2015: The Back to the Future question

Cafe Society
1

So 2015 is (almost) here and one of inevitable questions is: would a 17 year old kid from 2015 (the real one, not the fictional one) have as much culture shock going back to 1985 as someone from 1985 had going back to 1955.

I submit that they would but that most people would say no. They would say no because most of us lived through those 30 years and saw the changes happen incrementally which makes them harder to see.

Admittedly there are some differences between the two shifts of 30 years. The ubiquity of home video since the 60s and 70s on would make 1985 seem less alien then 1955 seemed to a kid from 1985. But I think as people living in it, it is hard for us to remember just how much has changes. Not just technology but social attitudes and mores.

All this said, I hope no one ever makes this movie :slight_smile: but it is an interesting thing to think about.

2

The black president is cool with gay marriage for our homosexuals in uniform.

3

two words, no hover boards

4

I think the 60s brought such huge change that even going from 1975 to 1955 is a bigger shock than going from 2015 to 1975.

You do have a point about when living the years the changes seem to happen incrementally. I always thought of the 80s as being much like the present but without cell phones and the internet. Then I watch 80s TV shows and wonder if I lived in ancient times and didn’t realize it. I was also reminded that even growing up in the 80s, I lived in a segregated neighborhood. Not by law, but still by tradition. The streets named after Presidents were where the white folks lived and after you got past Washington to streets named after I don’t even know who(Mayo, Wiley?) that was the black neighborhoods. Our elementary school was on Washington St, so we’d all leave school in one big walking mass and at the traffic light the white kids would all turn right and the black kids would all turn left. Today, both sections are mostly Latino.

5

I think the change would be bigger for a teen today going back to 1985 than for a teen from 1985 going back to 1955. Both generations would have grown up with movies and television reruns showing life during the earlier period, so they’d have at least a little sense of the culture, music, clothes and language. The difference is that smartphones and the internet make information ubiquitous for basically every teen. Today’s 15-year-old was within arm’s reach of a cell phone the first time he left his parents’ side for an overnight trip. Now he carries a smartphone with internet access. He has never really lived when they couldn’t be reached by his friends or parents 24 hours per day, or where he couldn’t look up whatever information he needed at a moment’s notice. He would really feel isolated without these tools to rely on. To me, losing this would be a far greater culture shock than any incremental shift in societal attitudes towards gays, minorities, drugs or what have you over 30 years. These societal shifts also wouldn’t be too important when he’s dealing with only a small number of people in his trip and his pressing concern is how or if he will get home. Maybe he would be shocked at how gay people are treated in the past, but he probably wouldn’t notice because in his small universe, he’s unlikely to even come across an out gay person.

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The biggest shock would be the ubiquitousness of computers and digital technology - in 1985very few people had access to desktop computers at all, and today most people carry around little pocket phone/camera/computers that are immensely more powerful. Remember how Marty and Doc had to communicate by walkie-talkie? And old Marty was fired by fax machine? That seemed futuristic in 1985.

Back then, having a black *mayor *seemed progressive, never mind a black president.

7

The 60’s saw huge social changes the same way the 90’s saw huge technology changes.

1985 Marty going back to 1955 was mostly culture shock based on race relations and 1950’s attitudes on how teens should behave. The technology Marty took back was magical thanks to the transistor, but really not as advanced as we all thought it was back in the 80’s.

A teen travelling from today to 1985 wouldn’t notice nearly as much social difference. If anything he might be surprised at how much more freedom teens of that time had than what he was used to. It’s the technology gap that would cause the most dissonance.

1985 Marty wowed 1955 with a walkman, a digital watch, and a portable video camera. 2015 Marty would have all that + a video arcade + (a non working) telephone + movies + a picture book + (non working?) GPS + … all on one single device in his pocket. In 1985 it wouldn’t even be thought of to have one device with so many different functions.

As for which Marty would have more difficulty, I think the social changes are more significant to us as people. 1985 Marty is going to have more trouble fitting in amongst his peers in 1955 than 2015 Marty would fitting in amongst 1985 peers. Heck - 2015 Marty probably grew up watching “Saved by the Bell” so already knows how to dress and act!

8

I don’t think you’d say this if you were a black or gay teen, and you probably wouldn’t even say it if you were a girl teen. And I say this as someone who has been straight, white and male in 1955, 1985 and 2015.

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Technology made huge leaps from the 80s to the 90s. Our cell phones in the 90s did one thing: made calls, but we had them. We had email and the internet, even if it was slow as molasses dial-up. Digital cameras existed, but they were very expensive, so most people still used film, but they existed. TV was in color, and most households had at least two. Cars were built to be aerodynamic, not stylish (I drive a 1994 car, and it doesn’t look that different from other cars on the road). DVDs existed, although since DVRs didn’t, people still used VCR to record shows, so most people hadn’t made the switch.

None of those things existed in the 80s. People who really needed to keep in contact carried pagers, and when they went off, the person needed to find a pay phone. Computers still used floppy disks (5.25"), and most computers were sort of glorified typewriters. People used them for word processing, Quicken, and spreadsheet databases (like Excel). Some people played games on them, but they were either really simple, or had to be loaded from several disks. There were programs for making calendars or cards, if you had a bubble jet printer, and a (very expensive) scanner.

Going from 2015 to 1995 would be much easier than going to 1985-- not just incrementally easier, you know, like only 2/3 the burden, if you tried to quantify it; the extra 10 years would be more than 1/3 more of the burden. By the same token, I think that for someone born in 2000, who in 15 next years, there wouldn’t be that much difference between 1985 and 1975.

A lot would depend on whom he met. People adapted to technology differently. My parents did not have a VCR until 1987, and didn’t have a color TV until 1992, or a CD player until about 1998. They have never had internet in the home, although they had it at work in the 1980s. My mother didn’t get a cell phone until about 10 years ago; my father passed away before they were small and cheap.

My aunt and uncle, on the other hand, had color TV in the 70s, a VCR from about 1982, cell phones in the late 90s, a CD player practically as soon as they were available, and internet back in the AOL days.

10

Even “much like the present but without cell phones and the internet” is a huge change. Take a random sampling of old movies, and take a count of how many of them would have the entire premise destroyed if everyone in them had cell phones. People not only didn’t use to be in constant communication; they would have considered the very concept to be bizarre. And that’s before we even factor in that most of those cell phones are also supercomputers.

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My brother and I were bored once after dinner when we were visiting our mother, and we were ticking off movies that would be five minutes long if cell phones, GPS or the internet had existed.

Most of the are suspense/thriller/mystery movies:

Wait Until Dark
Psycho
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
The Blair Witch Project

…and on and on…

12

You make a good point. I was imagining someone like our prototypical Marty McFly, that is a young, straight, white male traveling back to a largely homogeneous community where he didn’t stand out. A black teen traveling back 30 years to a white community would probably face a much bigger culture shock going from '85 to '55 than from 2015 to ‘85. A gay teen would probably understand that he would face even bigger discrimination 30 years ago, regardless of whether he landed in 1985 or 1955. Don’t forget that 1985 was the height of the AIDS panic and few people were publicly advocating for decent treatment of gay people, let alone anything that would approach today’s greater acceptance of gay peoples’ right to live their lives with respect and dignity. I’m not sure that a gay teen landing in 1955 would fare worse than one landing in 1985.

Why do you think a (white, straight) teen girl would be significantly more likely to experience culture shock when going back to 1955?

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Jesse Jackson was a major candidate just the year before. Even at the time, I believe that most people thought the idea of a black president wasn’t too far off in the future.

Same thing with gay rights. It was something that was talked about in the media. It didn’t have a lot of support, but I think if you asked the average joe in 1985, he would probably concede that gays would have many rights, including serving in the military. Gay marriage would probably cause a few eyerolls, although even from the opponents (probably 90% in 1985) they would see it as an inevitable consequence of wider acceptance of homosexuality.

So, those two things might cause some conversation, I don’t think they would be things which absolutely shocked anyone. Either way, political issues of the day probably wouldn’t be more than a side note in any conversations our 2015 Marty would have in 1985.

I am with other posters in agreeing that computers, instant access to information, and cell phones would be the main difference. Smoking in public places would be something else. Imagine 2015 Marty visiting someone in a hospital:

2015 Marty: "Geez, you guys are smoking in here? This is a hospital! Nurse! These guys are smoking in a hospital!

Nurse: Yeah? So?

Other things:

  1. attitudes towards seat belts. 2015 Marty gets in a car and buckles up. His 1985 buddies call him a pussy for wearing his seat belt.

  2. Younger drinking age. Marty could be out with 18 year olds legally buying booze.

  3. 55 mph speed limit. “Son, do you know how fast you were going? Sure, officer, only 70! Son, that’s again’ the law.”

  4. Maybe concealed carry permits. "What the hell is a concealed carry permit? Only cops can carry guns!

  5. 24 hour stores. “Stores are closed? Let’s just go to Wal-Mart…What the hell is a Wal-Mart?”

5a) Blue laws. All stores closed on Sunday morning.

  1. Caller ID. “Just call my phone so I will have your number on the caller ID…What in the hell is caller ID”?

  2. Area Code Dialing. “You only gave me 7 numbers. How am I supposed to call you?”

  3. 911 Emergency Dialing. Remember those old stickers on the phone with all of the different emergency numbers?

  4. Jesse Ventura or Arnold on TV. “Hey, he’s gonna be governor!..Yea, kid, that’ll be the day.”

  5. Comments on the Cold War…“The Soviet Union, they just folded…Sure, kid, the Russkies just gave up. Tell me another one!”

  6. Talking about text messaging…“You mean in the future, you have a phone that can fit in your hand, on which you can call anyone at anytime, with video, but you are just going to type messages on that tiny keyboard? Sure kid, whatever.”

There’s probably quite a few more. Like another poster said, we just don’t realize the changes because we lived through them incrementally.

14

Oh, coffee:

Marty walks into a coffee shop…

Order taker: You want coffee?
Marty: Yes, I’ll have a grande latte double espresso mocha Irish latte.
Order taker: Son, I don’t know what the hell you just said. We have regular and decaf.

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Earlier thread. My post is #50: How would Marty find the real 2015? - Cafe Society - Straight Dope Message Board

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Even today’s movies get around that with no cell reception or dead batteries. Seems that people in horror movies never charge their phones.

17

Funny how often that happens: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIZVcRccCx0

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You’re a straight, white, teenage girl in 1955.

Want to play high school sports? There’s volleyball, and maybe, if you’re school is really up to date, intramural girls basketball.

Want to run for class president? You can’t. That’s for boys only (in my high school that was a codified rule right up into the '70s.) You can be class secretary.

Want to take physics or calculus? Why not take home economics? That will give you a skill you can use.

Want to go to college? Okay. You can be a teacher, an assistant bookeeper or a nurse. Of course, you’ll quit your job after you get married, but it’s good to have a fallback in case your husband dies. Just be sure to work on your typing and shorthand.

Want to date? Don’t be ridiculous, you’re 15. And God forbid when you’re a couple of years older and you get pregnant like that slut down the street did. You’ll be expelled from school and be told either to marry the boy or get sent off “to visit your aunt” for six months.

I’m sure I’m missing a few things. That’s my sisters’ era, not mine.

19

2015’s teens would curl up and die in 1985 when they realized they can’t be connected 24/7.

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I think they would be relieved. Working with teenagers, I think the biggest challenge they face is that they are connected 24/7. Many of them would like to disconnect, but they fear the social repercussions. Imagine in 1985, not sitting in the lunchroom with your usual circle of friends. That is what today’s kids face every minute of every day. They never get a break – never get away. I think a modern kid would love the opportunity to disconnect.

I’m sure glad I didn’t grow up with the constant online culture.