What do you remember of your childhood that would be unacceptable now?

[Happyspendingthedayinthegarden]

I'm thinking smoking

We had sweet cigarettes.

Doctors smoking in their surgeries whilst examining you.

I remember when I first started working for the (then) DHSS we used to be allowed to smoke. Managers had glass ashtrays (with 'property of DHSS' & the HMSO (Her Majesty's Stationery Office) mark on - now they would be worth something on eBay now, I wish I'd kept a few) Clerical Officers & Assistants had foil ashtrays & there were large column ashtrays fixed to the floor in the public areas for them use. In the afternoon there would be a fog of smoke hanging a few feet from the floor on the floors where the benefit processors worked & the public area. 😨

That’s exactly what popped in my head when I saw the thread title!! I used to like doing that actually! (As a child not a grown up!)

Yes Music, Mime & Movement on the radio - I remember it well.

This terrifying specimen!

Being able to buy your mums cigarettes with a note and money.

Teachers lobbing things at you! Most memorable one was a cafeteria chair, thanks Mr. Stone.

Male PE teachers following the girls cross country team in their car shouting sexist insults as " motivation."

It being perfectly reasonable and acceptable to have an 11yr old babysit for neighbours multiple children.

Walking across hampstead heath with one other friend to school on our own age 5. It was about 1.5 miles. Back in the evening in the dark in winter. My mother had agoraphobia and never went out. My friends parents just didn't care.

Except those that didn’t , Health and safety legislation to stop people having hands chopped off by unguarded machines. And to avoid being decapitated on building sites. What a bunch of nonsense that was.

Ridiculous comment

We were allowed to leave school after lunch once a week and take the bus to another town to go swimming. This was in 1983 when I was 14. I remember getting late back to science once and not being let into the lesson so we went to hang out in the nice toilets. Teachers were weird back then.

I read that as BasilParsley's point - not a good thing which is main point of this thread. We're talking about children in the boot of cars, smoking in the same room as small children, chucking blackboard rubbers at children, leaving them alone in pub car parks while parents boozed etc - all unacceptable now, but didn't know any better in previous years.

Walking home ...30 mins in the dark at 8/9 years old from a club I went to

Having my mouth washed out with soap.

Fighting who was going in the boot of my friends estate car. Oh, and being put over my mums knee and hit with a wooden spoon.

the general misery of being a child.

people say it’s gone too far now and everything revolves around kids but when I was young it was very much the opposite: not being allowed choices, autonomy, opinions.

so I’ve missed out at both ends. Had to defer entirely to adults as a child and to children as an adult 🤣

You are so right there it seems that these days it's all about entertaining the precious DCs whereas we spent a lot of time having to entertain ourselves. I also think, as I've said, that we became more self-reliant as a result. At the age of 7 I was sent to walk about 1.5 miles to the village (there & back) along a country lane to the local newsagents to collect the local evening paper with my little brother (2 years younger). I felt proud of the responsibility.

Being forced naked as a teenager into the shower after a PE lesson along with the other girls in your class, with the PE teacher marking your period in a book if it was that time of the month. Totally grim and embarrassing for us all who experienced it!

But we did survive - we sat in the back of a truck which probably driven at about 30 miles max. I'm not talking about using machinery as a young child, I'm talking about a trip down the road (not far- maybe 10 miles max) in the back of a lorry when the level of traffic on the roads was minimal... Which was perfectly acceptable then but certainly wouldn't be now!

We also didn't have the huge number of clothes that kids seem to have now. I had school uniform, a 'best dress' & for parties etc (often my bridesmaid dress from that year as I come from a large family & was frequently a bridesmaid). If I'd been a bridesmaid & my bridesmaid shoes still fitted me I could wear them to parties, if they no longer fitted I wore my school shoes. I had a pair of 'daps' (black plimsoles with elastic on the front) to wear for PE & playing out & wellies (I was brought up in the country & wellies were essentials). I had one set of play clothes - trousers, tee-shirt & jumper. Last year's school anorak became this year's play anorak. We wore our full-length nighties until they were well above our knees. Then clothes were passed to younger siblings or relatives.

OMG I remember this - managed to convince PE teacher I had my period for at lest 1/2 a term😂

Riding in the boot an estate car. Being smacked . People smoking like chimneys indoors.

I remember smoking on the tube.

Dad smoking in the car 😮

My parents did this too 🤣. We’d occasionally get a packet of golden wonder cheese and onion crisps thrown in too if we had been well behaved that day.

Driving through Blackpool illuminations sat on the car roof with legs dangling through the sunroof.

The only rule was not to swing our legs so we didn't kick our parents in the face.

My Dad also used to let us 'drive' sat on his lap.

Madness but a lot of fun!

Oh god, I remember asking to be excused a shower in PE because I was on my period and the PE teacher rolling her eyes at me!

I definitely felt as a child that the world was for adults and I was just being dragged along in it. I remember being told repeatedly that childhood was the best years of my life and thinking ‘I bloody hope not.’

I think this was better for most children than the current state of affairs. They learned independence much more easily and it was good for their fitness and confidence.
A lot of anxiety amongst teens now is down to never negotiating simple situations or being trusted to do things when they were younger.

In the seventies, walking the mile to primary school, including crossing a busy A road at the zebra crossing, on my own from age around six or seven. Going for errands to the shop for a teacher - she'd give me cash - when I was about eight or nine. Going swimming at the local baths, again on my own, from age seven or eight. Times were very different then. Otoh my parents never went to the pub and left us outside with crisps and pop. If they went for an evening out, my Nan, (Great)Aunt, or a friend or neighbour would babysit DB and me at home.