When people see things from the 80s or 90s, there’s only one word to utter—that’s nostalgia. It often reminds millennials and Gen Xers of the good old times when everything was slower, simpler, and even truer. However, we also have lots of things that have improved in the 21st century. Here are 11 things that people think are better than before.
1. Internet
Somebody commented, “Internet is better. But we did go out more during the 90s, so maybe it was thanks to that.”
Another person replied, “The internet golden era was right before social media became a thing.”
2. Crime is Down
One person said, “G-ng v-olence is way down, and dr-gs are treated more as a health problem than a crime problem. They’re still a long way to go, but I feel like these things are moving in the right direction.”
3. Video Games
“Possibly an unpopular opinion, but video games. Been playing for over 30 years. There’s more stuff that interests these days than there was in the 90s,” one user stated.
“Sort of. The tech simply wasn’t there in the 90s to realize the potential video games had to create interesting worlds and tell incredible stories. But nowadays, so many videogames have colossal budgets and needless star-power, making them too expensive to take risks and do something interesting with. Although it’s a golden age for indie games which dispense with all that,” the second person replied.
“I would argue in some ways the limitations actually did more for my imagination in some weird way. Visually almost every game looks the same now while limitations back then forced developers to be creative and utilize many different styles. And many games in the 90s had interesting worlds and still told incredible stories,” the third added.
4. Phones
Somebody said, “Phones. At the beginning of the 1990s long distance calls could be incredibly expensive, like $9/minute.”
Another one replied, “In the early 80s calling China from Canada during business hours was up to $12/minute.”
Then the third added, “A two-edged sword. Now, people can get ahold of you 24/7. In the 90s, we had more peace in that regard.”
5. Accessibility to Knowledge
“Accessibility to knowledge. I really appreciate the existence of Wiki and Google Scholar,” one Redditor said.
“The downside here would be that there’s also a lot more misinformation out there reaching a lot more people,” replied another.
“The mention of accessibility brings web content accessibility to mind. It has come a long way since the release of WCAG 1.0 in 1999,” added another.
6. Attitude Toward Women and LGBT
One user shared, “Attitudes towards women and LGBT people. They were very very bad still in the 1990’s.”
Somebody replied, “I’m not saying things are perfect now but sometimes I hear younger people talk, and it’s clear they don’t know how bad it was in 2005, let alone 1995. Sometimes they’ll say things that are almost regressive. Again: there’s lots of room for improvement, but when I step back, it’s really remarkable how much progress has been made on both the women’s and lgbt fronts.”
7. Streaming
Somebody said, “I can watch, play, read, or listen to almost any form of media I want instantly.”
Another one replied, “In terms of TV, I feel like it’s kind of a double-edged sword kind of thing. Like, you can’t just stumble on a movie or TV show anymore like you used to. Now you have to pick it, and commit from the beginning kind of. You can’t really channel surf anymore, so I’m much less likely to give things a chance I find. It also weirds me out that we used to complain about cable packages so much, but now a lot of us are paying more because you *need* to have 3+ streaming services or whatever.”
8. Personal Computers
“PCs. Not just in terms of processing power, which is obvious. But it’s so much easier to slot it all together and power everything up without the fear that you might have made a critical mistake,” one person shared.
“While I generally agree, there are a couple of entirely modern gotchas. Molded molex power connectors melting, and the complete incompatibility between different brands/models of modular PSU cable,” replied another.
9. Body Positivity
One Reddit user commented, “Body positivity—in the 90s, women’s magazines were full of diet culture and features highlighting celebrity ‘flaws’ and telling women how to dress to ‘minimize’ body parts. Being a teenage girl then was pretty hellish if you weren’t very slim. Nowadays, it’s much better (although still not perfect!).”
The second person replied, “Why is this downvoted lol. The standards were insane then. Having ultra-low rise also come into fashion made it worse. I think even if you account for our perception of ‘average weight’ being larger due to people being heavier now, the standards were STILL outrageous in the 90s. Magazines called celebrities fat for having a bMI of 22. Trends with body types are bs but I hope if the pendulum swings towards skinniness again (as a reaction to thicc), the cultural conversation won’t be as gross as it was then. And again, while body type trends are horrific at least the thicc trend could encourage women to go to the gym and do squats and gain muscle. The trendy body type in the 80s also seemed fairly athletic. It’s very hard to get the 90s heroin chic look in a healthy way. Even an obsessive runner with minimal body fat wouldn’t measure up.”
10. Nothing Got Better
Somebody said, “IMO I don’t think anything got better tbh. Technology may well have ‘improved’ but really nothing has actually improved our lives in ways that anyone was asking for. Society is screwed because of all the tech advancements and we can’t keep up anymore. Technology has warped society and lead us down an unprecedented path, negativity is rife everywhere you go, right there in front of you oozing out of the screen. the 90s was truly the last stand before it all got f—ed up and this is why people refer to the 90s as the golden era, best of every gen beforehand and too good for any generation since. Peaceee.”
11. Online Communities
One person said, “Online communities seem more close-knit compared to today, where there’s so many people to the point where you can’t even find friends and whatnot.”
Another one replied, “I don’t know about that. Back in the days, you could find like-minded people who shared just the love of something like a hobby or a sport. Now it’s all about politics.”
Sometimes we can’t help but feel nostalgic, however, let’s not forget the improvements the world has made throughout the years.
Which improvement do you like the most? Let us know in the comments!
Source: Reddit.
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