1. Where you were on 9/11, and pre-9/11 times
Obviously everyone knows what happened with 9/11. But the 90s encapsulated a time that we actually weren't at war with anyone (which was really nice). The terrorist attack on the Twin Towers was a jarring event, and it's impossible to forget what it was like when that happened. Some schools shut down or released students early; a lot of students were picked up from school even if the school wasn't closing. We saw the 2nd plane go into the towers on the news in my 5th grade classroom, and my sister was crying when we were walking home (she was in 3rd grade) because she was afraid that my mom's school might be targeted. Suddenly the world became a much scarier and insecure place.
2. The Harry Potter craze
OK, I know JK Rowling has been TERF-y trash in the past year, but hear me out. When the books came out in the 90s kids went BANANAS for them. One of the most anticipated things for me was the release of the next book! I was never allowed to go to the midnight release parties (sad..) but my parents let me put in a preorder and pick it up the next day. I would then spend all my free time devouring it. Not to mention all the hype surrounding the casting and release of the movies. Watching the story unfold in real time (before JK added all the extra elements and kind of ruined it) was a special kind of magic.
3. Seeing video game graphics make leaps and bounds of progress
I'm not a gamer myself, but even from my outside viewpoint I can see how much has changed since Playstation and Nintendo first started releasing games. From blocky, pixelated games all the way up to crazy realistic characters and scenes with rich detail, things have certainly changed tremendously. We can still play the gamut of these games now, but nothing replaces the shock when you realize that the graphics have somehow gotten EVEN BETTER (when we thought the graphics that are objectively crap compared to today's standards were pretty good lol).
4. On the same note, seeing handheld gaming make massive progress too.
Once upon a time, there were GameBoys in black and white that actually seemed pretty advanced. Then color came out, and DAMN, that was a revolution. Four iterations later when the screen was actually backlit, and you didn't need light on or a wormlight to see your screen? priceless. There were also so many random games, including not so great games based on movies (my sister had a Shrek game that was particularly buggy).
That being said, I still have my GameBoy color and it still works, 20 years later.
5. Y2K/the new Millenium
We didn't have much faith that technology wouldn't kill us on sight, lol. The idea was that switching from 1999 to 2000 would confuse computers so much that they'd freak and launch nuclear missiles by accident (I think?). Well, anyway, that clearly did not happen. On top of that, we were going into a new century, AND a new millenium! What sort of crazy cool things could the future possibly hold??? (turns out, the answer is COVID-19 and a lot more racism/bigotry than I hoped the future would have).
New years eve that year was particularly crazy. I think everyone knew that there was nothing to worry about but I definitely wondered in the back of my head what could happen lol. Watching the Baja Men perform "Who Let the Dogs Out" right before the countdown didn't do anything to soothe my nerves.
6. There was no-to-minimal social media, and bullying was a totally different landscape
One thing Gen Z has to deal with is cyber-bullying, and I think that it is a major struggle that I'm glad existed less back in the day. It wasn't totally absent once Myspace and Facebook started to be a thing, but it wasn't nearly as problematic as it is now. Then, if people bothered you, you could flip them off and run away, and not have to deal with them once you got home. Now, your bullies are on you phone. In your pocket. All the time. It sounds godawful, and I feel for you guys.
There's also the insane expectations that social media puts on kids, with influencers and other teenagers (even preteens) getting involved. Some of those kids look like they are in their 20s and 30s, with all the makeup, fillers, etc. The pressure that this puts on kids today has to be enormous, and it's something we didn't deal with as much in the past.
Obviously there were beauty standards and pressure that came about in different ways, but the landscape has changed so much I feel like the pressure has gotten stronger (mainly with kid's ability to also post videos and pictures, and the pressure to fit in to that aesthetic). Before at least we only had to put up with the pressure among our peers at school.
7. On the same note, seeing the evolution of cell phones in real time was pretty wild
The first portable phones I saw were my parent's car phones with the thick, curly cords lol. Next came the brick phones, that could really only make calls. Then there were flip phones, which were the best in my opinion, and as things evolved cameras were added too. The first time I saw a Blackberry with a keyboard I was like "crazy, what will they think of next?" And so the story goes. Now everyone has texting, internet, and a billion other things at their fingertips. And if you told us that video calling would be easy and high quality? that would blow most people's minds. The first time I Skyped with someone was crazy lol.
It's also weird that basically no one has house phones anymore. Even my parents got rid of theirs and just use their cell phones.
8. Eminem, Nu Metal, boy bands, and all other sorts of weird music stuff.
First, I know everyone here knows who Eminem is. But when he first broke out as a new artist, the controversy against him was off the charts. If you guys think he should be "cancelled" for some of his music now, you might want to go back to his original albums and check that out... lol. That didn't stop my friends and I from singing the chorus to "the Kids" on loop during recess lmfao.
I am also biased because I adore nu metal (yes, tear me apart in the comments, but I said what I said). Were you even an angry, angsty millenial teenager if you weren't blasting Limp Bizkit's "Break Stuff" or KoRn's "Dead Bodies Everywhere" on repeat? The genre has mostly faded into obscurity, but the memories are still fond. Tho maybe not, since Limp Bizkit is making a bizarre comeback and KoRn has never really stopped w the new music. But it definitely used to be a bigger thing.
Lastly who can forget the quintessential boy bands lmfao. The NSync vs Backstreet Boy debate was real (and there was 98 degrees hanging out over there somewhere). I was never a huge boy band person myself, but it's hard to forget when they were literally everywhere. Go back and watch some of the choreography people thought was "hot," it's freaking hilarious.
Imma stop there because music could be a discussion unto itself.
9. So many latchkey kids
I'm sure there are still latchkey kids out there, but this used to be hella predominant back in the day, and I feel like this has mostly fallen to the wayside. In elementary school the teacher knew everyone who had younger siblings, and would let us out five minutes early so we could collect them and take them home. I would go pick up my younger sister and we would walk home, through pretty much any kind of weather. We were also responsible for getting ourselves up and ready for school (since my mom left to work early and my dad wouldn't be home from his overnight shift yet). My friend's mom would come pick us up at a certain time and we had to be damn sure to be ready. I would also watch us both a lot, and on half days was allowed to cook us easy things like mac n cheese or ramen noodles (unsupervised, on my parent's ancient gas stove lol).
There was a lot of playing outside and a reasonable amount of latitude about where we were allowed to go. I imagine a lot of kids do still play outside, but there's a lot more concern about safety overall. We'd get my mom's watch and be told to be home at a certain time (again, no cell phones so no other way to contact us) and if we were home late we would get into big trouble.
Again, not saying this doesn't happen anymore because I'm sure it does, but from my experience it's nowhere near as prevalent. This was just the norm for kids at the time.
10. Finally, you can be glad how things are appreciably better in some ways, but also sad that they have not progressed as much in others.
In school, there was no discussion about LGBTQ+ and certainly no one who admitted to being part of that community. Sex education was minimal and very straight-centric. There was no discussion of other genders or transgender individuals. I'm really glad that the upcoming generation is making this more of an open discussion and being more accepting of a broader range of expression and sexual identity. You guys rock! I didn't even realize nonbinary was a thing until I was much older, and spent a lot of time fussing about/being confused about my identity, but now it makes so much more sense and I can feel more comfortable with myself. I wish I could've had that growing up.
I was lucky to go to a pretty diverse elementary school and appreciate the lessons it taught me about race, religion, and culture. I feel like we have made some strides with a lot of this but there is still a lot of struggle, and I know that I'm sad we haven't been able to make as much of a dent in this as we wanted to. I'm hoping with time we can continue to work and make things better.
Same with the environment. I'm glad that Gen Z is starting to pick up more because I feel like we have had some setbacks and we haven't made as much progress as we wanted when we were feeling younger and more idealistic.
I hope we can continue to work together to make this world a better place!
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