WE LOVE THE ‘80S
But Why The ‘80s Specifically?
I was born in 1996. However, if I time-traveled to the 1980s in a plutonium-powered Delorean, I think I would still have a relatively comfortable familiarity with the culture. I grew up listening to music from this era, which still plays constantly on classic rock stations. I played ’80s retro arcade games at my local movie theater. The movies of this time were so integral to my growing up that I could quote many of them.
Normally, we develop nostalgia for an era that rises and falls with little snaps of popularity coming back. However, it seems that ’80s nostalgia has gone on for my entire life. This era percolates through our current media: Stranger Things, Wonder Woman 1984, Black Mirror’s Bandersnatch episode, etc.
Fine, so we like the ’80s. Why this decade specifically?
Let’s consider the decades that are game for nostalgia. In her video “Stranger Things, IT, and the Upside Down of Nostalgia”, YouTuber and film critic Lindsay Ellis brings attention to the “30-year cycle”. She believes that the 30-year cycle, as opposed to a 20- or 40-year cycle, carries more relevance to it because it “reflects filmmakers, now probably parents themselves, portraying their vision of their own childhood.” Those who are experienced enough to make media, not just consume it, gravitate towards the era of their formative years and idealize it. They take what they may remember fondly and thus want to recreate. In turn, this attracts a consumer base that also shares that same nostalgia for their “childhood era” coupled with children and teenagers attracted to this idealized portrayal of it.
My generation is coming into the “nostalgia age”, with 1990 being 30 years ago. However, are we going to see media that looks fondly on the dot.com craze, the post-Cold War politics, grunge, flannel, and beanie babies?
There is a little smattering of ’70s nostalgia going on right now. Disco is making a comeback — artists like Dua Lipa and Doja Cat released hits in the past year that allude to the genre with high-pitched strings and up-tempo beats. Doja’s music video for “Say So” even captures ’70s disco culture. Still, the nostalgia for the ’70s is nothing like it ever was for the ‘80s.
Let’s go back to the ’80s for a minute. Compared to the ’90s, this period was easy to define — there was something uniquely ’80s about the ’80s. As journalist Amy Merrick writes in her New Yorker article “The Commercial Allure of the 1980s”, she believes that “this might have something to do with the fragmentation and the proliferation of media, and with the fact that so much of our cultural experience is now virtual rather than physical.” Clothing trends, music choices, television, and any other form of media may still evolve throughout the years, but nothing seems tied to a specific decade anymore as 80s culture did. With each year coming up with a new iPhone, clothing trends not being dictated by a particular brand as heavily as they did in the ’80s, and everything evolving so gradually yet so constantly with the aid of technology and media, there is no explicit, say, “naughties vibe” aside from maybe references you’ll find on South Park and that Britney Spears song that takes you back to the days of frosted tips and ripped jeans.
The ’80s can’t seem to go away not just because “they were so awesome!” It was a period where marketability ruled the landscape — the branding, the Reaganesque enthusiasm to buy and sell in a recovering post-Carter economy, the desire to appeal to the teenage demographic always eager to spend their mall job-earned cash.
I think that this nostalgia is dying down. The ’80s love may die a slow death, but as the generation that would be truly nostalgic for this time period ages more, a new generation is going to take its place. After the endurance of the Great Recession, polarizing Trump years, and COVID-19 pandemic and so much more, our generation may be entering a period of re-energized optimism. People are quitting the “9-to-5, 40-year” job plan for the freelance life and startup companies. New apps mean new ways to be entertained and exposed to cultural trends. It has never been easier to share our voices with podcasts, YouTube, Soundcloud, and social media.
When entering this article, I wondered if the “happiness” of the ’80s is what kept the nostalgia alive. I think, too, that we were in need of an escape to a “more fun” time, ignoring the fact that the ’80s still had its dark moments (massive drug use, AIDS, Cold War tensions, etc.). While that may still be part of the case, there’s more to the picture than that. They may have seemed like a “funner” time — they were also an easy escape.
Nostalgia will move more easily now with better technology at our disposal to do so. However, I hope that we’re taking off our rose-tinted Ray-Bans and ready to look at a new era.
Welcome to the 2020s. Let’s enjoy the ride.
