When I was a kid…..When the phone rang someone answered it. There was no caller ID, no screening calls, no voice mails. Pretty simple. If someone knocked at the door you went to see who it was. Even at night. Nowadays only murderers knock on doors. Or delivery people letting you know your package has arrived. I walked to school. It was over five blocks. Today children can’t even stand outside without armed guards. I guess no one used to kidnap children. When we “went out to play” we often traveled around the neighborhood. Even went downtown. My friends and I walked to the movie theater together. I might even go alone and meet a friend there. Of course there are no longer any downtown theaters in Berkeley to walk to. The last one closed earlier this month. At one point Berkeley boasted six downtown theaters. Before the pandemic there were three. Now zero.
Time was when the only requirement for entering a sports event was handing someone your ticket. Now you have to go through security. We didn’t use to have gun-wielding mass killers trying to go to basketball games. There are lots of restrictions on what you can bring into a sports venue. No umbrellas. If it’s raining you better put on poncho. No bottles or cans because you might be tempted to throw it at a game official or player on the opposing team.
The world is a lot more safety-conscious these days. At the same time we have a lot more mentally ill people with automatic weapons laying waste to complete strangers. One person one time brought an exploding device onto an airplane in a shoe. Now everyone, everywhere has to take off their shoes before getting on a plane. We’re all suspects.
Free speech was freer. Put another way, people got away with saying more insulting, insensitive, sexist, racist, homophobic comments. Talk about a double-edged sword. Today you have to be careful about what you say and certainly what you write on the internet. You might offend somebody or even an entire group of people. I’m glad racial slurs are no longer tolerated and that you can’t make fun of gay people or those with special needs. But like a lot of things it has — in my opinion — gone too far. Often people feel inhibited about speaking and are more conscious of conforming to newly-established norms rather than expressing themselves. As a society we need to figure this one out.
We didn’t use to have trigger warnings. People had thicker skins.
Before the internet we didn’t know as much about complete strangers, especially people who aren’t even noteworthy for accomplishments behind being famous for being famous. We have a lot more of that today: people known for being known. Used to he you were expected to have done something to earn your notoriety.
I started off mentioning phones. They used to stay in houses. If you had a long extension cord you could maybe drag out to the front porch or backyard, but you didn’t take it with you anywhere. It sure didn’t fit in your pocket. Thus people didn’t stare at their phones wherever they went. People used to talk to each other a lot more. Attention spans were longer. More people read books.
Taking a photograph was a much bigger deal. First of all you had to have a camera with you. Secondly you needed to have film in that camera. Course once you took a picture you had to wait until the roll (of film) was finished then you took it to be developed (ask your folks) then you paid money to get your photos some of which might be blurry or a person’s eyes were closed or you hadn’t centered it quite right. If you wanted video of something you need a video camera. They weren’t cheap. You generally only used them for special occasions.
Computers existed mostly in fiction, at special university labs and in people’s imaginations. The thought of having one in your home was ridiculous. The thought of having one in your phone which you carried in your pocket was….well, it didn’t exist as a thought.
People didn’t wear bicycle helmets. It was uncommon to see adults on bikes and crazy to think of a grown-up biking to work.
You didn’t have to take out a second mortgage to buy a ticket to a concert. A middle class family could afford good seats to a football game. High school kids didn’t think twice about going to hockey games, it was just a few bucks. The prices at concessions stands didn’t make you blink, let alone faint.
College football and baseball were pretty much as they had been for decades and would remain so for a few decades more. Today old-timers have no idea what has happened to the sports they once loved other than than money has been the ruination of them.
People dressed a lot more nicely. Men wore ties. You dressed to go to a nice restaurant. Now, regardless of the weather, half the adult males you see are wearing sandals and shorts. (We're seeing way to much of men's feet these days.) People go to the theater dressed as if on their way to see the Grateful Dead.
There were no TV channels that openly presented biased versions of the news. There was an actual effort towards objectivity. Editorials and opinions were rare and when they did appear were properly labeled. They also lasted a couple of minutes rather than a couple of hours. Of course this was back when there was something called “political compromise” and bi-partisan initiatives were more frequent than a blue moon. This was also at a time when you had the loyal opposition not a bunch of wing nuts more intent on fighting bogus cultural wars than helping improve the lives of American people.
Used to be that cigarettes and the attendant smoke were everywhere. Busses, restaurants, sports venues, offices, movie theaters and bars. Now you’re almost as likely to smell marijuana as tobacco.
Times have changed and I guess they always will.
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