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What are some things you remember from your youth that society was foaming at the mouth over?
Here are some of mine that are still kind of going on about: Video Games: Parents and society blame video games not only for violence, but for addictions and wasting precious time. Television: Some people believe that television has harmful effects on its users Harry Potter: Some thought that it would lead to Satanism.
I feel so old when people say things like Harry Potter was a part of their "youth", lol. But I'm not sure I'd agree that society was "foaming at the mouth" over Harry Potter - a very small minority of crazy people may have believed it was Satanic but I'm pretty sure society in general didn't.
I remember people being very concerned about the O-Zone layer when I was a kid. And when I was growing up, computers/the internet were becoming a common household item and so there were concerns (and still are today) about kid's access to inappropriate material.
The first news story I remember was about President Eisenhower sending in troops to Little Rock, AR to quell the riots over integrating the public schools there.
Rock'n roll, hot rods, and "cruising" were big on the "teen scene" which also included cult DJs and movies aimed especially at teenagers.
I was in eighth grade when President Kennedy was assassinated, fifty years ago next Friday. We found out via an announcement over the PA system. I was sitting in the front desk in the second row from the door in a yellow classroom. Mr Lazar, our social studies teacher was in charge. I can't remember, though, if it was a social studies class, a test session or a studyhall. I can't remember what happened the rest of the day. I just remember that moment absolutely clearly but nothing before or after.
The early Fifties furore over the transition of what had been called "race music," but recently renamed Rhythm n Blues, from exclusively black appeal to music being adopted by white teenagers as their own. What a silly howling outrage...yellow journalist, Lee Mortimer, weighed in, various White Citizens Councils, Frankie Sinatra and even the U.S. senate.
In some areas there was a drive to make sure that teenagers dressed in jackets and ties, appropriate dresses for the girls....blue jeans a no-no....etc. for social events. All sorts of BS about pledging to observe these codes.
The movies Blackboard Jungle and Rock Around the Clock really got a lot of undies in knot too.
What are some things you remember from your youth that some people insociety were foaming at the mouth over?
Smoking pot
Iranians due to the hostage crisis
Arabs due oil embargo
People against the Vietnam War
People against People against the Vietnam War
Long Hair on guys
The correct procedure to protect yourself in an atomic bomb attack.
Communists everywhere.
LOL, on a side note, my parents had a 'Castro Convertible' sofabed. I was so freaked by the real Castro (a scary, shadowy, unformed figure of a beast-man) I often wondered what they were doing with a communist sofabed!
I was a high school senior (Class of 1964) when Kennedy was assassinated, an event which I've come to recognize as THE pivotal point in my life because EVERYTHING changed from that point forward. The nation's big issues at the time, and for the next decade or so:
Civil Rights
The Spread of Communism
Vietnam (an extension of Item 2)
The clash between Rock & Roll, Motown, Folk, and "real music"
Oh, yes, and in the late 1960s came the hippies, free love, psychedelic music & drugs, Sergeant Pepper; basically the end of the world as my parents knew it... [<Grin!>]
Nixon, Johnson, Agnew, oil embargo of 73, and the cost of these new tennis shoes called Addidas...with three slanted black stripes down the side....I think they were $16...heady sum for the day...
The only things I remember people being worried about were:
no gas
hostages in Iran
nuclear war, (they made that movie, "The Day After" that scared the crap out of many...I wasn't allowed to watch it, though.)
Reagan getting shot
Other than that, nothing so major that even little kids knew there was a problem, just those two things.
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