Someone on TikTok asked people aged 30 and up to name things they had to tolerate as kids, that would emotionally DESTROY kids today.
1. Dodgeball in gym class. Kids just got wrecked.
2. Before computers, having to write multiple drafts by hand. First, second, and third drafts, all written out.
3. Non-stop bullying was normal. And it was tolerated. The most common advice was “try to ignore it.”
4. Having to babysit infants and small children. And you were only 12.
5. Being bored. Kids today don’t know what real boredom is.
6. Going all day at school without a water bottle. The only option was hitting the fountain between classes.
7. The slowness of dial-up internet. And having to log off if someone had to make a call. You also couldn’t receive calls if you were logged on.
8. Just dealing with not knowing something. If no one knew the answer and there wasn’t a book, you just continued to not know.
9. Being trapped in a car with both parents smoking cigarettes. If it was cold out, they might have even had the windows up.
10. Nothing was on-demand. So there was unavoidable FOMO. If you wanted to watch something AND there was a party that night, you had to choose.
11. Parents listening in on landlines. Sneaky parents, or siblings, could pick up another phone in the house and monitor your conversation.
12. Calling your friend’s house. Because you’d probably have to talk to their parents first.
13. No caller I.D. You just had to be ready to talk to whoever.
14. Blowing into your video games to make them work. And sometimes it didn’t. You’d want to play a Nintendo game, but just couldn’t play it.
15. Getting a summer job. If you wanted one, you had to walk into different businesses and ask an actual human, “Are you hiring?”
16. Ordering stuff from catalogs. And waiting “six to eight weeks” to get it.
17. Instead of texting, you passed notes in class. And if you got caught, the teacher made you read it out loud so everyone could hear.
18. Taking tests. The loud ticking of the wall clock would make today’s kids anxious.
19. Stressing over whether you’d get fined $250,000 by the FBI for copying a VHS tape. Or later, stressing that you’d get arrested for pirating MP3s.
20. No “auto-save.” If you forgot to hit save and your computer crashed, you just had to redo it.
(BuzzFeed)
