this post was submitted on 09 Jan 2026
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[–] August27th@lemmy.ca 68 points 2 days ago (2 children)

As someone from the long long ago, it's funny seeing this post. For my generation, this has the same vibe as "of course smoking is bad for you", meanwhile the generation before mine was saturated in tobacco smoke and normalized tobacco culture. Sure, there was always an undercurrent that it was bad, but there wasn't the vehement rejection of it like today.

You could go back further again and do it with something like not wearing seatbelts. The value of seatbelts is obvious now, but it wasn't always part of the zeitgeist.

The same goes for fast food. We knew it wasn't great, but healthy eating awareness was hardly a thing back then, especially compared to what it is today. It is precisely because of things like Supersize Me raising awareness, (even ham-fistedly in retrospect) and changing the culture, that we get to call out that shit as obvious today.

You had to be there. You're welcome.

[–] shalafi@lemmy.world 15 points 2 days ago

People fought drunk driving measures, antilock brakes, seatbelts and airbags.

[–] tomenzgg@midwest.social 19 points 2 days ago

This was exactly my thought; feels similar to people's response to PSAs regarding forest fires: "you had to be told to put out camp fires or check they're fully put out?"

Clearly, history indicates that concepts don't stick unless drilled into "common cultural sense".