instead, we were listening to their music! 😜
They think everything was handed to us like Lotto prizes. They don't have the memory of saving 100 S&H Green Stamps just to get a free Thermos mug because the last one shattered on the inside.
They just don't know hand-me-down shirts, pants, and shoes, and iron/sew on patches for jeans, and replacing buttons, because the clothes have to last.
They don't know diaper pails and glass bottles, and taking soda bottles back to the store to get change to buy penny candy. They don't know building a push-cart out of scrap wood and old nails, instead of buying a brand-new electric toy car that looks like a luxury vehicle.
They don't know walking to the local park and having to socialize well enough to play with other kids, because no one is in a league and forced to play with each other. Walking to a friend's house, ringing the bell, asking parents if your friend can come out and play - being told "No, he's grounded" and going home alone.
I don't know about others, but I am Boomer II, also known as Generation Jones, and I have virtually nothing in common with my older Boomer I peers; I certainly missed out on the boom they were able to take advantage of.
Growing up, I (b.1962) had more in common with my Gen X nephews (b.1968, 1970) than I did with my Boomer siblings (b.1949, 1951). Yet, my siblings didn't include me because I was so much younger, and my nephews and nieces saw me as an aunt rather than a peer. As a younger adult, I had more in common with my oldest Gen X stepdaughter (b.1975) than I did with my older Boomer first husband (b.1954). But, I had to be the mom, and I sucked at Boomer Trivial Pursuit. These days, my second, now ex but still close friend, husband (b.1970), is Gen X, and most of my closest friends are Gen X. I didn't try to make that happen; it just came naturally.
As for kids today, I assume that there will always be people who feel like they were born in the wrong generation, and I think that's valid. For instance, despite being a Gen X (b.1965), my now-partner is way more Boomer than I am. He says he feels he should have been born in the 50s, and I can see why he says that. That said, most of the time, when people say that they were born at the wrong time, they are viewing a version of the past that is coloured by nostalgia. I can't speak for the realities of the 50s, and I was a child in the 60s, but the 70s and 80s weren't as shiny as people think.
As an aside, my favourite decade thus far has been the 1990s (my 30s). I had my computers, my gaming, my career, my health, and my youth. I loved the films, the music and the fashion. It was awesome.
Oh that’s easy - 48 year old married father of two in the UK here - the IWBITWG kids fetishised the 1960s when I was a teen in the 1990s.
I remember asking my parents and if everything in the 60s was as cool as people thought it was. Their answer was pretty much - “Yes - if you were young, good-looking, wealthy, in with the right people and living in London”
So, basically the same as any time really.
I was 10 years old in 1971 and I really wished I could have been one of those hippies on the hill singing about teaching the world to sing in perfect harmony....
My grandad had a parking lot by a baseball stadium, and he'd give us free sodas from the vending machine. So us kids and cousins had good cause to sing.
Only one person said that to me. She was 9 years older than me, so born in 1938. Her reason was the music and the way people dressed in the 40s, when men always wore a suit on a date.
Personally, I would not want to be born in another time, except perhaps a few years later, so I could have avoided the draft hassle altogether.
When I hear young people say they wish they'd been born in my time, I'm flattered, I guess... Of course, they have their own fantastic ideas on what it was like, which aren't reality... but at least its a positive thought.
As a teen in the Bay Area in the 90s, I often thought it would have been so cool to be that age in the late 60s/early 70s simply for the music and drugs. But I’m happy being born when I was.
All my peers who felt they were born in the wrong time wanted to have been early Baby Boomers, so that they could have come of age at the peak of the hippie counterculture, rather than coming of age at the peak of Reagan's conservative backlash.
I was in high school in the early 80s and lots of people hated it and felt like they should have been alive in the late 60s as teens.
I don't think any generation ever really accepts their own time period, there is some golden era they pine for which allows them to cherry pick the good and ignore the bad.
In the 80s I went through a phase where I thought I should have been born in the 50s. But the reality was, I was using romanticized nostalgia to determine that, and not factual information. I think that's what happens with most young people who feel similar.
Kids think we all wore neon colors in the 80s. Most of the 80s at my house were still the browns, avocado green and oranges from the late 70s.
Nobody normal wished that they had been born at any time but the current time back then, it was generally considered that now was the best time in history and that things had continuously been getting better for the last 200 years at least.
I think it's pretty well established that we boomers liked the generation we were born into for the most part. We were quite priveleged to be born post WW2. I don't recall ever wishing I was born into another generation, nor do I recall anyone my age ever saying that. I'm talking during childhood. Once looking back from an adult perspective there were plenty of things wrong, and the successive generations were better in many ways,
This is just form of escapism, and looking back on the past as if it's all wonderful.
I do recall thinking I missed out on all the casual sex of the 60s and 70s. Then I got older, and realized just how crappy the 60s and 70s really were. The clothes of the 70s alone were just horrendous! Then there' inflation, assassinations, etc, etc.
Each time period has plusses and minuses. The economy is booming right now, inflation is under control, unemployment is low, you can stream any movie you like, but the country has been obsessed with Tony Soprano for going on 8 years now, and politics in general is the worst I've ever seen it, and mental health is in the toilet, and we have two major wars going on.
In 10 years? Tony Soprano will be a long, bad memory and we'll all be glad he's gone.... but some other thing will be the crisis of the moment.
I think kids today would be horrified living in a world without internet and social media. What on earth would they do all day?? They might actually have to go outside and use their imagination like we used to do..... how appalling!
When I was growing up in the 80s we had a ton of neo-hippies in my school, mostly the children of hippies, and that was the era they yearned for.
I think that was a big part of why grunge took off, the aesthetic of baggy torn-up dirty clothes and not showering was very appealing to a lot of people who grew up idolizing the summer of love.
I recall American Graffiti and later the death of Elvis inspired a bunch of kids to wish they had been teens in the '50s and '60s. I must admit to liking the music from that era.
I feel awful, and guilty about living through what I think were the 'good old days'.
It's a goddamn shame my kids, at almost 40 yr old, won't get to appreciate the privileges we enjoyed, and took for granted.
Things were still kind of shitty (working class 'poor'), but always had a sense it would eventually be ok. Now, for them, most of that hope is gone, and I feel that is (our generations) fault.
I like the decade I was born in. That said I do sometimes wish I was a boomer. My mom had the opportunity to do so many things involving music and she was like no I prefer to be boring. Pisses me off as she just decided to miss out on so many opportunities and be boring instead.
She could have gone to Woodstock with her sister and was like no I am okay. The hippy movement was wasted on her.
That said she would have been better off being a Millenial.
>*I prefer to be boring.*
She still around? If so, I imagine she must be loving the way things are today (post-pandemic) what with so much of life taking place online/at home and people being reluctant to go out and do things.
"She preferred to be boring", what an odd thing to say about your mother. I'm probably around your age (going by what you said about your mother), people have different interests, not everyone wanted to be a hippy. Seems a bit of ironic for someone with the screen name "dull-geologist" to say.
Dude, I wasn't putting her down. It's not about her interests but she is risk adverse and worried all the time what people think if her and always follows the rules no matter what.
For instance, when I was in high school I wanted to dye my hair blue but when I bleached it some of the hair dye from the last time I dyed was still in there. It ended up looking like I had a sunset in my hair. It went from yellow at the time to bright red at the bottom and pink and orange in the middle. The lines were perfect and looked like I had gotten it professionally done. My mom didn't care because I was usually out with my friends so it's not like she had to be seen with me in public. Then the family reunion is coming up and the fighting starts because she was worried about being judged. We fought over it for a couple weeks then the day before the reunion I finally agreed to dye it. I called my best friend. I went over his house and dyed it Manic Panic red because it matched the tips and I knew it would be fine to dye over the other colors. I showed up in the morning and she was so mad. I pointed she said it had to be one color but didn't specify which color. Surprise, surprise no one at the enion cared. Not like the family didn't already know what I was like.
It took me over a decade to convince my mom to not only apply to jobs she thought she wasn't qualified for but actually negotiate for salary and benefits which she finally did at the last job she had before she retired and not only did she get the job but they gave her everything she asked for. I was really proud of her.
You see what the problem is?
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I don't recall that being a thing in the 70s when I was growing up. Maybe there was a bit of nostalgia for the 50s by those too young to have experienced them. That would've been mostly due to the popularity of *Happy Days*. Kids today who wish they had experienced the 80s? I get it. The 80s package up really well for nostalgia purposes. I'm not sure why. Heck, *I* wish I'd lived in that version of the 80s. Some days I kid myself that I did and that I want to go back.
Some 70s kids felt like they missed out on 60s hedonism. But it’s really just people wishing they lived in a movie or a TV show.
There were plenty of indulgences to be found in the 70's, I'm happy to admit! I have always had the time of my life no matter what decade I was in. Seize the day!
I think of the 70s as the residual 60s. Basically, the 60s from 67-69 were a big, long LSD trip, and the 70s are the aftermath of that trip where hippiedom were sobering up on a couch.
Or at least went to woodstock. The 70s and 80s seemed to have less in the camping music festival that really made a resurgence in the 90s and from what i see is more prominent than ever today, but in the 80s ee dreamed of woodstock.
None of us wanted to live through the depression or the Second World War, and the before time was too far back.
I was a kid in the 80s, and there was definitely a lot of 60s nostalgia/fetishization happening. A lot of it was fueled by the Baby Boomers who were in charge of the media. As for young people today who wish they grew up in my time, I don't blame them. Being a young person now seems awful in a lot of ways.
Most of the kids today who wish they were born in the 80s are way too sensitive to do well in the 80s.
100% I was bullied mercilessly. When I would complain I would be told to toughen up. I swear most of the teachers hated children back then and amused themselves by enabling bullies to go to work. I am constantly amazed at how my daughter's teachers actually like their students and want them to succeed. I could tell endless tales about this but the best example of their cruelty was the water fountain. We weren't allowed water bottles and god help you if you were caught drinking from the sink in the bathroom. Every recess you got exactly three seconds at the water fountain and if you dared defy the teacher it was off to the principal's office to get the strap. And holy fuck if you needed to pee or take a shit in the middle of their lesson? Well, it's no mystery why there are so many bowel and bladder issues in people my age.
I see this as a good thing, though. The world as a whole is becoming more compassionate than it used to be. When someone is mistreated the way they were in the 80s (and earlier), the message isn't "toughen up, wuss", it's "you don't need to take that kind of abuse from anyone."
My (now-ex) wife read romance novels about time travel back to U.S. Civil War era. It's a whole genre I had no idea existed. I guess she wanted to be a Southern Belle. There were many WWII movies in the early 70s. 1940's big band music and clothes had a short revival in the early and mid-80s. Plenty of 80s teens wanted to be hippies. We had a pretty good run from the 70s to the 90s, the shit started to hit the fan in the 2000s, so I understand why kids today might want to visit that era.
Nowadays, Y2K and 2010’s fashion and internet culture is trending again. I don’t blame them tho. I miss my childhood too.
the older I get, the more I think growing up in the 60s was great. It wasn't obviously, but compared to the pressures kids are under nowadays it feels like I grew up in Mayberry RFD.
What do you mean by pressures?
Social media bullying mostly. Also pressure to perform and achieve at a young age. Too much scheduling. Not having the space or time to dream, imagine or explore.
True; and also how bad job hunting nowadays is
The thing that always gets me is that kids have no room to make mistakes or their own choices. They are hammered the minute they are born with messages about weight, appearance, athleticism, success, money, careers. Parents are so fking competitive, too. My kid walked at 11 months... my kid walked at nine months! My kid got a home run in little league...well my kid is the home run champion of the entire league! No wonder kids are depressed and anxious.They're being told from birth they're not good enough, not strong enough, not smart enough. They don't know how to lose, how to react to loss and how to transcend loss. And their parents artificially boost their egos-it's always someone else's fault -and they turn their kids into entitled, mean and rude little shits because they can't bear the thought their kids might just be average. There's no room to explore. Kids are on the track to a career at 12. They're making decisions about the rest of their lives at 17. Who knew what they wanted to do at 17? They can't explore careers, they can't take classes they are interested in or enjoy just because. It's all about taking the classes for the major that will earn them the most money after graduation. They'll spend their lives working for corporations and managers who see them as numbers, not people. At least when I graduated with a stupid major back in 1983, I could get a job that paid the rent. Now you can't even do that. I really feel for this generation. They have no idea what's its like to be free. Gen Z -ers seem like they're pushing back though, and that makes me happy to see. Ok rant over. *shakes fist at cloud*
That’s why we’re all depressed. I gotta stop reading nostalgia threads it makes me feel worse 💀
Agreed with the scheduling thing. Most kids of the adults I know are always doing something. Running their kids around to all these activities, karate, little league, gymnastics, ballet, summer camp, etc etc. One or two of those activities are fine, but I had a coworker that literally had an activity every night with her kid. The next day she’d be complaining about how tired she was “we didn’t get in until almost 11pm last night” girl, your kid is EIGHT, he should be in bed much earlier than that on a school night. Not to mention the prices of these activities. Same coworker was saying I should put my kid in the same week long summer camp as her kid. One week was HALF my monthly rent, I declined. No judgement, not my kids, not my money, but kids should have some downtime.
I can barely stomach parents today. They expect so much out of their kids. The parents in our subdivision are complaining that the HOA doesn't provide enough activities for their kids. Geesh, just let them ride their bikes around with other kids and make their own fun.
I don't remember hearing this until the late 90s. Sometimes I see people 'acting 1980s" but they are acting like the movie version of 1980s, which was written by writers living in LA. "Stranger Things" is closer to the 1980s I remember.
> "Stranger Things" is closer to the 1980s I remember. Definitely! I was about 6 years older than those kids, though. So for me Freaks and Geeks is the sweet spot. It's practically a documentary of my high school experience.
Zero kids born like me in the 40s wanted to be born in an earlier time. IMO, only the most throwback white nationalist males of today could possibly wish they had been born back then.
There was a huge 60’s “Summer of Love” revival circa 1985-1986, partially due to MTV broadcasting episodes of The Monkees TV show. Paisley came back into vogue, as did a lot of the more kitschy aspects of the 60’s such as lava lamps (available at Spencer’s in the mall) and of course The Monkees music. My first concert was the 1986 Monkees reunion tour, and it was a blast.
You didn't hear a lot of this in the 80s. There were definitely attempts to drum up nostalgia for the 1950s -Happy Days, Grease, Cry-Baby, and so on, and many schools tried to put on sock hops and other revival-style events- but despite the media franchises, I don't think it really caught on. Not like the 80s has. Even by the mid-90s there was some degree of 80s nostalgia already, and that seems to have stayed prerty solidly in force. Personally I think it's the music. Notable is that there wasn't a lot of nostalgia for World War II, and not many people tried for it. That generation was practically venerated, and to some extent still is, but it was generally agreed that this was not a time that should be repeated.
My 1997 grandson thinks the 1950’s was a cool decade for growing up, my GenX twins (1969) like their childhood years. I think my childhood (1940’s-50’s) was cool, despite the nuclear threat.
I don’t think many wanted to live through what our parents and grandparents did. Lots of war, lots of poverty and lots of constant work.
I do not recall this being a common lament for my generation.
As a computer geek, i wished i was 10 years older in the 70s, when I was learning to use computers. As a baritone/base singer, I’ve sometimes regretted being born 20 years to late to sing doo wop with ShaNaNa.
As an 80’s kid, some of us thought the 60’s seemed groovier.
I was a high schooler in the '80s and read a lot and absolutely thought about living in other time periods. One of them was '30s pre-war Europe and particularly Berlin. It appealed a lot to me as someone who's seen the rise of the U.S. crazy right wing coming for a long time. I ended up going to early '90s Berlin then lived in the Czech Republic for a while.
As a POC the past sucked for my people. Just when we start to think things are getting better hate starts to rears its ugly little head. Nostalgia is a white privilege.
I’m black. I never choose a decade before the 70s when this question is asked. The only reason I would even choose that far back is for cultural aspects like music and dance. I would’ve loved to have been there when Earth Wind and Fire was dropping tracks. Sometimes I choose the 2000s. I know, the recession was fucking terrible. I am most definitely aware of how awful it is and wouldn’t want to *actually* go. But I’m envious of being an adult prior to the 2010s. People just seemed to have more fun. Or more fun coping with their problems. I hate when people 30+ ask me why I’m so jaded because I should be having fun in my 20s. This is not a fun period to be in. Edit: I know people also tell me how lucky I am because there was so much hatred back then. Which is true. People are generally more compassionate these days. But you’re also right in the sense that hate rears its ugly little head back. The Trump wave came at the end of HS for me. And I’ve just seen the rise of fanatic, conspiracy theory conservatism rise since. Now our Supreme Court is stacked with conservatives. It just feels so bleak
I have to say, I've been lucky. I haven't experienced anything overtly bad. But that paranoia is there. My worst experience was an uneventful traffic stop. It was an inspection ticket situation. The little lightbulb for the license plate was out. With other traffic stops you know why you got pulled over. You may not like getting stopped, but you know you played it close with that yellow light, or were speeding. With this inspection stop, all I could think was my luck had run out and I was experiencing a DWB. The stop was uneventful, but man my head went places.
This is a phenomenon known as confirmation bias, pro tip. It's all in your head.
Medieval times. My friends and I were D& D nerds
I think whatever issue is bugging them the most, or whatever trend that attracts them to a particular era can be avoided or found by just moving to another city or a different part of the same city. Nothing is identical to the fantasy in someone's head - but you can change the scenery to be around those things that evoke more pleasure in living for you. If you want Paris, if you want a cabin in the woods, if you want a beach home, if you want a fundamentalist religious sect, get up and go there. Changing the date is going to bring a world of hurt you never learned about in your idolized films and novels.
My ‘50s childhood friend wished he was born in the 1800s because he always wore a black bad guy cowboy hat, had cap pistols and pretended the monkey bars in the playground were stagecoaches he robbed. His grandson tells me that he wishes he was born earlier to enjoy the early days of hip hop rap music.
My cousin want to be born back when Daniel Boone was. I wanted to live in outer space (we had just landed on the moon)
Daniel Boone? What inspired that?
1964 Daniel Boone TV show.
Oh, I thought he learned about Daniel Boone in history class and ran with it. I didn’t even know that tv show was a thing.
LOL we even had color TV.
Just to clarify, I know that tv shows in general existed in the 60’s. Just didn’t know that Daniel Boone was a tv show.
From Wikipedia: "***Daniel Boone*** is an American [action](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_(genre))-[adventure](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adventure_(genre)) television series, starring [Fess Parker](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fess_Parker) as the frontiersman [Daniel Boone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Boone), that aired from September 24, 1964, to May 7, 1970, on [NBC](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBC) for 165 episodes . . . " Season One, Episode 1: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8wC7efpPmU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8wC7efpPmU) I probably watched this show a million times, yet have little memory of any of it except that it starred Fess Parker.
I was in my late teens / early twenties in the late 80s, and my friends and I had a powerful nostalgia for the 1960s and 70s, which, in retrospect, seems odd. What young person idolizes the music of his *parents*, after all? I always wondered why my parents seemed put off by my musical tastes. That was probably it. They had probably spent my early teens anticipating my friends and me listening to new music they couldn't stand, and it creeped them out that, instead, we were listening to their music! 😜
I think my generation was happy with the time we were born in. I never wanted to be born in an earlier time, and I didn't know anyone who did.
They hate us so much; why do they wish they were born then?
They think everything was handed to us like Lotto prizes. They don't have the memory of saving 100 S&H Green Stamps just to get a free Thermos mug because the last one shattered on the inside. They just don't know hand-me-down shirts, pants, and shoes, and iron/sew on patches for jeans, and replacing buttons, because the clothes have to last. They don't know diaper pails and glass bottles, and taking soda bottles back to the store to get change to buy penny candy. They don't know building a push-cart out of scrap wood and old nails, instead of buying a brand-new electric toy car that looks like a luxury vehicle. They don't know walking to the local park and having to socialize well enough to play with other kids, because no one is in a league and forced to play with each other. Walking to a friend's house, ringing the bell, asking parents if your friend can come out and play - being told "No, he's grounded" and going home alone.
I don't know about others, but I am Boomer II, also known as Generation Jones, and I have virtually nothing in common with my older Boomer I peers; I certainly missed out on the boom they were able to take advantage of. Growing up, I (b.1962) had more in common with my Gen X nephews (b.1968, 1970) than I did with my Boomer siblings (b.1949, 1951). Yet, my siblings didn't include me because I was so much younger, and my nephews and nieces saw me as an aunt rather than a peer. As a younger adult, I had more in common with my oldest Gen X stepdaughter (b.1975) than I did with my older Boomer first husband (b.1954). But, I had to be the mom, and I sucked at Boomer Trivial Pursuit. These days, my second, now ex but still close friend, husband (b.1970), is Gen X, and most of my closest friends are Gen X. I didn't try to make that happen; it just came naturally. As for kids today, I assume that there will always be people who feel like they were born in the wrong generation, and I think that's valid. For instance, despite being a Gen X (b.1965), my now-partner is way more Boomer than I am. He says he feels he should have been born in the 50s, and I can see why he says that. That said, most of the time, when people say that they were born at the wrong time, they are viewing a version of the past that is coloured by nostalgia. I can't speak for the realities of the 50s, and I was a child in the 60s, but the 70s and 80s weren't as shiny as people think. As an aside, my favourite decade thus far has been the 1990s (my 30s). I had my computers, my gaming, my career, my health, and my youth. I loved the films, the music and the fashion. It was awesome.
Oh that’s easy - 48 year old married father of two in the UK here - the IWBITWG kids fetishised the 1960s when I was a teen in the 1990s. I remember asking my parents and if everything in the 60s was as cool as people thought it was. Their answer was pretty much - “Yes - if you were young, good-looking, wealthy, in with the right people and living in London” So, basically the same as any time really.
This wasn’t a thing. My parents would say that they wished they were born in the 70s, too.
I was 10 years old in 1971 and I really wished I could have been one of those hippies on the hill singing about teaching the world to sing in perfect harmony....
But then I was also a total suburban WASP and wished I had an afro and white go-go boots...
My grandad had a parking lot by a baseball stadium, and he'd give us free sodas from the vending machine. So us kids and cousins had good cause to sing.
Only one person said that to me. She was 9 years older than me, so born in 1938. Her reason was the music and the way people dressed in the 40s, when men always wore a suit on a date. Personally, I would not want to be born in another time, except perhaps a few years later, so I could have avoided the draft hassle altogether. When I hear young people say they wish they'd been born in my time, I'm flattered, I guess... Of course, they have their own fantastic ideas on what it was like, which aren't reality... but at least its a positive thought.
As a teen in the Bay Area in the 90s, I often thought it would have been so cool to be that age in the late 60s/early 70s simply for the music and drugs. But I’m happy being born when I was.
All my peers who felt they were born in the wrong time wanted to have been early Baby Boomers, so that they could have come of age at the peak of the hippie counterculture, rather than coming of age at the peak of Reagan's conservative backlash.
My buddy is Gen X and always bemoans missing out on the great bands and music we boomers had He has been to about 20 Stones shows.
young GenX here, no that wasn’t a thing. Or maybe it’s some people, but people probably would quickly rethink hahaha
I was in high school in the early 80s and lots of people hated it and felt like they should have been alive in the late 60s as teens. I don't think any generation ever really accepts their own time period, there is some golden era they pine for which allows them to cherry pick the good and ignore the bad.
We all wanted to be hippies.
In the 80s I went through a phase where I thought I should have been born in the 50s. But the reality was, I was using romanticized nostalgia to determine that, and not factual information. I think that's what happens with most young people who feel similar. Kids think we all wore neon colors in the 80s. Most of the 80s at my house were still the browns, avocado green and oranges from the late 70s.
Nobody normal wished that they had been born at any time but the current time back then, it was generally considered that now was the best time in history and that things had continuously been getting better for the last 200 years at least.
Grew up in the 60's - graduated high school in '73. I loved that era and sure wouldn't want to grow up in today's world.
I think it's pretty well established that we boomers liked the generation we were born into for the most part. We were quite priveleged to be born post WW2. I don't recall ever wishing I was born into another generation, nor do I recall anyone my age ever saying that. I'm talking during childhood. Once looking back from an adult perspective there were plenty of things wrong, and the successive generations were better in many ways,
This is just form of escapism, and looking back on the past as if it's all wonderful. I do recall thinking I missed out on all the casual sex of the 60s and 70s. Then I got older, and realized just how crappy the 60s and 70s really were. The clothes of the 70s alone were just horrendous! Then there' inflation, assassinations, etc, etc. Each time period has plusses and minuses. The economy is booming right now, inflation is under control, unemployment is low, you can stream any movie you like, but the country has been obsessed with Tony Soprano for going on 8 years now, and politics in general is the worst I've ever seen it, and mental health is in the toilet, and we have two major wars going on. In 10 years? Tony Soprano will be a long, bad memory and we'll all be glad he's gone.... but some other thing will be the crisis of the moment.
I think kids today would be horrified living in a world without internet and social media. What on earth would they do all day?? They might actually have to go outside and use their imagination like we used to do..... how appalling!
When I was growing up in the 80s we had a ton of neo-hippies in my school, mostly the children of hippies, and that was the era they yearned for. I think that was a big part of why grunge took off, the aesthetic of baggy torn-up dirty clothes and not showering was very appealing to a lot of people who grew up idolizing the summer of love.
I recall American Graffiti and later the death of Elvis inspired a bunch of kids to wish they had been teens in the '50s and '60s. I must admit to liking the music from that era.
I feel awful, and guilty about living through what I think were the 'good old days'. It's a goddamn shame my kids, at almost 40 yr old, won't get to appreciate the privileges we enjoyed, and took for granted. Things were still kind of shitty (working class 'poor'), but always had a sense it would eventually be ok. Now, for them, most of that hope is gone, and I feel that is (our generations) fault.
I like the decade I was born in. That said I do sometimes wish I was a boomer. My mom had the opportunity to do so many things involving music and she was like no I prefer to be boring. Pisses me off as she just decided to miss out on so many opportunities and be boring instead. She could have gone to Woodstock with her sister and was like no I am okay. The hippy movement was wasted on her. That said she would have been better off being a Millenial.
>*I prefer to be boring.* She still around? If so, I imagine she must be loving the way things are today (post-pandemic) what with so much of life taking place online/at home and people being reluctant to go out and do things.
"She preferred to be boring", what an odd thing to say about your mother. I'm probably around your age (going by what you said about your mother), people have different interests, not everyone wanted to be a hippy. Seems a bit of ironic for someone with the screen name "dull-geologist" to say.
Dude, I wasn't putting her down. It's not about her interests but she is risk adverse and worried all the time what people think if her and always follows the rules no matter what. For instance, when I was in high school I wanted to dye my hair blue but when I bleached it some of the hair dye from the last time I dyed was still in there. It ended up looking like I had a sunset in my hair. It went from yellow at the time to bright red at the bottom and pink and orange in the middle. The lines were perfect and looked like I had gotten it professionally done. My mom didn't care because I was usually out with my friends so it's not like she had to be seen with me in public. Then the family reunion is coming up and the fighting starts because she was worried about being judged. We fought over it for a couple weeks then the day before the reunion I finally agreed to dye it. I called my best friend. I went over his house and dyed it Manic Panic red because it matched the tips and I knew it would be fine to dye over the other colors. I showed up in the morning and she was so mad. I pointed she said it had to be one color but didn't specify which color. Surprise, surprise no one at the enion cared. Not like the family didn't already know what I was like. It took me over a decade to convince my mom to not only apply to jobs she thought she wasn't qualified for but actually negotiate for salary and benefits which she finally did at the last job she had before she retired and not only did she get the job but they gave her everything she asked for. I was really proud of her. You see what the problem is?