To think the UK was really cool and exciting in the nineties and early noughties?

[Fuckthecostofliving]

Just thinking of all the music, films and general whole vibe. It was amazing! I visited London in 1997 as a teen for the first time and loved everything about it immediately.

I know part of this is to do with nostalgia for being young, but honestly there seemed to be such an exciting mixture of brilliant cultural stuff going on. And way less internet, no iphones, it was just a whole different atmosphere.

Anyone else nostalgic for the 90's?

Those are the decades when I was a child/teen. It's probably because you remember being young. Every decade has its good and bad points. I don't miss being a kid and in my teens tbh. I look back on the music fondly though.

Golden years here…1980s young teenager to adulthood- New Romantics, Gay becomes okay and Labour lifts us out of misery. 90s oh the music and clubbing. Joined the military and travelled the world, fucking amazing life.

I don't think the 'Cool Britannia' period was particularly cool. The 80s were cool and there's some really good music now, but the popular culture of the so-called cool period was a bit naff IMHO.

Racism was a every day norm in the 90s and early 00s.

Lot of truth in this.

I never used to be embarrassed about being British because I thought there was good and bad and the British people were basically sound, with a few idiots. Brexit and the anti vax movement plus people keeping on voting for Boris Johnson, Dominic Raab, Matt Hancock and Jacob Frigging Rees Mogg have completely trashed my belief in them.

The UK isn't as cool as it was back then.

It's a well respected country with a great deal going for it.

I don't understand why people don't appreciate what they have and why they live here if they long for another culture.

I have lived elsewhere, where they wished to have what we have, some people sound ungrateful and unappreciative.

I was just thinking about this and I don’t think it is actually.

Theres been a noticeable decline in mood and a more pessimistic outlook across all generations in the last few years, not just those who were young in the 90s/2000s.

I know there’s been ups and downs in every decade but this one is probably the worst since WW2 - Recession, Brexit, Covid, Ukraine and then nuclear threat ramping up again, endless austerity, 4 prime ministers in as many years, endless political scandal, cost of living crisis.. I mean I’m sure I’ve forgotten something. It really is a completely shit time.

Im early 30s and I have spent my entire adult working life under austerity and the Conservative government.

And sexism

At least we knew what a woman was!

Child in the 70s teen in the 80s snd a mum in the 90s/2000s

Bloody awful now compared to then. Nothing works! Embarrassed to be british as the Scot's snd Welsh governments equally bloody awful.

But women got treated worse back the , whatever we were.

I was a kid in the 90s and my childhood was very happy which I’m thankful for. However I love that fact it’s now normal to talk about periods, women’s health issues and all the things I couldn’t back then. I love that it’s ok to be an introvert, it’s ok to not be ‘cool’, it’s ok to not be heterosexual. So many things people are more open minded about and vocal about now and it’s been so much better for my mental health. I look at my younger cousins and they are so much more confident and empowered than I was back then. They do have other issues, but at least it’s acceptable to talk about their mental health and most of them are very good at pushing back men who treat them badly. But social media has caused lots of other problems, so swings and roundabouts really.

Lad and ladette culture, sexism and homophobia were rampant. But culturally it was an exciting time with the turn of the millennium and lots of iconic moments. Plus economically things were pretty good.

Yep. Cannot imagine the open sexual harassment I experienced at work (FROM THE MOST SENIOR PERSON THERE) in the early noughties happening now without a fuss. And this was at a professional marketing agency.

So much stuff was awful!

Also I love how curvier bodies are more acceptable now. I’m not even talking overweight - just not a stick. So much better mental health awareness too and less shame talking about it.

Errm London was cool. Manchester was everything.

Manchester was incredible in the 90’s

This 👆

I definitely made the most of the 90's

Yeah, the 1990-3 recession and the Asia crisis were amazing

LOL, this really was not on the radar of many people coming of age in the late 90s….

YANBU, OP.

I arrived in London from the other side of the world in the spring of ‘98.

Had the absolute time of my life. Clubbed up and down the country at the turn of the century. We had some of the best weekend-long house parties with my ex and his friends on the decks.

Then we split and I met my now H. Had three or four years of amazing carefree fun, and then married and got into adult life - kids and settling down, which has been great in a very different way.

The 90s felt like halcyon days - so, so different from now. 9/11 happened, and the internet and mobile phones - while great in a lot of ways - have also had negative impacts that I don’t think most of us even fully understand yet.

It was great. I was a teenager in NI in the 80s, the music was great but the Troubles weren't. I moved to London in 1991 as a graduate trainee, my starting salary was more than my dad earned. I met my now-husband a few months later and we spent the next decade having an absolute ball, living in a tiny flat out almost every night, raving at the weekend, going to lots of festivals. Got married and when we had a baby in 2001 we knew the party was over and moved away to Ireland. Still feel very lucky to have lived in the right time in the right place, and to have had the cash and freedom to fully enjoy it, as I don't think it would be possible now.