30 Times People Were So Blinded By Their Own Nostalgia, The Internet Called Them Out For It (New Pics)
Interview
Ah, The Good Old Days(™)! A time when everything was (allegedly) better: the music, the food, and even the fabric of society. Though… which era are we talking about, specifically? For some, it might be the ‘70s and ‘80s. For others, it’s the ‘90s and early 2000s. While others yearn to live a century or two ago, periods they never experienced firsthand.
Nostalgia is great in small doses, but too much of it can make you miss the beauty of the present. The r/lewronggeneration subreddit is a witty online community that is “dedicated to satirically mocking” folks who are completely and utterly “blinded by their own nostalgia.” We’ve collected some of their most cringeworthy posts to show you how many people wear rose-colored glasses to an unhealthy extent.
Bored Panda got in touch with the team that runs r/lewronggeneration, and one of the moderators, u/oh_dangit, was kind enough to answer our questions. Read on to see what they told us.
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J’accuse!
Like Three People Will Get This
Well, I'm one (I grew up with cassette tapes). So.... who are the other two here?
Inverse Reversal
I found my dad's old Gameboy today. Sad thing is it doesn't work, but his gamestar does
We were interested to get the moderator's take on why the r/lewronggeneration subreddit has seen so much success over the years. "I think that the anti-nostalgia baiting message that is attached to the subreddit and has been there since its inception resonates with a lot of people who don't have strong feelings of nostalgia for one thing or another," u/oh_dangit told Bored Panda.
"One of the core beginnings was based on music; such as people who becry musicians nowadays for creating their own sound and making it unique to themselves," they said.
We were also curious to find out more about what it's like to moderate an online community of this size. According to u/oh_dangit, being a moderator mostly "comes down to dealing with spam and people leaving comments that break rules."
Not Sure If This Has Been Thrown Around Before But I Think It Belongs Here
Romantic music then: Never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down Romantic music now: Yummy yummy yummy yummy (no offense, I just wanted to rickroll)
🦓
they did what they wanted around the world and created so the terrorists----
I Got No Words
Remember when: What other people might think of us controlled our lives.
Remember when people could live on what they were paid? Me either, that was before my time. I’ll wear my pjs to be comfy while coping with crushing weight of corporate greed’s drain on society.
Remember when having a job meant you could afford to buy nice clothes? Pepperidge farm remembers.
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Seriously, whoever made this must have forgotten seeing all the ladies in the store shopping, while their hair was in curlers and half covered with a scarf. That went on from the 50s to the late 70s.
Can confirm. As a bonus, my Mum used to wear beer can hats over her curlers, which is barely a step above jammies if you ask me, lol.
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Ah yes, a photo of a typical trip to the grocery shop way-back-when. The husband would always accompany the wife. There's no way he would work 9-5 and then go out with the boys.
Imagine thinking that an advertising photo of professional models represents real life. LOL, I was around back then and remember women wearing curlers in the store while cigarettes hung out the side of their mouths.
Exactly. This is clearly a photo shoot. You can find staged family photos of well dressed folks from any time since photography was invented, up until today. House dresses were really commonly worn, and they look dressy to us because dress=fancy in our modern brains, but they were the "hoodie and leggings" of that generation.
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Back in the day, my mother never left the house without wearing a girdle. Not to go to the grocery store, not to go on vacation, or to go to a PTA meeting. Inside the house, she didn’t wear one, but I have clear memories of her struggling to get that damn thing on. I also remember visiting Williamsburg VA one summer. If you’ve ever been in the southeast US in summer, you know what I mean. When we got back to the hotel room free walking around all day, she went to shower and change for dinner. That’s when she found out her girdle’s elastic waistband had melted enough to fuse with her underwear’s elastic waistband, because it was hot that day, and she’d been exercising and getting hot herself with all the walking we did. That was in the early seventies, and the moment I decided I would never wear a girdle—-they’re called Spanx today, btw. I never have worn one, I just try to stay in relatively good shape and buy clothes that actually fit. Now that I live in Maryland, I am much much cooler in summer than my mother was back in the day, I can tell you.
Your poor mother. Admittedly, this reminds me of the movie "Steel Magnolias".
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Women did go out in public wearing something like pajamas during this time though. It was called a "day dress" and it was worn after a woman took off her nightgown but before she was fully attired. Day dresses were knee length shifts that either buttoned or zipped up the front, sometimes cinched with a belt or sash, usually short sleeved, and came in all colors and patterns. And they were frequently worn while the hair was in rollers with a scarf over them. Nobody went shopping dolled up like Jayne Mansfield.
True they did, but it was during the hot summer months, now EVERY SINGLE DAY!!!
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Only time I do that is if I'm at home sick in bed.
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I still don't go out in public in my PJs. I also don't think the grocery store is Fashion Week in Milan.
If you're offended by someone wearing sweat pants at the grocery store, you need to get control over your life.
We’re not talking about SWEAT PANTS, we’re talking about ACTUAL PAJAMAS that are meant fit sleeping in!!!
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Remember when your Father's job was enough to have a middle class lifestyle where Mom stayed at home and guaranteed everyone had clean ironed clothes and home cooked meals instead of working two shifts then blasting something in a microwave for dinner?
I remember when women were expected quit their job when they got married and then had nothing much to do but cook and clean for their husband and kids. Yeah, great times.
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and with a blanket, some of the people go shopping with a blanket on them as if it were a cape
But, back then pjs had an obvious look to them. Today, the same set can be sold in one store in the pj section, and every day wear in another. I buy pjs like that for the exact reason that I can stay in my pjs during the day (having a chronic illness where I am in bed sick more than not), but can pass as dressed if a visitor stops by, or the 10 minutes it takes to drop off or pick up the kids from school. I wore pjs to a medical procedure and the doctor had no idea, commenting they wanted the same cute outfit.
Women couldn't wear trousers. Men were laughed at if they went shopping and were actively discouraged from having time with family and, again, laughed at if they pushed their kids in prams. Yeh, the old days were c**p..
You believe everything that was in Mad Men was 100% true and historical accurate, it wasn’t!
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Now see, my nostalgic thought seeing this picture was, remember when a family of four could buy a full cart of groceries every week on a single person's paycheck?
I wasn’t aware swinging by Kroger for some pork chops and Diet Coke was a formal event.
As long as it's not your "staying in bed" pajamas, for me you can do what you want. At least wear an "outdoor" pajamas
And that’s why women keep doing it, because people who think it’s no big deal…
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I wear wtf I want. I also donate, dont wreck a place, and have a couple businesses. Balance
I'll take pajamas over putting on a suit every time I needed to go to the store.
Oh please, I'm 66 years old and I don't remember anyone dressing up to go grocery shopping. In fact it wasn't uncommon to see women at the store with curlers in their hair. I was in high school before we had a blow dryer in our house and if women wanted their hair done to go at night they had no choice but to wear curlers all day,.
Remember when people had some dignity and propriety. Not saying you should wear a suit or Sunday dress in public, just, don't wear pajamas
Remember when you could afford a house and nice suit on minimum wage and only one stream of income?
A Father wasn’t making minimum wage, back then, he had a salary of at least $25 a year and only paid $8k for a 2 bedroom home and $1-2k for a decent car.
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I can't shake the feeling/fact that my family back then wouldn't be allowed in that store and if one of them so much as walked on the sidewalk the mother would hold the daughter against her and would have the shopkeeper make them leave.
When did Dad ever go shopping with the shopping cart? The wife did that when he was sitting comfy in his office. The kid is wearing a gun, so as an adult now probably owns a gun or three. The girl looks like she is going to a party. Tell me this is an ad and I will pretend to be surprised.
I'm pretty urge this image was uncommon as well. Dad would've been at work, kids would've been in school!
“Dad, aren’t you going to return the cart?” “Nah, they pay people to do that.”
Being comfy is more important than being someone that others want you to be..
And we went on family trips to national parks without AC, and wore suits the whole way.
AND Mrs. Cleaver also wore pearls while she vacuumed the living room.
Yes, but I also remember a new, young male teacher telling the girls in our two room school that we had to wear dresses. At the tender age of twelve I, a girl, had to explain to him that in the country some kids had to walk a mile or more to school in the winter and that was why we wore pants to school. He amended the rule so we could wear jeans to school but under our dresses. Btw there were no snowpants back then. Ignorance in authority is terrifying.
That mum doesn't look very happy - maybe something to do with having to conform to this c**p.
Yeah..I’m with the picture in this. Wearing pajamas out in public is tacky as hell.
My goal is not to please you, so I'm good with being tacky as hell.
Load More Replies... I wasn't born then but I remember people wearing gowns and suits to get their mail
My father taught me that if I took the time to groom myself and wear nice clothes in public and in business that I would feel good about myself and that would lead me to success with people and in my life in general. It wasn’t the most sage advice but I have to say he was not wrong. When I see people in public dressed in pajamas or worse, they almost alway look unhappy and it makes me think about my dad’s advice.
Unless it's 3AM and you need to get that certain something right now, put on some daylight clothes ya slob!
I used to think, Why can't people dress nice? But when the hour-glass turned into a mason-jar and sneezing caused an issue, yoga-pants became optimal.
They added: "Though there is a lot of reposting since heaps of [stuff] like this is reposted constantly. Maybe in the past, when there were more actual posts and popular posts, I think that there'd be far more time committed to moderating," they said that the times have changed a bit.
The moderator also shared their thoughts on where the line is when someone's become far too immersed in nostalgia: "Looking too much towards the past will only hurt your perspective towards the future," they said.
The r/lewronggeneration community has been going strong for nearly a decade now. Founded in mid-August of 2013, the sub has grown to house over 300k members since that time.
According to the moderator team running the whole show, the subreddit itself was created out of annoyance over the ‘born in the wrong generation’ that fans of ‘60s and ‘70s rock often express. So there’s a special emphasis on music on r/lewronggeneration, but other forms of nostalgia are welcome, too, from other forms of media to societal trends.
Kids Today Are So Stupid
Ah yes, because every young person is eating tide pods these days, definitely not just a small number of stupid people
Never Realised You Had To Listen To Modern Music, And That Statements Just Blatantly Untrue
That’s Probably Not The Flex You Think It Is…
Breaking news: teens of EVERY generation (yes, it’s true. Some generations worse than others) break the rules, do drugs, drink, cheat, push boundaries, swear, screw, steal, lie etc. You all did at least one of those things, and probably knew someone that did it all. That’s just what teens do, test waters, figuring c**p out, rebelling. It’s just a fact. The only thing that really matters is getting past it all and coming out the other end a sane, healthy, law abiding, loving, kind, well adjusted adult. THATS what’s worth bragging about and being proud of.
The mods ask the members to post images and videos that fit the spirit of the subreddit. In short, the content should be focused on “quasi-nostalgic attitudes, often with a sense of superiority.” However, posts can’t have anyone’s identifying information displayed in them, whether that’s actual names or internet usernames. The point is to gently mock over-the-top nostalgia, not the individuals themselves.
Moreover, members of r/lewronggeneration ought to avoid posting content that they created themselves. Meanwhile, if anyone’s in the mood for some satire, they’re welcome to go for it, but they have to add the ‘Satire’ flair to make it clear to everyone else.
In the meantime, everyone’s asked to be civil, and polite, and to “keep the elitism at the door.” While disagreements are perfectly fine (and, if we’re honest, completely unavoidable on the internet), calling other users names and insulting them is way over the line. What’s more, the mods frown upon low-effort posts, redditors who spam memes, and repost irresponsibly.
Quite Literally
We Are Not The Same
Men Today No Longer Want To Break Free
Valentina Stoycheva Ph.D. explains in a post on Psychology Today that nostalgia can lead to unhelpful behaviors and have negative consequences when taken to an extreme.
“The difference between helpful and harmful nostalgia is the difference between incorporating the positive emotions of reminiscing into the present versus renouncing the present for the sake of reinstating and perpetually reliving some moment in the past,” she writes.
Those Were Ye Good Ol' Days
Man, Boomers Who Post [things] Like This Completely Forgot The Message Of The Breakfast Club
![Man, Boomers Who Post [things] Like This Completely Forgot The Message Of The Breakfast Club](https://www.boredpanda.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/blinded-by-their-own-nostalgia-posts-14-64a28c0142b5b__700.jpg "Man, Boomers Who Post [things] Like This Completely Forgot The Message Of The Breakfast Club")
Modern Cartoons Suck Now
In Stoycheva’s opinion, overindulging in nostalgia is similar to overusing salt or pepper in your dishes, leading to the present being “colored by the negative emotions, in favor of glorifying some moment in the past.” There’s a need for balance here so that nostalgia doesn’t consume someone’s life.
Is This Welcome Here?
Fyi - The Thing On The Right Is A Pencil Sharpener And The Thing On The Left Is A Pencil
The funny thing is, I seem to still be using these untensils now....
"Cars Now Don't Have Any Character"
Some individual examples where people go overboard with nostalgia include getting excessive plastic surgery in order to create the illusion of youth, hoarding things, and using social media to track down their ex-partners. On a societal level, overindulging in nostalgia can lead to people glorifying their historical past without acknowledging the collective traumas of the past.
For Reelz
Damn :((
Vintage Le Wrong Generation
Nostalgia, according to Stoycheva, is focused on simplicity rather than complexity, so it can backfire as an emotional regulatory strategy because the world itself is so complex. According to her, this can be countered by coming face to face with our own biases and beliefs and tackling uncomfortable feelings of shame and longing.
Ah The 80s, You Know The Time When You Could Make Real Friends And Walk Around Not Being Scared
They're All On Cocaine
Of Course All The Comments Were Saying "Sad But True"
Stoycheva suggests that everyone who’s feeling nostalgic for an activity, a period of time, and people to ask themselves these questions: “What emotion am I after? In engaging in nostalgia, what former self-state am I seeking to recreate? How will this help me and also how can I stay rooted in the present while I also feel the positive emotions of reminiscing? Am I avoiding complex emotions? If so, what are they, and why are they so hard for me? Where else can I seek help in managing my emotions?”
I Too Am Absolutely Horrified By Men On Scooters
In 79 a young adult could afford a clunker and it was simple enough to fix up. Today it might be 1 scooter is all the two could afford.
"Why Aren't Soldiers Like My Hollywood Heroes"
Today's Generation Is Lazy
As a Gen Xer, I disagree with this. I know people like to portray the Millennials and Gen Z like this, but it's nonsense. My generation got hosed. But nothing like these generations have. I admire how they don't take c**p from companies and challenge the idea of "work hard and you'll get ahead". The truth is their is a natural reaction to companies exploiting them. And all you need to do is open your eyes and you will see it. The model businesses operate under now demands that kind of response. They broke the social contract between between companies and workers. And they did it in a deceptive manner. Pensions, healthcare, and social security are a few examples. They made sure to take care of the Boomers so they wouldn't call foul and let Gen X & Y work old school style without the rewards. And we were too inexperienced to see it. From the time I turned 18 I have seen home costs jump from $30k for a house to $350k. While the federal minimum wage went from $2.35 to $7.25. Insane.
In the meantime, Bored Panda has previously written about how people tend to be the most nostalgic for those periods of time when they were happiest. For many, that’s their childhood because they had fewer responsibilities. However, if someone had an awful childhood, you most likely won’t find them reminiscing about that period of time.
Though nostalgia can be a good coping strategy when you’re feeling blue, it can interfere with our daily lives. For instance, if we constantly compare the present to the past and feel like nothing ever measures up in terms of values and quality, then we’ll feel disappointed.
Quirky
So We've Come To This Now
Bruh
Note: this post originally had 64 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
It’s vital to remember that our memories aren’t perfect: they’re not as accurate as we might think and we might be reliving only the moments we want to remember. Meanwhile, the present has many opportunities to be seized, even if the world has changed and will continue to change.
For some more posts about nostalgia and r/lewronggeneration, check out Bored Panda's earlier feature over here.
This is less about nostalgia but more of the "Them V Us" conflicts that really should not be happening. History has taught us this time after time and yet it still happens.
I hate these nostalgia memes and I'm a middle-aged man. I love a bit of nostalgia but I hate the way it is weaponised to make younger generations seem bad. It's just dumb. Every generation complains about "kids today" while simultaneously contributing to the culture they are complaining about. Hate modern movies? How old do you think the studio execs are? Hate the internet? How old do you think the people who run TikTok (and benefit most financially) are?
"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers." --Socrates
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This thread... It's bad. Whoever thought it was a good idea to post should feel bad...
This thread sucks... and also, why did I get downvoted for saying I liked the art style of the GoldenEye game?
There's a lot of bigotry that BP calls nostalgia in many of these posts.
Sheesh, this article sucked. It was pretty much young people bad, old people good. This was a waste of an article.
New rule! Anyone who does some sort of "Blah Blah Blah.... We are not the same" whinge gets an instant swift kick in the shins so that they actually have some real and legitimate pain to whine about.
Your name is Marno, my name is Marco. We are not the same.
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Yes. That is exactly what happens to most people and there's nothing you can do to stop it. It's all perfectly normal, unfortunately.
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wow what a wonderfully hateful article. keep it up! /s
Couldn't even make it through the whole list. Griping about how "things were so much better at (insert time in the past)" is boring, depressing, predictable and stupid. YOUR parents said the same thing about your generation. So just stop.
Remember that it's good to look back and reminisce every now and then, but people often start romanticizing the past because maybe their present isn't looking all that great and their future brings a lot of uncertainty. I get it, life seemed much simpler and less complicated back then compared to today. But, they start having a distorted view of the past while both ignoring problems of the past while currently ignoring the present.
The one about "vibrant LA chicks" is a picture of the three girls who were part of the Manson family and involved in killing a senator's wife.
The title says that this is about seeing the past through rose-colored glasses, and forgetting about the bad stuff. That's what the title says, but that's not what the list is about. Like, at all.
As a boomer (born when Truman was president) all of this nostalgia nonsense is nonsense. Times are better now, even with all of the current drama. In 30 years people will be talking just as nostalgically about the 2010s.
Generational politics does not equal nostalgia. It amounts to bigotry and stereotyping which helps no one.
I was hoping (as the title suggests) to see the internet calling out the misplaced nostalgia... not just the misplaced nostalgia posts
The posts on BP are getting steadily worse.
Load More Replies... This is less about nostalgia but more of the "Them V Us" conflicts that really should not be happening. History has taught us this time after time and yet it still happens.
I hate these nostalgia memes and I'm a middle-aged man. I love a bit of nostalgia but I hate the way it is weaponised to make younger generations seem bad. It's just dumb. Every generation complains about "kids today" while simultaneously contributing to the culture they are complaining about. Hate modern movies? How old do you think the studio execs are? Hate the internet? How old do you think the people who run TikTok (and benefit most financially) are?
"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers." --Socrates
Load More Replies... This thread... It's bad. Whoever thought it was a good idea to post should feel bad...
This thread sucks... and also, why did I get downvoted for saying I liked the art style of the GoldenEye game?
There's a lot of bigotry that BP calls nostalgia in many of these posts.
Sheesh, this article sucked. It was pretty much young people bad, old people good. This was a waste of an article.
New rule! Anyone who does some sort of "Blah Blah Blah.... We are not the same" whinge gets an instant swift kick in the shins so that they actually have some real and legitimate pain to whine about.
Your name is Marno, my name is Marco. We are not the same.
Load More Replies... Yes. That is exactly what happens to most people and there's nothing you can do to stop it. It's all perfectly normal, unfortunately.
Load More Replies... wow what a wonderfully hateful article. keep it up! /s
Couldn't even make it through the whole list. Griping about how "things were so much better at (insert time in the past)" is boring, depressing, predictable and stupid. YOUR parents said the same thing about your generation. So just stop.
Remember that it's good to look back and reminisce every now and then, but people often start romanticizing the past because maybe their present isn't looking all that great and their future brings a lot of uncertainty. I get it, life seemed much simpler and less complicated back then compared to today. But, they start having a distorted view of the past while both ignoring problems of the past while currently ignoring the present.
The one about "vibrant LA chicks" is a picture of the three girls who were part of the Manson family and involved in killing a senator's wife.
The title says that this is about seeing the past through rose-colored glasses, and forgetting about the bad stuff. That's what the title says, but that's not what the list is about. Like, at all.
As a boomer (born when Truman was president) all of this nostalgia nonsense is nonsense. Times are better now, even with all of the current drama. In 30 years people will be talking just as nostalgically about the 2010s.
Generational politics does not equal nostalgia. It amounts to bigotry and stereotyping which helps no one.
I was hoping (as the title suggests) to see the internet calling out the misplaced nostalgia... not just the misplaced nostalgia posts
The posts on BP are getting steadily worse.
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