A youngster asked people what life was like in the 2000s and the answers will leave you reaching for a zimmer frame
When millennials – who were born between 1981 and 1996 – were children, the 2000s sounded incredibly futuristic. But to kids today the decade that gave us flip phones and Avril Lavigne is so old-fashioned it may as well have been the stone age. Over on Reddit, a user called 1dfk000 asked:
‘Older millennials of Reddit: what was life like in the 2000s?’
And received the kind of replies that will make you feel positively geriatric.
1.
‘The 90s and 2000s were a perfect blend of comfortable analogue life and the tantalizing promise of a digital future.
‘It was a time when you could go to the mall and literally be disconnected from everyone but the friends you met there. Your parents couldn’t call you. Your work couldn’t call you. None of you were staring at a screen texting people who weren’t there.’
-The_Law_of_Pizza
2.
‘The moment of truth if the mp3 you’ve been downloading for 6 hours gives you computer-herpes or is actually what you’ve been looking for.’
-groundbeef_smoothie
3.
‘Music was huge. We had pop-punk bands like Blink-182 and Green Day. TV shows like Friends and The Sopranos were at their peak. We didn’t have YouTube yet, so we’d watch music videos on MTV or VH1. Kids today don’t know the joy of getting a new CD on release day.’
-harris999x5
4.
‘My parents were convinced that people only used the internet for porn so any home that had the internet was deviant and I was to stay away.’
-dit_dit_dit
5.
‘New episodes of shows came out at a specific time on a specific day, so you’d plan your week around it, then talk about it the next day at work/school or plan to watch it with someone every week. Sometimes I’d even call friends during commercial breaks to discuss what was happening in that episode.’
-wineandcheese
6.
‘As someone who has now lived in four decades, the 2000s by far has had the worst fashion so far. I see you younger generations trying to bring some of it back and you all need to stop it.’
-SPEK2120
7.
‘Everyone wore polos, flip flops and proudly carried whichever Twilight book they were on, regardless of gender. Some of us really got into MySpace and later Facebook. You could break a window with your Nokia phone and it would have been fine.’
-Right_Barracuda6850
8.
‘Touch screen as we know it today was still this sci-fi technology you only saw in movies.’
-Stef-fa-fa
9.
‘One time my best friend and I were having a debate at about 10pm about the lyrics to ‘I Love You, Always Forever’. We had no thought of trying to find the answer online (not really sure if we could have or not back then).
‘So we opened a phone book (lol) and randomly picked names to call and ask their opinions. Most people hung up on us immediately, some were totally game to try and figure it out.
-IamKingofKings13
10.
‘Layers on layers on layers on layers. Wanna wear jeans but you told your friends you’d wear a skirt? Just put it over the jeans. Wanna wear a blue polo but told your friend you’d wear yellow? LAYER THOSE SUCKERS.’
-kitten_paws_1437
11.
‘Everyone wasn’t a self proclaimed expert in every topic imaginable.’
-Chongoloco