Which decade would you choose?

[Gradine]

But, thanks to Morrus's stipulation that you can't act on knowledge of the future, you CAN'T give your younger self that advice....

Ah, the stipulation was that I can't use my knowledge of the future for my advantage. My intervention has already created a separate timeline which I am bound to live out on my own. No reason I should let this timeline's version of me suffer through what I had to.

I think every one has contemplated giving advise to ones younger self.

That scenario I agree is pretty common. The rarity I mentioned is in contemplating how you would react if your future self visited you, and they had a different gender identity and expression from you. For younger me, it would have answered some questions, but raised so, so many more.

 

[schneeland]

Pretty easily the 90s. The wall in Berlin is down and Germany just re-unified, but social security nets are still pretty tight and you can still hope to buy a house with a middle class income. Also IT is starting to spread, so my skills are not totally useless.
On the media side, there's solid video games, Goth Rock&Metal, some TV shows which I remember fondly, and playing Shadowrun is still cool.
And on top of that, I actually get to enjoy it more since I am no longer an angsty teenager.

 

[Zsong]

1920s. I like the music and the elegance. Cars were becoming mainstream. Lots of art and men were men. Apollo was making it big. Lots of great art movements. And I love the farming life and rural life too. Lots of great bluegrass music being developed. Too bad the 1930s had to follow it.

 

[Sacrosanct]

That’s the second post now where someone said “when men were men”. What does that even mean? Having grown up on a farm, and spent time in the military, I have an idea of what it’s usually meant to refer to (none of it good), but I don’t want to make assumptions.

 

[Ryujin]

That’s the second post now where someone said “when men were men”. What does that even mean? Having grown up on a farm, and spent time in the military, I have an idea of what it’s usually meant to refer to (none of it good), but I don’t want to make assumptions.

Presumably when toxic masculinity was the norm and "wimmin knew their place."

 

[dragoner]

Makes me think of the old compilation record in the 80's: "When Men Were Men, and Sheep Were Scared" When Men Where Men...And Sheep Were Scared - Bemisbrain Records 1985

 

[MarkB]

Makes me think of the old compilation record in the 80's: "When Men Were Men, and Sheep Were Scared" When Men Where Men...And Sheep Were Scared - Bemisbrain Records 1985

Makes me think of the Douglas Adams Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy quote describing the old days of the galactic empire. "Men were real men, women were real women and small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri were real small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri."

 

[dragoner]

Makes me think of the Douglas Adams Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy quote describing the old days of the galactic empire. "Men were real men, women were real women and small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri were real small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri."

Yes! I remember that, he had the same sort of energy saying that. It is an expression past its expiration date.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

The other thing about "Real men etc." is that it reminds me, that once you go past a certain period, and that period varies by location, one's behaviour, as a man or a woman, becomes more narrowly constrained by social norms. Stepping outside those norms could be dangerous. Unless one had money, the wealthy were allowed their little peccadilloes.

 

[Orius]

None of them. I wouldn't want to give up the conveniences of modern technology for anything the 20th century had to offer, even if the current culture wars make me sick.

The 80s would probably be my choice if I were forced kicking and screaming, but that's probably just childhood nostalgia talking before I was too young to notice real problems in the world.

The 90s? Overrated. Too many squandered opportunities and mistakes from world leaders which just laid the foundation for today's problems. The initial Internet bubble just masked underlying problems under a false veneer of prosperity.

As for the rest, forget it.

1900s? Still culturally in the abominable 19th Century. Teddy Roosevelt is the decade's only saving grace.

1910s? WWI. 'Nuff said.

1920s? Better than most, assuming you live in the Anglosphere or even France. You don't want to live in Russia, or China, or Germany, or just about anywhere else though. And things do not end well at all. It's also 100 years ago at this point, and I wouldn't want to go that far back.

1930? Worst decade without a World War. The Depression, the rise of fascism, Stalin running the Soviet Union into the ground, Japan rampaging through a civil war torn China; who the hell in their right mind would want to live in this decade?

1940s? WWII. 'Nuff said.

1950s? Decent amount of postwar prosperity, but American culture is dominated by stodgy buttheads. Okay, I'm white, straight, male, and not a liberal, so I'd probably fare better than others, but I don't have a rosy eyed nostalgic view of the 50s. And it's still 70 years back, so everything is woefully outdated for me. America the only place you want to be, because everyone else is rebuilding from WWII, decolonizing, or behind the Iron Curtain. Well, there's Canada too I guess. Maybe Australia and New Zealand as well.

1960s? Gag. Rising social unrest, Vietnam, hippies, and other various problems combined with a culture that mostly sucked. And then by the end, all the pstwar prosperity is over.

1970s? Even worse than the 60s. Stagflation and other economic problems galore, Watetgate and its aftermath, the energy crises, a total lack of style from EVERYONE (the 80's doesn't get a free pass on style at ALL though, WTF was that decade thinking!?) disco and so on. I had the misfortune of being born in this horrid armpit of a decade.

So yeah, the 20th century was probably still on of the best centuries since H. sapiens "evolved*", but I wouldn't want to return to it, at least not blind. Gray's Sports Almanac style cheating is the only way I'd want to do it, though I'd likely go stocks instead (sell in 1987 and then again in 1999!) Or have fun rampaging in New York's real estate market at the time where I can enjoy the sublime pleasure of stomping on people like Donald Trump and Leona Helmsley. But I'm the kind of guy you would not want to give a time machine to, because I would deliberately start screwing with the timeline everywhere.

Note that some of this is very much tongue in cheek.

*"Evolved" in the sense one should expect from a very cynical misanthrope who notes with disdain and contempt how much human behavior is not at all far removed from the rest of the apes.