How has society changed since the 70s--your opinion

[clw]

I was born in the mid 60s and grew up in the 70s. The things that stand out the most for me are related to technology and parenting:

1) Technology. We grew up with mimeographs, rotary phones, 8 track tapes. We've had to learn from scratch and keep up with an incredible amount of technology. Which has had a tremendous impact on all of society, including careers. Which leads me to

2) The amount of information we process daily and our work productivity has skyrocketed. No wonder I can't find my car keys.

and then

3) When I was a kid, we dropped off our books, went outside and played anywhere within a 2-3 mile radius of home. Mom rang the bell when dinner was ready (or hollered!). There were no cell phones or texting. I was a responsible paid babysitter at 10-11 years old. My friends and I rode the bus downtown in middle school and spent the day there. We trick or treated by ourselves in 3rd grade. Life was a lot safer and we also got way more fresh air and exercise.

4) I get that the world is not as safe as it used to be and precautions need to be taken. But helicopter parenting is WAY different than the way we were raised. We were Breakfast Club kids; solidly Generation X. There were kids I went to school with since elementary school, whose Dads I never, ever saw (much less met).

I too also miss handwritten letters. I still have boxes of letters I received in college from my family and friends at other schools. The excitement of receiving a hand written letter from someone special; well, there's just nothing like that anymore.

had the 8 track player going all the time in my 72 black Camaro!!!

I was born in the mid 60s and grew up in the 70s. The things that stand out the most for me are related to technology and parenting:

1) Technology. We grew up with mimeographs, rotary phones, 8 track tapes. We've had to learn from scratch and keep up with an incredible amount of technology. Which has had a tremendous impact on all of society, including careers. Which leads me to

2) The amount of information we process daily and our work productivity has skyrocketed. No wonder I can't find my car keys.

and then

3) When I was a kid, we dropped off our books, went outside and played anywhere within a 2-3 mile radius of home. Mom rang the bell when dinner was ready (or hollered!). There were no cell phones or texting. I was a responsible paid babysitter at 10-11 years old. My friends and I rode the bus downtown in middle school and spent the day there. We trick or treated by ourselves in 3rd grade. Life was a lot safer and we also got way more fresh air and exercise.

4) I get that the world is not as safe as it used to be and precautions need to be taken. But helicopter parenting is WAY different than the way we were raised. We were Breakfast Club kids; solidly Generation X. There were kids I went to school with since elementary school, whose Dads I never, ever saw (much less met).

I too also miss handwritten letters. I still have boxes of letters I received in college from my family and friends at other schools. The excitement of receiving a hand written letter from someone special; well, there's just nothing like that anymore.

[Cecil.]

Dads teaching sons how to look under the hood and commenting our choice of spanner.

If you wanted something it involved cutting the lawn for a decade....

[slave to zep]

This is true. Although Thatcher was VERY unpopular and she managed to win three general elections including one landslide. Maybe the red hair somehow counteracts the unpopularity?

lol, dunno about that. she gets called Juliar, does that tell you anything?

[slave to zep]

It's called child abuse and one of the biggest advances since the 70s is we finally are taking it seriously. I've been a substance abuse counselor and the vast majority of the addicts I worked with were survivors of child abuse. Every study has shown that beating children leads to emotional problems, drug problems and/or criminal behavior. Of course it's hard for people to come to terms with what happened to them in childhood, which is why it's important for the survivors to go to therapy.

And of course the word pedophilia has been around for a long time, but most laypeople were not familiar with it.

i don't mean to speak for sozo zoso, but i think it is a real stretch to say that kids having consequences and punishment is child abuse.

i know you are a worker in this field, and i am sure there are many cases that are classed as that and rightly so. but i think she was just talking about kids getting a slap on the bum when they did something wrong/dangerous. imho it's needed sometimes, i used it and all my kids are are fine and healthy.

[Janvier]

illustration by James Taylor

[Pagesbow]

lol, dunno about that. she gets called Juliar, does that tell you anything?

It tells me that awful puns will never go out of fashion:p Seriously though Blair was called Bliar by many after his involvement in the Iraq war - and he still got voted in for another term.

[ScarletMacaw]

I was born in '64 and I also had a babysitting business when I was 11. Now some people don't want to leave their 11-year-olds at home alone!

I also miss handwritten letters, which is why I still send birthday and Christmas cards to some people. I also keep old letters/cards, some going back decades, in a box in my closet.

I was born in the mid 60s and grew up in the 70s. The things that stand out the most for me are related to technology and parenting:

1) Technology. We grew up with mimeographs, rotary phones, 8 track tapes. We've had to learn from scratch and keep up with an incredible amount of technology. Which has had a tremendous impact on all of society, including careers. Which leads me to

2) The amount of information we process daily and our work productivity has skyrocketed. No wonder I can't find my car keys.

and then

3) When I was a kid, we dropped off our books, went outside and played anywhere within a 2-3 mile radius of home. Mom rang the bell when dinner was ready (or hollered!). There were no cell phones or texting. I was a responsible paid babysitter at 10-11 years old. My friends and I rode the bus downtown in middle school and spent the day there. We trick or treated by ourselves in 3rd grade. Life was a lot safer and we also got way more fresh air and exercise.

4) I get that the world is not as safe as it used to be and precautions need to be taken. But helicopter parenting is WAY different than the way we were raised. We were Breakfast Club kids; solidly Generation X. There were kids I went to school with since elementary school, whose Dads I never, ever saw (much less met).

I too also miss handwritten letters. I still have boxes of letters I received in college from my family and friends at other schools. The excitement of receiving a hand written letter from someone special; well, there's just nothing like that anymore.

[Pagesbow]

4) I get that the world is not as safe as it used to be and precautions need to be taken. But helicopter parenting is WAY different than the way we were raised. We were Breakfast Club kids; solidly Generation X. There were kids I went to school with since elementary school, whose Dads I never, ever saw (much less met).

I think there is a perception that the world is "not as safe" but is that actually corroborated by any research or facts other than anecdotal evidence? I'm not so sure. I mean you could argue that the 70's was the "golden age" of the serial killer - It was certainly when that term was first coined.

[ally]

I think there is a perception that the world is "not as safe" but is that actually corroborated by any research or facts other than anecdotal evidence? I'm not so sure. I mean you could argue that the 70's was the "golden age" of the serial killer - It was certainly when that term was first coined.

I honestly don't think it's a perception but I do think that the amount of minute to minute information we're soaking up on a daily basis has played a massive role in how we have dealt with our children. I'm not suggesting that parents should just put their heads in the sand and ignore the negative information they're hearing but with parenting being such a huge responsibility , I can understand why so many have opted to error on the side of caution. The term Too Much Information comes to mind and it's become a full time job just trying to make sense of it all

[Virginia]

I think there is a perception that the world is "not as safe" but is that actually corroborated by any research or facts other than anecdotal evidence? I'm not so sure. I mean you could argue that the 70's was the "golden age" of the serial killer - It was certainly when that term was first coined.

I don't have statistics but I do think the hazards now are different than before. The possibility of encountering dangerous people on the internet, and fear as a result of terrorist activities come immediately to mind. Although we were raised with a lot of independence, I am cautious with my own kids; although I try to empower them to learn how to do things for themselves.

[ally]

Virginia

[Pagesbow]

I don't have statistics but I do think the hazards now are different than before. The possibility of encountering dangerous people on the internet, and fear as a result of terrorist activities come immediately to mind. Although we were raised with a lot of independence, I am cautious with my own kids; although I try to empower them to learn how to do things for themselves.

Well yeah, the hazards have evolved and adapted to their environments but that doesn't say anything about whether the world is "not as safe" generally speaking. Dangerous people have always been around and will always be around.

However, If we take the U.S as an example, a mere 5 minutes of research tells you that we are much safer now than we were in the 70's.

"After World War II, crime rates increased in the United States, peaking from the 1970s to the early 1990s. Violent crime nearly quadrupled between 1960 and its peak in 1991. Property crime more than doubled over the same period. Since the 1990s, however, crime in the United States has declined steeply."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_the_United_States

[ally]

Not sure what to make of those stats as I have no qualified way to speak for or against them but one thing is for sure , where I live, the threat of violent crime is certainly much greater today than it ever was when I was growing up and I think it's safe to say that most people of my vintage would agree with that. Tbh,as a kid, the only thing I had to concern myself with was getting punched out by an older guy. We did have gangs and once in a while someone in those gangs would take things too far but for the most part, if we crossed paths with them, it was usually because we were stupid enough to venture into their turf.

[Pagesbow]

Not sure what to make of those stats as I have no qualified way to speak for or against them but one thing is for sure , where I live, the threat of violent crime is certainly much greater today than it ever was when I was growing up and I think it's safe to say that most people of my vintage would agree with that. Tbh,as a kid, the only thing I had to concern myself with was getting punched out by an older guy. We did have gangs and once in a while someone in those gangs would take things too far but for the most part, if we crossed paths with them, it was usually because we were stupid enough to venture into their turf.

I'm no expert, but from the bits and pieces I've looked at today, I think it is pretty clear that crime rates were higher in the 70's & 80's, and that virtually all types of crime have fallen since then and are a lot lower today.

And I'm sure people of your vintage may disagree, but ultimately, it is down to perception: If your house has been burgled three times in five years whilst your neighbour across the street (who isn't aware of this fact) has never had his or her property broken into, then perceptions of how safe your street is are going to vary somewhat between you.

[Virginia]

I don't have any statistics to disagree with overall crime in the US being lower now, but the crime rate where we live is definitely up (rural small town). Home invasions, violent break ins (one across the street); meth labs, people disappearing. Back in the 70s this area was mainly farmland. Much like in Northern VA, the commuting areas to the cities have widened and that has brought more crime in.

[slave to zep]

i think the difference could be a combination of things, for eg

we don't know our neighbours anymore - i knew everyone that lived around my house as a kid, we all looked out for eachother, and so did the parents

kids were not left home alone as much back then, and if they were, they just asked the neighbour to watch them

there is just more cars/traffic/people everywhere now - as a kid, we could play on the road, and only had to move aside every now and then!

everyone knew everyone - if a stranger was around, they stuck out - "who's that? "

[weslgarlic]

I watched an interesting programme about Women in Iraq , Interesting that a woman who lost her husband in the conflict would find it hard to remarry if she had children , because men just don't bring up other men's children , And a daughter had brought shame on her family because she was raped.there were other similar stories

I also remember reading that in Sri Lanka they have a film industry that is similar to Bollywood but on a smaller scale, That the leading female had been " rumoured " to behaving an affair with a marrried leading man , which she denied ,but she was still banned from making films,he got off scot free.

In the UK men from the Pakistani community groom young white girls , because they are seen as " easy meat " . they don't see themselves in the same way , they see themselves for sleeping with them but as the victims that have been tempted

[Pagesbow]

I don't have any statistics to disagree with overall crime in the US being lower now, but the crime rate where we live is definitely up (rural small town). Home invasions, violent break ins (one across the street); meth labs, people disappearing. Back in the 70s this area was mainly farmland. Much like in Northern VA, the commuting areas to the cities have widened and that has brought more crime in.

i think the difference could be a combination of things, for eg

we don't know our neighbours anymore - i knew everyone that lived around my house as a kid, we all looked out for eachother, and so did the parents

kids were not left home alone as much back then, and if they were, they just asked the neighbour to watch them

there is just more cars/traffic/people everywhere now - as a kid, we could play on the road, and only had to move aside every now and then!

everyone knew everyone - if a stranger was around, they stuck out - "who's that? "

Ok, maybe we can agree on this, that society has become more homogenised since the seventies? every town looks the same, has its Holiday Inn, its McDonalds, its Starbucks - there are becoming less and less family businesses as all the big corporations have moved in and squeezed the "little man" out. I can only really comment on the U.K and to a lesser extent, Australia. When I travelled town to town in Aus, it had a lot more local character and didn't all blend into one big generic lump of blandness like the UK mostly does. Saying that, bloody American companies like Target and Kmart were all over the place (Target in Ballarat, Target in Dandenong) JB Hi-Fi seemed to be everywhere, too. I was also a little surprised to find that Aldi has made its way over to Aus; but at least I can die happy having visited both both the Aus and U.K Aldi. Anyway, I don't think Aus is as homogenised as the U.K *yet*

This is quite a interesting docu regarding the homogenisation of small towns in which a man tries to travel across America without giving any money to the big corporations as he goes.

http://www.davegorman.com/projects_america_unchained.html

http://www.putlocker.com/file/876F5C95FB8FFCF2#

[redrum]

illustration by James Taylor

Love the 70's outfit. Very early porn. :^)

[ally]

And I'm sure people of your vintage may disagree, but ultimately, it is down to perception: If your house has been burgled three times in five years whilst your neighbour across the street (who isn't aware of this fact) has never had his or her property broken into, then perceptions of how safe your street is are going to vary somewhat between you.

While I agree that perception does play a role , reality trumps all statistics. I'm not as safe today as I was in the 70's and that has nothing to do with my perception of things. Violent crime and the chances of becoming an innocent victim are much more a reality now than they ever were in this city. As for being burgled, well there have always been thieves in this world but even knowing that, the chances of becoming a victim of a violent crime as a result of being burgled are almost a guarantee. It used to be that burglars would wait until no one was home, now, most are packing a piece and god help you if you happen to be home when they decide your house is a good target. Having said that, if the statistics are showing that crime is down in the USA and that translates to reality, then I'm happy for all of my American friends. However,like myself, I doubt many of them will agree that those stats are telling the whole story

[slave to zep]

ally, i agree with you. i don't feel anywhere near as safe as i used to in the 70's. we never even used to lock our house up, ever. also agree with what you said about burglaries. they did used to occur mainly when people were away, at least that was my experience, and that was just what i would hear on the radio etc. i never knew anyone that was burgled, and i have never been ( touch wood ).

[Sunshine woman]

Hmm, I don't know about crime rates, I have no stats, as with the rest of you, but I reckon the reason why we think our society is more dangerous is because of the media. As in, if there ever is a crime committed or anything, it's reported on the news all around the world within an hour and people can check their smart phones for crime updates and etc. A good example of this is weapons rape - it's something like less than 1% of all sexual assaults are done with a weapon (e.g. a knife or gun) to threaten, but there's a huge misconception that most rape occurs at knifepoint, and this is because everytime a weapons rape happens, it makes news. Whereas, date rape, where the rapist is a person you know and it's just digital penetration (still classified as rape) rarely ever goes reported.

So I really don't think crime rates have grown, I think they've remained the same, but people have just become more aware of them.

[Pagesbow]

Hmm, I don't know about crime rates, I have no stats, as with the rest of you, but I reckon the reason why we think our society is more dangerous is because of the media. As in, if there ever is a crime committed or anything, it's reported on the news all around the world within an hour and people can check their smart phones for crime updates and etc. A good example of this is weapons rape - it's something like less than 1% of all sexual assaults are done with a weapon (e.g. a knife or gun) to threaten, but there's a huge misconception that most rape occurs at knifepoint, and this is because everytime a weapons rape happens, it makes news. Whereas, date rape, where the rapist is a person you know and it's just digital penetration (still classified as rape) rarely ever goes reported.

So I really don't think crime rates have grown, I think they've remained the same, but people have just become more aware of them.

I agree that people have become more aware of crime due to easier access to knee-jerk reactionary media coverage which can create an unrealistic perception - although I would say that the real sea change came with the advent of 24 hour news channels.

In regard to the crime rates: if we take America as the example it clearly shows that crime rates have declined since a peak which occurred in the 1980's. If that's what the figures show then I don't see how it is up for debate. In Aus they may have stayed the same, but I can't really comment until I see some stats in regard to that.

[ally]

I'll just use my own stats and give you what my perception of reality is and what my union and employers perception of reality is. I've been doing my job for 24yrs and for most of those years I've worked, by choice, what would be considered the least desirable hours, in some of the least desirable areas of the city. The first 15 of those years I never had as much as a threat to my safety, in the last 8 of those years ( I've been off for a year) I've been assaulted three times, once severely. That said, the job has become far less safe for all of my fellow co workers with assaults way up from what they were . This is were stats get interesting for me. Our union has stats on all assaults and our employer has stats on all assaults and since all assaults need to be officially reported, you'd think they'd be roughly the same wouldn't ya. Well, they are not and they're not because both sides have an agenda and would rather politicize the issue than actually do something about it. In my employers case, pay for the necessary protected work station. In my unions case, they just like to maintain a sense of false hope and keep the anger growing. Anyway's, every time I see stats on just about anything, were the fix will cost money, I view them as a method of creating or maintaining a political agenda which very rarely translates into a fix and more often than not, justify's doing absolutely nothing to fix the problem. They can also be used to do just the opposite so no thanks, to me stats just = political agenda. Not much else

[Bingo]

In all honesty I haven't read this thread yet, I just wanted to respond to the question in a musical sense which covers a societal change. Back then we were all equal, it didn't matter if you lived in Beverly Hills or The South Bronx. When tickets for concerts went on sale, we all had the same opportunity to purchase the same $10-$20 ticket.

Part of the experience of the concert was for those three hours, people from all walks of life mingled together. The rich, the poor, the saints and psychotics were all the same. Now, we have a caste system for concerts, the wealthy can pay $800 for a floor ticket while the poor sit in the boondocks for $150.

The same can be said about sporting events, not everyone has a chance to grab the first 10 rows of a show/sporting events. We have made the distinction between the haves and have-nots obvious.

I have more to say, but I'll have a cup of coffee first.