It is now no longer social suicide to not drink.

From an American perspective, flying on an airplane sucks. 9/11/01 resulted in a whole bunch of security theatre at the airport and airlines have slowly whittled away whatever comfort or convience remained.

When I was in high school, gay was the generic negative word. If Wendys gave you a medium fry when you ordered a large - gay. If your homie cancelled plans last minute - gay. If you slipped on the stairs and busted your ass - gay. It’s bizarre in hindsight.

The death of appointment television.

Kids are way nicer now. Kids in my day were brutal and violent. Most things have improved. People are more aware of dangers to kids now so there are stronger safeguards. Kids are better protected by laws so violence against them is getting less common. Women actually make pretty good money now and aren’t restricted to secretary like roles and there’s less jokes that the woman is a secretary. I had never seen female ceos. They just didn’t exist. Now women can scam the public just as well as men 🤣 There’s still a long way to go but things are a lot better. Gay people aren’t dying of AIDS as much anymore and people will touch gay people without a problem. When I was growing up people believed gay men might be carrying AIDS and would not touch them. Thanks princess di for your work on this. Racial diversity is so much better now. Like women, people of color did not make CEO frequently. It’s still being worked on, but it’s gotten better. Racism itself has gotten better, kids don’t say racial slurs to one another.

As far as environment there was a time when in the US we would celebrate some new technology innovation or infrastructure innovation. I remember when Boeing released a new plane and everyone was like wow so cool, this is redefining planes.

But we have not had that in years. Our desire to be top in tech or science is gone. We used to want to be the best infrastructure, top of the line water treatment and getting to different space discoveries FIRST. Being part of nasa was a huge dream for many kids to just explore the planets.

Now china has all this high speed transit and we have decaying pipes. In my childhood, this would not have been accepted. China was frowned upon.

Other countries have gotten better to the point they surpassed us. When I would visit Mexico it would be to help build in rural areas. Now our rural areas are further decrepit than anything I saw there back then and Mexico City is a vibrant bustling gorgeous place.

One visit to Apalachia and I have wondered how America got this way.

There was also a lot more stress around decorum. This one was a double edged sword. People cared a lot about how they were perceived to the point of committing heinous acts to cover up the slightest insult to their character or perception. Now, it’s more free. We don’t keep up with the Joneses on the level it was back then. Being loud or dressing any type of way means nothing. It’s all good.

But that has also led to the open and blatant acceptance of things like felonious behavior and led to what we have now. This kind of scandal would never have flown.

But then again, no woman could have ever HOPED to run for president.

There is also a lot more macro interests. I believe the people have more power now. Before, you had to listen to what’s on the radio. You had to watch why’s on tv. Trends could be fully controlled by the owners of these resources. Now your friend can post a video of their thermos surviving a car accident and suddenly a company who’s entire perception could not have possibly entered mainstream can. There is more freedom as a macro economy, you can truly access what interests you. This also leads to “too much choice” sometimes but it’s definitely awesome for some of us with unique interests. It has also leveled the playing field in way for trends to be able to match without extreme financial backing. You don’t have to be part of the big guys for your song or dance to go viral. You can have a niche on YouTube and make a living on commentary videos. You could not do this before.

Finally, the access to tech has not only improved our lives but brought a level of freedom unheard of. In my day, only movie studios had the tools to make media. Now people can express themselves with minimal financial investment. People are creating at levels never seen before because they finally have access to tools needed for it. Microphones, software, cameras, painting classes, and the world has distinctly become more and more creative and colorful. This is also helped by the less keeping up with the Joneses worrying about their perception thing. The more free we are in creating and expression, the more diverse and beautiful our works get. And yes I think it’s cool people can openly create furry porn and then connect with others who like it. This is truly something unimaginable to my generation. Our weirdness was violently oppressed. Now we out here turning that violence into twilight fanfics that spawn movie franchises.

You win some you lose some.

• People are way more free to talk about their mental health problems.
• Climate change is part of mainstream awareness, most people want to see action on it.
• Gays and lesbians are very broadly accepted in many parts of the world. Trans people are too (and they are more visible), even if there is also a culture war backlash.
• Nearly everyone hates capitalism. Not everyone has figured out what needs to be done about it, but it’s a good start.
• Conspiracy thinking is more rampant, presumably because of internet (mis/dis)information bubbles

(I was born in the early 80s, so this is over the last 30ish years, since the mid 90s)

Hats, almost completely removed from formal settings and now only in informal settings.

People have a much more rigid and accurate sense of time. You don’t meet for lunch, you meet at 12pm on the dot. People don’t wait for someone for half an hour, they wait like 5 minutes or so.

People talk much more openly about problems and their views. When I was young people didn’t really talk about religion, politics, medical issues, and so on in public. Now people will tell you they are on an antidepressant or LGBT+ and be open about things.

I’ve been arrested, held up at gun point, and spent a few weeks in a Texas jail in the 90s because I like smoking weed. Now I have 3 weed stores within 2 miles of me, and it’s as mundane as buying a loaf of bread. So that’s a positive in my book.

The mall was full of stores with good quality products that you would value for a non insignificant amount of time if purchased.

More aggressive driving. Statistics even support it so it’s not just an anecdotal thing.

Isolation of individuals and the growing loss of ownership of, well, everything.

Everyone has reduced their perception of the world to a Bad Apple-esque black and white extreme of good or bad. All In Support or Nuclear Strike Disapproval. No inbetweens allowed.

Humanity getting dumber and dumber…

I got started on the Internet in 1988. You had to learn Unix (Linux didn’t exist yet) and the command line (GUI Internet didn’t exist yet), and had to manually piece together files to download them (www didn’t exist yet).

It still feels a little odd to me that restaurants don’t ask “smoking or non?”. Don’t get me wrong, I’m delighted everything stopped smelling like ash. But it’s surreal to remember my grand parents chain smoking over pancakes at Dennys.