“Interesting!
I think that as a little girl I was far more innocent than children of the same age now.Our pleasures were far more simple and expectations lower.
As a little girl I played for hours on the street with my friends, we played hide and seek, block and always had our skipping ropes with us.I watched very little television just Blue Peter and Magpie,when the weather wasn't so good I had friends to play at home, this was when Tressy and Barbie came out!
As an adult now looking back on that time it was good, the only person I remember who was predatory was a man involved with Church groups, he was creepy and as a result I was not allowed to become involved in any activities the Church organised! I never asked why, I just accepted it.
Today many of our children are far too spoilt and have not been allowed a traditional childhood, in years to come I fear we will be reading about social networking sites and the damage they have caused.”

“Better in some ways and not others. I find most people to be very selfish, greedy and inconsiderate nowadays and care only about money/possessions and what they can get from others. On the plus side Britain as a whole is more liberal (apart from Hull which at least 20 years behind everywhere else) and our cities are about a million times better than they used to be. Up until the early 90's most city centres were completely dead after 5pm and on Sundays.”

“Up until the early 90's most city centres were completely dead after 5pm and on Sundays

Yes and now they are full of drunks.”

“I think we do tend to look through spectacles rose-tinted with nostalgia - particularly when it comes to childhood. And no matter when you were born it seems the older generation believes the next one is being spoilt. There is a quote, attributed to Socrates: "The children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise".
On a more mundane, less erudite level, I clearly remember my nana saying how much we got for our birthdays was ridiculous and complaining because my sister was allowed to leave her vegetables.
When I was growing up, we did have more freedom - there is too much traffic in the part of the city in which we live for them to wander as freely as I did - but my children still play hide and seek, block 1-2-3, ride bikes, skip and explore outside for hours. Their lives are enriched further by the technology that is also available - they like snakes and ladders but I can hardly blame them for finding exciting, fast-paced computer games entertaining too.
When I was at school, there was massive economic upheaval and huge unemployment: many of my friends' parents were out of work (this was the 80s) and, looking back, there must have been lots of people struggling to get by.
Lots more children lived in poverty, with few choices and little opportunity to change their circumstances. Smacking ie hitting a child was not just tolerated but seen as a totally acceptable way of making your children do as you wished - and people turned a blind eye to many forms of domestic abuse. Inter-racial and same sex relationships were generally feared or mocked
The "good old days" were not so good for a lot of people.”

“I think every generation thinks that their childhood was better than any, before or since. My dad was eight when the war started. With all the horror stories we hear of those times it`s hard to think it could be anything other than horrific. My dad had a whale of a time, full of excitement and adventure. According to him, the only time he got upset was when the sweet shop got bombed and he soon got over it when he remembered there was another one further down the street.
I had a fabulous childhood. The freedom to play, not only in the street but to wander further afield aswell.
It`s only when I sit and really think deeply about it that I remember that all was not so rosey. The days were not all filled with sunshine. I do remember long, boring, wet sunday`s with nothing to do
I was born in the mid 50`s. The time when we were told we had never had it so good. So good that we often had ice on the inside of the bedroom windows in winter. We had one coal fire in the living room and if you opened a door all the heat rushed out and left you freezing. When coal got really expensive my mum and dad bought a two bar electric fire. The only way I could get warm was to sit almost on top of it and well remember my mum rushing in from the kitchen because she could smell my cardi scorching.
There was almost full employment in those days but wages were poor. Although we were always well fed and well dressed, I know it was hard to make the housekeeping last until the next payday.
We were the lucky ones in as much as we got a weeks holiday in a caravan at Withernsea. A lot of my friends never even had a day out.
Although there was a benefits system in place, it wasn`t anything like what it is now. You got dole and you could qualify for national assistance but from what I`ve heard since, most people were too ashamed to claim it and it was means tested anyway. There was alot of poverty around then. I well remember one lad in my class coming to school during what could possibly be the winter of `63, in plimsolls and no socks (and short trousers) He came from a very large family and I think it was first up got the pick of the clothes. I`ll never forget the state of his feet and calves. Red and purple with chilblains poor lad. I`m sure there was inadequate parenting aswell come to think of it.
We had paedophiles during my childhood too, I was only 7 or 8 when Myra Hindly and Ian Brady hit the headlines and we were always being told about bad men and not to go off with strangers.
In conclusion I think it`s natural that we all feel that we had the best of times simply because we were children and were not concerned with the politics or hardships of life. And that`s just how it should be.”

“I agree with most of the sentiments on here. I think people have rose-tinted glasses, in particular about their childhood. I remember the 80's and recall it being quite a miserable time actually. Very high unemployment and much more widespread, serious poverty than people experience in Britain today. The drabness of many cities also stuck in my mind (of course there had been little or no regeneration apart from in London perhaps). Now most cities are full of swanky bars and restaurants, posh shops and pavement cafes, in the 70's, 80's and even early 90's there were none. Cities were very boring and grim in those days and who could forget those horrid deck access council flats everywhere? Most of those went in the 80's.”

“As parents we can only compare to our own childhood, whenever that may have been.
I used to walk to school from the age of 7, nowadays you HAVE to be picked up.
We would play out for hours with our friends from school, now all the fields are fenced off, roads like motorways and after school activities paid for.

A telephone, a thing in the hall, with a wriggly wire, a camera something your dad owned, now children as young as 5 with a mobile and able to record their lives on it too in video or as a jpeg.
A time when an accident on the road or at work was just that, nowadays...well you all know solicitors, when back in the day.. they used to do important stuff in a court or do divorces!
When a trip to the library was an event, information from the Encyclopaedia and indisputable, now the internet....
When employment was high, but still that thinking that living off the state was a bad thing, my mother never allowed us to get free school meals, saving pennies so we were not looked upon as being "needy", nowadays....
Games (That meant playing football, netball, rugby and rounders, that cross country run) and PE at school, music lessons and O levels and sports day, now reduced to joining in , fluffy exercise and course work.

Old school, get out work or fail. Nowadays lets just keep everyone in school, 6th form turned to college, university almost a need rather than an aspiration, don't work keep learning and 4 years later, you can become manager at McD rather than a server.

Rose tinted glasses, no. Hankering for traditional values, yes.”

“So much good common sense expressed here. So then how can our leaders have got the political/economic/financial/social changes of the last 50yrs so completely wrong?

Drugs are the scourge of our communities and that includes leafy suburbia as well as the grimy inner-cities. Health and Safety has become a barrier to economic expansion as investors are frightened off by the dead hand of inspectors and employees who know their rights.

Our education system has become nothing more than a political football. The Tories want change just because Labour wanted one thing.

Education was once the jewel in Hull's crown. I know that in the 50's and 60's children were more deferential but the fact that Hull had so many selective schools from Hull GS to the College of Art there was a place for everyone. We all thrived and came out of school at 14,15,16 or 18 with a sense of purpose and an ability to take the next step. Let's make Education a politics free zone.

The Police and the upkeep of Law and Order is a near impossible job to do given that so many people are willing to take advantage of a No Win, No Fee legal system. That system has led to the demise of Legal Aid and the huge increase in cost of the insurance you and I all pay for everyday services.

Transport is a near joke. Try getting from Hedon to N.Cave at any daylight hour. Try getting from Hull to London at any time whether it be by rail, car or air. We are an island with such an antiquated infrastructure that I despair. But it need not be like this. We have a a good canal sytem and numerous rivers that are navigable. Our railways could be updated very simply and ELECTRIFIED. Just look at France and Germany. Take the heavy goods away from our ailing motorways and we would all significantly benefit.

Where has our national confidence gone? We fought 2 World Wars, numerous colonial engagements and won. The USA would have us believe that without their help we would have struggled but they do tend to overstate their contribution. Hollywood makes good films but poor history.

America is our great nemesis. Yes, we have stood shoulder to shoulder in times of war but somehow they've always come out of it better than us. Lend-Lease from the last war was a success for the Americans we paid every last penny back even though we were impoverished by doing so. Our culture has been sullied by their values and attitudes. We have more in common with our near continental neighbours than the people of the USA. Never forget that.”