• FirstToServe [they/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Someone who wasn't alive at the time simply will not be able to understand how totally it took over all of culture and identity.

    • Aryuproudomenowdaddy [comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I have a vivid memory of a girl I knew coming to school with red white and blue clothes and wearing U.S. flag facepaint while she walked around sobbing, this was on the west coast and I'm almost positive she knew no one who was there.

    • commiecapybara [he/him, e/em/eir]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I remember being on sites like Neopets, and they were full of people drawing pictures of their digital animal characters saluting the American flag while a single tear drifts down their face. It was utterly bizarre.

      • Frogmanfromlake [none/use name]
        ·
        3 years ago

        Neopets was a bizarre place overall back in the day. I still remember JazzInvincible being a celebrity of sorts and some guy named Matt making threads announcing his arrival getting several hundred replies.

    • came_apart_at_Kmart [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I was alive, unemployed and 21 at the time. I remember going to a professional office-type job interview not long after and the hiring manager was talking about the dress code for casual Fridays and said no racist language/imagery, unless it's against Muslims or Arabs. guy was like 45, married, kids and dead serious.

      I remember thinking, as a dumb young adult who expected real adults to still be in charge, "is that really what we're taking away from this event?"

      it turns out, it was.

      • FirstToServe [they/them]
        ·
        edit-2
        3 years ago

        In the before times you would only really see the US flag at post offices and schools. Maybe a flagpole in a strip mall. But only because McDonald's wanted to fly their flag and it would be weird alone.

        • HauntedBySpectacle [he/him, comrade/them]
          ·
          3 years ago

          As a zoomer I'm kinda shocked by this. Americans being weepy flagwavers who display it anywhere they can just feels in-character to me, I never would've thought it wasn't in front of people's houses and shit back then.

          • Ho_Chi_Chungus [she/her]
            hexagon
            ·
            3 years ago

            Yeah I just can't imagine Americans in the 90s not being 24/7 turbo jingos

          • FirstToServe [they/them]
            ·
            edit-2
            3 years ago

            People would have one in their closet to put out on like veteran's day or the 4th. You'd be a little weird having it out otherwise. There'd be like one guy at the town fireworks display who had a flag shirt. Couldn't figure out if they were rah rah about the country or the picnic.

          • commiecapybara [he/him, e/em/eir]
            ·
            3 years ago

            Would it shock you to know that we used to be able to meet people at the gate in airports, without having to go through security?

        • huf [he/him]
          ·
          3 years ago

          lol what no

          i was in the US in about 1998 and it was full of flags. the amount of flags was already ridiculous.