To think people looked and felt better back in the old days vs now?

[wildernesswild]

Currently watching videos of Olivia Newton-John (rest in peace ) and I always notice people born years and years ago, maybe in the 60s/70s/80s look amazing then and now, no fakeness, I'm always told by my grandparents nobody really back in the day was majorly obese or had any mental health issues. Even the men groomed themselves and dressed amazingly.

What do we think contributes to our issues these days? Is it social media, processed food, unrealistic standards? I'd love to hear everyone's opinion

There were mental health problems, they just weren't discussed as openly.

Olivia Newton-John was first diagnosed with breast cancer at 43 and sadly had relatively few healthy life years compared to many people.

Wealthy and glamorous celebrities aren’t really representative of the majority though are they? Look at photos of ordinary people from a few decades ago, and people generally appear noticeably older than people of the same age do nowadays. Mental health issues have always existed, they just weren’t spoken about: if you were middle or upper class you might “suffer from nerves”; everyone else just kept quiet for fear of being branded a nutter who should be in the loony bin.

If anything, the vast majority of people have more opportunities to be healthy and look good nowadays. On average we work shorter hours than we did a few decades ago, leaving more time for leisure; the proliferation of budget gyms makes fitness more accessible even to people on lower incomes; fast fashion, whilst terrible for the planet, puts fashionable clothing within the reach of more people.

Acne was also much more of an issue when I was a teenager in the late 80s/early 90s. I do still see a lot of teenagers these days as I sometimes pick up DD2 from school and there is just zero bad acne.

Basically there was far less botox, plastic surgery, junk food etc.

Yes, this re. kids being older than their years.

Both my DM and MIL started work full-time at 15 - they were basically expected to be adults, with all the responsibilities that entailed, and also had to deal with sexual harassment and groping at work that was laughed off as 'just a bit of fun'. My mum remembers, aged 15, being scared to go into one of her bosses' offices because he used to grope her.

A lot of people younger than my generation (50's) are obese, some morbidly so they don't dress well. They wear vast amounts of unflattering makeup, have fillers etc which most of them don't need.
Their hair is generally better than our 80's mops but over all for the first time the mid life generation who bother, look and dress better than the ones below.
My teeth are beautiful now but only because I had (expensive) treatment that wasn't available in my younger years.

I think teenagers look far better now! When I was a teen, we were all awful hair (perms had come back), terrible clothes, and badly applied make up. My friends’ teens all look flawless now - in real life as well as on the ‘gram. And people in their 30s and 40s definitely look and seem younger now than they did 30 years ago. Wasn’t Shirley Valentine only supposed to be 42?

You had to grow up a lot quicker, that's for sure.

It depends how far back you are going. During the war the British were better nourished than they had ever been, because rationing enabled everyone to have a reasonable diet, but previously, poorer people had a diet very high in sugar; sweet tea and bread and jam. George Orwell's Road to Wigan Pier is an eye-opener as to life in the 20s and 30s.

I was born in 1953 and got my first contact lenses when I was 16.

I was born in 64 and lived in a poor area, but had the happiest childhood ever, my parents were professional, Mum was a teacher and taught on traveller sites, I went to a local school which I loved, multi cultural. To me everything was perfect, my aunts were hippies who bought me amazing clothes, and we had good meals, no snacking though, which was common.
BUT, as I grew into my teens I grew aware of the racism everywhere that I lived, National front was big then and had no trouble recruiting in my area, east London, the n word and p word were part of everyday vocabulary, my parents were very anti racism.
Also, I realised the absolute poverty , kids with plimsolls (their only footwear) with holes in, mums with tabs in the corner shop ( not sexist, that's how it was) most houses without bathrooms.
I have recently been watching documentaries about poverty in the 70s on you tube, (well worth a watch) it was horrendous and worse than it is now.
So, through a sheltered childs eyes, yes it was infinitely better, but scratch that surface and thousands were suffering.

My mother said no sugar ever at all during her teens in WWII meant she never liked it so never had it. I suspect that and less food is one reason things were better BUT more people smoked and there was lead in petrol and smog in London so it was not all being slim and pretty

Olivia Newton-John was naturally beautiful, fit and clearly loved performing. Being confident in your body and enjoying what you do goes a long way.

Same for John Travolta. I watched a documentary about the making of Saturday Night Fever recently, which highlighted how ridiculously good he was at dancing. A dance instructor was going through the film moves with a troupe of young students, but advised them not try some of them, as they would likely injure themselves.

I do think there is something effortless about good-looking movie stars from the old days. Someone like Carey Grant was classically handsome, but didn't look like he spent 4 hours in the gym all day.

Good looking teenagers really stood out when I was young. They were definitely the exception and everyone else was ordinary looking.
Nowadays pretty young girls seem ten a penny and no one really looks twice. I agree a lot of it is fake beauty, not the natural good looks that made people stand out in the 70s and 80s.

Just had a thought about glasses. I came from a working class family, glasses were national health subsidised, none nhs frames were incredibly expensive ( to us anyway). It wasn't until Specsavers and Vision Express came along and kicked to market up the ass that we started to get the massive choice of frames we have today.

Everyone was allowed to look much older in the 80s. Look at shows like Golden Girls, they were only in 50s and 60s. Compared to the famous 50 and 60 year olds, now its so different.

And teeth. As kids the dentists couldn't wait to drill and fill. Our kids had much more dental hygiene awareness, plus better treatments to prevent cavities. Most people I know my age have loads of missing teeth, fillings, crowns, bridges and dentures. But we all look gorgeous.

Bloody hell, I opened this expecting 'old days' to mean pre WWI at least, not to the 'years and years ago' of people born in the 70s and 80s. I feel absolutely ancient now.

If you're looking at old photos, OP, don't forget the colour processing was different and people did have a sort of golden look in 70s/early 80s photos.

No one had mental health issues?
My aunt died in an asylum. She was dead before I knew she existed.
My family has a huge history of mental illness, which I didn’t escape. However after a single stint being sectioned in my late teens, I’ve been treated successfully in the community and live a happy life. My relatives didn’t have that chance! Of course it seemed like no one had MH issues- they were locked up and hidden or left to commit suicide which was written off as a tragic accident.

Maybe people in 1920s and 1930s and on looked differently dressed, smarter, nicer face features.
In the 70/80s women did not look young where I lived. I remember all our neighbours and local people in the village I lived looked much older, like women in their 40s looked like 60-70 already, blokes in 40s looked like 60 too.
There days older women look much younger as there is more options..

people born years and years ago, maybe in the 60s/70s/80s
Jeez

I think everyone is forgetting that old photos and films were much poorer quality and not as high definition, so everything is blurred and makes people look better in a vintagey kind of way. You can't see any imperfections or dark circles etc in such photos. I have a Polaroid camera and look so much better in photos from that than I do in my phone camera photos!

Obesity was rare and most people were slim because there were fewer processed foods, takeaways were a treat food rather than a regular go to, and fewer people had cars so walking/cycling was more of a thing. I think women drank a lot less, to generalise broadly, and cafes were rare. Portion sizes were smaller too. Now it’s normal to be served a gigantic portion.

I’m not so sure that mental illness was less prevalent though. Awareness was poor and a lot of people suffered in silence or self medicated. Or were written off as “hysterical”, “crazy”, “weird” etc. Deaths we now recognise as self inflicted such as alcohol poisoning and single vehicle car crashes were presumed to be accidental.

I have been in education for the past 30 years and have seen risk aversion in girls rocket. The “epic fails”, pranks, “circle of shame”, forensic analysis of appearance, apps which photograph you and then give a percentage attractiveness score and relentless sarcasm on the internet must play a part here.

This. I was 16 in 1976 and had contact lenses.