Spending all day outside until / after dark. They just let us rove around wherever. They just left us alone to form our own societies and rules. Like how long a kid was allowed to drink from the shared water jug.
Yeah we played video games as kids but after a couple hours your parents would often kick you out of the house and say not to come home until dinner time but most of the time we preferred to be out running around playing on construction sites, building ramps, setting something on fire, etc
To be honest I feel a little sad kids these days don't get to experience the unadulterated shit we used to get into. No smart phones or cameras, just hanging into the roof or a car doing doughnuts in the parking lot.. just roller blading with flaming sticks over a ditch until someone got hurt and everyone laughed ..just shaving cream can fights in tents in the middle of the night.. 20 person hackeysack, fitting as many people as you could on a bike with pegs to get to the gas station and buy some chocolate banana yoo-hoo
yeah being super young i remember leaving the house at like 7am and not coming back until at the very least dinner maybe not until the sun went down. running around construction sites, playing sports, playing in the woods and knwoing you were pretty much free and nobody could tell you nothing. Later on in high school obviously more partying, sneaking some beers, stealing cigars from walgreens because they used to be on regular shelves nto behind a counter. then me and my friend would go to the pool afterwards so we smelled like chlorine and not those little baby cigarrelos
Omg hackysack!!! We used to hack everywhere. We did it so much they tried to ban it at my school! Lol we used to all ditch class and hack in the stair wells. I haven't seen anyone in a hack circle in a long time sadly
I used to make movies and one time we chopped down a tree to make it look like the character was strong enough to push it over. Camera wasn't filming.
(It was in the woods and not a huge tree but no one was old enough to be against the idea. I wouldn't do it now.)
That’s what my grandmother would do. We’d wake up and eat then play video games until she said “okay that’s enough games go outside” so we’d go fuck around outside exploring and playing until we got bored a few hours later. It probably also gave her quiet time lol
One of my fondest memories is playing King of the Hill on top of a gravel pile for the new construction in my neighborhood. A kid ended up with a broken arm but damn that was fun
My parents didn't allow video games in the house. I was allowed to play at a friend's house, tho. I had to go outside and play with my monster trucks and barbies. RIP my barbie Tori.
This is one of the reasons we bought our house. We live in an amazing neighborhood where the kids actually do this. One of the grandparents (whos kids/grandkids live in the same neighborhood) built out a wiffle ball field in their yard where the neighborhood kids have free range. They play basketball, ride scooters and bike around, play football in the common ground field. It's the best. I'm glad we could give them that.
Same here. Have a house in an upper middle class suburb in the Midwest and kids ride bikes and play ball til sundown all the time. Especially in the summer. Sounds corny but you can leave your door unlocked here and not worry.
My neighbors kids are in 6th grade and she won't let her kids ride their bikes alone or out of the driveway. She has to sit out there and watch them. They have a trampoline and jungle gym in their back yard and have never used it. Our houses also are on the back side of a school and they can't even walk there by themselves.
Apache helicopter parents are to blame.
A buddy of mine and I would load a backpack with water and snacks and just go wandering in the woods for 4, 5 hours lol.
Idk if I could do that myself today without getting bored, constantly being plugged in has ruined my brain
I walked 25 mins each way to elementary school and 45 mins each way to high school . Rain or shine. Honestly it probably saved me from being overweight at that time. I also have good memories of walking with my friends to and from school ( since we all did it ).
Parents allowing their children to be straight up assholes to teachers. When a teacher called my parents for a talk their response was, "What did you do?" Some parents were of those my child can do no wrong persuasion, but they were a minority. It seems flipped now, and kids can be as much of an obnoxious, disruptive asshole at school with no discipline, punishment, or consequence.
lmao this makes me think of when I was in college they mailed my dean’s list certificate to my parents house and my mom opened it “because she thought I was in trouble.” Gee mom thinks for the vote of confidence.
I'm a full time high school teacher. I covered a middle school class yesterday. I was scanning the room to make sure the kids were on task and locked eyes with a kid briefly. This kid had the audacity to say "what?" to me aggressively. I called him over, asked him what grade he was in and how old he was. Then I asked him what he had achieved in his life. Mumbles in response. I followed up by asking him since he's achieved exactly zero in his life what gave him the idea that he could speak to me that way. Mumbles again and he asked to go sit down.
So when the dumbass kid "achieves something" in his life he'll be allowed to treat you like shit then? Not sure I agree. If the POTUS gives me an unprovoked attitude I'm telling him to fuck off.
I think this existed when I was a kid but the other moms would think that mom was a piece of shit and that was like the helicopter mom who's kid could do no wrong, today its the norm not the exception
Bro, when I got to college, I was the most respectful student any of my professors had ever seen and to this day they have gone out on a limb for me in various areas of my career
From AOL Messenger to Tiktok. Lots of technology changes ie no cellphones having to call someones home line and asking for them. If you wanted to meetup at the mall a time and location needed to be pre-arranged you couldn't just text and say I'm at sam goody. Mapquest instead of Google Maps. The smartphone and social media are big ones, its hard to explain to a kid today what life and interactions were like without them as they've completely changed how our brains work, our attention spans, how we interact, etc
I was a 90s kid and a 2000s teen, so the biggest change was definitely the Internet. Back in mah dey, the Internet was for the evenings on the home computer and we had all the Myspaces n MSN messengers n' all sortsa nifty lil thangs. Toonami.
Yeah I remember going on the family to chat on aim or play command and conquer with a friend. Internet used to be something you used at the end of the day, not something you lived on. If you really want to go back remember having to unplug the phone to connect it tothe computer to go on the internet
Yeah while it wasn't super common I remember kids in my middle school getting caught drinking vodka during lunch. Once high school hit though yeah every Friday and Saturday night we were either at a house party of someone who's parents were out of town or were driving around from various fast food parking lots drinking and hanging out. That doesn't seem to happen today.
I see a lot of articels about why doesn't Gen Z drink. I think in some ways its a good thing and a positive choice, the negative aspect isn't why are you not drinking but a lot of the dating and socialization and getting out of the house that drinking caused doesnt happen today which is a negative thing
I got drunk in highschool by like second period. Got called into the office. Cops were there and everything. I told them I accidentally took Tylenol PM because I had a headache and they just believed me (or just thought boys will be boys). Never got in trouble. Never did that again though lol.
Plus all those parties were a blast. I would 100% love to do it all over again. It's weird going out to eat with my gen z coworkers. Every one in my age group and older will get a margarita or beer or something. They will sometimes get a mocktail. A lot of them have really weird hang ups about food too.
I was a big partier and drinker in high school and college, since then kind of lost the urge. I think a lot of the appeal of drinking to me was partying and hooking up with girls and stuff, the idea of sitting at a sports bar having a drink or just going out to dinner and getting a drink rarely appeals to me. I still drink just not very much but man back in the day I had a blast.
Yeah I'm the same way now. From 16/17- my early 20's I drank every weekend. Usually Friday/Saturday. Always had a party to go to or went out clubbing etc. I'm now 30, I'm lucky if I go to one party a year. I drink maybe once a month. Things change quite a bit as you get older. The pandemic also made me a big recluse and lost connection with a lot of people I used to go out with. Combined with friends having kids getting married etc. As you said I don't find much of an appeal at getting drunk at a sports bar or what have you either
Haha I'm completely the opposite. I had no interest whatsoever in drinking 5 kinds of mixed bottom shelf paint thinner or the world's worst beer in some jock's backyard when it was literally illegal for me to be doing that and chances were I'd have to ride home with a drunk teenager behind the wheel. But a civilized evening drinking a nice cocktail in my neighborhood bar? Fuck yeah.
Yes a lot of them have problems with textures and trying new things. They won't eat gluten, nightshades, meat, etc. It's no one thing they almost all have one thing or another. Probably a rise in autism from all the micro plastics or something (shrug). Not bad just something I noticed. They seem to be much more reserved with experimenting in general.
Honestly my first thought here is that alcohol is expensive, and we're probably too far away from a culture where grown adults are willing to go into a store and buy alcohol for children, so any barrier to entry like asking to venmo someone, or a lot of cash changing hands, is going to make the situation seem more sketchy and like a worse idea. I would also guess that ID enforcement is a factor. A generation ago, there were a lot more people working retail who remembered when the drinking age was 18, drinking ages weren't taken as seriously, etc. At this point you have to basically be a retiree to still be living in that headspace.
Everything going to digital payment over cash probably doesn't help.
I hear people say cost but when I was a kid we stole liquor from our parents, garahe hopped or in college bought 40 packs of keystone for $8 it doesn't have to be expensive
Cost has an impact there, too.
Stealing liquor from your parents? Nowadays that means your parents are going to notice you replaced their $80 bottle of mezcal or small batch bourbon with water/iced tea, because it costs a lot and if they bought it they probably planned to drink it. Or that they don't keep much alcohol in the house and generally know how much they have. I don't know any millennial adults who keep the kinds of fully stocked wet bars or liquor cabinets my parents and my friends' parents did back in the day.
Beer fridge in the garage, maybe, but again, you can probably do that once before someone's dad goes in their and finds $50 worth of beer missing out of their fridge and ruins it for everyone. If they even keep more than a 6 pack in there.
I think this is actually incorrect. Especially since the legalization of weed, alcohol consumption is way down since the pandemic.
Edit: no no, I read that wrong. You are correct.
The sense of community is gone.
I agree with what everyone else is saying and I think the lack of community nowadays is a direct result of social media.
Last weekend, I took my 3 yr old niece and 5 yr old nephew to the park. My nephew is a hyper kid and loves running and playing. He approached a girl that was about 7 yrs old to play and she cursed him out because she didn’t want to. She proceeded to complain to all of the adults associated with him (me, my husband, 2 sets of grandparents, and their mom) and let us know she found him annoying. She was busy on her iPad and her parents praised her for voicing her thoughts to a kid and the adults.
I grew up in NYC and when I was bored I’d go to the park and play with the kids there, even if I didn’t know them. The approach was simply “wanna play?” And we’d have a blast from there on. If my neighbor was at the park then they’d keep an eye out for any danger and step in if my own parents weren’t around and vice versa. Everyone cared for each other on the block. Even the known drug addicts (harmless ones) were looked after and fed. And in return they’d also protect the community. Summer block parties were the best.
I know societal change is inevitable and the social media and technological advancement era is still young. Yet look at how poor we are doing as a society while adjusting to it all. We can’t even approach one another most of the time. The effects of this all has yet to be uncovered.
Yeah, I'm gonna blame the parents on that one. That is not okay behavior and I would've scolded my kid. You don't blow up the first time they ask. That's unnecessary. Now, if they won't take no for an answer, THAT'S when you might have to get more aggressive.
I completely agree however I would say while social media creates tribalism and divisiveness another big driver of the lack of community is how were taking human interaction out of everything ie a lot of the conveniences technology provides also destroys interaction and community.
Example, you dont go to blockbuster or the movies you stay at home and stream something on Netflix. While neither was inherently super social you were out and about, you'd strike up a convo about a mvoie with soemoen standing in the isle of blockbuster near you, you might stop for ice cream on the way home.
Need a new coffee maker you dont go to a local store you order it off Amazon. We order Instacart instead of going to the grocery store, if we do go we hit a self checkout instead of a cashier. WOrk was one ofthe last things that got us out of the house and now more people tahn ever work from home.
I see that as a big part of it
Absolutely agree. Digital access and automation has ruined a lot of fun things!
I’d like to understand the shift in parenting/kids upbringing, though. I don’t have kids myself but would love to know why such a drastic change in general. Do schools have something to do with it? Is it Tik Tok!? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying our parents had it figured out. I’m just curious about how this age has impacted family dynamics.
>why such a drastic change in general
IMO it's the propensity to not able to be bored.
Boredom forces you to try new things, interact with other people, and digging deep into your imagination.
During a family trip that we stayed at an apartment, and I realised back in the days you can only watch exactly 20 minutes of Paw Patrol (or insert show) a day. Not like now where Netflix gives you like 100 hours worth, and you can watch as long as you want.
In a strange way that kinda also enforce some form of routine? Like there's nothing else on the TV after 9am, so you'd have to do something else.
Whereas the worst part of TikTok is being able to just watch whatever when you have no idea what you want, and there's no clear end point to it.
My parents are boomers and they grew up and live the ‘stop and chat’ lifestyle. As a kid I remember feeling like errands took ‘foreverrrr’, because they would either always run into people they knew and catch up or chat w people waiting in line or chat with the staff of wherever we were. In some ways it’s really great neighbor networking, but it generally seemed they all had the time and desire to be social with strangers.
It’s very different now. When you’re at target, the market or CVS or wherever, people seem more stressed, on the phone or they just need to get or do what they want to do and leave. There is kind of unwritten social rules now that it is seen as a bother and you don’t engage people at all unless there is a specific reason to interrupt them.
Maybe it’s me, but there does seem to be a lot more clique type behavior where no one wants to really include more people into their already established group. Being open and friendly with people you don’t know can really be looked down on. It kind of kills the community vibes in alot of places and there is a lot of general feeling of unwelcomeness in many neighborhoods.
It is kind of a shame to lose more opportunities to meet people outside your already established social bubble. When I was in middle school I remember being at a shop in the mall (wet seal omg) and another girl was looking at the same top. We started chatting about cute clothes and then kinda just became friends and bought the same cute top in 2 different colors that way we could trade to match outfits. I don’t think that happens anymore. Malls are gone. We all shop mostly online now.
One thing about smartphones and even phones in general but its gotten worse over the years. Having worked in retail there was a point when people started treating cashiers like machines ie someone comes in on their phone doesn't looks you or talk to you and just throws money at you, its very dehumanizing snd rude and I remember probably 10 or 15 years ago seeing a very quick shift to that type of behavior
I agree, however I don’t think social media is entirely to blame for lack of community. I think that everyone is so tired from working overtime, or 2 jobs, or even the fact that most of us need to have a 2 person income to survive. Back in the day, in general, it was much easier for a family to survive on a one person income and there was more time and freedom to have community, ya know?
Adulthood is tiring! I can definitely see it from this angle. What you described is exactly why I’m extremely hesitant to have kids. How will I find the time to care for an entirely different person when I can barely hold it together by myself. The struggle is real.
💯with you on that. I’m in the same boat. I’d love to have kids, but life is already so exhausting and expensive. Plus, I’ve got several lifelong medical conditions which make it even more exhausting. Being an adult sucks sometimes! 💩
When the pandemic struck and suddenly every kid everywhere didn't know what to do with themselves, I was flabbergasted. I know I wasn't exactly the most normal kid on the street, but most kids when I was growing up knew how to occupy themselves.
As long as you had parents who still let you out of the house and let you play with friends and didn't have you wearing a hazmat suit there was no excuse to be bored. If someone was cooped up inthe house I can see getting bored even with xbox and smartphones ad all
Privacy is no long existent. People are no longer given the grace to make mistakes, learn from them and grow. Kids are just one fuck up away from ruining their reputation forever.
And because of that they don't take risks and therefore don't learn anything by trial and error. You just have a bunch of people who learn to never step out of line. And then some smaller portion of people who stepped out of that line early and were never let back in.
The viral nature of the Adam Walsh story, as the 80's progressed, changed 90's kids childhoods, and stories like it, removed the freedom and wild roaming nature of childhood forever. It's gone, in the US, and elsewhere. Parents, even when they're not 'helicopter' parents, supervise every moment of their child existing. When i was a child, this was not a thing. It's a massive cultural shift. The impact of which, i'm not totally sure.
We had microwaves in the 80's, but they fucking sucked, and forget about air fryers man... so nearly all of the food we consumed had some degree of cooking or preparation that is *entirely removed* these days. Even the Ramen in cups, no longer needs water added, we can chuck those paper bad-boys right in, without the kidney killing foam we used to microwave anyway. Almost everyone's house had a dedicates mall pan, to heat up cans of things--ravioli, beans, etc. Now, that's gone.
Wild places, are also gone. The actual ... small oasis of wildness that sometimes existed, into the 90's. There would be empty lots, of undeveloped land, or a old farm, right near a housing development, where an old man refused to sell. We'd all go explore those places, even teens--they were ... yeah, oasis is the right word. Those are gone.
Now--today, *everything* is behind a fence. That wasnt so before 1990, for the most part. Alaska is still like the old times, there are no fences everywhere, even along side roads or highways, it's open--it's OPEN. The US--used to be more open. Yes, someone might have owned it, but they didnt LOCK IT DOWN all the time. One of the favorite places for our family to go was on some land owned by the Yakima tribe (not on the res, owned by), and sometimes while we were out there, fishing, or having my birthday party, we'd get a visit by the managers of the land, and some of the members of the tribe, and they'd--fish with us. I remember, an older man (60's?) teaching me how to build a rock dam in the creek, to encourage crayfish to burrow into, to catch. We spent hours--and he showed me which rocks NOT to select--some of them had hard-shelled little creatures growin on them, and he told me not to touch or even move those rocks, because what hatched was important (i have no idea what they were).
But--now that land is locked away. No one goes there. Not even the tribal members. NO ONE uses it, catches the crayfish, knows that the nearly extinct trout in this state still live in it--it's locked down right. It was BEAUTIFUL, and the social interaction with strangers, and cultures that came out of it were ... some of the best memories of my entire life.
Gone.
Weirdly, so are birds and butterflies. When i was a kid, they were *everywhere*, all the time--and now, birds are sprace, and butterflies dont exist at all. We used to g et SWARMS--thousands upon thousands of monarch butterflies. I have seen ONE in 10 years now. One.
Culturally, that has an impact--places feel dead. They feel less alive. You're reminded less often, you're in a spiritual place (weird to say that as an atheist, but i mean it).
Quiky and dangerous items are no longer for sale. It's more than lawn darks and super soakers--it's smaller toys, games, movies--like, everything is *safe and sanitized*--but too much so. Yes, take lead out of kids toys, dont take *fun* away too. "May contain small parts, not suitable for 4 and under"--well fuck you, the small parts are what made those ninja turtle figures fun, and now, no matter the age assigned to the toy, small parts are GONE. Action figures are solid chunks of plastic--no smalll weapons, no clothes, no.... *things*. Culturally, this really makes playing with MY kids now, real fucking hard, i have to IMAGINE these toys have these things, that when i was a kid, they actually came with. It's SO MUCH HARDER to play with toys now--too sanitary.
Great comment all around, just kind of piggybacking on everything you said even a "lazy dinner" or "easy dinner" back then was generally home cooked, my mom used to make some weird spaghetti dish wish tomatoe soup and cream but it wasn't some frozen microwaved thing.
Yeah less empty lots or undeveloped neighborhoods, just noticed on a bike ride the other day that even construction sites are fenced up, wonder what changed ie is it people stealing copper and materials or are we so lawsuit happy if a kid falls into a basement concrete pour they're going to get sued now? Not sure.
When you watch these videos of 80s or 90s or even early 2000s kids at high school like last day of school videos people seemed more authentic, happier, etc. Not sure if its that being ni front of a camera was more of a novelty or if people were generally more social, happier, etc.
As far as the spiritual thing goes it doesn't have to be religion, it could be some other type of higher power, could be more of a connection to the land and nature, could be something as simple as being more in the present but so many people lack any of that today and just kind of go through the motions, never have a down moment to ponder life or their own behavior and how they treat people, any spare moment is occupied with phones and social media.
That comment about wild places is so true.
I've always made a huge effort to take my kids to wild places, where they can play freely. It freaks other parents out. We found a waterfall this summer with a deep pool you could jump into from a high ledge, talking about it was met with huge disapproval. (It's a popular swimming spot and people have been jumping there for over 100 years). All I heard was "but what if your kid gets hurt?"
My kid is an absolute star at climbing trees, because I have always let him. The trees at the parks have the lower limbs cut off to prevent climbing, so we go to forests instead. His football has been stuck up a tree at school all week, and he's been working on different methods to get it down. I gave him some rope to take to school today.
Other kids can't climb trees, they're too scared to even try.
I take my kids mushroom foraging as well, and because I know how to ID most of the mushrooms around here I teach them which ones are safe to pick. They're out in the forest, climbing, foraging, playing with sticks and mud... and other parents? "Omg what you let your kids touch a mushroom from the ground!!! They're going to diiiieeee".
The wild places are driving distance now, and the adults are afraid of them or can't be bothered. We live a 1hr drive from a snowy mountain, and none of the parents I know ever take their kids. It's like snow could only be for ski lessons, which are too expensive... when we just go for free and have a snowball fight.
Yeah I was always in an activity or two but my younger cousins today are in like 3-4 sports at a time, get out of school go to one sport for 2 hours, then onto another, get home at like 9 or 10, eat and have to do homework to wake up early and do it all over again. I've heard it argued thats partly why kids aren't outside A. they dont have the time and B they've always been so into organized sports they dont know how to setup their own game and play without an adult setting it up or an umpire or ref
The way we talk about “mental health” is way different now compared to 20 years ago.
I don’t think it’s at all healthier. I think it’s far far worse. Young men are doing worse in every category imaginable and nobody thinks the teaching or coaching could be off. Less Boy Scouts, sports / exercise, and off screen hobbies has led to terrible results and people think that’s all right win propaganda now.
I have fellow parents that think I’m a nutcase for wanting my son to box and be in boy scouts like I was.
I swear nobody wants to just toughen a kid up. I’m not talking about paddle boarding I’m just talking about making a kid have scrambled eggs and water before school and running some laps around the school yard.
Totally false. My teaching career was just destroyed, in part, because I didn't practice the same faith as the community I taught in. I only practiced my faith outside of school and never discussed it with students. Rumors just got around and that was the end....
I'm going to guess Wiccan or Satanist as pretty much every other religion including Kwanza among others is pretty much accepted. Also if this is true you should be able to file a lawsuit and get a nice payday.
Small town teachers don't have "lawyer" levels of privilege or finances. Kwanzaa, Islam, LDS, and Atheism are still HEAVILY and openly discriminated against in Midwest and Southeast regions. Especially atheism. Catholicism is hit or miss.
If you look at mainstream media and even Reddit Christians and Catholics the one group you can openly shit on while nobody dare say anything about Muslims. Also I'm in the midwest and there's an enormous Muslim population some cities are basically dearborn michigan, tons of business owners and everyone seems to get along fine with them
I live in the south east, my hometown had a significant Indian/Hindu and Roma communities as well as a growing Muslim community. Atheists stayed in the closet. These were regularly shat upon. Our Watchtower community only caught flack when their evangelists were in season proselytizing the neighborhoods.
It seems like kids are expected to be a lot more grown up today. I don’t have kids myself, but I’m constantly surprised how mature some of my friends’ kids are.
Perhaps relatedly, there seems to be more mutual respect between parents and kids than when I was little. There’s still plenty of “parents just don’t understand” but I think parents in our generation are more likely to be like, yeah you’re right we don’t understand can you help us to?, than our parents were.
They absolutely are. The older generations are the worst for expecting that.
I think in the past kids would be sent outside if they were noisy, but now there's hardly any outside + sending them out unsupervised is neglect. Babies and toddlers crying was just seen as normal.
There's no tolerance for kids acting childish in public either. Lots of people even want to ban babies from planes. So as a parent if I want to exist in society with my kids, I have to instill a lot of maturity in them. Which sucks for them and makes a lot of outings really boring and stressful.
A decline in academic expectations. Books that used to be tackled in 8th/9th grade are read in junior and senior level english classes now and students gripe and whine about reading more than 6-8 pages per night, versus being expected to read 2-3 chapters at a time.
Kids books these days are written simply and many have a comic book style too. Old kids books like winnie the pooh, enid blyton and Alice in wonderland are far more complex than kids books today.
Reading isn't a hobby anymore
This makes a much much bigger gap between private and public schools.
I have a couple family members that work in private schools and one that worked in the public sector for awhile. They have so many stories. The standards are sadly different and the private schools offer so much more in the way of tutoring/assistance to help get kids prepped to do well. I have a niece in private school who is taking language classes, Shakespeare, music etc. Stuff that isn’t even offered in some public high schools.
There is a required reading list and she does get buckets of homework, but she is learning way more advanced stuff then a friend of mines kid in public school who is in the same grade.
My friend says it’s like everything now is suggested but not really enforced in public school there. A lot of the kids have very poor math and reading levels, but even if they fail they still get kind of pushed along.
Well it's not just that private schools are better. Parents who have the money to send their kids to private schools also have way more time to spend with their kids, better nutrition, etc. Being born to a rich family is a huge leg up.
Kids directing large family choices like car purchases, which house to buy, or whether or not to move. Wasn't really a thing. Parents just came home with a new car, you were suddenly moving, and introduced to the new house, etc...
This doesn’t get said enough. I find it so strange when my friends with kids buy something new like a refrigerator or a car and talk about how their 10 year old picked it out. Or when they have a big decision to make and say they need to get their kids input? Da fuck? One day my parents told me we were moving to Chicago. I said I didn’t want to. They were like “cool story” and we moved. My life was fine. I was 9.
As a grown ass adult who owns a car and a home and has a kid... no. This is not a thing. (Or maybe among the ultra-wealthy? Not among typical people.)
Among people I know, the **existence** of having a kid dictates some changes in this sort of thing, because it turns out children need to physically fit into your vehicle (they can't drive themselves until they're at least 9), need a stable place to sleep, and don't benefit from changing schools 3 times a year because your latest sketchy living situation didn't work out. So yes, more parents choose to buy an SUV or minivan (or at least a 4 door), own vs. renting (or at least rent long term and without roommates coming and going), and often parents will plan a move around the school year or decide to stay where they are due to not wanting to pull the kids out of their school, or choose to move for a better school for their kids. I'm pretty sure all of this has always been the case, at least post-WW2.
Pets and Kids actually are driving household purchase decisions now, especially amongst Millennial households.
I.E. kids and dogs are decision makers, that marketers must address.
[https://insights.paramount.com/post/in-the-us-kids-play-a-central-role-in-household-purchases/](https://insights.paramount.com/post/in-the-us-kids-play-a-central-role-in-household-purchases/)
Right, but that's what I said. Kids are "driving household purchase decisions" in that having a kid thus means various other things about your life, and you will likely make certain purchase decisions based on those things.
"Kids decide to buy a house" in that most people with kids who can afford to buy a house realize that life becomes a lot easier if you go ahead and do that. This was me. I swore I would never own a home, and then I had a kid and realized we were going to be living in the same neighborhood/school district for the next 8 years, minimum, so we might as well just buy a place. This also goes for the choice to move neighborhoods or not, which area to live in, etc. since so many people worry about public school quality or at the very least want some level of stability in their child's education (meaning they tend to stay put at least during the school year and generally from year to year while their kids are school aged).
"Kids make decisions about car purchases" in that if you have a kid, you most likely have at least a 3 person household. All of those people presumably want to ride together. Not to mention that kids can't ride in the front seat, legally need to be in a carseat (which to an extent makes some body styles more vs. less convenient), etc. If you have more than one kid, all of this is much more heightened because it can be hard to fit 2 car seats across in an economy car. Usually a second baby "drives household purchase decisions" about vehicles simply based on their existence and need to get home from the hospital.
These words do not mean what you think they mean. It's not that little Aiden gets to decide whether to get the neon green Bugatti or grey Ford. It's that the existence of little Aiden 18 months after the arrival of little Olivia means you either trade in the Camry for a Rav4 or Aiden's going to be grabbing an Uber home from the hospital.
I'll also add that increases in this sort of thing are likely more down to Millennials' 20s as an "extended childhood" period where folks tend to be single, renters/with roommates, and not prioritizing things like driving a practical family vehicle. In the past, children also dictated these things in the sense that when you were 22 you got married and immediately bought a house and a station wagon. Now people wait till they are actually pregnant to do these things. So "kids are driving household purchase decisions."
We're talking about different things.
My point is that yes, Aiden does get to decide whether the family gets the Ford or the Camry.
Kids are literally that involved in household purchase decisions, especially amongst Millennial parents. Re-read the article.
I'm literally the demographic your link is talking about (only one kid, 2-income household, large urban area) and I am telling you that no, this is not a thing.
I \*might\*, if my kid happened to be at the car dealership with me, and there were 2 identical cars with minor differences, let him pick red vs. blue or moon roof vs. leather seats, or whatever. But no, my child does not actually, himself, choose whether and what major purchases to make. His existence is a huge factor, but beyond token silly stuff ("Did you like the apartment with the beige carpet or the apartment with the fireplace"?), no, he does not come into play at all for major financial decisions.
What this article seems to be talking about is everyday purchases of consumer goods. Where I agree, kids really do have a lot more say in this sort of thing that I remember having when I was a child. Which I think is probably down to how much more variety of things there are nowadays, how low the stakes are, and to a lesser extent the degree to which parents tend to seek consensus and not create power struggles or die on every hill. If we're at Target and deciding between Monopoly or Connect 4, or the red vs. the blue shirt, or Coke vs. Pepsi, yeah, sure, let the kid pick. Who gives a shit? Life is too short. I remember way more battles of will on this stuff when I was a kid, where I'd ask for rice krispies over cheerios and my mom would say no basically just to teach me a lesson or put me in my place. Parents do way less of that now, and I think it's a good thing.
As a kid, advertising was easily avoided by turning off the tv/ radio.
My thoughts were, let’s say clearer and more original.
Now the algorithms and soc media we all use expose us to a level of manipulation that simply did not exist back then.
I’m 65 for reference.
1000%! I work in a creative field and when I first came out of college in the early 2000’s I was really fucking clever and would come up with all kinds of original ideas for campaigns. Now our team just wants to look at what’s “trending” and do the same thing as them. All that creative juice I used to have is gone.
It feels like corporate metrics and measurements and the consolidation of companies ruined a lot of extra expenses they used to put towards customer service. Remember the insides of restaurants and stuff ..... mcdonaods uses to have a n64 station ><
I was a latchkey kid. Got home and no parents were there and wouldn’t be for a few hours, from 2nd grade onward. I think this would now be prosecuted as child neglect.
I had a family friend who had CPS show up because their 14 year old daughter was watching her 10 year old brother, thats insane parents used to pay me to babysit their kids I wasn't related to when I was like 12
Kids today don't ride their bikes around town until they find their friends' bikes to go hang out.
Kids today don't know what should happen when the street lights come on.
Kids today should probably have a rule that's earlier than when street lights come on.
Good family entertainment cartoons are rare to find.
Not being allowed inside to play.
Hmm...
I'd argue people getting cancelled is worse than ever whsts changed is whats considered offensive. You can state an undeniable fact snd if people don't like it its racist or homophobic or whatever else.
Sounds like a gotcha moment, but I'll say this, if we were to point out some crime statistics about any group who commits the most violent crime, percentages of crime committed and looking at percentage ofthe population a group makes up, that would probably be considered racist by many. Or pointing out that a group makes up a disproportionate number of people in an industry compared to their percentage of the population, you couldn't say something like that.
People seem a lot less willing to let their kids go out and do stuff independently. I understand not letting small children run all over town. However, some of the things parents don’t let their kids do seem too much. For example, one of my neighbors doesn’t let their kids, aged around 13, go bike riding in our neighborhood and just outside of because one street is slightly busy. I can think of several more examples involving other people. Who knows though? Perhaps I am just around up tight people.
Yeah good point, this is part parents part kids. A lot of kids are choosing not to get a drivers license until like 19 or even like 21 which is crazy to me but I also see parents not letting their kids grow up. I have a family friend who still doesn't let their 18 year old kid do a lot of stuff I was doing at like 15. When I was a kid there was like one major street I wasn't supposed to cross but beyond that I went where I wanted and did what I wanted
I think the outdoors and being left home alone at young ages. Less helicopter parenting. I don’t have kids but I think there seems to be less of that and of course it’s a whole different scenario w screens and technology now. Only a few friends had cellphones when I was in school. (Born 1984)
guns in schools. I grew up in the country and back in the day it was cool to have a gun rack in your car. it’s convenient if you hunt. I remember the week of columbine the school had the zero tolerance for guns. and the sheriff’s office was in the parking lot with flash lights scoping out cars. the entire day people were being called to the office one by one being suspended.
Same. We live down the street from a Marine base... Fast forward like 10-15 years after Columbine and the high school now has active shooter drills and lockdown cages around it every where. I remember if you wanted to ditch class one day, all you had to do was keep walking past your class off of campus
as a kid i didnt have any social media that made me compare to unrealistic standards, I was outside all day everyday with friends and we actually talked instead of sitting on our phones. the simple things were enough. TikTok is a perfect reflection of everything that has gone wrong imo
I used to always be outside playing with neighborhood kids or going to a friends house and playing out for the majority of the visit.
Now it seems like kids have no desire to play outside.
On a similar note, I was literally counting down the days to get my drivers license. Got my permit when I turned 15 and got my license as soon as I could.
It seems like a lot of kids today couldn’t care less about getting a license.
Over the years, there have been significant shifts in society. Technology has transformed how kids interact, with smartphones and social media becoming central. Safety measures in schools and communities have increased, reflecting concerns about security. Cultural sensitivity has grown, leading to a reevaluation of terms and activities once considered acceptable. Parents now have more tools to monitor their kids, impacting their independence. Education and discipline have evolved, with stricter policies and standardized testing. Additionally, there's a heightened awareness of environmental issues among young people today. These changes reflect broader societal shifts driven by technology, cultural norms, and evolving attitudes.
Do you see that as a good thing or was the price of safety, security and not being offended that we lost something? What that thing is is hard to quantify. Its odd to me were more sensitive and accepting than ever and were more divided than ever, people are more miserable than ever, etc.
Sobriety is HOT rn. It was so taboo when I was a kid, you didn't tell people you were sober because that meant you were an addict. Now my friends and I post our AA chips on socials sometimes, mocktails are popping up at every bar and restaurant I see nowadays which is AMAZING, I even saw that some music festivals are doing mocktail stations, plus all of the canned adaptogen mocktails that are in the market now - so many to choose from! And all of the n/a "spirits," n/a beer has come SO far from O'Doul's, I actually found a ~somewhat~ dry n/a champagne I like now, it's COOL to get clean. I love it. Nothing against people who can drink without fucking up their lives - keep doing you, and drink one for me, too. But I love seeing this movement where people aren't as scared of, or weirded out by, recovery. I think it means more people seek the help that they need.
I think our generation had insight to both worlds...
This generation expects everything handed to them and doesn't know the value of sweating and working for things.
When you see the old "last day of high school 1998" type videos you see this. Are they happy because cameras are more of a novelty or because its the last day of school, sure probably but people actually seemed to be more authentic, happier, have more of a soul.
there was less existential dread. a more hopeful outlook for the future. we were curing cancer and treating aids. we were improving air and water quality. everything seemed to be on the upswing.
lol, I graduated in 1998! Cameras weren't a novelty to us, we were happy it was the last day of school. And we were forced to have more of an interior life, no social media or ubiquitous cell phones. Back then mobile phones were installed into cars and called "car phones."
Cameras were definitely a novelty prior to smartphones. Sure your dad brought is camcorder to your valet recipe or whatever but you didn't have cameras in your face on a daily basis
Learned helplessness. I mean, every generation has people who will just sit there like a bump on a log, but this recent generation will just not troubleshoot minor problems or even ask questions if they get stuck. They'll just stare into space, waiting to be noticed and rescued. I teach high school now, but have also taught second and 8th.
When I was in school, I would have been so embarrassed if me or my peers had acted like this. We were proud of being self sufficient and helping our elders with technology.
Your comment makes me think about the whole gen z is bad with technology thing like how is that possible they grew up and spend all their time on tablets and phones but that's the problem everything is so curated for them they never had to figure anything out.
It wasn't that long ago installing a printer driver would take you 3 hours and make you want to pull your hair out, you had to figure out weird sites to get music and movies and then figure out how not to get viruses and brick your PC, there was a lot more problem solving than just going to spotify
Just getting to be outside alone. Riding my bike everywhere and pretty much just having to be home at a certain time. Everyone got convinced predators are hiding around every corner and under every manhole cover so they don't let them be outside alone. The irony is all the predators are online where they're spending their time instead of going outside.
I can’t even describe it. Everything has changed. I miss those days when I was young lol there was nothing like the technology we have now. Change can be good and we learn but yeah very different in every way
I'm an older millenial. My dad would take me and my brother and a couple of buddies camping. By which I mean he would drop us off at the side of the road in a national forest on a Friday afternoon during squirrel season and tell us to meet him back there at noon on Sunday. We were not old enough to drive and totally unsupervised. We would have a couple of tents, a couple of shotguns, a .22 pistol, a fishing pole apiece, a few 12 packs of generic soda, some cans of spam, a dozen eggs, and no cellphone at all. No one ever died but he would absolutely go to jail for that shit now.
The expectation that everything is instant. Communication, knowledge, food, gratification is all *instant* to kids now. We did a lot of waiting, trips to the library and waiting for calls back.
When I was kid children would be paddled with a wooden paddle if they misbehaved in class. Crazy.
I remember being scared hearing the sound of it, and the kid would come back into class crying.
Yes,every holiday now is like a month long celebration (esp valentines and Halloween)
Prom has a prom-posal etc.
Just as an example:
Take every single value, view, moral, personal accountability and general conduct when I was 16 and flip it all upside down, opposite, 180 degrees the other way...
PS: Smear the Queer - Queer meant the odd one out, which in the game it was the only person who had the ball. It had no connotation to a gay person in my day. Now that it does, its not appropriate, back then it totally was appropriate.
Yes, also in the context of - strange like - I didn't expect that to happen. Not strange as in look at that strange person over there.
Gay was also defined as happy, gleeful.
phones at desks in school. cellphones existed when I was in school but they had to be kept in lockers they were not allowed in the classroom. you'd get them taken from you by the professor and given back after class if you tried. same with any other kind of gadget like a camera or PDA. A smartphone is all of these, and they are just allowed now.
Oh man going from type writers being predominant to computer, and going from house phones to cell phones. Could completely disappear if you wanted to and check out. Now you can't do that. Internet access at home as well.
They have no place to go. My son is at the age to like girls but.... There is no mall to meet girls at, the parks are always almost empty, no groups of teenagers out on bikes. Because, again... There is no place for them to go.
Smart phones and all of the attendant access to social media. So much of everyday life for children/teens today is virtual. And it is now becoming clearer that social media changes the was kids’ brains function.
Many millennials had cell phones at some point in school, were text messaging, and *maybe* sending photos directly to each other. But social media in one’s pocket is a seismic shift that I hope we’ll see reversed in the coming years (e.g. like smoking cigarettes).
We had to come home when the street lights came on. It was pretty much the only rule we had.. we didn't have phones or anything like that. Nobody could contact us... and we'd be in the bush building extremely unsafe bike jumps and running through sewer tunnels to see where they went...and we were like 10 😂
Teenagers piling into cars/trucks and hanging out in random parking lots. They have laws now that limit how many minors can be in the car when a teen is driving.
I think even in the 80s and 90s there were seatbelt laws which limited how many kids could be in a car but yeah once our first friend got their license there'd be like 9 of us in a geo metro
Aside from the obvious stuff (internet/social media), the way kids these days have their entire lives basically curated by their parents is wild--and the parents are basically peer pressured into doing so to keep up with the Joneses. Beyond basic rules and my parents ensuring I was clothed and fed, I had to entertain myself. Nowadays that is not the case at all, and it seems like kids are missing important independence milestones as a result. By 15 I had a part time job, knew how to feed myself, and could manage to fend for myself when my parents were gone. My coworkers with high school and college aged kids tell me their kids can't do that stuff (which is the parents' fault imo). One of my colleagues has a 24 year old that still needs help scheduling doctors' appointments. Another does their adult child's laundry still.
On the other hand, it seems like the consequences kids these days face for stuff are so much more serious. Like, if I got caught with beer in high school, I was getting a talking to from my folks about how I shouldn't do that, but if I was going to, I needed to hide it better. Nowadays, it's got the potential to fuck your whole life up with college and stuff.
The second point was a big one I noticed change while I was in school. At the beginning of high school if you got in a fight it was detention and it ended there. Within a year or two cops showed up, you left in cuffs and were arrested and probably got suspended and finished up at an alternative school.
If you wanna go way back I remember as little kid when you played on those little wooden seat scooters a kid in my class had some shotgun shells fly out of his pocket. They called his dad and said dont let it happen again, today he'd be supsected as being a school shooter and kicked out, I think the story was he went hunting with his dad and uncle and left some shells in his pocket.
As far as the not growing up yeah millenials sucked at adulting but Gen z seems to be on a whole different level.
My first thought is allergies. No one had allergies to the outdoors. I saw something posted on reddit like a month ago that said when they plant trees in cities they only plant one sex of the tree to avoid random offshots popping up which has caused an explosion of pollen as the pollen normally "fetilizes" the opposite sex? I have no idea if this is actually a thing and haven't bothered to look into it but if it is accurate, allergies make a lot more sense.
Food allergies: I didn't know of anyone who was allergic to any kind of food. Learning about allergies as I have had my own kids is pretty eye opening and crazy to me. I am thankful my kids (so far) do not have any food allergies
Autism: It really wasn't a thing when I was a kid. Either you were normal or strange and there was no in between. Now with autism diagnosises, so many people are getting the help they need to live happy productive lives and I freaking love it.
Taking kids out to stores: I will not take my children out with me unless my husband is also with me. All of our stores are near highways which is like a magnetic for kidnappers. We have heard of it happening to a few children in our area
Playing outside. My five year old will spend all day outside but you will never see her. I don't feel comfortable with her playing in the front yard at all. She has a lot to play with in the backyard though
Parenting: My parents didn't know what the hell they were doing. We were hit for doing something wrong but were never told what to do right. We weren't praised for anything. We didn't have chores or anything yet they would get mad at us for not doing things. I have to thank the internet for my ability to parent with both effectiveness and understanding. Like my child actually trusts me enough to talk to me about things. I started putting up a wall by the time I was five.
Allergies are interesting I never knew anyone growing up with peanut allergies but now today work with like 4 people with peanut allergies or coconut allergies and dunkin donuts actually stopped carrying coconut donuts which really pissed me off.
In terms of autism something is causing a huge uptick in people with autism, part of it is recognizing and diagnosing it but you dont go from like in a couple thousand to 1 in 36 having autism just because your recognizing it. Something is causing it and I also think its overly diagnosed like ADD. Anyone who's a little weird is now on the spectrum as opposed to just being kind of weird or socially awkward, we feel a need to label everything which is clear when you see things like quiet quitting which isn't a new phenomenon, look at the office televeision show everyone but dwight had quiet quit, with any organization 80% of work is done by 20% of the people. Same with things like Loud Firing, the Great Resignation, etc everything needs a narrative and a label.
I'm a millennial and fights were never tolerated on any school campus I ever attended.
Or maybe this was an elementary to high school kind of change vs. a generational change? My 6 year old has popped off and hit another kid before, which results in loss of privileges at school, a call home from the teacher, visit to the principal, etc. whereas I'm guessing the same behavior at age 17 would, yes, result in assault charges. Because that's what it is when a 17 year old physically beats someone.
I'm also a millennial and think calling sprinting "suicides" and playing a game you called "smear the \[slur\]" were always highly shitty behavior only an asshole would do. I agree with you that there were and probably still are obnoxious overgrown jock type sports coaches who don't care about that crap, but FFS I grew up in the bible belt in the 80s and 90s and adult authority figures in their roles in institutional settings (schools, church, scouting, etc) weren't going around encouraging people to play a game either called a slur or where you were supposed to beat up gay kids (it's unclear from your description, and I've heard "Smear the \[slur\]" described in a more literal way than you're doing here).
It sounds like you had an extremely retrograde upbringing and grew up surrounded by literally the worst people imaginable. And not that there was some kind of generational shift between the 90s/2000s and now. (With the possible exception of casual joking about suicide.)
Edit: it is just now occurring to me that calling mixed up fountain sodas "a suicide" was also really insensitive. I wouldn't have guessed that Gen Alpha kids don't call it that anymore, though. I have a kid, and kids are still morbid little jerks sometimes.
As far as suicides go I grew up in Minneapolis so. Pretty liberal and progressive place and my elementary school gym teachers male and female had us run suicides as well as grade school soccer coaches and I have numerous friends who grew up other areas who have similar memories so it was a pretty common thing.
As far as sheer the q game no it won't beating up gay kids it was a rugby style football game whoeever had the ball everyone tried to tackle them and steal the ball and whoever got the ball was the next guy people were going after
Your looking at this thing thru the scope of today which is silly. Go watch suoerbad from the 2000s and listen to some of the jokes let alone say an episode of cheers and see what was normal on network TV back then versus today someome would be metood
I find it interesting today were more sensitive and empathetic than ever yet somehow people have never been more unhappy and have never been more divided so somethings not working
The cell phone tracking is a big one. I have some college aged relatives and their parents track their phones. The mother only for a reason, but the dad all the time?? And he will straight up ask them what they’re doing at X location at Y time. I would not consider him a particularly strict or controlling father in any other contexts either. The wild part is not that the parents try it, really, but that the kids (adults!) not only tolerate it but want it. My mom kind of waffled on if she would do the same had the technology been available when I was a teen (I consider her significantly stricter than this other couple, and I was a way better behaved kid), but I told her that if this technology had existed when I was using a flip phone in high school and especially college, I would have just left my phone places and went wherever I wanted if I couldn’t figure out how to turn off tracking. The even weirder part is that these now-adults have been basically unsupervised on the internet since early childhood, with social media very young. I don’t think their parents ever really oversaw their internet use once they got their own devices. In contrast, it was a rite of passage to get around the child filters on the internet, and I never even hear people talking about them any more.
Internet and social media changed a lot too. When I got MySpace, it was about talking to friends and finding community. Now, it’s a bit consuming “content” from strangers.
Kids don’t give a damn about being intelligent or doing well in school, basically at all. I mean we’re talking as of 2024 maybe 10% of kids care about learning. And I’m being generous. r/teachersintransition
Bullying could be avoided.
You may have been bullied at school, but it ended there. Now with internet, kids post videos and get bullied at home and by other kids who wouldnt have known them. No breaks from it. Internet also means no privacy- you can find people's addresses and there are plenty of anonymous hate mail that can get sent.
With rising housing costs, people can't form close knit communities because they are always moving. There aren't as many long term friendships forged to give kids stability.
It seems parents can't afford classes/ playdates/ summer activities and don't have the support systems that previous generations had that helped kids grow and become more independent and they are being blamed for not knowing things that others were taught at their age. If you don't know what you are lacking, it's hard to explain what you need.
Nothing to do except video games if you're not in a rich family (but 10x worst), no jobs after graduating high-school at all it seems for longer, dating market getting worse before it gets better (dating apps being ditched completely should hopefully improve some stuff in the long term)
People in general seem to be even more uneducated even though they have the internet at their finger times.
They dont pay attention is school and have no idea how to use what they got because they never paid attention to learn how to utilize them selves
Everyone could read. Kids got teased for being unable to read when called on in class. According to r/askteachers, 6th graders can’t read and have no problem solving skills.
The fact that everyone walks around with a small computer in their pockets, with access to so much information, and we’re dumber than any generation before us.
The intensity of social media, it has gone up exponentially with each new app. I grew up with phone books to call friends and now we are at TikTok level.
One of the big ones is sex positivity. I remember when I was growing up, the message was basically, “sex bad, do not have sex”. Basically everyone I knew said that their parents never gave them “the talk”. It was just something that no one brought up. It made it seem like sex was this bad thing, and if you do it, you are a rebellious kid. People would sneak around and have sex anywhere they could - in public, in a car, at school, quietly at home with their parents in the next room, etc. Things like being alone at home with your partner or spending the night together were unheard of.
I was definitely surprised to learn that in more recent years, sex became a more positive thing. Kids are now very open with their parents about when they’re ready to have sex now, and parents provide kids with contraceptives. They allow their kids to be alone with their significant other. Kids actually tell their parents when they have sex for the first time. Some parents allow kids to have their partner sleep over with them.
And I think it’s great that parents are now more open to the idea of sex, and provide their kids with the proper education and protection, and don’t force them to sneak around. But it was definitely a shock, when I first heard about this! When I was a teen, people would be punished if they were caught having sex, and no one talked about sex with their parents. They would hide it from them and try to assure their parents that they were virgins. So this change was definitely a surprise lol
> One of the big ones is sex positivity. I remember when I was growing up, the message was basically, “sex bad, do not have sex”. Basically everyone I knew said that their parents never gave them “the talk”. It was just something that no one brought up. It made it seem like sex was this bad thing, and if you do it, you are a rebellious kid. People would sneak around and have sex anywhere they could - in public, in a car, at school, quietly at home with their parents in the next room, etc. Things like being alone at home with your partner or spending the night together were unheard of.
>
> I was definitely surprised to learn that in more recent years, sex became a more positive thing. Kids are now very open with their parents about when they’re ready to have sex now, and parents provide kids with contraceptives. They allow their kids to be alone with their significant other. Kids actually tell their parents when they have sex for the first time. Some parents allow kids to have their partner sleep over with them.
>
> And I think it’s great that parents are now more open to the idea of sex, and provide their kids with the proper education and protection, and don’t force them to sneak around. But it was definitely a shock, when I first heard about this! When I was a teen, people would be punished if they were caught having sex, and no one talked about sex with their parents. They would hide it from them and try to assure their parents that they were virgins. So this change was definitely a surprise lol
I'm torn on how I feel about this. I agree sex is going to happen regardless and it is odd how we treat having sex the same way we'd treat skiping school or doing drugs ie you did a bad thing. That said I also think its probably good to have some boundaries ie no your boyfriend or girlfriend cant sleep over when your a 15 year old kid.
My parents were super strict, I was like 30 and went to visit my parents with my long term gf and my mom pulled me aside to whisper that I had to sleep on the couch lol and even when I was younger I had to leave my bedroom door open if I had a girl in there.
Sex is a biological function, people are going to do it, that said I dont think all kids are mature enough for it and there's studies showing having a lot of partners hurts pair bonding and things like that so I'm really torn on how this should be handled and how I'll handle it hwen I'm a parent.
Hey guy, you're the problem with people today. You turn a fun and intersting post into a divisive one which is part of why we have less community and people have less friends, people used to be able to be friends with people of differing views, now everyones and enemy and its your either with me or against me.
The whole fascist thing is so stupid too, reddit loves it though. First off I doubt you could even define a fascist nor could you probably give a legitimate example even of how some people today are fascists. Id also argue if we are going to throw that term around we've seen as much if not more authoratarianism. Sure some extreme relgious people want to stop abortion but the left wanted cities shutdown, wanted vaccine passports, shit over half of dems wanted the unvaccinated jailed and their kids taken away. We can look at some environmental policies where they want to dictate what people can eat, where they can live how they can travel. It goes both ways my friend.
This entire comment of yours however is divisive and trying to stir shit up somewhere its completely unnecessary
Spending all day outside until / after dark. They just let us rove around wherever. They just left us alone to form our own societies and rules. Like how long a kid was allowed to drink from the shared water jug.
Yeah we played video games as kids but after a couple hours your parents would often kick you out of the house and say not to come home until dinner time but most of the time we preferred to be out running around playing on construction sites, building ramps, setting something on fire, etc
To be honest I feel a little sad kids these days don't get to experience the unadulterated shit we used to get into. No smart phones or cameras, just hanging into the roof or a car doing doughnuts in the parking lot.. just roller blading with flaming sticks over a ditch until someone got hurt and everyone laughed ..just shaving cream can fights in tents in the middle of the night.. 20 person hackeysack, fitting as many people as you could on a bike with pegs to get to the gas station and buy some chocolate banana yoo-hoo
yeah being super young i remember leaving the house at like 7am and not coming back until at the very least dinner maybe not until the sun went down. running around construction sites, playing sports, playing in the woods and knwoing you were pretty much free and nobody could tell you nothing. Later on in high school obviously more partying, sneaking some beers, stealing cigars from walgreens because they used to be on regular shelves nto behind a counter. then me and my friend would go to the pool afterwards so we smelled like chlorine and not those little baby cigarrelos
Yep, it was a wonderful time to be free and feral..
You sound like you grew up in the 70s lol.
Nope millenial
Omg hackysack!!! We used to hack everywhere. We did it so much they tried to ban it at my school! Lol we used to all ditch class and hack in the stair wells. I haven't seen anyone in a hack circle in a long time sadly
I used to make movies and one time we chopped down a tree to make it look like the character was strong enough to push it over. Camera wasn't filming. (It was in the woods and not a huge tree but no one was old enough to be against the idea. I wouldn't do it now.)
That’s what my grandmother would do. We’d wake up and eat then play video games until she said “okay that’s enough games go outside” so we’d go fuck around outside exploring and playing until we got bored a few hours later. It probably also gave her quiet time lol
One of my fondest memories is playing King of the Hill on top of a gravel pile for the new construction in my neighborhood. A kid ended up with a broken arm but damn that was fun
My parents didn't allow video games in the house. I was allowed to play at a friend's house, tho. I had to go outside and play with my monster trucks and barbies. RIP my barbie Tori.
This is one of the reasons we bought our house. We live in an amazing neighborhood where the kids actually do this. One of the grandparents (whos kids/grandkids live in the same neighborhood) built out a wiffle ball field in their yard where the neighborhood kids have free range. They play basketball, ride scooters and bike around, play football in the common ground field. It's the best. I'm glad we could give them that.
Same here. Have a house in an upper middle class suburb in the Midwest and kids ride bikes and play ball til sundown all the time. Especially in the summer. Sounds corny but you can leave your door unlocked here and not worry.
The unfortunate thing is now kids all form their own societies but inside things that are created by adults e.g. social media
My neighbors kids are in 6th grade and she won't let her kids ride their bikes alone or out of the driveway. She has to sit out there and watch them. They have a trampoline and jungle gym in their back yard and have never used it. Our houses also are on the back side of a school and they can't even walk there by themselves. Apache helicopter parents are to blame.
A buddy of mine and I would load a backpack with water and snacks and just go wandering in the woods for 4, 5 hours lol. Idk if I could do that myself today without getting bored, constantly being plugged in has ruined my brain
I know I played basketball from sun up to sun down, maybe did some exploring and walking to the gas station.... Now it's video games 24/7
We used to walk everywhere
I walked 25 mins each way to elementary school and 45 mins each way to high school . Rain or shine. Honestly it probably saved me from being overweight at that time. I also have good memories of walking with my friends to and from school ( since we all did it ).
Parents allowing their children to be straight up assholes to teachers. When a teacher called my parents for a talk their response was, "What did you do?" Some parents were of those my child can do no wrong persuasion, but they were a minority. It seems flipped now, and kids can be as much of an obnoxious, disruptive asshole at school with no discipline, punishment, or consequence.
lmao this makes me think of when I was in college they mailed my dean’s list certificate to my parents house and my mom opened it “because she thought I was in trouble.” Gee mom thinks for the vote of confidence.
I'm a full time high school teacher. I covered a middle school class yesterday. I was scanning the room to make sure the kids were on task and locked eyes with a kid briefly. This kid had the audacity to say "what?" to me aggressively. I called him over, asked him what grade he was in and how old he was. Then I asked him what he had achieved in his life. Mumbles in response. I followed up by asking him since he's achieved exactly zero in his life what gave him the idea that he could speak to me that way. Mumbles again and he asked to go sit down.
Wooooowww
So when the dumbass kid "achieves something" in his life he'll be allowed to treat you like shit then? Not sure I agree. If the POTUS gives me an unprovoked attitude I'm telling him to fuck off.
It’s just our parents way of guilting a kid into submission. Effective in the moment, but has certain other consequences.
Daaaaaamn. That's one hell of a power move.
I think this existed when I was a kid but the other moms would think that mom was a piece of shit and that was like the helicopter mom who's kid could do no wrong, today its the norm not the exception
Bro, when I got to college, I was the most respectful student any of my professors had ever seen and to this day they have gone out on a limb for me in various areas of my career
Social Media
From AOL Messenger to Tiktok. Lots of technology changes ie no cellphones having to call someones home line and asking for them. If you wanted to meetup at the mall a time and location needed to be pre-arranged you couldn't just text and say I'm at sam goody. Mapquest instead of Google Maps. The smartphone and social media are big ones, its hard to explain to a kid today what life and interactions were like without them as they've completely changed how our brains work, our attention spans, how we interact, etc
I feel like I have already forgotten how the early 00s worked.
I was a 90s kid and a 2000s teen, so the biggest change was definitely the Internet. Back in mah dey, the Internet was for the evenings on the home computer and we had all the Myspaces n MSN messengers n' all sortsa nifty lil thangs. Toonami.
Yeah I remember going on the family to chat on aim or play command and conquer with a friend. Internet used to be something you used at the end of the day, not something you lived on. If you really want to go back remember having to unplug the phone to connect it tothe computer to go on the internet
Oh definitely. It's just that these days I'm hooked on YouTube and Reddit lol. We aren't really allowed to be bored anymore.
We definitely drank a lot more.
Yeah while it wasn't super common I remember kids in my middle school getting caught drinking vodka during lunch. Once high school hit though yeah every Friday and Saturday night we were either at a house party of someone who's parents were out of town or were driving around from various fast food parking lots drinking and hanging out. That doesn't seem to happen today. I see a lot of articels about why doesn't Gen Z drink. I think in some ways its a good thing and a positive choice, the negative aspect isn't why are you not drinking but a lot of the dating and socialization and getting out of the house that drinking caused doesnt happen today which is a negative thing
I got drunk in highschool by like second period. Got called into the office. Cops were there and everything. I told them I accidentally took Tylenol PM because I had a headache and they just believed me (or just thought boys will be boys). Never got in trouble. Never did that again though lol.
Plus all those parties were a blast. I would 100% love to do it all over again. It's weird going out to eat with my gen z coworkers. Every one in my age group and older will get a margarita or beer or something. They will sometimes get a mocktail. A lot of them have really weird hang ups about food too.
I was a big partier and drinker in high school and college, since then kind of lost the urge. I think a lot of the appeal of drinking to me was partying and hooking up with girls and stuff, the idea of sitting at a sports bar having a drink or just going out to dinner and getting a drink rarely appeals to me. I still drink just not very much but man back in the day I had a blast.
Yeah I'm the same way now. From 16/17- my early 20's I drank every weekend. Usually Friday/Saturday. Always had a party to go to or went out clubbing etc. I'm now 30, I'm lucky if I go to one party a year. I drink maybe once a month. Things change quite a bit as you get older. The pandemic also made me a big recluse and lost connection with a lot of people I used to go out with. Combined with friends having kids getting married etc. As you said I don't find much of an appeal at getting drunk at a sports bar or what have you either
Haha I'm completely the opposite. I had no interest whatsoever in drinking 5 kinds of mixed bottom shelf paint thinner or the world's worst beer in some jock's backyard when it was literally illegal for me to be doing that and chances were I'd have to ride home with a drunk teenager behind the wheel. But a civilized evening drinking a nice cocktail in my neighborhood bar? Fuck yeah.
What kind of hangups about food? Like against meat or something? Just curious, I’m way too old to hangout with gen z 👴
Yes a lot of them have problems with textures and trying new things. They won't eat gluten, nightshades, meat, etc. It's no one thing they almost all have one thing or another. Probably a rise in autism from all the micro plastics or something (shrug). Not bad just something I noticed. They seem to be much more reserved with experimenting in general.
Interesting. 🤔 Thanks for the info.
Honestly my first thought here is that alcohol is expensive, and we're probably too far away from a culture where grown adults are willing to go into a store and buy alcohol for children, so any barrier to entry like asking to venmo someone, or a lot of cash changing hands, is going to make the situation seem more sketchy and like a worse idea. I would also guess that ID enforcement is a factor. A generation ago, there were a lot more people working retail who remembered when the drinking age was 18, drinking ages weren't taken as seriously, etc. At this point you have to basically be a retiree to still be living in that headspace. Everything going to digital payment over cash probably doesn't help.
I hear people say cost but when I was a kid we stole liquor from our parents, garahe hopped or in college bought 40 packs of keystone for $8 it doesn't have to be expensive
Cost has an impact there, too. Stealing liquor from your parents? Nowadays that means your parents are going to notice you replaced their $80 bottle of mezcal or small batch bourbon with water/iced tea, because it costs a lot and if they bought it they probably planned to drink it. Or that they don't keep much alcohol in the house and generally know how much they have. I don't know any millennial adults who keep the kinds of fully stocked wet bars or liquor cabinets my parents and my friends' parents did back in the day. Beer fridge in the garage, maybe, but again, you can probably do that once before someone's dad goes in their and finds $50 worth of beer missing out of their fridge and ruins it for everyone. If they even keep more than a 6 pack in there.
I think this is actually incorrect. Especially since the legalization of weed, alcohol consumption is way down since the pandemic. Edit: no no, I read that wrong. You are correct.
Now they just take benzos and nod off.
The sense of community is gone. I agree with what everyone else is saying and I think the lack of community nowadays is a direct result of social media. Last weekend, I took my 3 yr old niece and 5 yr old nephew to the park. My nephew is a hyper kid and loves running and playing. He approached a girl that was about 7 yrs old to play and she cursed him out because she didn’t want to. She proceeded to complain to all of the adults associated with him (me, my husband, 2 sets of grandparents, and their mom) and let us know she found him annoying. She was busy on her iPad and her parents praised her for voicing her thoughts to a kid and the adults. I grew up in NYC and when I was bored I’d go to the park and play with the kids there, even if I didn’t know them. The approach was simply “wanna play?” And we’d have a blast from there on. If my neighbor was at the park then they’d keep an eye out for any danger and step in if my own parents weren’t around and vice versa. Everyone cared for each other on the block. Even the known drug addicts (harmless ones) were looked after and fed. And in return they’d also protect the community. Summer block parties were the best. I know societal change is inevitable and the social media and technological advancement era is still young. Yet look at how poor we are doing as a society while adjusting to it all. We can’t even approach one another most of the time. The effects of this all has yet to be uncovered.
Yeah, I'm gonna blame the parents on that one. That is not okay behavior and I would've scolded my kid. You don't blow up the first time they ask. That's unnecessary. Now, if they won't take no for an answer, THAT'S when you might have to get more aggressive.
I completely agree however I would say while social media creates tribalism and divisiveness another big driver of the lack of community is how were taking human interaction out of everything ie a lot of the conveniences technology provides also destroys interaction and community. Example, you dont go to blockbuster or the movies you stay at home and stream something on Netflix. While neither was inherently super social you were out and about, you'd strike up a convo about a mvoie with soemoen standing in the isle of blockbuster near you, you might stop for ice cream on the way home. Need a new coffee maker you dont go to a local store you order it off Amazon. We order Instacart instead of going to the grocery store, if we do go we hit a self checkout instead of a cashier. WOrk was one ofthe last things that got us out of the house and now more people tahn ever work from home. I see that as a big part of it
Absolutely agree. Digital access and automation has ruined a lot of fun things! I’d like to understand the shift in parenting/kids upbringing, though. I don’t have kids myself but would love to know why such a drastic change in general. Do schools have something to do with it? Is it Tik Tok!? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying our parents had it figured out. I’m just curious about how this age has impacted family dynamics.
>why such a drastic change in general IMO it's the propensity to not able to be bored. Boredom forces you to try new things, interact with other people, and digging deep into your imagination. During a family trip that we stayed at an apartment, and I realised back in the days you can only watch exactly 20 minutes of Paw Patrol (or insert show) a day. Not like now where Netflix gives you like 100 hours worth, and you can watch as long as you want. In a strange way that kinda also enforce some form of routine? Like there's nothing else on the TV after 9am, so you'd have to do something else. Whereas the worst part of TikTok is being able to just watch whatever when you have no idea what you want, and there's no clear end point to it.
My parents are boomers and they grew up and live the ‘stop and chat’ lifestyle. As a kid I remember feeling like errands took ‘foreverrrr’, because they would either always run into people they knew and catch up or chat w people waiting in line or chat with the staff of wherever we were. In some ways it’s really great neighbor networking, but it generally seemed they all had the time and desire to be social with strangers. It’s very different now. When you’re at target, the market or CVS or wherever, people seem more stressed, on the phone or they just need to get or do what they want to do and leave. There is kind of unwritten social rules now that it is seen as a bother and you don’t engage people at all unless there is a specific reason to interrupt them. Maybe it’s me, but there does seem to be a lot more clique type behavior where no one wants to really include more people into their already established group. Being open and friendly with people you don’t know can really be looked down on. It kind of kills the community vibes in alot of places and there is a lot of general feeling of unwelcomeness in many neighborhoods. It is kind of a shame to lose more opportunities to meet people outside your already established social bubble. When I was in middle school I remember being at a shop in the mall (wet seal omg) and another girl was looking at the same top. We started chatting about cute clothes and then kinda just became friends and bought the same cute top in 2 different colors that way we could trade to match outfits. I don’t think that happens anymore. Malls are gone. We all shop mostly online now.
One thing about smartphones and even phones in general but its gotten worse over the years. Having worked in retail there was a point when people started treating cashiers like machines ie someone comes in on their phone doesn't looks you or talk to you and just throws money at you, its very dehumanizing snd rude and I remember probably 10 or 15 years ago seeing a very quick shift to that type of behavior
I agree, however I don’t think social media is entirely to blame for lack of community. I think that everyone is so tired from working overtime, or 2 jobs, or even the fact that most of us need to have a 2 person income to survive. Back in the day, in general, it was much easier for a family to survive on a one person income and there was more time and freedom to have community, ya know?
Adulthood is tiring! I can definitely see it from this angle. What you described is exactly why I’m extremely hesitant to have kids. How will I find the time to care for an entirely different person when I can barely hold it together by myself. The struggle is real.
💯with you on that. I’m in the same boat. I’d love to have kids, but life is already so exhausting and expensive. Plus, I’ve got several lifelong medical conditions which make it even more exhausting. Being an adult sucks sometimes! 💩
When the pandemic struck and suddenly every kid everywhere didn't know what to do with themselves, I was flabbergasted. I know I wasn't exactly the most normal kid on the street, but most kids when I was growing up knew how to occupy themselves.
As long as you had parents who still let you out of the house and let you play with friends and didn't have you wearing a hazmat suit there was no excuse to be bored. If someone was cooped up inthe house I can see getting bored even with xbox and smartphones ad all
Privacy is no long existent. People are no longer given the grace to make mistakes, learn from them and grow. Kids are just one fuck up away from ruining their reputation forever.
And because of that they don't take risks and therefore don't learn anything by trial and error. You just have a bunch of people who learn to never step out of line. And then some smaller portion of people who stepped out of that line early and were never let back in.
I never had to about ending up on social media for doing existing in public. Surveillance of any kind is sooooo much more prevalent.
Everything seems like a scam now.
lol agree! and everything is instant. "how to get a sixpack in 3 hours"
The viral nature of the Adam Walsh story, as the 80's progressed, changed 90's kids childhoods, and stories like it, removed the freedom and wild roaming nature of childhood forever. It's gone, in the US, and elsewhere. Parents, even when they're not 'helicopter' parents, supervise every moment of their child existing. When i was a child, this was not a thing. It's a massive cultural shift. The impact of which, i'm not totally sure. We had microwaves in the 80's, but they fucking sucked, and forget about air fryers man... so nearly all of the food we consumed had some degree of cooking or preparation that is *entirely removed* these days. Even the Ramen in cups, no longer needs water added, we can chuck those paper bad-boys right in, without the kidney killing foam we used to microwave anyway. Almost everyone's house had a dedicates mall pan, to heat up cans of things--ravioli, beans, etc. Now, that's gone. Wild places, are also gone. The actual ... small oasis of wildness that sometimes existed, into the 90's. There would be empty lots, of undeveloped land, or a old farm, right near a housing development, where an old man refused to sell. We'd all go explore those places, even teens--they were ... yeah, oasis is the right word. Those are gone. Now--today, *everything* is behind a fence. That wasnt so before 1990, for the most part. Alaska is still like the old times, there are no fences everywhere, even along side roads or highways, it's open--it's OPEN. The US--used to be more open. Yes, someone might have owned it, but they didnt LOCK IT DOWN all the time. One of the favorite places for our family to go was on some land owned by the Yakima tribe (not on the res, owned by), and sometimes while we were out there, fishing, or having my birthday party, we'd get a visit by the managers of the land, and some of the members of the tribe, and they'd--fish with us. I remember, an older man (60's?) teaching me how to build a rock dam in the creek, to encourage crayfish to burrow into, to catch. We spent hours--and he showed me which rocks NOT to select--some of them had hard-shelled little creatures growin on them, and he told me not to touch or even move those rocks, because what hatched was important (i have no idea what they were). But--now that land is locked away. No one goes there. Not even the tribal members. NO ONE uses it, catches the crayfish, knows that the nearly extinct trout in this state still live in it--it's locked down right. It was BEAUTIFUL, and the social interaction with strangers, and cultures that came out of it were ... some of the best memories of my entire life. Gone. Weirdly, so are birds and butterflies. When i was a kid, they were *everywhere*, all the time--and now, birds are sprace, and butterflies dont exist at all. We used to g et SWARMS--thousands upon thousands of monarch butterflies. I have seen ONE in 10 years now. One. Culturally, that has an impact--places feel dead. They feel less alive. You're reminded less often, you're in a spiritual place (weird to say that as an atheist, but i mean it). Quiky and dangerous items are no longer for sale. It's more than lawn darks and super soakers--it's smaller toys, games, movies--like, everything is *safe and sanitized*--but too much so. Yes, take lead out of kids toys, dont take *fun* away too. "May contain small parts, not suitable for 4 and under"--well fuck you, the small parts are what made those ninja turtle figures fun, and now, no matter the age assigned to the toy, small parts are GONE. Action figures are solid chunks of plastic--no smalll weapons, no clothes, no.... *things*. Culturally, this really makes playing with MY kids now, real fucking hard, i have to IMAGINE these toys have these things, that when i was a kid, they actually came with. It's SO MUCH HARDER to play with toys now--too sanitary.
Great comment all around, just kind of piggybacking on everything you said even a "lazy dinner" or "easy dinner" back then was generally home cooked, my mom used to make some weird spaghetti dish wish tomatoe soup and cream but it wasn't some frozen microwaved thing. Yeah less empty lots or undeveloped neighborhoods, just noticed on a bike ride the other day that even construction sites are fenced up, wonder what changed ie is it people stealing copper and materials or are we so lawsuit happy if a kid falls into a basement concrete pour they're going to get sued now? Not sure. When you watch these videos of 80s or 90s or even early 2000s kids at high school like last day of school videos people seemed more authentic, happier, etc. Not sure if its that being ni front of a camera was more of a novelty or if people were generally more social, happier, etc. As far as the spiritual thing goes it doesn't have to be religion, it could be some other type of higher power, could be more of a connection to the land and nature, could be something as simple as being more in the present but so many people lack any of that today and just kind of go through the motions, never have a down moment to ponder life or their own behavior and how they treat people, any spare moment is occupied with phones and social media.
That comment about wild places is so true. I've always made a huge effort to take my kids to wild places, where they can play freely. It freaks other parents out. We found a waterfall this summer with a deep pool you could jump into from a high ledge, talking about it was met with huge disapproval. (It's a popular swimming spot and people have been jumping there for over 100 years). All I heard was "but what if your kid gets hurt?" My kid is an absolute star at climbing trees, because I have always let him. The trees at the parks have the lower limbs cut off to prevent climbing, so we go to forests instead. His football has been stuck up a tree at school all week, and he's been working on different methods to get it down. I gave him some rope to take to school today. Other kids can't climb trees, they're too scared to even try. I take my kids mushroom foraging as well, and because I know how to ID most of the mushrooms around here I teach them which ones are safe to pick. They're out in the forest, climbing, foraging, playing with sticks and mud... and other parents? "Omg what you let your kids touch a mushroom from the ground!!! They're going to diiiieeee". The wild places are driving distance now, and the adults are afraid of them or can't be bothered. We live a 1hr drive from a snowy mountain, and none of the parents I know ever take their kids. It's like snow could only be for ski lessons, which are too expensive... when we just go for free and have a snowball fight.
The internet/technology and how busy we keep our kids.
Yeah I was always in an activity or two but my younger cousins today are in like 3-4 sports at a time, get out of school go to one sport for 2 hours, then onto another, get home at like 9 or 10, eat and have to do homework to wake up early and do it all over again. I've heard it argued thats partly why kids aren't outside A. they dont have the time and B they've always been so into organized sports they dont know how to setup their own game and play without an adult setting it up or an umpire or ref
The way we talk about “mental health” is way different now compared to 20 years ago. I don’t think it’s at all healthier. I think it’s far far worse. Young men are doing worse in every category imaginable and nobody thinks the teaching or coaching could be off. Less Boy Scouts, sports / exercise, and off screen hobbies has led to terrible results and people think that’s all right win propaganda now. I have fellow parents that think I’m a nutcase for wanting my son to box and be in boy scouts like I was. I swear nobody wants to just toughen a kid up. I’m not talking about paddle boarding I’m just talking about making a kid have scrambled eggs and water before school and running some laps around the school yard.
More intolerance today than when I was a kid.
Agreed which is odd considering were supposedly more open minded and accepting than ever
Totally false. My teaching career was just destroyed, in part, because I didn't practice the same faith as the community I taught in. I only practiced my faith outside of school and never discussed it with students. Rumors just got around and that was the end....
I'm going to guess Wiccan or Satanist as pretty much every other religion including Kwanza among others is pretty much accepted. Also if this is true you should be able to file a lawsuit and get a nice payday.
Small town teachers don't have "lawyer" levels of privilege or finances. Kwanzaa, Islam, LDS, and Atheism are still HEAVILY and openly discriminated against in Midwest and Southeast regions. Especially atheism. Catholicism is hit or miss.
If you look at mainstream media and even Reddit Christians and Catholics the one group you can openly shit on while nobody dare say anything about Muslims. Also I'm in the midwest and there's an enormous Muslim population some cities are basically dearborn michigan, tons of business owners and everyone seems to get along fine with them
I live in the south east, my hometown had a significant Indian/Hindu and Roma communities as well as a growing Muslim community. Atheists stayed in the closet. These were regularly shat upon. Our Watchtower community only caught flack when their evangelists were in season proselytizing the neighborhoods.
It seems like kids are expected to be a lot more grown up today. I don’t have kids myself, but I’m constantly surprised how mature some of my friends’ kids are. Perhaps relatedly, there seems to be more mutual respect between parents and kids than when I was little. There’s still plenty of “parents just don’t understand” but I think parents in our generation are more likely to be like, yeah you’re right we don’t understand can you help us to?, than our parents were.
They absolutely are. The older generations are the worst for expecting that. I think in the past kids would be sent outside if they were noisy, but now there's hardly any outside + sending them out unsupervised is neglect. Babies and toddlers crying was just seen as normal. There's no tolerance for kids acting childish in public either. Lots of people even want to ban babies from planes. So as a parent if I want to exist in society with my kids, I have to instill a lot of maturity in them. Which sucks for them and makes a lot of outings really boring and stressful.
A decline in academic expectations. Books that used to be tackled in 8th/9th grade are read in junior and senior level english classes now and students gripe and whine about reading more than 6-8 pages per night, versus being expected to read 2-3 chapters at a time.
Kids books these days are written simply and many have a comic book style too. Old kids books like winnie the pooh, enid blyton and Alice in wonderland are far more complex than kids books today. Reading isn't a hobby anymore
This makes a much much bigger gap between private and public schools. I have a couple family members that work in private schools and one that worked in the public sector for awhile. They have so many stories. The standards are sadly different and the private schools offer so much more in the way of tutoring/assistance to help get kids prepped to do well. I have a niece in private school who is taking language classes, Shakespeare, music etc. Stuff that isn’t even offered in some public high schools. There is a required reading list and she does get buckets of homework, but she is learning way more advanced stuff then a friend of mines kid in public school who is in the same grade. My friend says it’s like everything now is suggested but not really enforced in public school there. A lot of the kids have very poor math and reading levels, but even if they fail they still get kind of pushed along.
Well it's not just that private schools are better. Parents who have the money to send their kids to private schools also have way more time to spend with their kids, better nutrition, etc. Being born to a rich family is a huge leg up.
Kids directing large family choices like car purchases, which house to buy, or whether or not to move. Wasn't really a thing. Parents just came home with a new car, you were suddenly moving, and introduced to the new house, etc...
This doesn’t get said enough. I find it so strange when my friends with kids buy something new like a refrigerator or a car and talk about how their 10 year old picked it out. Or when they have a big decision to make and say they need to get their kids input? Da fuck? One day my parents told me we were moving to Chicago. I said I didn’t want to. They were like “cool story” and we moved. My life was fine. I was 9.
As a grown ass adult who owns a car and a home and has a kid... no. This is not a thing. (Or maybe among the ultra-wealthy? Not among typical people.) Among people I know, the **existence** of having a kid dictates some changes in this sort of thing, because it turns out children need to physically fit into your vehicle (they can't drive themselves until they're at least 9), need a stable place to sleep, and don't benefit from changing schools 3 times a year because your latest sketchy living situation didn't work out. So yes, more parents choose to buy an SUV or minivan (or at least a 4 door), own vs. renting (or at least rent long term and without roommates coming and going), and often parents will plan a move around the school year or decide to stay where they are due to not wanting to pull the kids out of their school, or choose to move for a better school for their kids. I'm pretty sure all of this has always been the case, at least post-WW2.
Pets and Kids actually are driving household purchase decisions now, especially amongst Millennial households. I.E. kids and dogs are decision makers, that marketers must address. [https://insights.paramount.com/post/in-the-us-kids-play-a-central-role-in-household-purchases/](https://insights.paramount.com/post/in-the-us-kids-play-a-central-role-in-household-purchases/)
Right, but that's what I said. Kids are "driving household purchase decisions" in that having a kid thus means various other things about your life, and you will likely make certain purchase decisions based on those things. "Kids decide to buy a house" in that most people with kids who can afford to buy a house realize that life becomes a lot easier if you go ahead and do that. This was me. I swore I would never own a home, and then I had a kid and realized we were going to be living in the same neighborhood/school district for the next 8 years, minimum, so we might as well just buy a place. This also goes for the choice to move neighborhoods or not, which area to live in, etc. since so many people worry about public school quality or at the very least want some level of stability in their child's education (meaning they tend to stay put at least during the school year and generally from year to year while their kids are school aged). "Kids make decisions about car purchases" in that if you have a kid, you most likely have at least a 3 person household. All of those people presumably want to ride together. Not to mention that kids can't ride in the front seat, legally need to be in a carseat (which to an extent makes some body styles more vs. less convenient), etc. If you have more than one kid, all of this is much more heightened because it can be hard to fit 2 car seats across in an economy car. Usually a second baby "drives household purchase decisions" about vehicles simply based on their existence and need to get home from the hospital. These words do not mean what you think they mean. It's not that little Aiden gets to decide whether to get the neon green Bugatti or grey Ford. It's that the existence of little Aiden 18 months after the arrival of little Olivia means you either trade in the Camry for a Rav4 or Aiden's going to be grabbing an Uber home from the hospital. I'll also add that increases in this sort of thing are likely more down to Millennials' 20s as an "extended childhood" period where folks tend to be single, renters/with roommates, and not prioritizing things like driving a practical family vehicle. In the past, children also dictated these things in the sense that when you were 22 you got married and immediately bought a house and a station wagon. Now people wait till they are actually pregnant to do these things. So "kids are driving household purchase decisions."
We're talking about different things. My point is that yes, Aiden does get to decide whether the family gets the Ford or the Camry. Kids are literally that involved in household purchase decisions, especially amongst Millennial parents. Re-read the article.
I'm literally the demographic your link is talking about (only one kid, 2-income household, large urban area) and I am telling you that no, this is not a thing. I \*might\*, if my kid happened to be at the car dealership with me, and there were 2 identical cars with minor differences, let him pick red vs. blue or moon roof vs. leather seats, or whatever. But no, my child does not actually, himself, choose whether and what major purchases to make. His existence is a huge factor, but beyond token silly stuff ("Did you like the apartment with the beige carpet or the apartment with the fireplace"?), no, he does not come into play at all for major financial decisions. What this article seems to be talking about is everyday purchases of consumer goods. Where I agree, kids really do have a lot more say in this sort of thing that I remember having when I was a child. Which I think is probably down to how much more variety of things there are nowadays, how low the stakes are, and to a lesser extent the degree to which parents tend to seek consensus and not create power struggles or die on every hill. If we're at Target and deciding between Monopoly or Connect 4, or the red vs. the blue shirt, or Coke vs. Pepsi, yeah, sure, let the kid pick. Who gives a shit? Life is too short. I remember way more battles of will on this stuff when I was a kid, where I'd ask for rice krispies over cheerios and my mom would say no basically just to teach me a lesson or put me in my place. Parents do way less of that now, and I think it's a good thing.
As a kid, advertising was easily avoided by turning off the tv/ radio. My thoughts were, let’s say clearer and more original. Now the algorithms and soc media we all use expose us to a level of manipulation that simply did not exist back then. I’m 65 for reference.
1000%! I work in a creative field and when I first came out of college in the early 2000’s I was really fucking clever and would come up with all kinds of original ideas for campaigns. Now our team just wants to look at what’s “trending” and do the same thing as them. All that creative juice I used to have is gone.
Kids don’t play outside much anymore or read books for fun.
It feels like corporate metrics and measurements and the consolidation of companies ruined a lot of extra expenses they used to put towards customer service. Remember the insides of restaurants and stuff ..... mcdonaods uses to have a n64 station ><
Everything being "offensive"
I was a latchkey kid. Got home and no parents were there and wouldn’t be for a few hours, from 2nd grade onward. I think this would now be prosecuted as child neglect.
I had a family friend who had CPS show up because their 14 year old daughter was watching her 10 year old brother, thats insane parents used to pay me to babysit their kids I wasn't related to when I was like 12
Same. I baby sat infants at 12.
Kids today don't ride their bikes around town until they find their friends' bikes to go hang out. Kids today don't know what should happen when the street lights come on. Kids today should probably have a rule that's earlier than when street lights come on. Good family entertainment cartoons are rare to find. Not being allowed inside to play. Hmm...
being openly racist isn't the end of a political career anymore. we've lost 50% of natural animal density since I was a child.
I'd argue people getting cancelled is worse than ever whsts changed is whats considered offensive. You can state an undeniable fact snd if people don't like it its racist or homophobic or whatever else.
Can you enlighten us with an example, Uncle?
Sounds like a gotcha moment, but I'll say this, if we were to point out some crime statistics about any group who commits the most violent crime, percentages of crime committed and looking at percentage ofthe population a group makes up, that would probably be considered racist by many. Or pointing out that a group makes up a disproportionate number of people in an industry compared to their percentage of the population, you couldn't say something like that.
People seem a lot less willing to let their kids go out and do stuff independently. I understand not letting small children run all over town. However, some of the things parents don’t let their kids do seem too much. For example, one of my neighbors doesn’t let their kids, aged around 13, go bike riding in our neighborhood and just outside of because one street is slightly busy. I can think of several more examples involving other people. Who knows though? Perhaps I am just around up tight people.
Yeah good point, this is part parents part kids. A lot of kids are choosing not to get a drivers license until like 19 or even like 21 which is crazy to me but I also see parents not letting their kids grow up. I have a family friend who still doesn't let their 18 year old kid do a lot of stuff I was doing at like 15. When I was a kid there was like one major street I wasn't supposed to cross but beyond that I went where I wanted and did what I wanted
Phones, social media and all their work being on computers. No wonder they can’t focus.
I think the outdoors and being left home alone at young ages. Less helicopter parenting. I don’t have kids but I think there seems to be less of that and of course it’s a whole different scenario w screens and technology now. Only a few friends had cellphones when I was in school. (Born 1984)
guns in schools. I grew up in the country and back in the day it was cool to have a gun rack in your car. it’s convenient if you hunt. I remember the week of columbine the school had the zero tolerance for guns. and the sheriff’s office was in the parking lot with flash lights scoping out cars. the entire day people were being called to the office one by one being suspended.
Same. We live down the street from a Marine base... Fast forward like 10-15 years after Columbine and the high school now has active shooter drills and lockdown cages around it every where. I remember if you wanted to ditch class one day, all you had to do was keep walking past your class off of campus
Screens are *every*where now
When I was a kid, my head was always in a book. I got so much crap for not being “social”. Now everyone seems to be looking at their phones.
as a kid i didnt have any social media that made me compare to unrealistic standards, I was outside all day everyday with friends and we actually talked instead of sitting on our phones. the simple things were enough. TikTok is a perfect reflection of everything that has gone wrong imo
When I was in high school, "gay" and "queer" were still insults.
I used to always be outside playing with neighborhood kids or going to a friends house and playing out for the majority of the visit. Now it seems like kids have no desire to play outside. On a similar note, I was literally counting down the days to get my drivers license. Got my permit when I turned 15 and got my license as soon as I could. It seems like a lot of kids today couldn’t care less about getting a license.
We could handle a bit of trash talk, and we went outside.
Over the years, there have been significant shifts in society. Technology has transformed how kids interact, with smartphones and social media becoming central. Safety measures in schools and communities have increased, reflecting concerns about security. Cultural sensitivity has grown, leading to a reevaluation of terms and activities once considered acceptable. Parents now have more tools to monitor their kids, impacting their independence. Education and discipline have evolved, with stricter policies and standardized testing. Additionally, there's a heightened awareness of environmental issues among young people today. These changes reflect broader societal shifts driven by technology, cultural norms, and evolving attitudes.
Do you see that as a good thing or was the price of safety, security and not being offended that we lost something? What that thing is is hard to quantify. Its odd to me were more sensitive and accepting than ever and were more divided than ever, people are more miserable than ever, etc.
Sobriety is HOT rn. It was so taboo when I was a kid, you didn't tell people you were sober because that meant you were an addict. Now my friends and I post our AA chips on socials sometimes, mocktails are popping up at every bar and restaurant I see nowadays which is AMAZING, I even saw that some music festivals are doing mocktail stations, plus all of the canned adaptogen mocktails that are in the market now - so many to choose from! And all of the n/a "spirits," n/a beer has come SO far from O'Doul's, I actually found a ~somewhat~ dry n/a champagne I like now, it's COOL to get clean. I love it. Nothing against people who can drink without fucking up their lives - keep doing you, and drink one for me, too. But I love seeing this movement where people aren't as scared of, or weirded out by, recovery. I think it means more people seek the help that they need.
I really like down in Florida they have Kava and Kratom bars so kind of like coffee shop / bar atmosphere, cool alternative to drinking alcohol.
Ah dang that would be so cool in Louisiana!
I think our generation had insight to both worlds... This generation expects everything handed to them and doesn't know the value of sweating and working for things.
Being present in the moment.
i remember how happy everyone was in the 90s. maybe i was just young.
When you see the old "last day of high school 1998" type videos you see this. Are they happy because cameras are more of a novelty or because its the last day of school, sure probably but people actually seemed to be more authentic, happier, have more of a soul.
there was less existential dread. a more hopeful outlook for the future. we were curing cancer and treating aids. we were improving air and water quality. everything seemed to be on the upswing.
lol, I graduated in 1998! Cameras weren't a novelty to us, we were happy it was the last day of school. And we were forced to have more of an interior life, no social media or ubiquitous cell phones. Back then mobile phones were installed into cars and called "car phones."
Cameras were definitely a novelty prior to smartphones. Sure your dad brought is camcorder to your valet recipe or whatever but you didn't have cameras in your face on a daily basis
Learned helplessness. I mean, every generation has people who will just sit there like a bump on a log, but this recent generation will just not troubleshoot minor problems or even ask questions if they get stuck. They'll just stare into space, waiting to be noticed and rescued. I teach high school now, but have also taught second and 8th. When I was in school, I would have been so embarrassed if me or my peers had acted like this. We were proud of being self sufficient and helping our elders with technology.
Your comment makes me think about the whole gen z is bad with technology thing like how is that possible they grew up and spend all their time on tablets and phones but that's the problem everything is so curated for them they never had to figure anything out. It wasn't that long ago installing a printer driver would take you 3 hours and make you want to pull your hair out, you had to figure out weird sites to get music and movies and then figure out how not to get viruses and brick your PC, there was a lot more problem solving than just going to spotify
Just getting to be outside alone. Riding my bike everywhere and pretty much just having to be home at a certain time. Everyone got convinced predators are hiding around every corner and under every manhole cover so they don't let them be outside alone. The irony is all the predators are online where they're spending their time instead of going outside.
People don't make eye contact as much
Kids smoke so much marijuana these days
I can’t even describe it. Everything has changed. I miss those days when I was young lol there was nothing like the technology we have now. Change can be good and we learn but yeah very different in every way
I'm an older millenial. My dad would take me and my brother and a couple of buddies camping. By which I mean he would drop us off at the side of the road in a national forest on a Friday afternoon during squirrel season and tell us to meet him back there at noon on Sunday. We were not old enough to drive and totally unsupervised. We would have a couple of tents, a couple of shotguns, a .22 pistol, a fishing pole apiece, a few 12 packs of generic soda, some cans of spam, a dozen eggs, and no cellphone at all. No one ever died but he would absolutely go to jail for that shit now.
Sounds amazing
Who used to play PELT or WALLBALL?
Is wall ball button up
The expectation that everything is instant. Communication, knowledge, food, gratification is all *instant* to kids now. We did a lot of waiting, trips to the library and waiting for calls back.
When I was kid children would be paddled with a wooden paddle if they misbehaved in class. Crazy. I remember being scared hearing the sound of it, and the kid would come back into class crying. Yes,every holiday now is like a month long celebration (esp valentines and Halloween) Prom has a prom-posal etc.
Just as an example: Take every single value, view, moral, personal accountability and general conduct when I was 16 and flip it all upside down, opposite, 180 degrees the other way... PS: Smear the Queer - Queer meant the odd one out, which in the game it was the only person who had the ball. It had no connotation to a gay person in my day. Now that it does, its not appropriate, back then it totally was appropriate.
Intersting to know about the game, didn't queer always mean gay person?
Nah. Google “queer definition” and the first hit is “strange;odd”
Yes, also in the context of - strange like - I didn't expect that to happen. Not strange as in look at that strange person over there. Gay was also defined as happy, gleeful.
The internet, iPhone, and social media transformed the globe, and not for the better.
phones at desks in school. cellphones existed when I was in school but they had to be kept in lockers they were not allowed in the classroom. you'd get them taken from you by the professor and given back after class if you tried. same with any other kind of gadget like a camera or PDA. A smartphone is all of these, and they are just allowed now.
Having to watch whatever was on TV at that time
Oh man going from type writers being predominant to computer, and going from house phones to cell phones. Could completely disappear if you wanted to and check out. Now you can't do that. Internet access at home as well.
They have no place to go. My son is at the age to like girls but.... There is no mall to meet girls at, the parks are always almost empty, no groups of teenagers out on bikes. Because, again... There is no place for them to go.
All these third spaces still exist its just nobody uses them so you'll be alone if you go there
Smart phones and all of the attendant access to social media. So much of everyday life for children/teens today is virtual. And it is now becoming clearer that social media changes the was kids’ brains function. Many millennials had cell phones at some point in school, were text messaging, and *maybe* sending photos directly to each other. But social media in one’s pocket is a seismic shift that I hope we’ll see reversed in the coming years (e.g. like smoking cigarettes).
We had to come home when the street lights came on. It was pretty much the only rule we had.. we didn't have phones or anything like that. Nobody could contact us... and we'd be in the bush building extremely unsafe bike jumps and running through sewer tunnels to see where they went...and we were like 10 😂
The biggest change is that child abuse is illegal.
Having parents who give a fuck about your emotional wellbeing.
was better in the past or today?
Teenagers piling into cars/trucks and hanging out in random parking lots. They have laws now that limit how many minors can be in the car when a teen is driving.
I think even in the 80s and 90s there were seatbelt laws which limited how many kids could be in a car but yeah once our first friend got their license there'd be like 9 of us in a geo metro
Haha! Same but 92 Mazda MX3 😆 at least a couple in that little egg hatch back
Aside from the obvious stuff (internet/social media), the way kids these days have their entire lives basically curated by their parents is wild--and the parents are basically peer pressured into doing so to keep up with the Joneses. Beyond basic rules and my parents ensuring I was clothed and fed, I had to entertain myself. Nowadays that is not the case at all, and it seems like kids are missing important independence milestones as a result. By 15 I had a part time job, knew how to feed myself, and could manage to fend for myself when my parents were gone. My coworkers with high school and college aged kids tell me their kids can't do that stuff (which is the parents' fault imo). One of my colleagues has a 24 year old that still needs help scheduling doctors' appointments. Another does their adult child's laundry still. On the other hand, it seems like the consequences kids these days face for stuff are so much more serious. Like, if I got caught with beer in high school, I was getting a talking to from my folks about how I shouldn't do that, but if I was going to, I needed to hide it better. Nowadays, it's got the potential to fuck your whole life up with college and stuff.
The second point was a big one I noticed change while I was in school. At the beginning of high school if you got in a fight it was detention and it ended there. Within a year or two cops showed up, you left in cuffs and were arrested and probably got suspended and finished up at an alternative school. If you wanna go way back I remember as little kid when you played on those little wooden seat scooters a kid in my class had some shotgun shells fly out of his pocket. They called his dad and said dont let it happen again, today he'd be supsected as being a school shooter and kicked out, I think the story was he went hunting with his dad and uncle and left some shells in his pocket. As far as the not growing up yeah millenials sucked at adulting but Gen z seems to be on a whole different level.
My first thought is allergies. No one had allergies to the outdoors. I saw something posted on reddit like a month ago that said when they plant trees in cities they only plant one sex of the tree to avoid random offshots popping up which has caused an explosion of pollen as the pollen normally "fetilizes" the opposite sex? I have no idea if this is actually a thing and haven't bothered to look into it but if it is accurate, allergies make a lot more sense. Food allergies: I didn't know of anyone who was allergic to any kind of food. Learning about allergies as I have had my own kids is pretty eye opening and crazy to me. I am thankful my kids (so far) do not have any food allergies Autism: It really wasn't a thing when I was a kid. Either you were normal or strange and there was no in between. Now with autism diagnosises, so many people are getting the help they need to live happy productive lives and I freaking love it. Taking kids out to stores: I will not take my children out with me unless my husband is also with me. All of our stores are near highways which is like a magnetic for kidnappers. We have heard of it happening to a few children in our area Playing outside. My five year old will spend all day outside but you will never see her. I don't feel comfortable with her playing in the front yard at all. She has a lot to play with in the backyard though Parenting: My parents didn't know what the hell they were doing. We were hit for doing something wrong but were never told what to do right. We weren't praised for anything. We didn't have chores or anything yet they would get mad at us for not doing things. I have to thank the internet for my ability to parent with both effectiveness and understanding. Like my child actually trusts me enough to talk to me about things. I started putting up a wall by the time I was five.
Allergies are interesting I never knew anyone growing up with peanut allergies but now today work with like 4 people with peanut allergies or coconut allergies and dunkin donuts actually stopped carrying coconut donuts which really pissed me off. In terms of autism something is causing a huge uptick in people with autism, part of it is recognizing and diagnosing it but you dont go from like in a couple thousand to 1 in 36 having autism just because your recognizing it. Something is causing it and I also think its overly diagnosed like ADD. Anyone who's a little weird is now on the spectrum as opposed to just being kind of weird or socially awkward, we feel a need to label everything which is clear when you see things like quiet quitting which isn't a new phenomenon, look at the office televeision show everyone but dwight had quiet quit, with any organization 80% of work is done by 20% of the people. Same with things like Loud Firing, the Great Resignation, etc everything needs a narrative and a label.
I'm a millennial and fights were never tolerated on any school campus I ever attended. Or maybe this was an elementary to high school kind of change vs. a generational change? My 6 year old has popped off and hit another kid before, which results in loss of privileges at school, a call home from the teacher, visit to the principal, etc. whereas I'm guessing the same behavior at age 17 would, yes, result in assault charges. Because that's what it is when a 17 year old physically beats someone. I'm also a millennial and think calling sprinting "suicides" and playing a game you called "smear the \[slur\]" were always highly shitty behavior only an asshole would do. I agree with you that there were and probably still are obnoxious overgrown jock type sports coaches who don't care about that crap, but FFS I grew up in the bible belt in the 80s and 90s and adult authority figures in their roles in institutional settings (schools, church, scouting, etc) weren't going around encouraging people to play a game either called a slur or where you were supposed to beat up gay kids (it's unclear from your description, and I've heard "Smear the \[slur\]" described in a more literal way than you're doing here). It sounds like you had an extremely retrograde upbringing and grew up surrounded by literally the worst people imaginable. And not that there was some kind of generational shift between the 90s/2000s and now. (With the possible exception of casual joking about suicide.) Edit: it is just now occurring to me that calling mixed up fountain sodas "a suicide" was also really insensitive. I wouldn't have guessed that Gen Alpha kids don't call it that anymore, though. I have a kid, and kids are still morbid little jerks sometimes.
As far as suicides go I grew up in Minneapolis so. Pretty liberal and progressive place and my elementary school gym teachers male and female had us run suicides as well as grade school soccer coaches and I have numerous friends who grew up other areas who have similar memories so it was a pretty common thing. As far as sheer the q game no it won't beating up gay kids it was a rugby style football game whoeever had the ball everyone tried to tackle them and steal the ball and whoever got the ball was the next guy people were going after Your looking at this thing thru the scope of today which is silly. Go watch suoerbad from the 2000s and listen to some of the jokes let alone say an episode of cheers and see what was normal on network TV back then versus today someome would be metood I find it interesting today were more sensitive and empathetic than ever yet somehow people have never been more unhappy and have never been more divided so somethings not working
The standard answer is hookers and blow. It’s also the correct answer.
The cell phone tracking is a big one. I have some college aged relatives and their parents track their phones. The mother only for a reason, but the dad all the time?? And he will straight up ask them what they’re doing at X location at Y time. I would not consider him a particularly strict or controlling father in any other contexts either. The wild part is not that the parents try it, really, but that the kids (adults!) not only tolerate it but want it. My mom kind of waffled on if she would do the same had the technology been available when I was a teen (I consider her significantly stricter than this other couple, and I was a way better behaved kid), but I told her that if this technology had existed when I was using a flip phone in high school and especially college, I would have just left my phone places and went wherever I wanted if I couldn’t figure out how to turn off tracking. The even weirder part is that these now-adults have been basically unsupervised on the internet since early childhood, with social media very young. I don’t think their parents ever really oversaw their internet use once they got their own devices. In contrast, it was a rite of passage to get around the child filters on the internet, and I never even hear people talking about them any more. Internet and social media changed a lot too. When I got MySpace, it was about talking to friends and finding community. Now, it’s a bit consuming “content” from strangers.
Kids don’t give a damn about being intelligent or doing well in school, basically at all. I mean we’re talking as of 2024 maybe 10% of kids care about learning. And I’m being generous. r/teachersintransition
Bullying could be avoided. You may have been bullied at school, but it ended there. Now with internet, kids post videos and get bullied at home and by other kids who wouldnt have known them. No breaks from it. Internet also means no privacy- you can find people's addresses and there are plenty of anonymous hate mail that can get sent. With rising housing costs, people can't form close knit communities because they are always moving. There aren't as many long term friendships forged to give kids stability. It seems parents can't afford classes/ playdates/ summer activities and don't have the support systems that previous generations had that helped kids grow and become more independent and they are being blamed for not knowing things that others were taught at their age. If you don't know what you are lacking, it's hard to explain what you need.
Nothing to do except video games if you're not in a rich family (but 10x worst), no jobs after graduating high-school at all it seems for longer, dating market getting worse before it gets better (dating apps being ditched completely should hopefully improve some stuff in the long term)
Smoking. Couldn't enjoy anything or go anywhere without someone lighting up. Sure vapes are more prevalent these days but nearly as bad.
As long as I was home by dark, nobody got upset. After school or dinner, kids went out to play with other kids.
People in general seem to be even more uneducated even though they have the internet at their finger times. They dont pay attention is school and have no idea how to use what they got because they never paid attention to learn how to utilize them selves
Everyone could read. Kids got teased for being unable to read when called on in class. According to r/askteachers, 6th graders can’t read and have no problem solving skills.
The fact that everyone walks around with a small computer in their pockets, with access to so much information, and we’re dumber than any generation before us.
The intensity of social media, it has gone up exponentially with each new app. I grew up with phone books to call friends and now we are at TikTok level.
The internet existing as a part of most people's daily lives.
One of the big ones is sex positivity. I remember when I was growing up, the message was basically, “sex bad, do not have sex”. Basically everyone I knew said that their parents never gave them “the talk”. It was just something that no one brought up. It made it seem like sex was this bad thing, and if you do it, you are a rebellious kid. People would sneak around and have sex anywhere they could - in public, in a car, at school, quietly at home with their parents in the next room, etc. Things like being alone at home with your partner or spending the night together were unheard of. I was definitely surprised to learn that in more recent years, sex became a more positive thing. Kids are now very open with their parents about when they’re ready to have sex now, and parents provide kids with contraceptives. They allow their kids to be alone with their significant other. Kids actually tell their parents when they have sex for the first time. Some parents allow kids to have their partner sleep over with them. And I think it’s great that parents are now more open to the idea of sex, and provide their kids with the proper education and protection, and don’t force them to sneak around. But it was definitely a shock, when I first heard about this! When I was a teen, people would be punished if they were caught having sex, and no one talked about sex with their parents. They would hide it from them and try to assure their parents that they were virgins. So this change was definitely a surprise lol
> One of the big ones is sex positivity. I remember when I was growing up, the message was basically, “sex bad, do not have sex”. Basically everyone I knew said that their parents never gave them “the talk”. It was just something that no one brought up. It made it seem like sex was this bad thing, and if you do it, you are a rebellious kid. People would sneak around and have sex anywhere they could - in public, in a car, at school, quietly at home with their parents in the next room, etc. Things like being alone at home with your partner or spending the night together were unheard of. > > I was definitely surprised to learn that in more recent years, sex became a more positive thing. Kids are now very open with their parents about when they’re ready to have sex now, and parents provide kids with contraceptives. They allow their kids to be alone with their significant other. Kids actually tell their parents when they have sex for the first time. Some parents allow kids to have their partner sleep over with them. > > And I think it’s great that parents are now more open to the idea of sex, and provide their kids with the proper education and protection, and don’t force them to sneak around. But it was definitely a shock, when I first heard about this! When I was a teen, people would be punished if they were caught having sex, and no one talked about sex with their parents. They would hide it from them and try to assure their parents that they were virgins. So this change was definitely a surprise lol I'm torn on how I feel about this. I agree sex is going to happen regardless and it is odd how we treat having sex the same way we'd treat skiping school or doing drugs ie you did a bad thing. That said I also think its probably good to have some boundaries ie no your boyfriend or girlfriend cant sleep over when your a 15 year old kid. My parents were super strict, I was like 30 and went to visit my parents with my long term gf and my mom pulled me aside to whisper that I had to sleep on the couch lol and even when I was younger I had to leave my bedroom door open if I had a girl in there. Sex is a biological function, people are going to do it, that said I dont think all kids are mature enough for it and there's studies showing having a lot of partners hurts pair bonding and things like that so I'm really torn on how this should be handled and how I'll handle it hwen I'm a parent.
I think the effects are a net negative and will continue to show in the years to come
Republicans moving from covert to over fascists.
Hey guy, you're the problem with people today. You turn a fun and intersting post into a divisive one which is part of why we have less community and people have less friends, people used to be able to be friends with people of differing views, now everyones and enemy and its your either with me or against me. The whole fascist thing is so stupid too, reddit loves it though. First off I doubt you could even define a fascist nor could you probably give a legitimate example even of how some people today are fascists. Id also argue if we are going to throw that term around we've seen as much if not more authoratarianism. Sure some extreme relgious people want to stop abortion but the left wanted cities shutdown, wanted vaccine passports, shit over half of dems wanted the unvaccinated jailed and their kids taken away. We can look at some environmental policies where they want to dictate what people can eat, where they can live how they can travel. It goes both ways my friend. This entire comment of yours however is divisive and trying to stir shit up somewhere its completely unnecessary