50 Funny ’80s Memes That Gen Xers And Millennials Might Understand Too Well

Totally 80's Room is not just a platform for memes and nostalgia-inducing content. It’s also actually a room. The creator of the project, Pete, has a room dedicated to all things '80s. "The collection started first with just a few items I remembered from my childhood in the '80s, like toys and games," Pete tells Bored Panda.

"But just like any collector, it kind of snowballs from there with more and more items. I then decided I'd like to collect 1980s popular culture items like music, toys, clothing, electronics, common household items, movie props, etc. to represent the decade. I love to have one clean, great working example of items rather than quantity."

"The social media stuff came second because I wanted to share this collection of not only items but memories, nostalgia, and laughs with as many people as possible," Pete tells us about the inception of the Instagram and TikTok pages. "The feeling of these great memories and nostalgia is powerful and that’s what I enjoy sharing with people."

“I was a kid in the 1980s and the pop culture just had an impact on me,” the creator of the Totally 80's Room says about why he chose this decade in particular. “Kids growing up in the 1980s had the best childhood [in my opinion] and it was a great time to be a kid. This decade represents a very unique place in time for culture,” the man behind the pages, Pete, says.

The '80s revival in our current pop culture is going stronger than ever, and Pete says that he loves it, especially in style and musical influences. “It’s a testament to the uniqueness of the era. For me, it’s like having the experience of being a kid in the ’80s and now kind of experiencing the culture as an adult, and that’s exciting.”

Pete says that he likes some of the remakes in TV and movies. Admittedly, they’re not all that good. “But that’s definitely on point with the 1980s,” the creator quips.

“I love searching for and sharing content that gives you a laugh or digs up a memory for someone. There are a lot of younger people interested, and that is awesome, and so everyone is welcome in the totally80sroom universe. The pop culture of the '80 and '90s is so fascinating and influential, it bridges a generation gap, and that is awesome!”

We call the memes on this list "Gen X Memes," but the cutoff years for when one generation ends and another begins aren't so clear-cut. We know that Gen X is the generation after baby boomers and preceding millennials, but what years were they born exactly? And why are the '80s called their decade?

Most sources claim that Gen Xers were born between the 1960s and the early 1980s. Some pinpoint the beginning of Generation X in 1965, like the Pew Research Center. According to them, Gen X is between 1965 and 1980. Then millennials have 1981 as their starting point, right? Well, some people feel like there is a micro-generation with characteristics of both Gen X and Gen Y.

They call them Xennials – a portmanteau of 'Gen X' and 'millennials.' For those who like numbers, those born between 1977 and 1983 can call themselves Xennials. Associate Professor of Sociology at The University of Melbourne, Dan Woodman told Mamamia that they're a mix of both generations. If we consider Gen Xers to be "depressed flannelette-shirt-wearing, grunge-listening children," we think of millennials as more bubbly, maybe too optimistic and sure of themselves, and tech-savvy.

Xennials have a little bit of both. "Around technology they do have a particular experience – we hit this social media and IT digital technology boom in our 20s," Woodman said. In their childhood and adolescence, Xennials didn't have to worry about social media and mobile phones. "Then we hit this technology revolution before we were maybe in that frazzled period of our life with kids and no time to learn anything new. We hit it where we could still adopt in a selective way the new technologies," Woodman added.

Many Xennials sent their first emails upon finishing high school. This doesn't sound familiar either to Gen Xers or millennials: the former didn't have computers yet, and the latter most likely already had an email account when they were kids. Yet Woodman also said that it's normal if not everyone born at that time relates to what it supposedly means to be a Xennial. Such factors as gender and a family's financial situation can play an important role.

We also call Generation X 'latchkey kids.' Why is that, you ask? Gen Xers were born at a time when divorce rates were unusually high and more and more women started entering the workforce. Therefore kids were often left home alone spending time without adult supervision. That's why people often refer to Gen X as the 'MTV Generation,' as many would spend their time in front of a TV watching the music channel.

Many define Gen Xers as self-reliant and responsible for that reason. It's also why we consider Generation X to be incredibly independent. Many latchkey kids would have to microwave their own dinners, so, as grown-ups, they're used to doing things themselves. It's also why they're excellent DIYers. Because they would spend much time alone at home without parents, they had to learn a lot of things themselves by trial and error, like plunging a toilet.

In the never-ending battle of who's more entitled between baby boomers and millennials, Gen Xers somehow always get forgotten. It's no surprise that one of their other names is 'The Forgotten Generation' then. But in this war between the workaholics and the 'lazy youngsters,' Gen X are the winners – they're the "work hard, play hard" generation. They saw how their parents valued company loyalty over anything else and set healthy boundaries. Thanks to only burgeoning technologies, they also weren't available to their bosses 24/7.

However, Gen Xers are also said to be cynical and quite pessimistic. That's mostly because of how the political, economic, and social situation was at the time. There was the AIDS epidemic, the end of the Cold War, the first flight of the space shuttle in 1981, and the U.S. Government's war on drugs. That's why sociologists often describe Gen X as cynical.

But it wasn't all bad for Gen X in the '80s. It's the decade when gaming was born: the ultimate gaming experience that is the arcade. Pac-Man, Space Invaders, Street Fighter, and Donkey Kong were all the rage then. And we still know the games to this day. We can also thank the '80s for portable gaming consoles like Nintendo and Sega. I can't tell you how many times I've tried to save the princess in Super Mario Bros, even though I'm way too young to be an '80s kid.