Were things really boring in the 80s?

[Egyptiancottonhouse]

I was born in the 80s, grew up in the 90s but it's difficult to imagine now how things were.

I'm watching reruns of Brookside from 82 I think.

It's very nostalgic but things must have been so boring, although people didn't know any different. I don't think most of us today would cope without the Internet, TV on demand, online shopping, social media.

Being able to research anything you want in a second, look up a recipe, look at a map and street view.

The Internet really has changed our lives beyond recognition.

There's one huge difference, for good or bad - and the reason I'm so glad I was born in the 60s.

In the 80s we lived our lives fully IRL

Yes, life is so much more convenient now. My current job role could not exist without modern technology.

But given the choice, I'd go back to then (technology-wise) in a heartbeat. And I am not someone prone to reminiscence - particularly about the 80s. Lots of stuff was shit. But having none of this technology? Fuck me, it was great. It meant I had to have a life.

Love the scrutinising of Cherry Bakewell. 😂yes, l agree they did have a whole cherry on. Now it’s a sliver.

I was an estate agent in the late 90's and we still did all that! People used to come in to 'register' for property and we'd fill all their details out on an index card which you would file in your box alphabetically. The box then sat on your desk - no data protection! We used to go out and take photos, get them developed and stick them to the master details, which you would them photocopy and mail out to everyone looking in that price range.

I've been thinking about this thread today after talking to my young adult DS and his GF about their anxiety. Both of them are constantly glued to their phones, watching TikTok or YouTube. If they're parted for any length of time, they're constantly messaging one another. I know people must have had mental health issues and anxiety in the 80's, but I'm sure it wasn't as prominent amongst young people as it is today. We could switch off and we weren't constantly bombarded with images and videos that made us feel inadequate or like we were missing out. It's quite sad really.

I was in my mid 20s to mid 30s in the 1980s. I did quite a lot of backpacking whenever I had saved up enough money and most of that time worked as a temp so could go for longer travels if savings permitted and worked a few months in Australia on one very extended trip. Most of us got round with the aid of Lonely Planet (they only had 2 guidebooks published at the start of my travels). Independent travel really was - no internet and no mobiles meant you could only phone home if you were in a town big enough to have international phone facilities (I was in Asia mostly) and family had to write to me poste restante at places I had told them I was expecting to be going to (I had a flexible itinerary so sometimes I ended up elsewhere). We did not get news from each other for weeks at a time. Backpackers like me talked to each other on buses, trains, beaches, cheap homestays, etc. I met a wealth of interesting people of all ages and from all walks of life. Lone travellers like me were more likely to attract the curious interest of locals and get into conversations with them and be invited to meet and sometimes stay with their families. It was a fantastic experience and I gained much needed confidence from finding I could get myself around places with no local language or find somewhere to stay when I knew nothing about the place I had arrived at.. I learned a lot about other people with other lives . I also made some lifelong friends. I hear that now gap year and other travellers sit in the hostels, budget travel hotels, etc each glued to their ipads or phones and don't really talk to each other. A decade or two later, I travelled in less touristy bits of Indonesia (which once would have been places young travellers would hear about and aim to visit) - there were very few tourists though and the younger travellers were all going to Lombok, Bali and Java and doing the main tourist spots. I used to think everyone should travel to somewhere like Asia indepently for at least 2 months as a good preparation for managing life but I never envisaged the internet age and how it would minimise real human contact.

Take me back there any day.

I hate how things are now.

I remember being bored to tears in the 70s and 80s, particularly on Sundays.

We didn’t have tv (which I appreciate was unusual) or any money and went to church a lot, and I spent my spare time reading and drawing because I couldn’t think of anything else to do. I loved reading, but it was very much a ‘how on earth do I fill the days’ notice,

I wasn't born til 87 but id skip back to 2000 any day!

Yes, fully agree with the MH aspects.

Everyone was friendlier back then too. Shop assistants and receptionists (well everyone really) would make eye contact and actually speak rather than grunt at you as if you're a nuisance. There were fewer introverts - interacting with other humans was the norm, not like today with so many people shuffling around trying to pretend you're not there, wearing headphones, sitting (hiding) in corners, etc.

I think we're losing the ability to interact with random strangers, small talk, etc. That's because youngsters aren't "playing out" anymore, so don't get the same breadth of human contact, i.e. the old days of there always being a game of footie on a nearby patch of grass that was truly "everyone welcome" where you just joined in, even with kids you didn't know.

There are so many threads on here and other fora about Uni students who are lonely, depressed, etc., as they think "everyone else" is having a good time except them - they're just not used to going out and joining in! Unis are the one place where there's so many choices, lots going on, etc., but it's down to the student to get out there and join in. Whenever I go to our local one, it's like a zombie city, with loads of people randomly wandering around on their own, headphones on, eyes down - it's such a shame compared to how it used to be when it was friendly and vibrant.

The real killer for the internet for me is that I know quite a few people both online and in real life, not particularly "friends" as such, and they have completely different personalities. On line, they're constantly writing and responding to posts on SM, in real life, they're "head down, earphones in" not making contact! One sits a few seats away at our local football club - he writes blogs about the game on his own website, records his own webcam "chat" videos about past and upcoming games, but in real life, he's literally mute - it's so strange as everyone knows him from his website where he's friendly and chatty, but at the game he just won't interact with anyone. As part of his webpage, he also chats about other things, and he keeps mentioning his depression, anxiety, etc - I'm sure if he had a few "real life" friends rather than hiding behind the internet, he'd be less depressed!

To be honest, that's more due to a religious upbringing rather than lack of internet. If you weren't allowed a TV in the house, then you wouldn't have been allowed the internet either. We have neighbours who are "Brethren" who don't allow computers and that extends to mobile phones, so, even today, there are households not only without the TV, but without internet! Funnily enough, their children seem very happy - play out a lot, always chatty/friendly with neighbourhood kids, lots of eye contact, big family network, etc.

Don’t remember much but people were more sociable because they had to be. The drinking culture was huge- all the young people in my area would be out drinking each weekend.

You were expected to be an adult at sixteen, nobody cared about how you felt and showing vulnerability was a sign of weakness. Being hit was normal, very few people went to uni compared to today. There was still a culture of being a virgin before marriage- which most didn’t observe but it was normal to marry your first boyfriend.

Men would grope, leer and wolf whistle. Football matches were dangerous, Millwall supporters were well known for violence. Girls would dance round their handbags at the disco. Lots of punks, hippies around and the alternative lifestyle was popular.

Not boring at all - no time to be bored too busy, everything took far longer. More bored now everything is instant and we have that many options it gets overwhelming. No knowing the excitement of waiting a week for the next episode

I think people spent more time talking to each other in person or on the phone. Writing letters was quite common even up until the mid 90's. Some things too longer, looking at a road map to plan a journey going to the library but it wasn't boring. I think life is too overwhelming these days. Chosing a holiday for example, used to look in the brochure at a postage stamp sized photo and the prices and then pop into town and book. Now I spend hours online searching and comparing hotels on trip advisor, looking at streetwise and photos on Google before making a choice. Exhausting.

I've been watching brookside too, I think we made our own entertainment rather than relying on other things tv, internet etc.

I was more shocked how many times the teenagers made their parents a cup of tea and want to know when that's coming back into fashion 😁

You were expected to be an adult at sixteen, nobody cared about how you felt and showing vulnerability was a sign of weakness

This is not my experience at all. I had lots of mental health issues as a late teen/ young adult. Lots of support too from family, friends and gp’s

Not boring in the slightest. There was a lot more white space to be creative in the 80s and 90s. We made stuff up to keep ourselves entertained, now it’s constantly fed into your brain from a little box in your hand. I’m sad for young people now, they’ll rarely have the fun and opportunity we had. I don’t think the ability to have the answer to any question fed to you in seconds is necessarily a good thing human development.

Maybe it’s because I grew up in a working class environment but we certainly didn’t get as much ‘stuff’ as people do now. As I said earlier that included fattening food. A cream cake was an absolute treat. Very occasionally mum would buy cakes from the bakery. They were very expensive though, probably a similar price to what they are today. The same with pop. A bottle cost 50p from the pop man who came round, that was in the early 1980s. I can buy a bottle in Aldi for the same price now. I remember asking if mum and dad would bring me a bottle of Coke and a pack of crisps back from the club when they went out on a Saturday night. I didn’t get them that often but it was a real treat. The Coke was in the traditional glass bottle too, full sugar no low calorie variety.
The first MacDonalds I ever saw was when went went on a bus trip to London for my 9th birthday. We didn’t have them where I grew up. After that the next time I stepped foot in one was when I was an adult. Actually we went through the drive through and neither me nor dh had a clue what we were doing. When the cashier asked for our order I remember looking up and seeing a poster advertising Happy Meals. I asked the cashier what that was and thought I must have misheard her when she said we would get a toy! Anyway I ordered 2 of those not knowing they were supposed to be for kids. People can’t believe that fast food wasn’t a regular part of my diet.
Regarding the pop man, you would get money back for returning the glass pop bottle and it was quite a lot. Either 5p or 10p which 40 years ago was worth quite a lot. Everybody always recycled the pop bottles.
I also remember shops not selling alcohol on a Sunday. I’m not sure if that’s a good or bad thing but I do think there should be a limit as to when pubs open.
Another memory. Having lock ins in pubs after closing time at 11pm. We had to sit in darkness and be quiet in case the police drove past!

I was 14/15 in 1980 and it felt like a great time to be young ( apart from AIDS). I was always out cycling with my friends sometimes camping out. No phones so totally free from parental contact but they trusted us. I moved abroad in 1988 and rarely contacted my parents as I had no phone and I was a bad letter writer. I loved visiting the local library for research and couldn't wait for the lyrics to my favourite songs in SMASH. Don't remember being bored very often.

I think that's a Liverpool thing! My cousin's sons still make me lots of cups of tea when I visit and one is 15.

I was born in 84 so child of the 80s and 90s and I remember being so bored all the time as a child. It didn't help that we didn't have much money so didn't do many activities and rarely days out so always at home and I also hated being outdoors so I was literally limited to reading, drawing, painting or playing board games with my sisters. I don't think I would want to live through that era again.

I remember being bored rigid at the weekend when I was a DC, particularly every other weekend when I was at my dad's without any of my things to entertain me. I would literally sit and read a book most of those weekends. We rarely went anywhere or did anything. Sometimes my GPs would come for Sunday lunch.

When I was at my mum's in the summer I'd ride my bike or play in the garden, but in the winter there was very little to do. We'd sometimes do a jigsaw, play cards or a board game, but we weren't allowed to have the TV on during the day, apart from around Christmas when there would be children's films on during the day. We didn't know any different, but yeah, it was really boring!

There's a scene in 'This is England 90' where the teen characters are all sitting around bored AF. There are just four TV channels and nothing on (as opposed to 500 and nothing on now ), but I laughed out loud watching that scene, because it's exactly what it was like.

Born in the late 80s, grew up in the 90s. I was never bored. Outside playing constantly...bikes, rollerblades, skateboard, tennis, football, climbing trees, hide and seek, manhunt, sardines, what's the time Mr wolf. Inside: Reading, Lego, puzzles, drawing, games, writing, friend had a billiards table and we'd have competitions, toys.

Libraries, walks, parks, museums, safari parks, swimming, bowling, cinema, soft plays.

I dislike how much readily available information and instant entertainment we have today (guilty of using it too much myself).

I'd go back to the 80s right now, if I could. For all that we have at our fingertips nowadays, I don't think the world is any better a place. In fact, I'd say its far worse now.

I loved my toys too. Red plastic train track that would run all round the house and under the dining room table. Lego of course. Don't know if they still do it but some lego bricks had wheels so I used to make aeroplanes and cars for those little plastic toys you got in the cereal box. But my favourite toy was weebles. I had a whole collection, wish I'd kept them.

I was never bored, even on Sundays. Apart from toys we also learned how to play chess and cards and backgammon. I recently met a 16 year old who had no idea what a pack of cards was. Didn't know hearts, clubs, diamonds, spades. We taught him a few games and he loved it. Then there were all the board games. And the books! All the Enid Blytons and as I got older all the Agatha Christies.

Typical Christmas presents would be box of magic tricks and a Beano annual. Roller skates or skipping ropes. Lots of stuff that could be used for play or entertainment.