Was anything better in days gone by?

manclad said:
I often think about when I was younger back in the 60s and 70s.
There are only 2/3 things that I consider to be better back then.
1 - Beer,especially Boddingtons seemed to taste better back then. As did Tetleys,Sam Smiths and Wilsons.
2 - Houses were far cheaper than they are now. I bought my first terraced house in 1980 for £12300,and at the time my salary was @£5000. So I was easily able to afford the mortgage repayments which
the wife didn't need to go to work after her maternity leave and could stay at home to look after our 2 daughters. However house buying wasn't all a bed of roses then,interest rates were around the 12-15% mark right through the 80s and well into the 90s. I checked a couple of weeks ago on google and inflation in 1980 was 18%.
3 - Knife crime. Back when I was a teenager/young man I was involved in a few fights ,in school,on the street,in nightclubs and also at football matches. Plenty of punches,kicks (heavy leather brogues were my weapon of choice) and head butts. Nobody carried a knife or other weapon. So if you ended up in a punch up with other youths,you may have got a black eye,split lip,or busted nose. But you soon recovered from those type of injuries. Nowadays look at the wrong person or walk down the wrong street and it results in a stabbing and most likely dead.
Click to expand...

there was a lot of Stanley knife injuries round my way. Disfiguring but not penetrating so less likely to kill than today.
 
Big Swifty said:
It is now the received wisdom that life has improved over the last 30,40,50 or 60 years. Not everyone might agree, though. What cannot be disputed are the following:

- Health care (e.g. cancer treatment) and life expectancy are improved
- The Clean Air Act has ended the killer smogs of the 1950s
- Racism, sexism and homophobia are now seen as unacceptable
- Pubs, restaurants, cinemas and public transport are free from tobacco fumes
- Minimum wage
- Central heating in homes is the norm, not just for the rich
- Motorways avoid drivers being held up in a succession of town centres on longer trips
- Football stadia are more comfortable, pitches are infinitely better
- A much wider choice of foodstuffs
- Hundreds of TV channels, not just two or three
- I will not pass judgment on the dreaded social media.....

However, some (generally older) folk look back on the past with some fondness.
What I wonder is - was anything better in the past, i.e. within the memory of some of the pre-millennial Bluemooners? Would you really wish to go back to your early life?
Life wasn't easy then, but we didn't know any better, and our expectations were more modest. Not that it isn't hard for some people nowadays.

For all our modern creature comforts, have we lost something we had in earlier times?
Click to expand...


The sense of community ..... i grew up on a street where front door keys were rusted in their locks ... where neighbours would knock and let themselves in . Where kids all played out till 9 / 10 at night without fear. Where the elderly were looked after.


Then Thatcher
 
Flying - utter nightmare the thought of going to an airport now queuing for ages everywhere being shouted at to take your belt and shoes off, to get ripped off at every stage of the process From the moment you go online to book your flight with everyone paying priority on everything just to get the fuck out of the place and then to finally take your seat on the chav express bucket airline flight with some piss head in a sombrero next to you
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Unread Posts

Don't have an account? Register now and see fewer ads!

SIGN UP
Back
Top
✖
  AdBlock Detected
Bluemoon relies on advertising to pay our hosting fees. Please support the site by disabling your ad blocking software to help keep the forum sustainable. Thanks.