A commenter on yesterday’s post writes:
I don’t quite know what to say. I’m a millennial, and one who has hardly heard a song from the 80s (That I was aware of) but when I heard that last song on your list I felt… Something. It wasn’t nostalgia, it was… Nice if that describes it. It felt like a glimpse into the past, of a better time compared to the present times, despite the fact I don’t know the first thing about the 80s.
It makes me think of old computer games like Command and Conquer, and the classic Civ games.
This comment filled in a missing piece of the Gen Y – Millennial gap.
As often happens, I was too close to the issue to get the full perspective. The commenter helped me see the forest for the trees.
Why are Ys & older so nostalgia-prone, while Millennials tend to dwell in Year Zero?
Here’s what that comment tells me …
Our Millennial said the 80s style song made him feel something – not nostalgia, but a sense of something better that he found pleasant.
If you grew up in the 80s or before, you’ve always known on some level that art is just supposed to do that.
I totally missed that someone who grew up after Cultural Ground 0 wouldn’t have that transcendent experience of mainstream art.
Back in the day, you could expect a blockbuster film or top 40 song to at least elevate your emotions by pointing to higher things.
That’s what we lost.
That’s why people born before 1990 tend to get lost in nostalgia & gripe about Current Year entertainment.
It’s not just that everything’s corporate product. It always was. It’s that corps don’t even grasp for any higher reality in their art anymore. They deny it outright.
Even a bubblegum mall rock tune or schlocky buddy cop movie could invite reflection on friendship, patriotism, family, etc.
Because despite the looming threat of nuclear Armageddon, we took heart & kept faith that it would all turn out OK tomorrow.
But now that the US is the only superpower with no peer-level threats, we’re coming apart over manufactured bogeymen.
Because keeping faith means having it 1st. & we ditched Christ the second we thought the danger had passed.
And that is why no cultural revival can take place without a Christian revival in the West.
A read that is not only interesting, but helpful
