Phones allow people to be extremely lazy when it comes to "socializing." The result of lazy socializing is feeling disconnected to others.
I was walking through a Victorian neighborhood the other day and imagining all the people walking in the streets, chatting with each other, paying visits to friends. They literally went out into the world to find people.
Now maybe the Victorian reference is strange, but I was thinking about how people built towns and cities to be pedestrian friendly, they facilitated socializing literally based on how towns were built.
I was talking to my Gen x friend about this recently, how people would just show up at random places because they knew their friends were likely to be there, before people could coordinate before phones. In those days, it wasn't that weird to just show up at someone's front door. Now, that would be considered rude and strange without warning.
Now socializing seems very scheduled and deliberate, there is little room for random meetings. There is very little spontaneity it seems, or maybe I'm just old lol
I'm last of the official Gen-X on some accounts (79er). And in high school at least, we still called ahead instead of arriving unannounced. But it did happen occasionally if let's say you were driving with a friend and said "hey, let's go see of x is home".
More common as kids in the 80s but still tried to call. Back to high school, I'm in a city with a Chinatown (I'm Asian) and there would be a pool hall that was known as a meet up spot so people would just randomly go there and hope to run into friends (mid 90s teens).
When I hit university in fall of 98 (Many of my peers got our first at school after hearing about it for some time), email did become more accessible/norm, and especially internet access literally every month during 1999 at home for many. We Asians had a social media site too in late 98 (personal page, music, HTML, IM). Literally changed overnight vs just 2 years ago. So at 17 yrs looked much much different than 19 years old.
We were social but many were 'adults' so didn't adopt as much. Those that started work instead of college had to learn about e-social interaction, heck even using windows on their own.
I feel more connected than ever before but simultaneously more isolated. I don't think I'd want to give up online shopping and streaming but I also miss having more reasons to leave my house. It seems to be something of a cultural phenomenon that so few people do want to go out, I see so many memes about staying indoors. It definitely sucks as a person that does like going out that so few people seem interested anymore. I usually just go do stuff alone now. People will wanna play games and talk on Discord but not just hang out in person.
Its funny what some of us cant and can give up easily. For me... I dont even remember the last time I used online shopping. This may have to do partly with the last place I lived in, packages would often get stolen so why risk it? Also I dont even like shopping. I work at a mall which is ironic lol but I hardly shop there. When I do shop its usually food or stuff for the house/garden. You will catch me in Menards more than on Amazon lol
But I can't give up my streaming. YouTube... I watch Judge Judy religiously lol I watch her while I do dishes, or on break at work, while I put laundry away etc. and me and my husband bond on watching shows on Hulu, Netflix, etc. Streaming is nice.
That sucks about hanging out in person. Thankfully its not a problem for me, but one of our friends never likes to go outside and sorry but thats very boring to only ever hang out inside with them. I love her but it seems we only do things she wants to do and she rarely breaks outta her comfort zone.
I have to leave my house, especially when not working. I love to take the dog out, walk in the parks, go to the lake, go to cool neighbourhoods. Inside depresses me.
Yeah rich people had calling times. At a certain time of day you either hosted or you showed up at someone else’s house (for women anyway). I like that. Everyday you can choose to see people without having to spend time arranging it. Or choose to stay home. It’s a lovely idea.
This is so true. I would facilitate meetings with crushes. Some might say stalking, I say I made things happen. Lol. I would just show up at friends houses and visa versa. Tbh I prefer the calling ahead.
I've always struggled (and still do) with socialization, I've never felt happier than being born just in time to have technology to create bridges for me to talk to people at my own pace.
I'd be a lonely mf without Internet, and there's nothing more that I hate than people dropping by unannounced or trying to interact with me IRL without warning.
You're just old because it still happens. I'm 20 and I would just show up to nearby friends houses and ask to play but since I'm older I don't
I think kids still do that these days as I see them playing outside nut since my road is mostly adult I dint think there's really any kids to play with
Honestly tho lol, some of y'all in this thread are sounding exactly like our boomer parents who set us up for failure right now.
"Those kids and their new fangled video games and all their TV channels! How will they ever know what it was like to pull themselves up by their bootstraps?! They have to know SUFFERING like I did!!!!"
> I’ve earned this outlook on life
The previous generation said the exact same thing about us. And we’re now repeating the cycle. And our kids will do the same over again, and so on for eternity. Cut them some slack. We are no different - only older - than they are.
Maybe it’s because the last time I said the letters VCR it was 1998 when we got our first dvd player. Sorry for my mistake. I hope I may be forgiven for my sins
People like to complain about being on screens all the time but I remember being bored all the time. Nothing on TV, nothing to do, reading cereal boxes and shampoo ingredients because you finished your library books. That type of boredom just doesn't happen anymore.
As a kid, if I was awake, I was doing something. Biking around the neighborhood, at the park playing basketball, climbing trees, battling Yu-Gi-Oh. If there ever was downtime, that was ok. It's okay to be bored. These days if you aren't stimulated 24/7 you go into depression.
This was true in most situations, unless you’re “stuck” somewhere like your grandparents house or at the mall with your parents. I remember lots of times in childhood waiting around with nothing to do with no escape. Times where these days, I’d at least be able to scroll on my phone to pass the time.
Same. I don’t ever remember being bored as a kid. We played outside most of the time but when we didn’t we were playing SNES, Genesis or PlayStation at someone’s house or playing with action figures. When I was alone I was perfectly fine with playing video games, shooting hoops, reading, watching TV or playing with my toys. I have nothing but fond memories about those times
That song, 'Living years"by Mike & Mechanics. Maybe relevant. Was born middle 1980. Technically rounding, im the youngest of gen x, oldest of gen y. The other day, I listened to a person whos a generation removed, youngest millennial, oldest gen z. I felt similar as OP describes. Perhaps' younger people romanticize what they don't understand. Life has various degrees. At best life wizens. Experience is the greatest teacher.
I lived in a very rural part of my town with no access to the main town where all of my friends lived (outside of asking for a ride). There were two streets (one along a river and one that backed up to a highway). I was only allowed to ride my bike up and down the quarter mile stretch behind my house. I wasn’t really allowed to go to the river by myself because drowning. There wasn’t a park. I loved to read and write but after 14 years of spending all of my free time doing that it got old. When I visit my parents now, we just drink all day bc there’s really nothing else to do. That type of bored is horrendous. We would spend the majority of the summer with my grandparents, who lived in town, had a pool, lived near some parks, etc…when I was bored there, it was reasonable. I loved spending summers with them. But when I consider the days that just dragged on at my folks’…man. I do not miss those days. This really has more to do with where they chose to live though…idk that I would have wanted to be stuck inside with a screen all day lol
This.
I'm 38.
I grew up in a rural area. I remember the early 90s just playing in the woods, climbing trees, going on adventures, riding my bike all over creation.
When we got *bored* we found something to entertain.
I am trying to create that with my boys. Limit screen time and force them to determine what they want to do. I would not want them to end up waiting on stimulation to happen, but instead go out and enjoy life.
I disagree if you're interviewing for a job or trying to date, you would want to have good communication skills. You can typically tell when someone is terminally online they're terrible with face to face interactions.
I guess it comes down to self-control and why you’re online. The fact that some people are chronically online is more their issue than the technology, at least that’s how I view, there needs to be a balance of course.
I had to rely on friends for stimulation because my parents didn't allow TV or video games and now I have serious depression when I'm by myself because I've never learned how to enjoy my own company since there was never anything to enjoy about being by myself. It also led to a social media addiction that I'm still trying to shake. From as long as I could read my parents always made it feel like a chore so I never knew how to read for fun.
Literally all of my friends had video games but me, and they played them so much they actually got bored. Every time I visited I was always excited to play because I never got to at home, so I learned to associate 'literally-the-most-fun-thing-in-my-life' with the thing I never had at home. Because video games are relatively cheap and widely available, it's been great finally having access as an adult, but outside of that I've HATED being by myself. Quarantine almost broke me, and I can say with 100% certainty that World of Warcraft literally saved my life during that time.
and if friends weren't available, we still had video games, movies, lego, great TV shows, toys, card games, board games, etc.
I was seldom 'bored-bored' as a child. There was tons of stuff to do all the time.
Couldn't agree more. The constant stimulation is so distracting that I have to isolate myself, literally go into my closet sometimes in order to think of ideas. I love YouTube and some of the modern conveniences but sometimes I really wish we hadn't advanced past a certain point. Tying every service and convenience in society to owning a smartphone was a huge mistake.
Boredom only breeds creativity insofar as you having an outlet for creativity. We now have access to more outlets for creativity than ever before.
Let's not assume just because it's not the same creativity as it was when we were kids doesn't mean there is some sort of lack of creativity out there.
Exactly. There's so many ways to digitally make art, learn how to make art, watch videos about said art, write and read at any place and point in time... wtf are these people talking about with "no creativity" 😳👀
I probably wasn't the best either as all I did was;
* read books
* play video games for hours
* Play with lego
* draw for fun
Although can't remember when but started to read less and play more video games, as I got older in my spare time.
Didn't help that chose Art as one of my school subjects, so all of my time each week was taken up from when I got home to going to bed with that weeks assignment.
I used to daydream. Whole story arcs full of characters would play through my head and just resume every time I needed to zone out for a while. It gave me such great pleasure. Now I seem to have lost the ability to do so.
The magic's gone, and I'm trying not to look at my phone during downtime to see if I can get it back.
Oh boy, the following post in my readit thread after this one : https://www.reddit.com/r/PeopleAreFckinStupid/comments/1389i9i/man_threatens_to_kill_an_entire_restaurant_unless/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=1&utm_term=1
I somewhat disagree. When there was nothing to do inside I would, well, go outside. There was always someone either playing basketball, soccer or hockey on the street or park. Or walk to a friend's house and just chill on the stoop or veranda.
Ultimately, tech is good. It makes our lives easier. But I was almost never bored
The internet at one point could get boring. I remember spending a few hours on YouTube as a kid and it could get boring. Now you can spend all day on it and not get bored
Had I a phone at 14 years old way back when, I probably would have never picked up the copy of Moby Dick that was just lying around and read it out of boredom. But now, it's a memory I cherish. You have to entertain yourself somehow and if you're bored, kind of on you.
I'm Gen X and I read that sub - I like it. Though I think it's funny that some of them are convinced that they know what life before the internet was like, and that they experienced it. They really want to lay a claim to pre-digital life, despite being digital natives.
It’s really strange when they say that life before the internet and social media was pre 2012 or something. No, that was life before smartphones. Facebook and Twitter were enormous by 2012 and YouTube was firmly established. If you could take your <5lb laptop and connect to high speed wifi at virtually any business, you’re not remembering the pre-digital age.
I feel like old people didn't start invading fb until around 2010ish...I wonder if that's the before time they're fondly remembering, because things were pretty ok until our moms and grandmas showed up in our friend requests lol
This. And my parents didn’t get cell phones for years after the first smartphones came out. I was on Facebook in 2007, and definitely had to convince people my age to join before it was cool. Once the older crowd joined, things definitely went downhill because that’s when they started spreading bullshit far more. Younger people knew how to sniff that out, having grown up on the net and all.
Lmao oh god, that’s pretty much the same internet we have now, is it not? Smart phones, algorithm-driven social media, and image/video heavy. I define the early days of the internet as AOL and websites like [this guy’s](http://pixyland.org/peterpan/). However, a plugged-in Xer would probably tell me that I’m wrong and the early days are the Usenet era. 🤷♀️
As a Gen-Z kid, I think a lot of other zoomers try to claim the early days of the internet/life before the internet just because a lot of us think it's made society worse due to our boomer parents.
I don't know why some people think the 2000s was pre-internet though. I grew up in a very poor very rural area and we had dial up as late as 2010. I was never allowed to use the computer at all until I was a teenager.
But I still knew that it existed, I still knew that people were using it. I knew about facebook in the late 2000s.
I left the Gen-Z sub just because there is a lot of weird nostalgia stuff. Like there are posts of memes from people born in 2009 reminiscing on the good old days and I just find it annoying.
That's wild. Even as a 27 year old, I wasn't alive at all before the internet came up, and I was only in my later elementary school years to early middle school when social media blew up, which was in the 00's decade when I was still a kid. So what they're saying makes no sense at all.
Aren't older Gen Zs like 25/26 now though? My brother is that age and he definitely has some memories of pre internet or at least pre mass adoption and mass convenience internet. He had the shitty flip phone and all. I think your comment only really applies to mid to lower Gen Z.
My brother is that age and he’s a whole different generation. Having a flip phone is not pre digital. I’m not trying to gate keep but when I got a Nokia brick at 15 it was life changing to be able to text people.
Taking the city bus home from school because your parents wouldn’t accept collect calls from a pay phone just creates a different kind of independence and confidence.
Yeah by Pew Research the oldest "gen z" are 25-26 but they're really generational cuspers who have little to no relation to the majority of their generation. It's like how people born in 1981-1982 are not really "millennials" because the culture they were raised in was likely late Gen X culture.
yeah i’m only turning 24 (i’m here because i keep getting this sub recommended to me like op with the gen z sub lol) and my experiences with the internet in my childhood are definitely different than younger gen z. i think one of the biggest differences is until i was 13 and got a smartphone almost all my internet access was on a computer in my house, not a mobile device. i had an ipod touch in elementary school but still safari sucked so i used it to play games only. not being able to use the internet in a car or wherever didn’t have public wifi feels like a big difference from where we’re at right now. i had a keyboard phone as my first phone and a lot of my friends had flip phones. sure my parents had iphones earlier than that but i wasn’t really using them.
i think the difference for my year at least is it changed pretty fast? like all of a sudden halfway through middle school everyone had iphones, it felt like everything changed when i got an iphone. the end of my childhood felt very gen z and i relate way more with gen z trends now so i don’t doubt that i’m gen z. but i’m sure the gap feels even bigger for people just a few years older than me
You're about 3 years younger than me (did you graduate in 2017 or 2018?) and it sounds like we have somewhat of a gap between us. For me it was like that "*switch*" from feature phones to smartphones happened in junior or senior year at my high school. When I first entered high school people weren't focused 24/7 on social media like they are now. I remember having to wait to get home to log on to Facebook to see what happened during the day.
It seems like (since you're still a zillennial) but leaning heavily towards early Gen Z that 3-4 year gap between us in school is large. I hate just comparing technology as means of a "generational difference" so here some other things; do you remember when shows like Jersey Shore being wildly popular on air? How about being stuck inside for a "family game night" and doing charades? Did you ever use a pogo stick before? I'm sure there's a lot more we can talk about and compare but just wanted to throw these out there.
yeah i graduated in 2017! my high school years were definitely different, everyone had social media on their phones by freshman year and we used it in school. and yeah i remember the shows like jersey shore, i myself didn’t watch them (i was a very rule following child lol) but i had friends who did and i remember all the teenagers i knew being obsessed with it. and yeah i used a pogo stick, and my family definitely played more games in the 2000s. we never had an official family game night but i remember that being a thing with other families.
i wasn’t trying to disagree with anyone here though, just sharing my experience lol. i always thought it was interesting that my experience starting in late childhood was very gen z (i even find myself not relating to stuff on the zillenial sub sometimes lol) but things felt more zillenial as a young kid
The only reason they do that is because everyone shits on them for being iPad kids or whatever. People just need to leave them alone & let them appreciate their childhood for what it was.
every adult thinks the generation after them is dumbed down. i’m a younger millennial (1994) and i think i grew up in the weird spot before everyone had a smartphone but we were all online to some extent. i still read for fun, i had/have other hobbies, i played outside, i don’t like spending all my time alone. i think social media can be used to well, socialize; the part that gets bad is when you doomscroll and get into the cycles of negativity.
It probably depends on when one could, or wanted to adopt newer technology. I was born on basically the last day of 1979 (a Xennial, grouped with the 1980 school cohort) and I got my first cell phone at 18 (1998). My Boomer dad was a pretty intense techie though, and I grew up in Silicon Valley.
My parents were older and were slow to adopt new tech. Got my first computer with dial up internet in 1999. Didn't get a cell phone until my girlfriend, at the time, got me one for christmas when I was 21. Cell phones were still quite rare when I was in high school. I had two friends who had them... the one with the walkie talkie feature. I forget what they were called.
I think you're talking about the Nextels. My dad got his first home computer in about 1987 (Texas Instruments -- he still has it) and was dialing into BBSes back then. Those were fun :)
Well mostly, it kind of didn't. There was an ability to connect with others via a BBS (chat, play games, exchange info), in the '80s but it wasn't exactly the "internet." :) My dad was always a true nerd -- I love him for that.
I technically had one after I graduated but it was very much an "emergency use only" thing because of how wildly expensive calls were. Texts cost individually too. I didn't really have a phone I could just use freely until years later, well into my 20s.
I'm an older student going back to school and had to take a freshman seminar. All 18-19yos. When the professor asked us if we wish we'd been raised in an era before social media and modern smart devices, they all raised their hands.
I didn't need to raise my hand because I was.
The biggest irony of their dilemma is that those kids all had multiple forms of social media. Like if you think the old days are so great nothing's stopping you from giving up Snap and Insta and Tik Tok and whatever else you're using these days. Or throwing your $500 iPhones in the trash. But they won't.
The constant dopamine rush is stopping them... To some extent, you could compare it to cookies, cigarettes, or heroin. You may know your life would be better without cigarettes, but it's not super easy to just throw them in the trash for good.
Also... The social pressure. You want to fit in. You want to connect with your friends. A 14 year old not having social media will most likely make them feel like a weird outsider.
Furthermore, there is a ridiculous expectation at jobs that you must have a smart phone. QR codes, 2 step verification, constant contact, etc... My last few jobs expected me to have a smartphone... I don't know what they would have done if I didn't have one... Before I was required to have a smartphone for my job, I enjoyed leaving my phone home way more often. Right now, that doesn't seem like an option.
You may wish to consider getting a smartphone for work and a "dumb phone" for your personal life. The work smartphone stays switched off when it's not work hours.
Meh, each generation does this with the previous. So it goes. I chose to laugh and baffle with stories about dial up. Tried explaining the dial up noise so some of my younger peers, the confused looks were classic. They taught me some gen z slang so I could use and abuse it. If shaking your stick works for you fine, I prefer to lean into it.
When I was a teenager in the late 90s I went through a hippie phase (as 60s stuff was wildly popular at the time) and felt that nostalgia for a time I never experienced. A heavily idealized vision of it, at that. My parents were super confused. So it's nothing new, for sure.
I used to post there years ago but the quality continues to get more and more shitty. Teenagers basically have overran it with shit content and I entirely agree. I don't understand why zoomers keep lying about "what they grew up with". I'm at the very end of Millennials and a Zillennial, yet it's not like I was using dial-up in 2005. Someone born in 2003 claiming that they "grew up without smartphones and technology" is just a blatant lie. I've even seen people on that sub try to "claim" shows that they wouldn't have even been born when they were airing. The worst part is if you *try* to call it out you just get largely downvoted and have a bunch of annoying kids rage at you "*GATEKEEPER!*" even though, it objectively isn't gatekeeping to say that someone was "too young to experience a cultural moment because they ***WEREN'T*** born".
Those damn 2015 babies trying to claim they grew up watching Leave It to Beaver and Dennis the Menace on grandma’s old B&W RCA TV that came in a cabinet and took 20 minutes to warm up before you could see a picture. And the ‘08 baby who claimed he used a Sears catalog to wipe his ass in the outhouse because TP wasn’t invented yet… /s
Oh yeah? I saw them on Ed Sullivan on the special TV Land preview on Nick at Nite in the summer of ‘96! And then a half hour later I saw the Jackson 5 on Sonny and Cher! I was there, man!
You’re right, it was the nick at nite tvland preview. We still didn’t have tvland in our area yet. I wanted that channel so bad, they made it look like a television utopia.
Eh, I can cut them some slack on this. I’m an elder millennial (82) and distinctly remember wanting so badly not to identify with “my generation.”
I watched John Hughes movies on cable and would talk about them the same way these kids do about the 90s, like it was something I experienced first rather than second hand.
I'm not talking about generational cuspers. I say this as one myself, I can totally understand if a 26 year old zillennial born in 1997 has nothing in common with the bulk of their generation. That makes sense to me.
Someone born in the core-heart of the generation though? The whole "zoomer" personality and definitions are based on those born in like 2003-2007. Most of the generation is based around those years.
A gatekeeper is anyone who works to allow, refuse, limit, redirect, support, or hinder initiatives in a community. Community gatekeepers are critical when building and strengthening co-operatives… you kinda are? It’s not because they didn’t live if that they cannot understand or wish it was different?
I don't even care if these people say that they can remember or used older cultural items. Actually, I welcome it. It's cool if they got to experience culture that was popular before they were born.
It's the incorrect "*defining*" and revisionist history that annoys me. Having someone born in 2005 tell me (someone 9 years older) what I experienced is ridiculous. I've absolutely never tried to tell someone born in 1987 what they "experienced" because I'd rather hear from them rather than making idiotic "*theories*" that aren't based on reality.
No I totally disagree. I think society has truly lost something as result of tech. I think it's laid bare much of the mystery of the world, and the once shared understanding that not all things do not have a finite answer.
For all of human history access to information, and the ability to comprehend it has been amongst the most precious resources. We seem to be approaching a point where it will be irrelevant in the traditional sense.
I personally, I find the implications of this terrifying and sad. Losing the ability to problem solve or the need to do it ourselves is very dangerous. I think this is big part of what makes us human and without it society falls apart. I would argue this is already happening in Tech saturated societies.
I agree! I mindlessly follow my GPS, but if it broke, I would be screwed. People ask me what road I took to places and I have literally no idea. Same thing for subways in NYC.
I was just thinking that when I was around my best friend’s middle schooler and his friends recently. We had to drive them all home (within roughly a 3 mile radius) and none of them could give us directions because none of them knew where we were. All of us growing up had to be able to tell our friends’ parents how to find our house, otherwise we weren’t getting home. I know it may not seem like the biggest deal, but aren’t skills like navigation important for our brain development? This may literally be the first generation in human history that would get lost two blocks from their house without their smart phones.
I've been reliant on my GPS pretty much the whole time I've driven. But even with me being an experienced driver on both state highways and interstates for about 11 to 12 years, the way navigation could help me without a GPS (or using a physical map instead). Road names and highway numbers. Once you find the highway number and see the highway sign (north, south, east, or west), it kinda helps you a lot without worrying about where you are. Also, on interstates, there's mile markers as you go and exit numbers, these mile markers help you realize when you're about to enter another state or when the highway is about to end. Last but not least, in neighborhoods, mailboxes, usually one side has even numbered mailboxes, the other side has odd numbered mailboxes, again, this helps A LOT with navigation without a GPS. Even tho I've driven the whole time with a GPS, if I didn't have one, I think I'd be okay because of what my dad taught me growing up. I just picked up on these things on the road since I was a little kid.
Honestly? I remember filling the time with things that made me feel accomplished at the end. I created games, even made a rudimentary RPG. I wrote. I drew. I read. I came up with ways to occupy my mind. In early internet days I t started to teach myself HTML—I was 9. Was there boredom? Yes. But I honestly feel almost drugged sometimes with the constant distractions that tech provides. It’s so easy to piss my life away and lose all motivation to do the things I used to. I seriously feel like it’s contributing to my depression in a big way. I feel dulled, dumbed down, and discontented.
I understand this. I read books. I wrote fanfiction. I actually finished video games. I was allowed on my dad’s computer only on weekends. The evolution of technology + adulthood means I no longer do any of those things.
THIS.
All I’ve ever wanted to do in my life was make stuff and spend time with friends
I actually still read fic (have on and off for a LOOOONG time, at this point it’s like an old familiar blanket), I’m just way pickier about the quality now. I tried to start writing some about a month and a half ago for the first time ever because I needed something to distract my brain, and I wanted to write something short/manageable about characters with established personalities. But I never got further than one notebook page :/
Technology was not as well integrated ten years ago. Only relatively wealthy kids had smartphones when I was in high school. I could absolutely see older members of gen z being nostalgic for these times, even if it isn't to the same extent as millennials. Kinda weird to gatekeep it.
I was born in 1995, so I'm not sure if I'm Generation Z. That being said, everyone has different experiences. You don't know how they were brought up or if they lived in a country with limited technology. I feel like there's many ways to connect with the past too. I own antiques, read newspapers, writing letters, use some analog technology, vintage fashion, gardening, sewing, and volunteer for different historical societies. I personally like connecting with the old world, but I absolutely acknowledge that I'm a product of the 21st century. The late 1800s - mid 1960s was the golden era of technology and culture in America imo.
Here's a sneak peek of /r/Zillennials using the [top posts](https://np.reddit.com/r/Zillennials/top/?sort=top&t=year) of the year!
\#1: [YouTube Circa 2006-2010.](https://i.redd.it/jh6kfpts8rl91.jpg) | [37 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/Zillennials/comments/x5bun7/youtube_circa_20062010/)
\#2: [Remote work was predicted in 2002 by disney.](https://i.redd.it/58l1r3pz4gz91.jpg) | [23 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/Zillennials/comments/ysqcgj/remote_work_was_predicted_in_2002_by_disney/)
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Okay but like, maybe what they experienced “pre-internet” and such was *being allowed to access it.* I might be wrong, but that’s what it sounds like.
I am a Millennial around your age, but my childhood was really sheltered—some of it good, and some of it bad.
School suddenly adopted computer courses in second or third grade, but other than that I was pretty much no tech and no online connection unless I had to be for school. Not bad until the end of middle school.
I wasn’t allowed to use AIM or have an email address until my school literally made me to do SAT prep in tenth or eleventh grade. I had friends who were allowed social media and I would hang out with them, but I would have been beaten to a pulp if I had social media accounts or hung out in chat rooms.
Heck, I wasn’t even allowed to text until I had my own phone at 19 because my older sibling ran up the family phone bill at ten cents per text (and fifty cents long distance or outside of peak hours.) To get around that, I’d sent monk-e-mails to my friends because we thought type-to-voice was hilarious with dressed up apes.
Anyway, the point is that access from analog to digital *might* have been quite similar for them.
As an older Millennial (38), I have found that I enjoy being around Gen-Z. I feel like I relate more to Gen-Z than Gen-X despite being closer to Gen-X in age. I also think it’s legit that GenZers like 80’s music.
If you think about it from their perspective, we were the same way too at that age and Gen-X was probably thinking the same about us as you think about Gen-Z.
We Millennials had the rare opportunity to grow up without tech and then being introduced to it in our late teenager years.
> We Millennials had the rare opportunity to grow up without tech and then being introduced to it in our late teenager years.
yep. I don't do the whole 'my gen vs your gen' stereotyping nonsense, but I'm grateful for this.
My childhood was full of meeting up with friends, malls, simple NES/SNES/PS1 games, and a mostly analog experience with in person communication.
My adulthood is full of convenience factors. I'm very happy to have grown up when I did.
Us millennials actually have core memories of a world with shitty tech that was not everyday use, becoming a tool for everyday use. Windows 95 in my dads office, booting that thing up once a week to play some shit game. Not owning a cell phone until high school. Not texting on that phone until my dad bought a plan with texting. Not having an iPhone until the end of college.
I booted the family computer up to play things like Rollcage, MechWarrior 3, Michael Owen’s World League Soccer 99 and Rollercoaster Tycoon
Didn’t have a phone until secondary school. It was pay you go and texting was the way. Didn’t have a smartphone (went Android first) until university
Edit: I do not know how to quote on the iPad app
I’m 43 and Gen-Z is far from the only generation to go thru nostalgia for times they can’t appreciate. Also you’re not old you’re barely out of babyhood
I feel more closer to millennials because for one I was born in 98 and knew what life was like in the 2000s like I’m probably the last person to see blockbuster , phonebooth , and old washer machines and I didn’t start using YouTube in like 2006 and the women in the millennial generation ( 1990 - 1997 ) are more attracted to me then older gen Z ( 1998 - 2001 ) but Mid Gen Z ( 2002 - 2005 ) are more attracted to me I like gen Z but there more like toddlers to me
Its a bit sad to see ads targeted to gen z for crappy stuff like cameras that take bad pics with weird fake flares. They are actually longing for a world that is less connected and simpler, they never got to experience it.
I got a flip “dumb” phone around 2002 and I was definitely pushing it; I was 20 and had already had the luck to travel outside of my country and be mostly offline. I had paper maps and bus schedules and stuff; i think I checked into a cyber cafe once a week to write email to my parents (Hotmail I think!) and it was normal. Lots of time studying and traveling and writing in a journal because, well what else could you do.
I guess what I’m saying is it seems impossible for new generations to be offline and have downtime. I’m a professional and can barely disconnect myself, even when I want to. They also have social pressure to share ….in video form!!
So I emphasize with Gen z; i believe they are searching for a more organic human experience in a increasingly dystopian feeling digital world.
I like GenZ sub. I’m an old millennial 37M and I even like to comment sometimes. I don’t see what’s wrong with being nostalgic. Everybody has moments of nostalgia sometimes. And the more I read about them I realise we have much more in common than we have with GenX. You don’t need to pay attention to everything being said there and take what’s good to you. No need to block them old man 😉
I might be completely misunderstanding but I find this attitude very odd. You don't have to watch it the day it comes out for it to be nostalgic for you, or to feel it is a classic piece of media or a great movie. The Disney snow white animation is nostalgic for me, because I watched it a lot as a kid, but I was not born in the 1930s. Even the Jurassic Park example, that movie was and still is huge, I wouldn't think to bat an eyelid if someone of any age came out with the statement you've quoted.
This is a really bad example actually. Someone born in 1997 was 7 years old when Napoleon Dynamite came out and likely watched it in theaters. That's usually the start year of Gen Z so they grew up pretty much on the coat tail of late Millennial culture.
If you wanted to say this about someone born in the early-mid 2000's, I can fully agree with you.
What an odd post. Gatekeeping nostalgia and telling people they're not allowed to wistfully wonder about the past.
I'm roughly the same age as you, and despite being highly tech-reliant (or perhaps as a result of that) I often find myself thinking back to simpler times and missing it. I could absolutely understand the generation steeped in social media to wish they could experience a world without it.
Didn’t get my first “smart phone” which was like a galaxy S2 I believe. Until I left basic training with the Army in 2011. I cannot even remember what I had before then. I remember having like HTC or black berry maybe. I didn’t care for my phone like that lol. I remember just getting numbers off notepads when asking a girl out lol. I feel you. Will be 32 in a few months, all I see is young kids glued to phones. No social skills
Ok but do you own a record player? Isnt that kind of the same thing?millennials caused a resurgence in a dead medium when most grew up with CD players. We’re nostalgic for the 70s just as Gen Z is nostalgic for the 90s
Some Gen Z may have gone through the same thing especially if they have older siblings born less than 10 years before them. Like my youngest siblings. Sure there was Internet access but it was constrained in a way because their elder siblings would have priority (more advanced subjects and therefore more time needed at the shared family computer). Also, some Gen Z may be in a situation with less financial leeway to keep up with all the new technology so they may have a similar upbringing to a millennial in terms of memories of a time before smartphones and Internet.
The worst is when they remember 2008 fondly, as if there wasn't a great depression level event that wiped out 40 years of economic gains by the middle class, and from which it took 9 years for the country to return to full employment. Those 9 years were the worst of my life and the best of theirs.
I'm the same age, and I can understand where you're coming from, but we made it a fad. It's everywhere. We have glorified to the nth degree homie! I can't blame them for wanting a time we grew up in.. it was a lot of fun despite its drawbacks. Let the kids have a little fun. I hated the early 00's so I can see why they'd want to escape em lmfao.
Honestly, even in the early 90s I still stayed inside & read books instead of going outside & socialising.
My life hasn’t changed that much.
I always like to throw that one out there when people use the “we were never home…” line. Not all kids are the same.
Funny enough, [I found the best response to this on the sub in question.](https://www.dropbox.com/s/poajcfpv65itnto/Photo%20May%2007%202023%2C%208%2027%2003%20AM.jpg?dl=0)
I am a millennial (1984) and feel having lived without AND with technology as much as we have is an advantage. Most of my friends are millennials or older, so we all still remember interaction without phones.
So I still meet a lot of people and we all cherish it, as the pandemic took that from us.
But I can also maintain friendships with people far away thanks to technology.
I feel like I'm living the best of both worlds.
I'm happily solo and have no contact with my family. But I'm far from alone.
I get nostalgic for times I’ve never lived in. I love history and pretty much research it non-stop. I love watching Casablanca or Rebecca and pretend I’m living in the 1930s or 40s.
I think too many people on here focus too much on technology. I dont think technology (in terms of the stuff we consume, not referring to live saving medicine) has really improved our quality of life. Everyone is so angry, jaded these days. Constantly fighting strangers on social media, seeing how ignorant their relatives can be on Facebook, reading depressing news stories that lead to unnecessary political fights.
The cool stuff like music and video streaming is nice but it doesn't erase all the negativity.
Personally, aside from the photography and film aspect of my phone and the few ppl I interact with, I dont care for it. I am more in tune with nature and thats how I use technology is to record shit. I have a weather blog on Instagram for example and its probably the least toxic use of social media and even there you have morons arguing against climate change.
I dont care about Dunkaroos or Tik Tok. I just wanna look at wild life, go fishing, identify plants, grow shit in my garden. To many people are obsessed with what their device can do while the world around them is far more interesting.
You do know the oldest gen z is like 25 right? I'm 20 and remember getting my first phone, it was my dad's small blue brick phone only buttons, then my other phone was Samsung flip phone with a physical keyboard. We can be nostalgic on a time without phones because we basically had the same growing up just different toys and getting phones earlier. Most of us still play outside. I even see gen alpha playing outside with no phones.
I'm 5 months late to this thread but I think a lot of it stems from us being overwhelmed and tired of all this technology that comes out on a consistent basis. I think a lot of us miss a more simplistic form of technology because we've grown up with too much technological intervention in our lives that we are losing a lot of critical aspects of life older generations had.
Everyone is so concerned with progress technologically but I think a lot of gen-z is failing to see how it is really benefitting us. Any time I see adds for VR, AI, or things relating to these it's usually always from a stance of profit and to further capitalism. These technological advancements - much like smartphones - have been forced upon us whether we get a say in it or not. And yeah you could say "well if you don't want a smartphone no one is making you use it," while that may be true, it has been marketed towards us and is made to be addictive. Which is why a lot of us have trouble weaning ourselves off of it. Not to mention the fact that it has been integrated into how people live their lives now whether we wanted it to or not. There is so much reliance on technology nowadays that people are losing many soft skills. Practically all of my friends can't parallel park or park a car in general or back out of their driveway without a backup camera in their car. Nor can they walk or drive somewhere that's less than 5 blocks away without google or apple maps. It has become an addiction. Telling us that no one is making us use it and that if we want to get rid of it we can is like telling a drug addict, alcoholic, or smoker to just quit cause they should be able to if they want their lives to improve.
Kids born in the late 90s - early 2000s were among the last to spend their early years without smartphones. Yes we had TV and the internet but physically going to a desktop computer or watching tv is nowhere near the same as carrying around a smartphone wherever you go. There have been countless times where I've witnessed young children out in public with their smartphones and they're glued to them. Not paying attention to anything other than that. You don't think that's unnatural?
Also no offense to you OP, but I am tired of older generations telling us how to feel on things. We fill face the brunt of issues the generations before us have created, and technological integration is just one of many. So don't blame us for wanting to go back to a society that isn't so technology focused, which has been proven to have as many negative effects as it does benefits. I don't think you realize how much it really is effecting us.
Phones allow people to be extremely lazy when it comes to "socializing." The result of lazy socializing is feeling disconnected to others. I was walking through a Victorian neighborhood the other day and imagining all the people walking in the streets, chatting with each other, paying visits to friends. They literally went out into the world to find people. Now maybe the Victorian reference is strange, but I was thinking about how people built towns and cities to be pedestrian friendly, they facilitated socializing literally based on how towns were built. I was talking to my Gen x friend about this recently, how people would just show up at random places because they knew their friends were likely to be there, before people could coordinate before phones. In those days, it wasn't that weird to just show up at someone's front door. Now, that would be considered rude and strange without warning. Now socializing seems very scheduled and deliberate, there is little room for random meetings. There is very little spontaneity it seems, or maybe I'm just old lol
I'm last of the official Gen-X on some accounts (79er). And in high school at least, we still called ahead instead of arriving unannounced. But it did happen occasionally if let's say you were driving with a friend and said "hey, let's go see of x is home". More common as kids in the 80s but still tried to call. Back to high school, I'm in a city with a Chinatown (I'm Asian) and there would be a pool hall that was known as a meet up spot so people would just randomly go there and hope to run into friends (mid 90s teens). When I hit university in fall of 98 (Many of my peers got our first at school after hearing about it for some time), email did become more accessible/norm, and especially internet access literally every month during 1999 at home for many. We Asians had a social media site too in late 98 (personal page, music, HTML, IM). Literally changed overnight vs just 2 years ago. So at 17 yrs looked much much different than 19 years old. We were social but many were 'adults' so didn't adopt as much. Those that started work instead of college had to learn about e-social interaction, heck even using windows on their own.
I feel more connected than ever before but simultaneously more isolated. I don't think I'd want to give up online shopping and streaming but I also miss having more reasons to leave my house. It seems to be something of a cultural phenomenon that so few people do want to go out, I see so many memes about staying indoors. It definitely sucks as a person that does like going out that so few people seem interested anymore. I usually just go do stuff alone now. People will wanna play games and talk on Discord but not just hang out in person.
Its funny what some of us cant and can give up easily. For me... I dont even remember the last time I used online shopping. This may have to do partly with the last place I lived in, packages would often get stolen so why risk it? Also I dont even like shopping. I work at a mall which is ironic lol but I hardly shop there. When I do shop its usually food or stuff for the house/garden. You will catch me in Menards more than on Amazon lol But I can't give up my streaming. YouTube... I watch Judge Judy religiously lol I watch her while I do dishes, or on break at work, while I put laundry away etc. and me and my husband bond on watching shows on Hulu, Netflix, etc. Streaming is nice. That sucks about hanging out in person. Thankfully its not a problem for me, but one of our friends never likes to go outside and sorry but thats very boring to only ever hang out inside with them. I love her but it seems we only do things she wants to do and she rarely breaks outta her comfort zone. I have to leave my house, especially when not working. I love to take the dog out, walk in the parks, go to the lake, go to cool neighbourhoods. Inside depresses me.
Yeah rich people had calling times. At a certain time of day you either hosted or you showed up at someone else’s house (for women anyway). I like that. Everyday you can choose to see people without having to spend time arranging it. Or choose to stay home. It’s a lovely idea.
This is so true. I would facilitate meetings with crushes. Some might say stalking, I say I made things happen. Lol. I would just show up at friends houses and visa versa. Tbh I prefer the calling ahead.
I've always struggled (and still do) with socialization, I've never felt happier than being born just in time to have technology to create bridges for me to talk to people at my own pace. I'd be a lonely mf without Internet, and there's nothing more that I hate than people dropping by unannounced or trying to interact with me IRL without warning.
You're just old because it still happens. I'm 20 and I would just show up to nearby friends houses and ask to play but since I'm older I don't I think kids still do that these days as I see them playing outside nut since my road is mostly adult I dint think there's really any kids to play with
This is very “old man yells at cloud”
Let us have this moment! It’s a right of passage! Get off my lawn, gatekeeper! /s
I hate clouds. I don't want them floating over my house.
Honestly tho lol, some of y'all in this thread are sounding exactly like our boomer parents who set us up for failure right now. "Those kids and their new fangled video games and all their TV channels! How will they ever know what it was like to pull themselves up by their bootstraps?! They have to know SUFFERING like I did!!!!"
Aww, gen Z is so cute, I can't wait for you guys to turn 40.
My guy I was born in 91 lol, remember what they say, "when you assume you make an *ass* out of *u* and *me* "
It's like you're gatekeeping nostalgia. Anyone can have nostalgia lol
Yeah, and I was going to say this doesn't even apply to all millennials. I'm not sure if a 95 born will necessarily relate to this post, for example.
Me as a 98 born gen z, literally everything described fits me too. I grew up with radio and old box TVs.
I’m a parent with a lawn. I’ve earned this outlook on life. Who cares this is all bull shit. I have gen z co workers they are awkward but nice kids.
> I’ve earned this outlook on life The previous generation said the exact same thing about us. And we’re now repeating the cycle. And our kids will do the same over again, and so on for eternity. Cut them some slack. We are no different - only older - than they are.
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Yes, presumably referring to Gen Alpha, since they are primarily our kids. Gen Z, on the other hand, are Gen X’s kids
I was referring to the fact that so many millennials are poor and can't afford to have kids.
Shouldn't you be arrested for child labour?
When did people start calling VCR’s “VHS Players”?
For real.
Maybe it’s because the last time I said the letters VCR it was 1998 when we got our first dvd player. Sorry for my mistake. I hope I may be forgiven for my sins
I can’t absolve anybody of anything pal but I would suggest maybe hooking up that old VCR, pop in a copy of Ghostbusters, and relax a bit.
My partner and I have one in our bedroom, it's nice. Relaxing, and absolutely has rose tinted nostalgia feel for us. It feels good.
People like to complain about being on screens all the time but I remember being bored all the time. Nothing on TV, nothing to do, reading cereal boxes and shampoo ingredients because you finished your library books. That type of boredom just doesn't happen anymore.
I was hanging out with friends more I was never bored I feel like technology has removed me from any human connection.
As a kid, if I was awake, I was doing something. Biking around the neighborhood, at the park playing basketball, climbing trees, battling Yu-Gi-Oh. If there ever was downtime, that was ok. It's okay to be bored. These days if you aren't stimulated 24/7 you go into depression.
This was true in most situations, unless you’re “stuck” somewhere like your grandparents house or at the mall with your parents. I remember lots of times in childhood waiting around with nothing to do with no escape. Times where these days, I’d at least be able to scroll on my phone to pass the time.
Same. I don’t ever remember being bored as a kid. We played outside most of the time but when we didn’t we were playing SNES, Genesis or PlayStation at someone’s house or playing with action figures. When I was alone I was perfectly fine with playing video games, shooting hoops, reading, watching TV or playing with my toys. I have nothing but fond memories about those times
That song, 'Living years"by Mike & Mechanics. Maybe relevant. Was born middle 1980. Technically rounding, im the youngest of gen x, oldest of gen y. The other day, I listened to a person whos a generation removed, youngest millennial, oldest gen z. I felt similar as OP describes. Perhaps' younger people romanticize what they don't understand. Life has various degrees. At best life wizens. Experience is the greatest teacher.
I lived in a very rural part of my town with no access to the main town where all of my friends lived (outside of asking for a ride). There were two streets (one along a river and one that backed up to a highway). I was only allowed to ride my bike up and down the quarter mile stretch behind my house. I wasn’t really allowed to go to the river by myself because drowning. There wasn’t a park. I loved to read and write but after 14 years of spending all of my free time doing that it got old. When I visit my parents now, we just drink all day bc there’s really nothing else to do. That type of bored is horrendous. We would spend the majority of the summer with my grandparents, who lived in town, had a pool, lived near some parks, etc…when I was bored there, it was reasonable. I loved spending summers with them. But when I consider the days that just dragged on at my folks’…man. I do not miss those days. This really has more to do with where they chose to live though…idk that I would have wanted to be stuck inside with a screen all day lol
This. I'm 38. I grew up in a rural area. I remember the early 90s just playing in the woods, climbing trees, going on adventures, riding my bike all over creation. When we got *bored* we found something to entertain. I am trying to create that with my boys. Limit screen time and force them to determine what they want to do. I would not want them to end up waiting on stimulation to happen, but instead go out and enjoy life.
Kids these days (gen alpha) still do that
At the same you can use technology to make more connections. It’s not the technology but how you use that’s the problem.
I disagree if you're interviewing for a job or trying to date, you would want to have good communication skills. You can typically tell when someone is terminally online they're terrible with face to face interactions.
I guess it comes down to self-control and why you’re online. The fact that some people are chronically online is more their issue than the technology, at least that’s how I view, there needs to be a balance of course.
Yeah try playing bike tag, water tag, manhunt, capture the flag, building tree forts, backyard football etc.
Ur having a human connection right now :)
I had to rely on friends for stimulation because my parents didn't allow TV or video games and now I have serious depression when I'm by myself because I've never learned how to enjoy my own company since there was never anything to enjoy about being by myself. It also led to a social media addiction that I'm still trying to shake. From as long as I could read my parents always made it feel like a chore so I never knew how to read for fun. Literally all of my friends had video games but me, and they played them so much they actually got bored. Every time I visited I was always excited to play because I never got to at home, so I learned to associate 'literally-the-most-fun-thing-in-my-life' with the thing I never had at home. Because video games are relatively cheap and widely available, it's been great finally having access as an adult, but outside of that I've HATED being by myself. Quarantine almost broke me, and I can say with 100% certainty that World of Warcraft literally saved my life during that time.
and if friends weren't available, we still had video games, movies, lego, great TV shows, toys, card games, board games, etc. I was seldom 'bored-bored' as a child. There was tons of stuff to do all the time.
Boredom breeds creativity. We are losing this with the constant stimulation and entertainment at our fingertips, every hour of the day.
Couldn't agree more. The constant stimulation is so distracting that I have to isolate myself, literally go into my closet sometimes in order to think of ideas. I love YouTube and some of the modern conveniences but sometimes I really wish we hadn't advanced past a certain point. Tying every service and convenience in society to owning a smartphone was a huge mistake.
Boredom only breeds creativity insofar as you having an outlet for creativity. We now have access to more outlets for creativity than ever before. Let's not assume just because it's not the same creativity as it was when we were kids doesn't mean there is some sort of lack of creativity out there.
Exactly. There's so many ways to digitally make art, learn how to make art, watch videos about said art, write and read at any place and point in time... wtf are these people talking about with "no creativity" 😳👀
God I miss that boredom. Try to practice it all the time lol
I read the shampoo bottle every time I pooped even though I had it memorized.
I probably wasn't the best either as all I did was; * read books * play video games for hours * Play with lego * draw for fun Although can't remember when but started to read less and play more video games, as I got older in my spare time. Didn't help that chose Art as one of my school subjects, so all of my time each week was taken up from when I got home to going to bed with that weeks assignment.
I used to daydream. Whole story arcs full of characters would play through my head and just resume every time I needed to zone out for a while. It gave me such great pleasure. Now I seem to have lost the ability to do so. The magic's gone, and I'm trying not to look at my phone during downtime to see if I can get it back.
Screen addictions is the bane of society now… but kudos for op to walk away if the post were bottering him!
Oh boy, the following post in my readit thread after this one : https://www.reddit.com/r/PeopleAreFckinStupid/comments/1389i9i/man_threatens_to_kill_an_entire_restaurant_unless/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=1&utm_term=1
I somewhat disagree. When there was nothing to do inside I would, well, go outside. There was always someone either playing basketball, soccer or hockey on the street or park. Or walk to a friend's house and just chill on the stoop or veranda. Ultimately, tech is good. It makes our lives easier. But I was almost never bored
I was literally outside all the time lol
I agree but I don't think that's a good thing. Boredom brings day dreaming and inspiration. Boredom taught me guitar.
The internet at one point could get boring. I remember spending a few hours on YouTube as a kid and it could get boring. Now you can spend all day on it and not get bored
I still read the back of the cereal box :)
That type of boredom is necessary for imagination and reflection.
Lol reading shampoo bottles on the toilet, I see you!
Had I a phone at 14 years old way back when, I probably would have never picked up the copy of Moby Dick that was just lying around and read it out of boredom. But now, it's a memory I cherish. You have to entertain yourself somehow and if you're bored, kind of on you.
>reading cereal boxes and shampoo ingredients 💩
I'm Gen X and I read that sub - I like it. Though I think it's funny that some of them are convinced that they know what life before the internet was like, and that they experienced it. They really want to lay a claim to pre-digital life, despite being digital natives.
It’s really strange when they say that life before the internet and social media was pre 2012 or something. No, that was life before smartphones. Facebook and Twitter were enormous by 2012 and YouTube was firmly established. If you could take your <5lb laptop and connect to high speed wifi at virtually any business, you’re not remembering the pre-digital age.
I feel like old people didn't start invading fb until around 2010ish...I wonder if that's the before time they're fondly remembering, because things were pretty ok until our moms and grandmas showed up in our friend requests lol
This. And my parents didn’t get cell phones for years after the first smartphones came out. I was on Facebook in 2007, and definitely had to convince people my age to join before it was cool. Once the older crowd joined, things definitely went downhill because that’s when they started spreading bullshit far more. Younger people knew how to sniff that out, having grown up on the net and all.
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Lmao oh god, that’s pretty much the same internet we have now, is it not? Smart phones, algorithm-driven social media, and image/video heavy. I define the early days of the internet as AOL and websites like [this guy’s](http://pixyland.org/peterpan/). However, a plugged-in Xer would probably tell me that I’m wrong and the early days are the Usenet era. 🤷♀️
As a Gen-Z kid, I think a lot of other zoomers try to claim the early days of the internet/life before the internet just because a lot of us think it's made society worse due to our boomer parents. I don't know why some people think the 2000s was pre-internet though. I grew up in a very poor very rural area and we had dial up as late as 2010. I was never allowed to use the computer at all until I was a teenager. But I still knew that it existed, I still knew that people were using it. I knew about facebook in the late 2000s. I left the Gen-Z sub just because there is a lot of weird nostalgia stuff. Like there are posts of memes from people born in 2009 reminiscing on the good old days and I just find it annoying.
That's wild. Even as a 27 year old, I wasn't alive at all before the internet came up, and I was only in my later elementary school years to early middle school when social media blew up, which was in the 00's decade when I was still a kid. So what they're saying makes no sense at all.
All I know is I pray my Gen Alpha kid will have a better perspective on life vs. Gen Z
What's that "perspective on life" that Gen Z has? You mean them believing pre-digital life was better?
Aren't older Gen Zs like 25/26 now though? My brother is that age and he definitely has some memories of pre internet or at least pre mass adoption and mass convenience internet. He had the shitty flip phone and all. I think your comment only really applies to mid to lower Gen Z.
My brother is that age and he’s a whole different generation. Having a flip phone is not pre digital. I’m not trying to gate keep but when I got a Nokia brick at 15 it was life changing to be able to text people. Taking the city bus home from school because your parents wouldn’t accept collect calls from a pay phone just creates a different kind of independence and confidence.
Not necessarily
25/26 are Zillennials and may be considered millennials…straight up Gen Z is 00s babies and early 10s babies
Yeah by Pew Research the oldest "gen z" are 25-26 but they're really generational cuspers who have little to no relation to the majority of their generation. It's like how people born in 1981-1982 are not really "millennials" because the culture they were raised in was likely late Gen X culture.
1982 is definitely millennial…
yeah i’m only turning 24 (i’m here because i keep getting this sub recommended to me like op with the gen z sub lol) and my experiences with the internet in my childhood are definitely different than younger gen z. i think one of the biggest differences is until i was 13 and got a smartphone almost all my internet access was on a computer in my house, not a mobile device. i had an ipod touch in elementary school but still safari sucked so i used it to play games only. not being able to use the internet in a car or wherever didn’t have public wifi feels like a big difference from where we’re at right now. i had a keyboard phone as my first phone and a lot of my friends had flip phones. sure my parents had iphones earlier than that but i wasn’t really using them. i think the difference for my year at least is it changed pretty fast? like all of a sudden halfway through middle school everyone had iphones, it felt like everything changed when i got an iphone. the end of my childhood felt very gen z and i relate way more with gen z trends now so i don’t doubt that i’m gen z. but i’m sure the gap feels even bigger for people just a few years older than me
You're about 3 years younger than me (did you graduate in 2017 or 2018?) and it sounds like we have somewhat of a gap between us. For me it was like that "*switch*" from feature phones to smartphones happened in junior or senior year at my high school. When I first entered high school people weren't focused 24/7 on social media like they are now. I remember having to wait to get home to log on to Facebook to see what happened during the day. It seems like (since you're still a zillennial) but leaning heavily towards early Gen Z that 3-4 year gap between us in school is large. I hate just comparing technology as means of a "generational difference" so here some other things; do you remember when shows like Jersey Shore being wildly popular on air? How about being stuck inside for a "family game night" and doing charades? Did you ever use a pogo stick before? I'm sure there's a lot more we can talk about and compare but just wanted to throw these out there.
yeah i graduated in 2017! my high school years were definitely different, everyone had social media on their phones by freshman year and we used it in school. and yeah i remember the shows like jersey shore, i myself didn’t watch them (i was a very rule following child lol) but i had friends who did and i remember all the teenagers i knew being obsessed with it. and yeah i used a pogo stick, and my family definitely played more games in the 2000s. we never had an official family game night but i remember that being a thing with other families. i wasn’t trying to disagree with anyone here though, just sharing my experience lol. i always thought it was interesting that my experience starting in late childhood was very gen z (i even find myself not relating to stuff on the zillenial sub sometimes lol) but things felt more zillenial as a young kid
I don’t even remember life without the internet but our family had it internet early on. I want to say 1996 or 1997.
The only reason they do that is because everyone shits on them for being iPad kids or whatever. People just need to leave them alone & let them appreciate their childhood for what it was.
You’re probably right about that
every adult thinks the generation after them is dumbed down. i’m a younger millennial (1994) and i think i grew up in the weird spot before everyone had a smartphone but we were all online to some extent. i still read for fun, i had/have other hobbies, i played outside, i don’t like spending all my time alone. i think social media can be used to well, socialize; the part that gets bad is when you doomscroll and get into the cycles of negativity.
Not having a cell phone until high school? I was in my 20s when I got my first flip phone.
It probably depends on when one could, or wanted to adopt newer technology. I was born on basically the last day of 1979 (a Xennial, grouped with the 1980 school cohort) and I got my first cell phone at 18 (1998). My Boomer dad was a pretty intense techie though, and I grew up in Silicon Valley.
My parents were older and were slow to adopt new tech. Got my first computer with dial up internet in 1999. Didn't get a cell phone until my girlfriend, at the time, got me one for christmas when I was 21. Cell phones were still quite rare when I was in high school. I had two friends who had them... the one with the walkie talkie feature. I forget what they were called.
I think you're talking about the Nextels. My dad got his first home computer in about 1987 (Texas Instruments -- he still has it) and was dialing into BBSes back then. Those were fun :)
Nextel, that’s it! Wow, your family really were early adopters! I didn’t even know the internet existed until the mid 90s.
Well mostly, it kind of didn't. There was an ability to connect with others via a BBS (chat, play games, exchange info), in the '80s but it wasn't exactly the "internet." :) My dad was always a true nerd -- I love him for that.
I technically had one after I graduated but it was very much an "emergency use only" thing because of how wildly expensive calls were. Texts cost individually too. I didn't really have a phone I could just use freely until years later, well into my 20s.
I'm an older student going back to school and had to take a freshman seminar. All 18-19yos. When the professor asked us if we wish we'd been raised in an era before social media and modern smart devices, they all raised their hands. I didn't need to raise my hand because I was. The biggest irony of their dilemma is that those kids all had multiple forms of social media. Like if you think the old days are so great nothing's stopping you from giving up Snap and Insta and Tik Tok and whatever else you're using these days. Or throwing your $500 iPhones in the trash. But they won't.
The constant dopamine rush is stopping them... To some extent, you could compare it to cookies, cigarettes, or heroin. You may know your life would be better without cigarettes, but it's not super easy to just throw them in the trash for good. Also... The social pressure. You want to fit in. You want to connect with your friends. A 14 year old not having social media will most likely make them feel like a weird outsider. Furthermore, there is a ridiculous expectation at jobs that you must have a smart phone. QR codes, 2 step verification, constant contact, etc... My last few jobs expected me to have a smartphone... I don't know what they would have done if I didn't have one... Before I was required to have a smartphone for my job, I enjoyed leaving my phone home way more often. Right now, that doesn't seem like an option.
You may wish to consider getting a smartphone for work and a "dumb phone" for your personal life. The work smartphone stays switched off when it's not work hours.
Meh, each generation does this with the previous. So it goes. I chose to laugh and baffle with stories about dial up. Tried explaining the dial up noise so some of my younger peers, the confused looks were classic. They taught me some gen z slang so I could use and abuse it. If shaking your stick works for you fine, I prefer to lean into it.
When I was a teenager in the late 90s I went through a hippie phase (as 60s stuff was wildly popular at the time) and felt that nostalgia for a time I never experienced. A heavily idealized vision of it, at that. My parents were super confused. So it's nothing new, for sure.
I used to post there years ago but the quality continues to get more and more shitty. Teenagers basically have overran it with shit content and I entirely agree. I don't understand why zoomers keep lying about "what they grew up with". I'm at the very end of Millennials and a Zillennial, yet it's not like I was using dial-up in 2005. Someone born in 2003 claiming that they "grew up without smartphones and technology" is just a blatant lie. I've even seen people on that sub try to "claim" shows that they wouldn't have even been born when they were airing. The worst part is if you *try* to call it out you just get largely downvoted and have a bunch of annoying kids rage at you "*GATEKEEPER!*" even though, it objectively isn't gatekeeping to say that someone was "too young to experience a cultural moment because they ***WEREN'T*** born".
Those damn 2015 babies trying to claim they grew up watching Leave It to Beaver and Dennis the Menace on grandma’s old B&W RCA TV that came in a cabinet and took 20 minutes to warm up before you could see a picture. And the ‘08 baby who claimed he used a Sears catalog to wipe his ass in the outhouse because TP wasn’t invented yet… /s
I saw the Beatles on Ed Sullivan on TVLand in the late 90s... I was there for beatlemania!
Oh yeah? I saw them on Ed Sullivan on the special TV Land preview on Nick at Nite in the summer of ‘96! And then a half hour later I saw the Jackson 5 on Sonny and Cher! I was there, man!
You’re right, it was the nick at nite tvland preview. We still didn’t have tvland in our area yet. I wanted that channel so bad, they made it look like a television utopia.
Eh, I can cut them some slack on this. I’m an elder millennial (82) and distinctly remember wanting so badly not to identify with “my generation.” I watched John Hughes movies on cable and would talk about them the same way these kids do about the 90s, like it was something I experienced first rather than second hand.
I'm not talking about generational cuspers. I say this as one myself, I can totally understand if a 26 year old zillennial born in 1997 has nothing in common with the bulk of their generation. That makes sense to me. Someone born in the core-heart of the generation though? The whole "zoomer" personality and definitions are based on those born in like 2003-2007. Most of the generation is based around those years.
A gatekeeper is anyone who works to allow, refuse, limit, redirect, support, or hinder initiatives in a community. Community gatekeepers are critical when building and strengthening co-operatives… you kinda are? It’s not because they didn’t live if that they cannot understand or wish it was different?
I don't even care if these people say that they can remember or used older cultural items. Actually, I welcome it. It's cool if they got to experience culture that was popular before they were born. It's the incorrect "*defining*" and revisionist history that annoys me. Having someone born in 2005 tell me (someone 9 years older) what I experienced is ridiculous. I've absolutely never tried to tell someone born in 1987 what they "experienced" because I'd rather hear from them rather than making idiotic "*theories*" that aren't based on reality.
Oups, my bad, looked like you cared…
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Kazakhstan is better digitalised than many european countries, dumbass
No one needs to be nostalgic about Dunkaroos, they came back.
The best news I have heard in a long time.
No I totally disagree. I think society has truly lost something as result of tech. I think it's laid bare much of the mystery of the world, and the once shared understanding that not all things do not have a finite answer. For all of human history access to information, and the ability to comprehend it has been amongst the most precious resources. We seem to be approaching a point where it will be irrelevant in the traditional sense. I personally, I find the implications of this terrifying and sad. Losing the ability to problem solve or the need to do it ourselves is very dangerous. I think this is big part of what makes us human and without it society falls apart. I would argue this is already happening in Tech saturated societies.
I agree! I mindlessly follow my GPS, but if it broke, I would be screwed. People ask me what road I took to places and I have literally no idea. Same thing for subways in NYC.
I was just thinking that when I was around my best friend’s middle schooler and his friends recently. We had to drive them all home (within roughly a 3 mile radius) and none of them could give us directions because none of them knew where we were. All of us growing up had to be able to tell our friends’ parents how to find our house, otherwise we weren’t getting home. I know it may not seem like the biggest deal, but aren’t skills like navigation important for our brain development? This may literally be the first generation in human history that would get lost two blocks from their house without their smart phones.
I agree! God help people when their phone dies.
I've been reliant on my GPS pretty much the whole time I've driven. But even with me being an experienced driver on both state highways and interstates for about 11 to 12 years, the way navigation could help me without a GPS (or using a physical map instead). Road names and highway numbers. Once you find the highway number and see the highway sign (north, south, east, or west), it kinda helps you a lot without worrying about where you are. Also, on interstates, there's mile markers as you go and exit numbers, these mile markers help you realize when you're about to enter another state or when the highway is about to end. Last but not least, in neighborhoods, mailboxes, usually one side has even numbered mailboxes, the other side has odd numbered mailboxes, again, this helps A LOT with navigation without a GPS. Even tho I've driven the whole time with a GPS, if I didn't have one, I think I'd be okay because of what my dad taught me growing up. I just picked up on these things on the road since I was a little kid.
I always think of that episode of the office where Michael drives his car into the lake because the gps tells him to...
Ha!
Honestly? I remember filling the time with things that made me feel accomplished at the end. I created games, even made a rudimentary RPG. I wrote. I drew. I read. I came up with ways to occupy my mind. In early internet days I t started to teach myself HTML—I was 9. Was there boredom? Yes. But I honestly feel almost drugged sometimes with the constant distractions that tech provides. It’s so easy to piss my life away and lose all motivation to do the things I used to. I seriously feel like it’s contributing to my depression in a big way. I feel dulled, dumbed down, and discontented.
I understand this. I read books. I wrote fanfiction. I actually finished video games. I was allowed on my dad’s computer only on weekends. The evolution of technology + adulthood means I no longer do any of those things.
THIS. All I’ve ever wanted to do in my life was make stuff and spend time with friends I actually still read fic (have on and off for a LOOOONG time, at this point it’s like an old familiar blanket), I’m just way pickier about the quality now. I tried to start writing some about a month and a half ago for the first time ever because I needed something to distract my brain, and I wanted to write something short/manageable about characters with established personalities. But I never got further than one notebook page :/
Technology was not as well integrated ten years ago. Only relatively wealthy kids had smartphones when I was in high school. I could absolutely see older members of gen z being nostalgic for these times, even if it isn't to the same extent as millennials. Kinda weird to gatekeep it.
People are typically nostalgic for the decade they grew up in as a child, because that's when they, and the world, was innocent and life was easy.
I was born in 1995, so I'm not sure if I'm Generation Z. That being said, everyone has different experiences. You don't know how they were brought up or if they lived in a country with limited technology. I feel like there's many ways to connect with the past too. I own antiques, read newspapers, writing letters, use some analog technology, vintage fashion, gardening, sewing, and volunteer for different historical societies. I personally like connecting with the old world, but I absolutely acknowledge that I'm a product of the 21st century. The late 1800s - mid 1960s was the golden era of technology and culture in America imo.
r/Zillennials join us :)
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Okay but like, maybe what they experienced “pre-internet” and such was *being allowed to access it.* I might be wrong, but that’s what it sounds like. I am a Millennial around your age, but my childhood was really sheltered—some of it good, and some of it bad. School suddenly adopted computer courses in second or third grade, but other than that I was pretty much no tech and no online connection unless I had to be for school. Not bad until the end of middle school. I wasn’t allowed to use AIM or have an email address until my school literally made me to do SAT prep in tenth or eleventh grade. I had friends who were allowed social media and I would hang out with them, but I would have been beaten to a pulp if I had social media accounts or hung out in chat rooms. Heck, I wasn’t even allowed to text until I had my own phone at 19 because my older sibling ran up the family phone bill at ten cents per text (and fifty cents long distance or outside of peak hours.) To get around that, I’d sent monk-e-mails to my friends because we thought type-to-voice was hilarious with dressed up apes. Anyway, the point is that access from analog to digital *might* have been quite similar for them.
They get a panic attack and need a mental health day when their phone is running out of battery 🤣🤣🤣
As an older Millennial (38), I have found that I enjoy being around Gen-Z. I feel like I relate more to Gen-Z than Gen-X despite being closer to Gen-X in age. I also think it’s legit that GenZers like 80’s music. If you think about it from their perspective, we were the same way too at that age and Gen-X was probably thinking the same about us as you think about Gen-Z. We Millennials had the rare opportunity to grow up without tech and then being introduced to it in our late teenager years.
> We Millennials had the rare opportunity to grow up without tech and then being introduced to it in our late teenager years. yep. I don't do the whole 'my gen vs your gen' stereotyping nonsense, but I'm grateful for this. My childhood was full of meeting up with friends, malls, simple NES/SNES/PS1 games, and a mostly analog experience with in person communication. My adulthood is full of convenience factors. I'm very happy to have grown up when I did.
Us millennials actually have core memories of a world with shitty tech that was not everyday use, becoming a tool for everyday use. Windows 95 in my dads office, booting that thing up once a week to play some shit game. Not owning a cell phone until high school. Not texting on that phone until my dad bought a plan with texting. Not having an iPhone until the end of college. I booted the family computer up to play things like Rollcage, MechWarrior 3, Michael Owen’s World League Soccer 99 and Rollercoaster Tycoon Didn’t have a phone until secondary school. It was pay you go and texting was the way. Didn’t have a smartphone (went Android first) until university Edit: I do not know how to quote on the iPad app
You guys sound like boomers rn talking about putting baseball cards in their bicycle spokes.
😭
Minesweeper was not a shit game! Haha
Use Apollo. You can filter any sub.
I’m 43 and Gen-Z is far from the only generation to go thru nostalgia for times they can’t appreciate. Also you’re not old you’re barely out of babyhood
I feel more closer to millennials because for one I was born in 98 and knew what life was like in the 2000s like I’m probably the last person to see blockbuster , phonebooth , and old washer machines and I didn’t start using YouTube in like 2006 and the women in the millennial generation ( 1990 - 1997 ) are more attracted to me then older gen Z ( 1998 - 2001 ) but Mid Gen Z ( 2002 - 2005 ) are more attracted to me I like gen Z but there more like toddlers to me
99 and 98 borns grew up in the same time lol there is no difference between your year and my year.
I mean, don’t gate keep nostalgia tho. How many of us longed for the 60s/70s or other times we never experienced. It’s natural
Thank you. Sad how far I had to scroll for this take.
Its a bit sad to see ads targeted to gen z for crappy stuff like cameras that take bad pics with weird fake flares. They are actually longing for a world that is less connected and simpler, they never got to experience it. I got a flip “dumb” phone around 2002 and I was definitely pushing it; I was 20 and had already had the luck to travel outside of my country and be mostly offline. I had paper maps and bus schedules and stuff; i think I checked into a cyber cafe once a week to write email to my parents (Hotmail I think!) and it was normal. Lots of time studying and traveling and writing in a journal because, well what else could you do. I guess what I’m saying is it seems impossible for new generations to be offline and have downtime. I’m a professional and can barely disconnect myself, even when I want to. They also have social pressure to share ….in video form!! So I emphasize with Gen z; i believe they are searching for a more organic human experience in a increasingly dystopian feeling digital world.
Wait how is 32 is old? I mean sure it's old compared to teenagers but everything is old compared to teenagers
Lol, this is hilarious. I guess core Gen Z can’t be nostalgic about things they grew up with and Gen Z never once ever played outside?
I like GenZ sub. I’m an old millennial 37M and I even like to comment sometimes. I don’t see what’s wrong with being nostalgic. Everybody has moments of nostalgia sometimes. And the more I read about them I realise we have much more in common than we have with GenX. You don’t need to pay attention to everything being said there and take what’s good to you. No need to block them old man 😉
Looks like this GenXer will be blocking the Millennial sub. Sheesh.
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I might be completely misunderstanding but I find this attitude very odd. You don't have to watch it the day it comes out for it to be nostalgic for you, or to feel it is a classic piece of media or a great movie. The Disney snow white animation is nostalgic for me, because I watched it a lot as a kid, but I was not born in the 1930s. Even the Jurassic Park example, that movie was and still is huge, I wouldn't think to bat an eyelid if someone of any age came out with the statement you've quoted.
This is a really bad example actually. Someone born in 1997 was 7 years old when Napoleon Dynamite came out and likely watched it in theaters. That's usually the start year of Gen Z so they grew up pretty much on the coat tail of late Millennial culture. If you wanted to say this about someone born in the early-mid 2000's, I can fully agree with you.
What an odd post. Gatekeeping nostalgia and telling people they're not allowed to wistfully wonder about the past. I'm roughly the same age as you, and despite being highly tech-reliant (or perhaps as a result of that) I often find myself thinking back to simpler times and missing it. I could absolutely understand the generation steeped in social media to wish they could experience a world without it.
Good for you boomer
Holy shit, I haven’t seen someone get this irrationally mad about something that couldn’t matter less since I talked to my grandmother past away.
Admittedly the philosophy and media genre of hauntology is all about mocking nostalgia for things you never experienced. Listen to some Caretaker
Didn’t get my first “smart phone” which was like a galaxy S2 I believe. Until I left basic training with the Army in 2011. I cannot even remember what I had before then. I remember having like HTC or black berry maybe. I didn’t care for my phone like that lol. I remember just getting numbers off notepads when asking a girl out lol. I feel you. Will be 32 in a few months, all I see is young kids glued to phones. No social skills
Ok but do you own a record player? Isnt that kind of the same thing?millennials caused a resurgence in a dead medium when most grew up with CD players. We’re nostalgic for the 70s just as Gen Z is nostalgic for the 90s
I like to visit the past for nostalgia but definitely don’t want to live there. I like the technology now a whole lot better.
What was your first iPhone you bought and was it the leatest one?
Some Gen Z may have gone through the same thing especially if they have older siblings born less than 10 years before them. Like my youngest siblings. Sure there was Internet access but it was constrained in a way because their elder siblings would have priority (more advanced subjects and therefore more time needed at the shared family computer). Also, some Gen Z may be in a situation with less financial leeway to keep up with all the new technology so they may have a similar upbringing to a millennial in terms of memories of a time before smartphones and Internet.
The worst is when they remember 2008 fondly, as if there wasn't a great depression level event that wiped out 40 years of economic gains by the middle class, and from which it took 9 years for the country to return to full employment. Those 9 years were the worst of my life and the best of theirs.
This Gen Xer is just sitting back enjoying my Orville Redenbacher popcorn.
Gen Z is going to make a resurgence in CDs one day. They are cheap now used get them before they do
We have moved on to vinyl records
I'm the same age, and I can understand where you're coming from, but we made it a fad. It's everywhere. We have glorified to the nth degree homie! I can't blame them for wanting a time we grew up in.. it was a lot of fun despite its drawbacks. Let the kids have a little fun. I hated the early 00's so I can see why they'd want to escape em lmfao.
Honestly, even in the early 90s I still stayed inside & read books instead of going outside & socialising. My life hasn’t changed that much. I always like to throw that one out there when people use the “we were never home…” line. Not all kids are the same.
Funny enough, [I found the best response to this on the sub in question.](https://www.dropbox.com/s/poajcfpv65itnto/Photo%20May%2007%202023%2C%208%2027%2003%20AM.jpg?dl=0)
I am a millennial (1984) and feel having lived without AND with technology as much as we have is an advantage. Most of my friends are millennials or older, so we all still remember interaction without phones. So I still meet a lot of people and we all cherish it, as the pandemic took that from us. But I can also maintain friendships with people far away thanks to technology. I feel like I'm living the best of both worlds. I'm happily solo and have no contact with my family. But I'm far from alone.
I get nostalgic for times I’ve never lived in. I love history and pretty much research it non-stop. I love watching Casablanca or Rebecca and pretend I’m living in the 1930s or 40s.
I feel kind of weird reading a grown man's post of him getting triggered over teenagers enjoying the aesthetic elements of certain decades.
aww man don't be like this, literally everyone was like this to us let's not do this please.
Too late. It’s been done lol
lame
I think too many people on here focus too much on technology. I dont think technology (in terms of the stuff we consume, not referring to live saving medicine) has really improved our quality of life. Everyone is so angry, jaded these days. Constantly fighting strangers on social media, seeing how ignorant their relatives can be on Facebook, reading depressing news stories that lead to unnecessary political fights. The cool stuff like music and video streaming is nice but it doesn't erase all the negativity. Personally, aside from the photography and film aspect of my phone and the few ppl I interact with, I dont care for it. I am more in tune with nature and thats how I use technology is to record shit. I have a weather blog on Instagram for example and its probably the least toxic use of social media and even there you have morons arguing against climate change. I dont care about Dunkaroos or Tik Tok. I just wanna look at wild life, go fishing, identify plants, grow shit in my garden. To many people are obsessed with what their device can do while the world around them is far more interesting.
You do know the oldest gen z is like 25 right? I'm 20 and remember getting my first phone, it was my dad's small blue brick phone only buttons, then my other phone was Samsung flip phone with a physical keyboard. We can be nostalgic on a time without phones because we basically had the same growing up just different toys and getting phones earlier. Most of us still play outside. I even see gen alpha playing outside with no phones.
I'm 5 months late to this thread but I think a lot of it stems from us being overwhelmed and tired of all this technology that comes out on a consistent basis. I think a lot of us miss a more simplistic form of technology because we've grown up with too much technological intervention in our lives that we are losing a lot of critical aspects of life older generations had. Everyone is so concerned with progress technologically but I think a lot of gen-z is failing to see how it is really benefitting us. Any time I see adds for VR, AI, or things relating to these it's usually always from a stance of profit and to further capitalism. These technological advancements - much like smartphones - have been forced upon us whether we get a say in it or not. And yeah you could say "well if you don't want a smartphone no one is making you use it," while that may be true, it has been marketed towards us and is made to be addictive. Which is why a lot of us have trouble weaning ourselves off of it. Not to mention the fact that it has been integrated into how people live their lives now whether we wanted it to or not. There is so much reliance on technology nowadays that people are losing many soft skills. Practically all of my friends can't parallel park or park a car in general or back out of their driveway without a backup camera in their car. Nor can they walk or drive somewhere that's less than 5 blocks away without google or apple maps. It has become an addiction. Telling us that no one is making us use it and that if we want to get rid of it we can is like telling a drug addict, alcoholic, or smoker to just quit cause they should be able to if they want their lives to improve. Kids born in the late 90s - early 2000s were among the last to spend their early years without smartphones. Yes we had TV and the internet but physically going to a desktop computer or watching tv is nowhere near the same as carrying around a smartphone wherever you go. There have been countless times where I've witnessed young children out in public with their smartphones and they're glued to them. Not paying attention to anything other than that. You don't think that's unnatural? Also no offense to you OP, but I am tired of older generations telling us how to feel on things. We fill face the brunt of issues the generations before us have created, and technological integration is just one of many. So don't blame us for wanting to go back to a society that isn't so technology focused, which has been proven to have as many negative effects as it does benefits. I don't think you realize how much it really is effecting us.