To wonder if it was as bad as people say in the 70s?

[juicee2]

I am quite curious about it.

What caused the poverty? I thought the 80s were a poor decade - am I wrong?

I'm not denying that Peaches. I agree that certain groups of people were treated shockingly by society back in the 70s. My own father used to tell me about the time he was trying to book a friend from India into a hotel and no hotel would accept the booking. Total ignorance and intolerance.

But I also agree that there is more general rudeness, and lack of consideration in society nowadays e.g. parents letting kids shout and scream in restaurants, elderly people being left to stand on public transport, drivers aggressively tailgating and so on.

Well you are saying the same as me then, for people who fitted in life was more polite but for "others" it was much much worse. So if some people think that is OK it is very much an "I'm all right jack" mentality as the "others" still don't matter.

I don't think children's behaviour is worse, I had kids in the 70s, last time I was in London I was amazed at how considerate young men were as so many offered me seats, offered to carry my case etc. Driving is worse, I was a driver in the 70s, but the problem with that is that the roads are so much busier so not really comparing like with like.

Omg I'm just remembering the telly (bear in mind I LOVE telly)... Saturday night special with its dancing girls; benny bloody Hill, awful sitcoms.
It's hard to communicate how little choice there was. I was a bright, bookish child and we never watched 'clever' programmes, only crap on the single screen in the house.
Honestly I think things are better now, particularly for girls.
I know there are awful pressures (I have a 19 yo DD) but there was no choice or expectation, and so much awful stereotyping. I started getting catcalls in the street at about the age of 11 and I swear it was worse than my DD describes today.

Blue lady, I wonder whether you're aware that despite you 'explaining in words of one syllable' that some of us have simply had different experiences to you?

Me, and my family, and many of my friends, do not remember the 70s as a time of manners, consideration and selflessness. I don't denigrate your memories or experiences, but it simply wasn't the case for people like us.

I was born in 1970.
I remember a lot of bland food, there wasnt the choice there is now. We had things like stews with braising steak, chicken and potatoes and veg, luncheon meat sandwiches, sausage and chips etc.
Regarding frozen food it was all findus crispy pancakes, those french bread 1/2 pizzas, and vesta curries.
Homophobia was rampant, any gay man was just a shirtlifter or a puff etc. My Dad said that the Liberal party was just for perverts and puffs. I think this was when Jeremy Thorpe was the leader.
I remember having to walk home from school every night and make my tea on my own at 6 and wait for my parents getting in at 9-10p.m. It makes me laugh now when people say my child is 15 and I'm worried about leaving them whilst I pop to the shop.
Drink driving was very common, as was home brewing beer which smelled terrible. I dont remember any bread or sugar shortages.
Eating out at resteraunts didnt happen, it was all about visiting family on Sundays and having a Sunday dinner there.

Twisting my words again. Where did I say the 70s were a time of manners, consideration and selflessness? Nowhere, that's where. Manners and consideration have deteriorated and I'm not alone in that opinion.

I remember pink custard at school, it was my favourite.
I remember the working men's club organising a Christmas party for us kids and somehow it ended up with everyone throwing sandwiches at one another, it was total chaos but absolutely fantastic.

There is a big difference between the start of the 70s and the end of the 70s, and whether you were a child or an adult.
At the start of the 70s there was no help at all for families on a low wage, so they were often very very poor. Slum housing was still common with families living all in 1 or 2 rooms, no hot water and an outside toilet shared with other families. Equal Pay Act was passed in 1970 making it illegal for women and men doing the same job to be paid different amounts. But there was still a lot of sexism in the workplace.

By end of 1970s there had been major slum clearances and council house building, so far less families were living in slum properties. The top up for those on low wages made a big difference to those families, and the CAB movement had really pushed the idea that claiming benefits was a right and not charity - this was because many very poor people were too ashamed to claim benefits.

Children if they were living in areas with lots of other poor people did not tend to realise they were poor. Maybe seems strange, but without internet and limited TV available, they just accepted their life was normal. So if children had a loving family, they did tend to have a good childhood.

In 1971 57% of women were employed or actively seeking work. So there were more SAHMs, but also plenty who worked. The number of people living in single households was very small though unlike now. There were very few nurseries or official childcare routes. There was the playgroup movement to get women out of their house and mixing with other women.

Also any job in an office in the 70s was generally seen as having middle class status, even if not middle class wages. Many middle class people were better off then they are now. But the poorest are better off than people were certainly in 1970. The Government was still running campaigns to get people to take baths at least once a week. And it was pretty normal for kids to wear hand me downs.

'Save water, shower with a friend'!

There was a drought in the seventies and that was the slogan of the time

Just been to Bolton today.

As close to 1976 currently available.

It was fine, better for most I would think - no obesity, some processed food was not very nice (a new invention) but I like Angel Delight! Clothes more expensive than now, but I imagine made in the U.K., no low wage foreign factories.

Smoking everywhere - although I never smoked you just accepted it!

Money was tight for everyone i knew. Due to strikes etc.
Most mums sahm. I didn't know any lone parents. In high school, my mum was the only lone parent so i didn't tell anyone.
Nobody went abroad for the holidays. Most had more than 2 kids, it's different now.
Hand me downs, lack of choice with food. Bread was dearer.
No large supermarkets meant shopping was dearer. Lots of power cuts and hiding from the milkman.
But as a kid, i loved the 70s. My friends were always around in the holidays with sahm's, not packed off to childminder or scheduled activities. We organised our own visits it was great.

Mr Pan does that include the summer of 76? 🌄🌅

70s were great fun.

There was a bakery strike, but it only lasted weeks not the whole of the seventies! I don't remember sugar rationing at all. Inflation was very high making food and clothes expensive and mortgage interest rates were very high, up to 17%. We were hard up, having just bought a house, but we were lucky to be able to do that. No, in my opinion life was better then, but I was young and now I am not!

I was a teenager in the 70s (born in 1958). It was as it was - we enjoyed glam rock and a more carefree life, I think. We were more sexually liberated by far than most of our predecessors and the threat of AIDS wasn't yet a thing.

Economically, materially and culturally we were 'impoverished' in relation to now. Personally, I was brought up in a 2 up, 2 down house with no bathroom or inside toilet, nor central heating - not even plug sockets upstairs. Imagine what it was like for a girl with 2 brothers in that house once I hit my teens...

There were many things we take absolutely for granted now that were unheard of, certainly in most parts of the North then. For example, I never laid eyes on a pepper until I went to university in 1976 (the first person to go to university in my family AND the first on our council estate - we moved to a 3 bed with bathroom, but still no central heating, in 1974). I recall one girl from London on my corridor in hall brought her own duvet - we all crowded into her room and gasped in awe at it. I imagine other women of my age or similar on here can name a wider range of items you just couldn't get then!

But as I said at the start - it was as it was. If that's all you know, you don't see the relative poverty until you're much better off.

Rudgie47

I could be you but I was born in 64! the half bread pizzas

My dad called Jeremy Thorpe a shirt tail lifter no idea what that meant st the time but I remember being terribly sad that his dog was shot or that may have been his partners dog? It was all very shocking. ‘Puff and pansy’ were used regularly but then kids today refer to any emotion as ‘gay’ while championing trans issues snd gsy rights, very strange

My dad made home brew too from a large can! Yeuk.

Infant schools chucked you out the door at 4pm and aged 5 no one checked who was picking you up you just walked home. SS would be involved in all our families today.

But as a kid I loved my childhood snd I feel sorry for today’s kids.,so much in lots of ways and so little in others.

Kids were definatly more resilient and self reliant in the 70s... had no choice

I remember my gran watching snooker on her black & white telly and not knowing which ball was which.

Long summer days out with friends just mucking about, my parents having no idea where I was and no way of getting hold of me.

The blackouts were fun for us, there's something magical about an evening with just candlelight, I've even pretended that we had a powercut to my kids by flicking the fusebox switch for a few hours of no internet.
The food wasn't all bad though there were all sorts of colours and preservatives added to food and drink. It's probably best not to know what went into Pop Rocks and sweet cigarettes.

I'm pretty sure though that whichever decades you lived through as a child/teenager will be "The Best".

*Unless your childhood/teens were particulary hard.

Took O'Levels in 76 - the last year you could fail.

I managed to fail 2 in 1979 . I had a year at Grammar school before all our schools went comprehensive.

My DM worked mornings but only during the term time. She briefly worked in a nursery and it was a horrible place; really smelly and lots of kids crying.

I do remember the power cuts and shortages. I remember being told to fill up the bath with water because it got turned off but I've no idea when that was. I also remember being sent home from secondary school because there was no heating; presumably during the Winter of Discontent; and my DF having to queue for petrol, which was being rationed.

As far as after school activities went I had Brownies/Guides; ballet, tap and National then Modern dance; piano lessons and Sunday School. I can clearly remember having an activity every night of the week. Weekends my DF played sport so after the weekly shop (and Picture Club for me and DB) we all went off to where he was playing. The wives all sat together and chatted and all the kids went off into the fields. Nobody knew where we were or what we were doing, and nobody was interested as long as we turned up for tea.

We ate our main meal at lunchtime and my father came home from work. My DM was very conservative over food so we had a variation of meat, potatoes and 2 veg every day except Saturday which was cold meat and chips, or egg and chips. Pudding was pie, crumble, rice or Instant Whip (we rarely were allowed Angel Delight). My DPs thought the people next door were a bit Odd. They were from London and ate Brunch and yoghurt, and had dinner at tea time.

We had a lot of sugar. Sugar in tea and on breakfast cereal and on fruit. I was first given tea (from a saucer) at 2 months old!

I don't think I'd have liked to have been an adult in the 70s but it was a great time to be a kid.

The music was fantastic. Glam rock in the early 70s,then disco,followed by punk and new wave towards the end of the decade.

Ooh that's true Phoenix. Swarms of ladybirds on any white surface.

None in Bolton today.
😂

1970s were exactly my teenage years. Such a mixed and exciting time.

We also had WHITE custard sometimes as well as pink!

My favourite school pudding was this butterscotch sponge which had crystallised bits on the bottom. It was bloody amazing. Never seen the like since.

Took O'Levels in 76 - the last year you could fail

I took O'levels in the mid-80s and you could fail then.

Never mind white custard, what about the white dog poo?