Teenagers across the Decades

I asked this question once in an away message and I got a few responses, so I figured that I'd post it on my blog.

If you could choose to be a teenager in any decade, which would it be?

The 20s? Be a flapper in the roaring twenties, and defiant to mainstream culture. The jazz age, women's suffrage, literature surplus with Hemingway, TS Eliot, and Fitzgerald, prohibition and bootlegging, and the Harlem Renaissance.

The 30s? Great Depression, conservativism, Gone with the Wind, King Kong, The Wizard of Oz, Technicolor, gangsters like Al Capone, comic books, the start of radio, television and animation.

The 40s? A world divided: WWII, Jackie Robinson in baseball, Frank Sinatra, Humphrey Bogart, Marlon Brando, Katharine Hepburn, Walt Disney, Nat King Cole, Bing Crosby, and Casablanca.

The 50s? The rise of suburbia and the "ideal" family, Korean and Cold War, the Baby Boom, the rise of rock with Elvis Presley and others, the rise of Hollywood and movie-making known as the "Golden Age," the Beatniks, Jack Kerouac and William S. Burroughs, and basebell with Yogi Berra and Micky Mantle.

The 60s? The Civil Rights Movement, Vietnam War, the first space orbit and computer games, spiritual developments, drug use rises, and the rise of the "hippies" with the Summer of Love, Woodstock, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Grateful Dead, the Doors, the Velvet Underground, Andy Warhol, and Bob Dylan.

The 70s? Continuation of the "hippies," increasing numbers of students inhabit college universities, rise of the nuclear family, Kung Fu movies, disco, reggae music of Bob Marley, punk music from the Ramones and Sex Pistols, and the rise of legendary rock bands like Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, Aerosmith, the Eagles, Van Halen, the Who, Boston, Heart, Rush, and Deep Purple.

The 80s? The Berlin Wall comes down, alcohol and drug education increases, the rise of the information age with computers and electronics, video games like Donkey Kong and PacMan, MTV, rap and hip hop music, radical fashion statements, big hairstyles, and a new switch to electronica sounds of music from Madonna, Prince, and Michael Jackson, as well as glam metal and big hair bands like Guns n Roses, Motley Crue, Def Leppard, Queen, and Bon Jovi.

The 90s? HIV awareness, the internet, environmentalism, entrepreneurship, individualism, overalls, tattoos, flanel shrits, ying yangs, smiley faces, skateboarding, the Real World, Nintendo and Sega, techno and teen pop music soars, increase in rap and hip hop, and grunge music from Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Alice in Chains, Stone Temple Pilots, The Smashing Pumpkins, Bush, and Soundgarden.

The 00s? Terrorism, global warming, rise of cell phones, digital world, telecommunications, Iraq War, cell phones, pop music, music downloading, Emo music, HBO, reality TV, etc.

Which would you choose?

(If you get really deep with it, think about what else you would live through if you chose to be a teenager during those times, but, don't forget the question at hand: which decade would have been the coolest, best experience to be a teenager during the span of years?)