Things that you can’t quite believe were the norm

[ItsNotAShopItsAStore]

What’s one of those things you think in 10/20/30 years people will go “WTF why was that acceptable?”

For me - the Jeremy Kyle show. I’m so pleased it’s off air - awful poverty porn hosted by a nasty little bully and enabled by god-complex shit stirring producers. Also who wants to watch so much shouting and arguing at 9.25am!

I’m Gen X and very emotionally concerned and sensitive and so is my husband and my father. They are strong but very in touch with their emotions too. Great role models for the younger men/boys.

It was very rare for children to have (toilet) accidents in infant school simply because most had been toilet trained for 2 years+ before starting school, using the loo would be completely second nature.
A condition of attending pre school at 2.5 was to be "clean and dry". (Yes, I know they are not allowed to do that now).

I wonder how much the girls (teens) were paid?

two friends of mine (men) went on Naked Attraction as the naked ones.. they had a good time but why would you do that? I'm not a prude, as a Trade regular you can't be but it seems so grim

(Trade is a Hard house gay club just in case no one recognises the reference)

Quite a few of my mum's friends/siblings have said to me when I was despairing over ds1 not being toilet trained that back in the 80's they used to tell preschool that their child was toilet trained, put them in pants and hope they didn't have an accident. Then they put them back in nappies when they got home.

I remember working in a nursery in the early 2000's and one just turned 2 child's parents proudly announced that their child was toilet trained. She wasn't. She never used the potty or toilet and was having 10+ accidents a day. I don't know what they did at home.

My headteacher used to smoke in front of us in her office in primary school…

Yes, it is a gross generalisation. I am a man, sorry for not specifying.
My boomer Dad would say men of his generations were less concerned with their feelings. In reality, they always assumed that what they felt was important as the man of the house to the extent they never contemplated it.
My Dad would assume that my SO would directly be concerned with my well being in a way that would be considered very special indeed for men of my generation.

There is a balancing where the advances in equality mean that an outlook like yours is becoming an expectation, even from young men.
It means my impression is that many young feminist women have very different attitudes to those older feminist women. But sorry, it is just a rough impression and I have no real insight. SOrry.

Can you give examples. It’s interesting but I don’t really understand. What are the things ‘that would be considered very special indeed for men of my generation’?

I can't understand your post, Sweden99, could you possibly rephrase a bit? Also what is SO please?

I am not sure how helpful it is.
I had a friend whose brother commited suicide, and he went up to be with the parents that weekend. That meant cancelling a weekend trip with his GF, who not just understood but went up with him and offered support and help. My Dad's generation took that for granted, and most Gen X women were offfended that that would be impressive. Amongst men of men generation, her selflessless and egoless. Increasingly, I think young men would almost expect that.
I also had a friend who was trying for kids but stress had ruined his fertility (possibly), rather than being angry at him, his wife worked with him to make his life less stressful. It is the sort of thing that male feminists insist men should absolutely expect from women, but was certainly told it me as something very special.

Significant Other.
Sorry, I do not want my poor writing skills to cause me to spam the thread.

Helengreggregson · Today 09:40

i really wish I had been offered even a couple of hours rest when I was in hospital after having dc because I got no sleep in labour and no sleep after.id been awake for about 2 days when I had dc and he was handed to me and my husband then had to leave immediately because of Covid. Was soooo wrecked.

My aunt was a district midwife, but started off as a surgical nurse, then hospital midwife from the late 50s to early 80s. When they had mothers in after giving birth, they insisted that they would stay 7 days as a minimum and they were made to drink 2 bottles of Guinness a day.

The excuse was that it was for iron, but in reality, it was to help them sleep.

They insisted on 7 days because, no matter how much they explained to the fathers that mam needed rest, as soon as they got home it'd be, "How, pet! What's for dinner?"

Thanks. I’m quite out of touch with a lot of society so I can’t say whether either example would ever have been considered ‘very special’.

The Gen X men I encountered thought it special.
I think most Gen X women would lie to think they would do the same, so less likely to think is special (just like Gen X men might think a man building a shed from scratch is nothing special).
Boomers just seemed ot think it is what a woman should do.

Your post reads like my husband asking ChatGPT a follow up question!

Just because a word now has another connotation doesn't make it wrong to use it in it's original state! Who gets to decide that a word has changed its meaning and we should all conform?

When I was about 4 my mother left me outside the bakery to 'mind the pram' which had my little brother in it. When she came out, the pram and brother were still there but I was missing! She walked across the busy road to the school opposite and found me sitting in a very bemused Head's office telling her that I wanted to come to school. The Head took my name and said I could start soon, which obviously I would be doing anyway, but it made me very happy.

Yes, in England it was a thing in the 70s and 80s. I didn't finish school until 1989, before doing A levels. We had forced naked showers while the PE teacher watched, apparently to make sure everyone washed properly, between the ages of 9 and 14.

I left school in 96, it was definitely a thing for us in both middle school & high school. It was hell in middle school as the girls who hadn’t started puberty yet were massively bullied. The teachers stood at the ‘door’ to the open showers which was essentially a massive archway without actual doors so they could see everyone in there. It was horrendous

Keeping in mind, London is an international hub and gets a lot of business via air travel. The government wouldn't want to risk pushing that business away.
Putting tax on fuel could easily make it a lot cheaper to fly via Dublin, Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels, anywhere that doesn't have heavy tax on aviation fuel.

Then you end up with businesses relocating why bother with an office in London when is just as cheap to have one in Paris, and saves the powers at the top having to change flights.

I remember my mum saying in the 90s, when they started discharging new mums from hospital after a day or two, that this was the cause for the rise in PND. I'm inclined to believe she was onto something.

Rich people never get taxed like the rest of us.

For a lot of the country flying via Amsterdam is already cheaper than schlepping down to Heathrow etc when the cost of parking is taken into consideration and is probably quicker not having the long queues at the major airports.

That's actually a very good point. My mum always feels new mums aren't given a chance just expected to get on with it.

I also don't think it helps maternity wards being so short staffed. I don't think the need more fully qualified MWs more Carers, Nursery, Auxiliary type staff to help look after the babies and give mums a chance to rest and recover.

I think the issue is wards being short staffed and lack of support to new mothers. But the traditional lying in is bad for your body. We need to get up and move. I think it happened because it does seem to reduce post partum bleeding. This was probably noticed, along with high maternal deaths, so lying in was seen as the way to reduce deaths.

Mothers also stopped paid work much earlier than now. Even in the eighties most mothers stopped working by 7 or 8 months pregnant. Although they had far less maternity leave, many could not afford to go back to work afterwards as there was no help with childcare.