To miss the simplicity of the 90s/early 2000s

[Wazza89]

I was discussing with a friend yesterday how much simpler life was was in the 90s/early 2000s. Don’t get me wrong, I definitely enjoy the perks of Netflix, Messenger, etc. But things were just more laid back.

When my younger sister turned eighteen, her and her friends got their lips done. They all looked almost identical. 😂 I remember when any form of cosmetic surgery was only reserved for celebrities. Not that it was right, just that there was less pressure and money in regards to our appearance.

My aunt told me how her daughter-in-law spends over £200 on her children’s birthday parties - the cake, the balloon arrangements, and the costumes. I don’t live in an affluent area at all (it was actually one of the poorest areas in the UK a few years ago) and the school DS goes to has a lot of funding for disadvantaged kids. Yet most the parents I see (and their kids) wear Nike or The North Face. Loads of mums get their hair and nails done regularly and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that (I’m a bit jealous, to be honest 😂), but I’m worried about the insane amount of
pressure young girls are under to keep up appearances.

One of the mums was talking about the cake she had specially made for her DS and the lavish birthday party he was going to have. I actually felt guilty that my DS had a Colin the Caterpillar cake complete with balloons and a banner from Poundland. It was acceptable when I was a child but now it seems increasingly uncommon.

Sometimes I wander whether I’m stuck in the past and I’m worried DS will be left out by his peers. Anyone else?

I was just talking about this with a colleague the other day. I'm a teacher and we we're reflecting on additional workload since we entered the profession in 2000. Back then, if staff needed to know something, someone came to find you to tell you, or it was written on a board in the staffroom. These days, I probably spend close to an hour on a work night reading and responding to work emails and actioning requests emailed or WhatsApped to me during the day while I was teaching or since I arrived home, and that's before I even get started on marking or planning. I'm not even in a particularly special role. We're also accessible via email to various people who want feedback on training, evaluations of resources, online learning platforms that need new content or updating, sales people pitching educational experiences; it's endless. Previously, colleagues would have thought "Oh, it'll keep, I'll tell her when I see her in the morning," but now it's so easy to just fire off a message or a query, and people do. And no third party would ever be able to contact me directly. I resent it so badly.

I know which night out I prefer

People have to be on all the time now.

@YesIHaveAntOrDec

Oh look another mn class baiting thread. You forgot to mention flat screen TVs and tattoos.

Blimey, you seem to be zipping around threads being rather narky!

I miss Johnny and Denise on The Big Breakfast and almost missing morning registration because i couldn't possibly tear myself away from their antics

I had young children in the early 2000's and don't remember it being simple. I think perhaps you remember it as simple as you didn't have children then

Parties were just as ridiculous then as far as I remember.

I remember different pressures back then. I was bullied, so I don't have such fond memories. I remember the mid to late nineties, when everyone had to be wearing brands. Adidas trousers, Kickers shoes, Calvin Klein t shirts, Kappa, Nike etc... I was the youngest of a large family, and all of my clothes were hand me downs from older cousins. The clothes looked like they belonged on Timmy Mallet in the late 80s/early 90s. Everyone took the piss. There's no way my mum could afford £40 for Adidas trousers, or £70 for Kickers.
I do remember being really happy at Christmas when I was about 13, getting a fake Kickers jumper from the market.

Then I didn't quite fit in at college, when everyone had hair straighteners and ugg boots. I couldn't afford those either.

At least kids can get clothes in Primark now, and people aren't so bothered about logos.

I also remember the early 2000s being a scary time. The millennium bug 😅 When people said that planes would fall out of the sky, as the instruments would stop working. Of course, the world seemingly ending with 9/11.

Times have always been scary and a bit shit as far as I can tell. Just in different ways.

I definitely don't play the game of massive birthday cakes, balloon displays or posting everything on sm. You don't have to play along if you choose not to.

I also remember the horrible sexist attitudes back then. Seeing magazines with impossibly skinny and perfect models and celebrities, and higher up the shelves, the lads magazines with rear of the year and biggest tits of the week or whatever. Are they still a thing?

I know walking past magazines in more recent times, the covers look much more diverse. Women of all ages, shapes and skin tones which is wonderful to see.

I completely agree. I do believe it was much more relaxed in the 90's.

and i wish i'd been in a position/old enough to buy property in the 1990s

I agree as much as I enjoy perks of social media and smart tv and mobile phones. I preferred a time when we weren't on it 24/7, when plans were properly made because they involved an actual conversation.

I was a 90s teen. What strikes me was how little our expectations were back then. I went to a boarding school so round a set of I guess people from fairly affluent families. But we wore boots own make up, if someone had CK2 perfume it was pretty cool…we didn’t seem to need to spend big on expensive brands. I never would have expected my parents to spend £££ on stuff for me. In contrast I just spent Xmas with six teenagers. One got £100 slippers and £120 silk pjs and she’s 14! My mum would have fainted at the thought of that being spent on a child! They all have air pods and iPhones etc. It seems in three decades the amount you need to spend on a child has risen enormously.

I was bullied in the 90s to the point where I attempted suicide when I was 8 years old and school repeatedly told my parents it was my fault for not trying to fit in more. I remember in middle school constantly being called "paki" and being told no one would hire me because I'm too dark. The normalisation of racist jokes and if you didn't laugh, you were boring no matter how hurtful they could be. When walking to school someone threw a bottle of pee out of their van at me. I remember the pressures of everyone wearing make up to school and getting up at 4am to wash, straighten and style my hair before school. I also remember fast fashion was certainly a thing and lining up outside matalan for a particular coat that was out of sale everywhere else 😅.

Your perception of that era being a better time is from personal circumstances. I think the pressures are different now, but better in some respects.

It's sad OP but yes things have been more complicated since Facebook, all the social media apps and the expectations society has for many people.

I think exposure to social media from a very young age (think age 7) isn't healthy and yet so many of my friends kids have WhatsApp or Messenger already and their own iphones. I feel like a fuddy duddy not allowing my own dcs to have phones but they really don't need one!!

I think even back in the day we had pressures on us but they were mainly confined to school. At home I wasn't pestered by a million notifications like many are now. I see my dn chained to their phones and I know it's because they want to talk to their friends but really don't want my dc to go down that route.

The 90's were just the best. The new technology was just coming in but hadn't corroded society yet. Social media wasn't a thing yet, and I genuinely think this is why there is such a competition when it comes to parenting now.
I was born mid 80's so did my growing up in the 90's/ early 2000's so I may be looking back through rose tinted glasses but I think it's hard enough being an adult nowadays, I'd hate to be growing up now!

I think it's normal to remember our own childhoods as being simpler times - if you had a good one of course - because they were. I really hark back to the late 90s when I had 0 to worry about, my whole life ahead of me. I used to love getting up early on the weekend and watch cartoons with some orange juice. I'd love to go back for a day!

I've now got two dc who are young and I definitely try to give them the best of everything, especially in terms of experiences (covid permitting obviously). I don't post on sm though, it is just for them.

Interesting thread. I think the cosmetic surgery trend is horrible and I really hope it's passed by the time my girls are teenagers.

I do feel like there was a lot of pressure on appearances when I was a teenager in the early noughties though. I definitely remember beating myself up because I wasn't "pretty enough". It was the era of girl groups and stick thin models. I actually think there are more realistic portrayals in adverts/magazines now than there were back then.

The birthday cake thing is weird. I don't bake so my kids get cakes from M&S/Waitrose and I pay the extra £2 or whatever to get their name written on in icing. I don't think I've ever been judged for it but I have noticed that many of their friends have extravagant cakes these days!

There's so much pressure from social media/society. You have to be strong or have a strong network around you not to feel overwhelmed and pressurised in many ways.
The impact of the the above will not help many people's MH Sadly.

I agree the old days were better in many ways. If only we weren't exposed to much of the negativity that is around us 24/7 and also realised the joy of living a simpler and less materialistic life....
I also often think we need to work on our inner self first before rushing to getting surgery/injections. Many people end up looking the same and still not happy... it's sad.

It’s social media 100%! Even my dad commented that parents seem in competition with each other on there now. Before all that you just got on with bringing your kids up. The biggest pressure on kids was other kids and designer labels.

The other thing is- the amount of tat that seems to be available. My friend (I don’t want to sound rotten about this- and regardless the business seems to do very well) has a business that just (to me) seems to sell unnecessary crap. Balloon arches, elves in balloons, back to school things, light up letters, sweet carts, now personalized Easter egg bags… it’s all this stuff that you can opt out of buying or not. And again it seems all for social media.

I started secondary school in 1992 so I am possibly older than some of the posters on this thread.

You would be bullied if you didn’t have branded trainers (Nike, Adidas etc) for PE. You would be bullied if you looked in the mirror when getting changed, as it meant you were looking at the other girls and therefore you were a lesbian. You would be bullied if you were Asian, black, Chinese.

In the mid 1990s two young boys vanished at midnight and it took the police three days to start searching for them.

In the early 2000s, thirteen year olds got pregnant to adult men and were in relationships with them, not being groomed.

I started teaching in 2003 and the behaviour was utterly horrendous. Not just for the teachers but I would have hated to be a child in that school.

I don’t think it was easier. I am not saying there weren’t good things and I don’t have happy memories of the period 92-02 - it was my secondary school, college and university period - but I wouldn’t want to return as a society.

I suspect there were always some people who went over the top (re parties etc) back then OP and whilst I do agree that social media has a lot to answer for in terms of making life competitive and stressful, there were definitely stresses and strains in the 90s and early 2000s!

Maybe it’s the people we spend time with. I know plenty of families now who do very sensible down to earth parties for DC. There’s usually an activity of some sort but cakes and party bags are pretty simple - cakes either home made or bought from a supermarket - and people don’t seem to feel the need to go OTT. Maybe my DC just don’t get invited for the OTT parties but I’m nearly 18 years and 3 DC into parenthood, haven’t paid for a professional cake since our wedding day, feel no pressure whatsoever to do social media, and am proud to say I will probably go to my grave without ever getting my nails done. I do think it is still possible to avoid getting sucked into it all, but at the same time can see why so many do.

Talk about rose tinted spectacles. Lots of bits of that era were great (the music) and I certainly thoroughly enjoyed myself. But that was because I was young. Lots of it was shit too, and I wouldn't want to go back. IMO technology, especially the internet has made life much better, you don't have to get involved in all the Insta posturing or competitive cake buying or Botox or whatever, its a choice! These posts just remind me of my granny going on about the old days being better! She didn't even have an inside toilet until the late 70s! I was a student in the late 80s, we had no central heatIng, or phone, and used to queue for the phone box at the end of the street. I am glad my son doesn't have to live like that too. Progress is a good thing!

@confiscatedpopit you are so right about the tat that people seem to buy in abundance! I also have a friend who ‘crafts’ stuff which I personally wouldn’t give house room, and yet she struggles to keep up with demand! It must be down to social media and the FOMO.

I'm really not into all these lavish birthday parties. My DD's 3rd birthday was in a local park with a picnic and Colin the Caterpillar cake. She loved it. Baby DD is 1 soon, and it'll be a drop in at our house with another Colin, a few balloons and birthday bunting I'm borrowing from a friend. I absolutely don't see the point in lavish parties, especially at this age!