50 Funny ’80s Memes That Gen Xers And Millennials Might Understand Too Well
Interview With AuthorEach generation thinks their decade is the best. Millennials would say that it's the '90s. For Gen Z — the 2000s. And the often-overlooked Gen Xers will always love the '80s. In the end, it's all about the time when you were a kid, right? Big enough to go to your friend's house by yourself, but young enough to not have to worry about important adult stuff.
And who wouldn't love growing up in the '80s? Mullets, conversations on cord phones, and biking with your friends to the middle of nowhere were quintessential for a true '80s experience. Luckily, the IG page Totally 80's Room shares little snippets of what life was like back then. Scroll down and see the best picks of their content!
Bored Panda reached out to the creator of the page, Pete. He was kind enough to answer our questions and tell us more about his virtual (and physical!) '80s museum. Besides, Totally 80's Room is not just an Instagram page with almost 900k followers. It's also a popular TikTok account with over 2 million likes. Check out our conversation with the creator of the project below!
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The good ol' days! I swear I broke my rib while skiing behind a go-cart, slid right into a rebar and had the wind knocked out of me. Bounced back up after about 30 seconds and went another round. Our bodies were made out of jello I'm sure
Load More Replies..."Stranger Things" season 1 has been the only Hollywood production to ever inspire nostalgia in me... because it got 1980s bicycle culture correct.
This is true except for us latchkey kids. Most of our parents didn't really care as long as we got home on time.
And made sure the whole house was cleaned daily so I could get a lousy ten bucks to go buy an Olivia Newton John Poster for that amount. ( During her "Physical" song era poster.
Load More Replies...Amazing how Gen X never grew up in cities eh? These things are never like "got chased by the glue-sniffing kids at the train station, mugged in the park, had our bikes nicked and got arrested for shoplifting." I mean, I did all the exploring derelict buildings and stuff too but come on. Statistically most of us grew up in cities.
I grew up in a city and we did all of this and more. If someone stole our bikes, we stole them back. We traveled in packs and fought other neighborhood "gangs". We played sports against these same "gangs" lol! It, definitely, was different from stories I heard from the "county" kids that I went to school with.
Load More Replies...I would have gone with the poster for the movie Stand By Me. That movie is set in the 50s but it's all about Gen-X.
Got into several fights, made up, played catch, hit caps with hammers, and drank from the hose.
Oh, mom knew what I was doing. Not the details, but she knew. As long as I was home by sundown, all was good.
We did this in the 60s too - the Moors murderers curtailed mine and my friends activities as they were active in the area I lived in.
This is why that generation grew up to be helicopter parents because they did all of this stuff!
My parents' house backed onto a state forest, so we just disappeared into the woods for hours at a time. There were no trails where we were other than those made by animals, but I could probably still find my way around in there with no problem.
It was the 70s & 80s. This is exactly what we did. If it made it to the 90s where you grew up, despite Gameboys and computers, I'm glad.
Load More Replies...What is going on in that picture? Kid 1 and 4 look okay, but Kid 2 has his arms blending into the bike and Kid 3 has no face. Maybe it's just my screen but I am sure that is AI generated. Or just my paranoia rearranging reality for me.
Stuff I did (a very long time ago) as a 6yo would get parents arrested today.
Yep, though we were all girls. The 70s and early 80s were pretty unisex if you lived in the country.
And hung out all day with people you never met before and would probably never see again.
Went into a experimental building, opened a interdimensional portal and fought against monsters
Yep...it was an adventure. As long as we were home when the street lights came on we were good. Hell...we were on the other side of town, drinking out of hoses, etc. This is the kind of childhood my kids have now. We live in a village in Germany and after homework is done, they're hanging out with friends. My daughter came home with a baby chick her name is May..🤣
I lived with extended family, my cousins were bullies.... during summer break rather than being at home with THEM all day I left, was gone from dawn to dusk... I just walked around the neighborhood. All day. My aunt refused to believe me that I was out walking.
I grew up in the early 70's but I remember doing that. Just going out in the woods and building a fire. With gas we'd stolen from Mr McKee's garage. A LOT of gas. Then we'd smoke cigarettes we'd pilfered from my friend's Dad. Then we'd climb a tree and try to pee down onto the fire. Then we'd get bored and probably didn't put the fire out properly, and leave while throwing rocks at each other, and practicing swearing. Ahh, the innocence of youth.
And that's why statistically speaking, things were more dangerous back in the day. Kids were getting lost and abducted all the time. There just wasn't Internet to made us aware
Nah, my Mum expected me to be up to much worse. She did some bizarre stuff as a kid!
They forgot 'Almost set the neighborhood on fire'. Lol. Damn, the 80s were just wilden so so hard.
Late 50s, early 60s. Miles away. Climbed over the barbed wire on the New Jersey tower of the George Washington Bridge. Went all the way to the top. Rode the tops of the elevators in my 18-story apartment building in New York City. Many adventures. Years later, my mom did even then not want to hear of what I got up to in my early life.
I confirm that I climbed across part of roof belonging to the neighbors across the roof. This was back in the 90s though.
Tried to find the quicksand in the gulch right behind my neighborhood, that same gulch where a 14 yr. old's murdered body was found a few years later. I found out a few years later that the killer lived near our neighborhood.
My mom thought my cousin and I were in the woods right behind my house. She was horrified when we took her to see where we were actually playing and had our fort. It was extremely far in the woods, at the edge of the salt marshes. She was also not pleased to find out we were always walking the railroad tracks!
It’s all good until someone gets seriously hurt. Then, not so much
Load More Replies...We would always ride to a gas station a few miles away to get candy on Saturdays!
Tried repeatedly to build a pool on an empty lot across from the basketball court.
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."
The Two Great Ones: William "Bill" S. Preston, Esq., and Ted "Theodore" Logan.
“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.
Well to be fair people back in the day really did look way older than their actual age!
Nope. It should be concrete, gravel and broken glass, not grass.
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.
"Well, the hurt doesn't show, but the pain still grows It's no stranger to you and me" Dun dun dun dun dun dun ...dundun
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.
Burgers & fries, ya want some burgers & fries, well there's some right here (don't you tell me no lies!)
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.
The look on airborne kid's face is "oh sh*t oh sh*t oh sh*t...look cool, act like this was what you meant to happen!!!
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.
Yep. She gave me nightmares. It was never a beautiful day in her neighborhood. .
Used to take the faceplate off, put it in it's box and stuff the box in the glove compartment. Fairly sure I'm not the only one!
We still have the one my grandmother made in the 50's. It was a popular ceramics class.
Just like booting that abandoned 10 y/o console and be shocked by the downgrade of graphics since the last time you played on it 😭
Note: this post originally had 95 images. It’s been shortened to the top 50 images based on user votes.
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All of this is lovely, though I still think growing up in the 90's was more fun... cause we had some of the best movies, music and video games ever created, plus the Cold War was over and we actually thought the world would be peaceful (oh, how wrong we were).
I will respectfully disagree about the music. 1970's music will never be beat.
Load More Replies...The author forgot to mention the threat of nuclear war was a real fear in the 80's.
As a Gen Z, I wish that I would’ve been able to experience all these.
They forgot the gum that came in a pack of hockey/baseball cards. It was so hard it shattered and tasted like soap for some reason. You still chewed it, it just tasted like soap.
As a Gen Z with Gen X parents, I know some of this stuff secondhand
She grew up in the 80s so was aware of what I did and didn’t care
Load More Replies...I think most of the people who looked at these are technology challenged and are probably from the '80's. They used the down arrow when I think they meant to up vote it!
All of this is lovely, though I still think growing up in the 90's was more fun... cause we had some of the best movies, music and video games ever created, plus the Cold War was over and we actually thought the world would be peaceful (oh, how wrong we were).
I will respectfully disagree about the music. 1970's music will never be beat.
Load More Replies...The author forgot to mention the threat of nuclear war was a real fear in the 80's.
As a Gen Z, I wish that I would’ve been able to experience all these.
They forgot the gum that came in a pack of hockey/baseball cards. It was so hard it shattered and tasted like soap for some reason. You still chewed it, it just tasted like soap.
As a Gen Z with Gen X parents, I know some of this stuff secondhand
She grew up in the 80s so was aware of what I did and didn’t care
Load More Replies...I think most of the people who looked at these are technology challenged and are probably from the '80's. They used the down arrow when I think they meant to up vote it!