To having been born in the 1970s and see how much the world has changed?

Not intentionally lol...

I remember life being harsher. You were expected just to get on with it. People seem so fragile and incapable now. I'm certainly more resilient from growing up then.

If you felt bored, you had to look for things to do and there was no helicopter parenting. I spent years just roaming around amusing myself. There was more freedom and you had to get creative with how you spent your time. Things were more casual and simpler.

Jeez a nice nostalgic thread ruined by talk of conjugals.

1991, the case was R v R

@Deeperthantheocean does your name come from a Space Brothers song?

But would you want to be a teenager these days?

60s born here and was using computers in the late 79s/early 80s. I've embraced them.

I loved my youth time and enjoy life now but dear god I am glad I'm not a teenager now.

Actually no. You're absolutely kidding yourselves if you think this is better now.
It's worse than ever. I take it you've heard of county lines, grooming gangs - Rotherham etc
Kids are not less naïve than they used to be and they are a lot more accessible now.

I was born in ‘73. I remember playing out a lot, building dens from mum’s clothes horse, riding my bike on the nearby culdesac where my friends lived, we played skipping, marbles, two- ball, Sindy and Barbie dolls, Tiny Tears and dolls prams. I coloured a lot. I watched children’s BBC programs every afternoon like Blue Peter, Grange Hill, Take Heart, etc.

I had a good childhood, but my own DD has done all of the above too being born in 2005. She had also done more than I did as we are more wealthy than my parents were and have taken her on foreign holidays, payed for swimming and music lessons and private tuition to help her pass her 11+. She has achieved better than me as in hindsight she has had more support and encouragement academically and she is much more confident than I am. It’s a shame though that she will be saddled with around 50,000 pounds of debt in order to get her degree!

The 70s and 80s seemed nice times to grow up in, but I don’t think they were all good - There was a lot of fear where I lived over the Yorkshire Ripper and I remember my mum and her friends being frightened to go out alone and children were not allowed to play out in the evenings or out of sight if adults. There was the miner’ strikes, power cuts, recessions and high unemployment. There was great fear of the IRA bombings, AIDS, nuclear war, and the UK was at war twice during my childhood with the Falkland’s war and the Gulf War.

Marital rape was made illegal in 1992 I believe.

When I was a teenager in the 80s in north Kent, cannabis (particularly resin) was everywhere. Admittedly it wasn't great quality but it was easy to get hold of. Speed was also available but a bit harder to find. We'd heard about cocaine, but only in the same way we'd heard about nouvelle cuisine - it was a London rich boy thing.

I was brought up in a place that is considered an ‘abject shithole’ (just googled and that’s what came up 😁) and not once did I ever come across drugs (1970s). Not at parties, or clubs or friends or colleagues. I didn’t actually come across them until the 1990s when I lived for a short while in a very ‘naice’ olde worlde village😯

Oh I loved The Persuaders!

See the 90s was when I was bringing up young kids.

You've encapsulated my childhood too. I do remember being bored, especially those rainy wet Saturdays where only the football results and the wrestling was on the TV, but it also lead me to become a prolific reader, read all the old classics as there was nothing much else to do to fill the time.

Until we moved to London I didn't see any either

Definitely area specific - I don't remember ever coming into contact with any drugs apart from the odd older person that smoked weed.

I know what you mean, OP. It's odd and also interesting to have seen half a century and mull over what has changed for both the better and worse. I don't feel I've seen the changes my parents and particularly my grandparents did, though. Nothing like.

Hmm I was born in 71. We didn't have a tv at all never mind only 3 channels No home phone until I was much older either.

But I don't remember being bored Used to play out for hours , or do heaps of reading if it was wet. Also crab fishing in the river or tadpoles in the pond Ride bikes to see people ,-although if my aunt caught any of us misbehaving we would get a stern telling off.

If I did complain about boredom then my dad would find jobs for me to do

Sundays was Sunday school then lunch then possibly out for a walk or off to visit someone

Born mid 60s. Playgrounds made with proper hard cement. None of this bouncy rubbish. Broken arms and concussions all round!
I know what people say about TV then but I watched Porridge on BBC archive for old people recently, wow, it was good. Tiny bit of sexism but nothing horrifying. And it was actually anti racist in places! And it wasn't homophobic, Christopher Biggins cast as a gay man.
I read Ronnie Barker recorded a guide to real prisons on audio tape or tape as we used to say, for first time prisoners in the 1980s which cut the rate of suicide and self harm amongst prisoners a lot.
I nearly died of sun burn that summer in the 1970s, anyone else?

I was born in the 70s. There was definitely more of a drugs problem when I was a teenager than my three teens are experiencing now. It's probably area specific though.

I remember the youth clubs and the crisps were less 10p lol. 5p for an orange squash.

My mother worked full time in the 70s so hardly reliant on a man.

Great points yes

Actually yes.

I think you make a good point here.

Same in my social circle. It was normal back then for a guy in his late 20s to be picking a 15 year old up for a date

Theres a lot of suppressed trauma

There were lots of great things, the summer of '76, the community feel, the Maypole dancing, the pubs annual vegetable growing competition, the village sports day and procession of floats, the village hall where you could do brownies, ballet, drama, badminton, "Young Wives", playgroup AND go to the doctor in the surgery at the end of the building, the playing out, the fact that every village had pubs, butcher, baker, grocer, post office, banks, hair dresser, everyone watching TV at the same time, some amazing music and TV, free milk at school and every school having its own proper kitchen and dinner ladies!

BUT

• the food was rubbish - this was before the foodie revolution in the 80s
• sheets and blankets not duvets
• baths not showers
• generally much less compassionate response to kids - clip round the ear etc
• general poor emotional intelligence
• kids who were not bright or who acted out at school or dyslexic or autistic - all just labelled as stupid and naughty by the staff and bullied by kids
• the misogyny on tv
• creepy men - much harder to call them out on it - dodgy old guys, everyone knew who they were
• the SMALLNESS of the world. I grew up in a rural area - and I now live here again with my own kids. But we have two cars and the internet - my kids are tapped into the wider world in a way that I just was not. I went to a local beauty spot the other day with the kids - totally ordinary for us now but when I was a kid it was a big treat to go there (four mile trip!)
• no internet. If you wanted to book a holiday cottage, apply to university, arrange insurance - do ANYTHING - you had to write off for a leaflet or a form. Nowadays we are so much more appraised of possibilities and opportunities out there and life is so much easier.

I was born early 60s and although the technology is clearly very different, it's still a recognisable world. Caught myself moaning about having to do something on the smart tv and remembered the absolute nightmare of 60s tellies! Stopped moaning.

My grandfather was born in the early 1890s on a rural farm that was lit by oil lamps and candles and totally horse powered. He lived to see men walk on the moon, loved it all, found it amazing (he was quite tech though as he started driving in about 1909) That is big change in a lifetime.