File under: things that would not fly today
Posted by theladyroy@reddit | Xennials | View on Reddit | 15 comments
Just yesterday, I remembered that I used to get my comics from a tobacco shop. It had a rack of comics in the back, and you had to walk through all the smoking paraphernalia and saucy magazines to get to said comics. Can you imagine a such a shop allowing a 12-year-old to just ramble in today? I don’t know that I would be okay with my niece doing it, but my buddy and I just dropped our bikes on the pavement outside and rambled in, saluted the owner, picked up our nerd pages and caffeine and walked out. Maybe my Dad (who had an art studio down the road) knew the owner, but it was still odd to think about.
sjd208@reddit
I was trying to explain the concept of those cigarette vending machines with the big knobs you pull to my 10 year old. Prompted by the experience of buying him a candy bar from a vending machine for $2.50.
noonesaidityet@reddit
I can't remember the last time I used one of those, but even being of age I still felt like I was 15-16 again trying to get it done before a grownup walked by.
MarandTierra@reddit
Age 15/16 is around the last time I saw one too. I remember it was inside the lobby at Sizzler lol
monkeetoes82@reddit
$2.50 is probably about what a pack cost back then too.
chronicnerv@reddit
Kids today don’t have to wander into odd little shops to find things, they can access everything online, for better or worse. A lot of them stumble onto stuff way too early simply because they’re curious and the internet doesn’t really have guardrails.
They end up knowing far more about the world at a younger age than we ever did, mostly because anything they wonder about is just a search away. If a kid still believes in something like Santa by the time they’re a teenager, it’s almost surprising now because the world reaches them so much earlier.
In a way, the internet fast forwarded childhood before anyone really understood how it would affect them.
ILikeBumblebees@reddit
There's actually a scary implication to this, in that younger kids are learning about things in a way that's increasingly detatched and abstracted away from their real life experiences, and that's exactly the sort of thing that can lead to dogmatism and superstition.
chronicnerv@reddit
Outside of exploitation and displacement, I honestly think one of the biggest issues for kids now is the gambling-style stuff built into games. Loot boxes and skins are basically just the modern version of fruit machines, but they’re sold as harmless fun. And the UK government seems far more interested in keeping shareholders happy than actually limiting addictive mechanics in hobbies aimed at young people.
I completely agree with your point, you can already see the effects in younger generations. They’ve started to behave like mini-enterprises, using something until it’s no longer useful and then immediately swapping it out for the next thing. You see it in fast-fashion clothing habits, but also in how people treat others, almost like brands to engage with rather than actual human beings.
Dahleh-Llama@reddit
Your last point has a way to sound really good and also really bad at the same time. We won't know until a few decades from now.
catsoncrack420@reddit
Exactly.
Tenement-on_Wheels@reddit
Eads in Boulder?
Slownavyguy@reddit
Kids today aren't allowed to wander period. Someone will call the police and do a "welfare check" if they see 12 year olds walking around unsupervised.
Rare-Airport4261@reddit
My local corner shop in the UK still has at least two shelves of girlie magazines (just realised I have no idea what people actually call them!) right above the kids comics and hobby magazines. It was the norm for newsagents to have these magazines on show when I was a kid, but I find it pretty bizarre these days.
BoredPandemicPanda@reddit
Lack of parenting from sunrise to sunset. As long as I was back home before dinner, all was good in the world.
Seven22am@reddit
When I first signed up to play baseball, I was on the Brewers (also probably not flying today!). We ant into the local card and memorabilia shop and found a Brewers. I don’t think it ever stopped smelling like cigar from the dude who sat behind the counter smoking all day every day.
MrThouu@reddit
Going to sketchy places to buy hard to find things or like a sketchy arcade. It's crazy to me looking back that'd I was willing to hang out in a place with known pickpocketing and the more sketchy kids bugging you for change just because I wanted to play Street Fighter II.