Did you grow up in 70s/80s?

[WomanBornNotWorn]

I was born in 63 so have no memory of the Beatles / hippies etc. But at around ten years old I started to become aware of and adored glam rock, Marc Bolan, Freddie Mercury, the guys from Sweet - long hair, Spandex, tons of makeup, platform heels and all. That morphed into disco - flares, more makeup, more platforms - and punk - leather, short hair, even more makeup - and New Romantics - lace, frilly shirts, still more makeup ... it all went on like fireworks over only about ten years or so.

I feel sorry for kids & teens now, there just doesn't seem to be the flamboyance and fun and freedom to dress up, without a heavy drag and gender identity boxing-up and labelling.

Maybe I'm misreading and it was there all along. But it does seem that there is less freedom, more narrow definitions now.

Anyone here young enough or have kids and able to say if there's anything similar happening, now that isn't all about gender?

So many images out there from such a relatively short time

Yes. I'm 4 years older than you OP, so can just about remember the Beatles. Remember watching their films on TV at Christmas (Hard Day's Night and Yellow Submarine etc). I was a teenager in the 70s and remember when the lads used to wear platform shoes with high heels, even at school. School had to ban them for both sexes in the end because of so many broken ankles on the stairs Lads also wore eyeliner for discos. I think the sexes were much closer in image back then.

Hi OP born in the late 1960s and recall things a bit differently from you. Lots of sexism and racism that passed without comment as ‘banter’; it being acceptable for a male boss to pat a female employee on the head and call her a ‘good girl’; being told to go home and change if I wore trousers to work. Would not have any of that back again (though I accept we now have some equally divisive issues to manage). I do recall eighties fashion with some affection though; amid the garish horrors there were some wonderfully individual and creative styles around and you could express who you were without bothering about brands or labels. I was always broke so shopped in jumble sales and charity shops. I think my, erm, ‘eclectic’ style has remained (and I still wear the occasional item of jewellery or clothing from that era too).

i was born in '71, Op, so the new romantics/culture club are what i remember.
i'm happy to see that Marilyn (remember him?) doesn't buy any of the current gender baloney.

I was born in 1976.

Music provided two big wake ups for me - I’m from a traditional Irish household

• learning Boy George with his beautiful long hair and make up was really a George (I think it was the A-Team episode)

• The Communards with Sarah Jane Morris

Loving - ‘Dont Leave Me This Way’ and watching the video for the first time and seeing - the person with the high voice - whom I presumed to be a woman - was the super wonderful Jimmy Somervillle and the person with the low voice - whom I assumed to be a man - was the wonderful Sarah Jane!

I saw this image of Harry Styles over the weekend and did really admire how masculine he looked in sailor trousers and a hot pink shirt, I was just searching Google images so I could post it here and found a wealth of photos of Harry in pink, sparkles, glitzy, stereotypical girly outfits.

www.teenvogue.com/story/harry-styles-sexuality-labels-gender-norms

While speaking about his style choices — a wardrobe that has included pearls and ruffled dresses in the past — Harry explained that he doesn’t accept boundaries within fashion. “What women wear. What men wear. For me it’s not a question of that,” the singer told The Guardian’s Tom Lamont. “If I see a nice shirt and get told, ‘But it’s for ladies.’ I think: ‘Okaaaay?’ Doesn’t make me want to wear it less though.”

But at around ten years old I started to become aware of and adored glam rock, Marc Bolan, Freddie Mercury, the guys from Sweet - long hair, Spandex, tons of makeup, platform heels and all.

I was born in 1974 and Marc Bolan and T=Rex were my first love.

As a very small child I had a record called Stu Pot's Pop Party which featured Get It On (also Gary Glitter, best we don't mention that).

I've been a fan my whole life. Currently have both Children of the Revolution and Ride a White Swan on my car MP3 player.

As I grew older I also favoured 80s variety glam rock, Poison, Motley Crue etc and delved into the back catalogue of American glam rock from the 70s, Aerosmith, New York Dolls etc.

And of course as others have mentioned 80s pop was also full of beautiful men in make up.

I've always found men in beards much weirder to be honest.

All of which makes trans nonsense even more annoying. That Alex Drummond character from Stonewall would be exactly my type if it weren't for the pretending to be a woman thing.

Oh yes, the 60s and 70s had their own sexist racist horrors - I watch a lot of Talking Pictures TV channel and the programmes often have to have a warning about the attitudes reflecting the times the programmes were made. Also the TOTP pervert scandals were all happening round then.

Flashback - I used to buy Popswop and Music Star magazines, and Jackie of course.

Boy George, Marilyn, Communards - yes, I'd forgotten them! 💞

I just missed Biba - I think I'd have loved that.

Like the Harry Styles reference - but isn't that how Eddie Izzard used to talk?

Anyway - what else is happening at the moment? I thought Billy Porter's gown was gorgeous. Complete absence of drag.

Similar vintage to you, OP and what I think is missing these days is the amateurish nature of things in the 70s - people made their own fashion items, used their sewing machines and just sort of cobbled stuff together how they wanted sometimes. These days it's all much more seriously glamorous and expensive to emulate. It's all about brands and what's in and what's not, very high maintenance. Or so it looks from the outside!

Harry's great. He wears what he wants to wear, without a peep about any gender-related bollocks. The more I see of him, the more respect I have for him.

The 70s and 80s were a very dressed-up, creative time. In the 90s, I noticed that young people on the streets were starting to look less interesting and more conformist. It became rarer and rarer to see someone in a really unusual outfit. It was like watching the lights going out. A couple of years ago, on the streets of Cambridge, I happened to be out for a walk on a night when a lot of the May Balls were on. I saw lots of young people dressed up (so-called dressed up) and it was profoundly depressing. They all looked the same - the boys in cheap dinner suits, and the girls in boring little dresses, with long hair and low-key makeup. In the 80s, at the Cambridge May Balls, it was like carnival time - loads of people dressed to kill, in all sorts of wild, creative, elaborate outfits.

As an older person, looking at the young from the outside, it seems to me that they are far more conformist and far less creative in their dress than young people used to be. It's depressing.

I was born in 1959 and at school in the 70s and remember men's long hair and platform shoes. I lived in a very working-class macho area, so men didn't wear make up - except sometimes ironic dark coloured nail polish - but they did wear flared jeans/trousers - very flared bell-bottom trousers which got very tight above the knee, and platform shoes, and "skinny rib" jumpers.

And David Bowie was a favourite singer amongst the boys I was at school with.

So different to nowadays.

63 vintage here.

Yes there was a lot more gender fluid style , and a lot of casual sexest behavoiur. I found out the management at work referred to me as the "feminist" cause I wouldn't pour the tea at the union meetings .

Is it better or worse now? Or have I just got old?

Born in 1960. Was a Bolan/Bowie fan. To be perfectly honest, I wasn't really into the 'gender bending' thing though, I preferred it when they presented as masculine. A lot of us thought they looked like wallies when they were dressed up.

The phallacy comes from thinking that dismantling gender roles in the area of fashion and individual subjectivity and style (only) will dismantle the patriarchy. There are other issues that concern the sexual division of labour, reproductive rights and so on.

At secondary school in the 70s. In 72, the school told the hippy sixth-form to get their hair cut and put bras on. Much to the disappointment of this little lad.

My memory is that there were a few exceptional brilliant girls who were encouraged to believe they could do anything, and the rest who were going to be wives and mums so don't bother with ambition.

Boys were told to polish our shoes, do our ties up and look smart, because that was how you go on in life. (Seems no one told Steve Jobs, Richard Branson etc.)

I was born in 1960 so do remember the Beatles(my dad had 45s).By the Sergeant Pepper stage we had a mixture of Doris Day and younger,colourful fashion.
My brother had long hair as did a lot of school friends when we were teenagers.
Fashion was colourful,rainbow colours everywhere but without any connotations.
Then glam pop and punk.
No body batted an eye at men in makeup ,the androgenous look.
Yes there was a lot of sexism but that hasn't gone away.My DD had to look sten to a load of boys discussing girls and what they would like to do to them etc.on the school bus.
In my day what boys knew about sex was much more limited and talked about
amongst themselves .And there was no pressure because it was not expected that girls would allow a boy much behind kissing and a bit of petting.
As for make up,us girls thought that frosted green and blue eyeshadow with an oil slick of strawberry flavours lip gloss was the bee's knees until the glamorous boys came along.

Phallacy
Phreudian slip of the tongue there Spartacus.

It was actually deliberate :) Honest!

Your Freudian slip's showing.

Another word to add to my GC lexicon.

As you were...

There does seem to be a bit of a lack of flamboyance these days, but that's just the way fashions go, it may come back.
I was 18 in the early 90s and the indie/baggy/shoegazing/grunge look was very much in, which wasn't at all flamboyant, but later got into the goth scene which very much was.

Funny, I've talked to my DD a lot about this. I grew up in this time. In many ways it was a poor time for equality - gay rights, maternity leave and so on, but it felt like things were changing and the opportunities for women especially were improving. Challenging gender roles was about non conformity, men wearing make up, women having short hair, etc.
My DD is incredulous that the whole idea of gender identity is no older than she is.

Born 1959 and was a teenager in the 70s with David Bowie, Marc Bolan and Freddie Mercury as male role models. While I was a young feminist wearing dungarees and Kickers and had short hair in the 6th form, some of the lads wore more make-up than me, and had longer hair than me and wore more feminine clothes.

It seemed perfectly acceptable. I lived in a small town: London was wilder. You only have to see old TOTP shows on TV to see how much more freedom of expression there was in dress and appearance for both sexes.

That's entirely separate from the attitudes that people held in those days.