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Family tries to party like it's 1986

mmntech

mmntech

Lifer
Shirking technology by going back to the era of rampant conspicuous consumption.

A family of four from Guelph, Ont., has banished cell phones and computers, donned cut-off jeans and combed out their mullets, vowing to live the low-tech life for a year.

Blair McMillan, his partner Morgan Patey, and their two sons Trey, 5, and Denton, 2, are playing an elaborate game of make-believe, pretending it is the year 1986 — the year Blair and Morgan were born.

They even dress the part, with mullets for the three boys, an 80s-inspired hairstyle for Morgan, a true Tom Selleck Magnum P.I. moustache for Blair and vintage clothing for all.

'My 5-year-old would almost associate family with what mobile phone they had in their pockets.'
—Blair McMillan, father

"No cell phones, no computers, no internet. I basically wanted to mold it around my household when I was growing up," McMillan told The Morning Edition host Craig Norris on Thursday.

"I used to live outside, playing outside, and I realized how different my kids are."

Father worried
He said he noticed a number of "red flags" watching his kids grow up tethered to technology and decided he needed to take action.

"Our two-year-old was able to swipe and mimic us on the cell phone, which they do a lot, but he was learning how to play the games because Trey would always be playing the games," said McMillan.

"My 5-year-old would almost associate family with what mobile phone they had in their pockets. Say, for instance, an uncle would come and he knew he had an iPhone, he would see him, do a quick hello and reach into his pocket because he would want to play on his mobile games."

Children vulnerable to smartphone, tablet addictions
The family packed up their tablets, phones, computers and DVDs in plastic tubs and stowed them, along with three flat screen TVs, in Blair's parents' cellar.

Out of comfort zone
Blair says he now wakes up to AM sports radio in the morning, the family sits down and has breakfast together and the kids play in the backyard with the family dog after school.

"We're just always actively doing something. I think before, I was guilty myself — you just get in a comfort zone. You pop on the TV; we have 24-hour cartoon stations now; you pop on a cartoon for the kids... that's what kind of happens."

The McMillans will stay stuck in 1986 until next April. Blair says it was now or never.

"A lot of the technologies we use, rotary phone — those things, are kind of on the verge of being extinct so maybe if I wanted to do this project in five years I might not even be able to do it."
Click to expand...
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitch...013/09/05/kw-retro-family-blair-mcmillan.html
 
BORN in 86?! Kids... :^D

Unless they were Amish, they didn't lead a disconnected life. 1986 was almost yesterday, and the only thing really different was the lack of pervasive internet. Everything else had technological equivalents, even if they were a bit more primitive.
 
Pretty cool honestly. I hope it works well for them. And hey,they can still get down with some c64 and nes action.
 
Haha cool. I always thought how weird would it be to pretend like its 2000 again, no iPod, 56k internet (for me), pentium II 333mhz and playing pharoah + C&C 95/RA1 constantly on the PC. Actually watching TV as well, BBC2 for star trek + simpsons. :awe:
 
lxskllr said:
BORN in 86?! Kids... :^D

Unless they were Amish, they didn't lead a disconnected life. 1986 was almost yesterday, and the only thing really different was the lack of pervasive internet. Everything else had technological equivalents, even if they were a bit more primitive.
Click to expand...

foghorn67 said:
Rotary phones were dead in 86. Not extinct, but not even my grandparents had those anymore.
Click to expand...

Both of these things. To me, the cutoff should be switch from vacuum tubes to transistors, the building of the interstates, and lots of rural areas with no electricity.

Still, it is cool what they are doing and it is no secret that people glued to smart phones and tablets is on the rise.

Edit: seems appropriate
 
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It's still only a measure (his childhood) of intervention. He still wakes up to AM radio. What about waking up to a wind up alarm clock? (My parents used to have one of those. 2 bells & loud as !%$%) He still has a phone. How about ditching electrically powered devices altogether??

(Although admittedly the internet is the biggest problem with this stuff)
 
The other big thing besides the internet and cellphones that's different is that now you can pay for everything everywhere with your debit card.
 
lxskllr said:
BORN in 86?! Kids... :^D

Unless they were Amish, they didn't lead a disconnected life. 1986 was almost yesterday, and the only thing really different was the lack of pervasive internet. Everything else had technological equivalents, even if they were a bit more primitive.
Click to expand...

It was a huge difference. You didn't have 4 cell phones. You had one house phone and could only be reached there. That alone makes a big difference. You didn't have GPS to fiddle with. You didn't have computers (unless you're a nerd back then). Even then it didn't have internet. You didn't have 5 huge TV's in every room. The TV may have only had 12 channels not 700 channels. You didn't have on demand videos in every room, or DVR. You had to go down and rent one. Which wouldn't happen a super lot. It was a big deal and the whole family would at least watch together.

Change all that and it's a massive change in lifestyle. Without detailing it all you basically don't have every single person distracted doing different things constantly and living totally separate lives within a house. You have to be social or you'd be bored. Much more free time too. And all that cost a lot more money. Buying new phones and that many plans, new computers all the time, 5 new bigger TV's, cable internet bills, huge satellite TV bills, etc
 
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T9D said:
It was a huge difference. You didn't have 4 cell phones. You had one house phone and could only be reached there. That alone makes a big difference. You didn't have GPS to fiddle with. You didn't have computers (unless you're a nerd back then). Even then it didn't have internet. You didn't have 5 huge TV's in every room. The TV may have only had 12 channels not 700 channels. You didn't have on demand videos in every room, or DVR. You had to go down and rent one. Which wouldn't happen a super lot. It was a big deal and the whole family would at least watch together.

Change all that and it's a massive change in lifestyle. Without detailing it all you basically don't have every single person distracted doing different things constantly and living totally separate lives within a house. You have to be social or you'd be bored. Much more free time too. And all that cost a lot more money. Buying new phones and that many plans, new computers all the time, 5 new bigger TV's, cable internet bills, huge satellite TV bills, etc
Click to expand...

People are always distracted. They just get distracted doing different things now than they did then. You could say some distractions are better than others, but there is a reason why technology has become the prevalent "entertainment" of the present.

Not only that. They put their kids in mullets? Really? That wasn't even cool then.
 
Kadarin said:
The other big thing besides the internet and cellphones that's different is that now you can pay for everything everywhere with your debit card.
Click to expand...
This I don't get. Standing in line at the convenience store and watching customer after customer put $2-3 purchases on their debit cards. Reward credit cards I would understand but the totally cashless approach to life seems more trouble than it's worth.

That said, the nation-wide ATM network is an incredible advance that didn't exist in 1986. ATMs existed well before then but they weren't all linked up.
 
foghorn67 said:
Rotary phones were dead in 86. Not extinct, but not even my grandparents had those anymore.
Click to expand...

There's still one in my parents basement in a box. We used to use it as a second phone.

Do rotary phones even still work anymore? Wonder what would happen if I plugged it into my VOIP box.
 
Those kids don't need interwebs and iphones to survive. Give them a NES for a year with Zelda, super mario brothers and ninja gaiden and they'll be just fine.
 
OK, I just watched the whole video. I think that is pretty awesome. My son is only 2, but he is already a zombie when it comes to Youtube or watching Angry Birds cartoons on my iPhone. We were watching a cartoon on Youtube the other day while I was feeding him and he started freaking out and finally leaned over and pointed to the "Skip Ad" button on the screen because I wasn't paying attention to his cartoon 😀 While those are easy babysitting tools, I totally agree with this guy - it's not the way you really want your kids to grow up, being screen addicts and not interacting with the people and places around them. That's not the case for everyone, but human nature being what it is, well - it reminds me of this comic: (re: postcount)

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lv4umaPApn1qiqia4o1_500.jpg

We've actually been making a pretty big shift away from technology overload in our home, such as removing the televisions & computers from the bedrooms. I don't think technology is bad in moderation, but because it's such an easy trap to fall into, you end up stuck on it all the time - your phone, your tablet, your laptop, your desktop, your Internet-enable television, etc. There is a really good short video about this idea on Youtube called "I forgot my phone":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OINa46HeWg8

That is scarily accurate. I have had conversations with people where they are staring at their phone the entire time because they just can't break away. I recently read a really good quote by Robert A. Heinlein, a famous sci-fi author: "In the absence of clearly-defined goals, we become strangely loyal to performing daily trivia until ultimately we become enslaved by it." And again, human nature being what it is, you end up like this:

http://i.imgur.com/mS6yB.jpg

One of the other changes we've done is dump cable TV & our Tivo. We have Netflix & have digitized the movies we own and just use a Roku now. It's definitely cut down on the amount of TV we watch. I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with watching television, but we'd record tons of shows and then sit around and watch an endless stream of shows all the time instead of going on trips or doing stuff outside or doing stuff together. So, props to this guy for getting serious about taking on a cool project. That's pretty neat!
 
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lxskllr said:
BORN in 86?! Kids... :^D

Unless they were Amish, they didn't lead a disconnected life. 1986 was almost yesterday, and the only thing really different was the lack of pervasive internet. Everything else had technological equivalents, even if they were a bit more primitive.
Click to expand...

You forgot a biggie, cell phones, yes, they were available but very few had then as they were the size of a brick, cost a fortune and coverage was tiny.
 
mmntech said:
There's still one in my parents basement in a box. We used to use it as a second phone.

Do rotary phones even still work anymore? Wonder what would happen if I plugged it into my VOIP box.
Click to expand...

It's very strange to not have a house phone. My wife and I each have a cell phone and that's it. I remember when we were kids arguing about who should answer the phone because no one wanted to get up to get it when it rang :biggrin:
 
mmntech said:
There's still one in my parents basement in a box. We used to use it as a second phone.

Do rotary phones even still work anymore? Wonder what would happen if I plugged it into my VOIP box.
Click to expand...

depending on where you live yes they still may work. we had one at our summer place until a few years ago
 
Kaido said:
OK, I just watched the whole video. I think that is pretty awesome. My son is only 2, but he is already a zombie when it comes to Youtube or watching Angry Birds cartoons on my iPhone. We were watching a cartoon on Youtube the other day while I was feeding him and he started freaking out and finally leaned over and pointed to the "Skip Ad" button on the screen because I wasn't paying attention to his cartoon 😀 While those are easy babysitting tools, I totally agree with this guy - it's not the way you really want your kids to grow up, being screen addicts and not interacting with the people and places around them. That's not the case for everyone, but human nature being what it is, well - it reminds me of this comic: (re: postcount)

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lv4umaPApn1qiqia4o1_500.jpg

We've actually been making a pretty big shift away from technology overload in our home, such as removing the televisions & computers from the bedrooms. I don't think technology is bad in moderation, but because it's such an easy trap to fall into, you end up stuck on it all the time - your phone, your tablet, your laptop, your desktop, your Internet-enable television, etc. There is a really good short video about this idea on Youtube called "I forgot my phone":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OINa46HeWg8

That is scarily accurate. I have had conversations with people where they are staring at their phone the entire time because they just can't break away. I recently read a really good quote by Robert A. Heinlein, a famous sci-fi author: "In the absence of clearly-defined goals, we become strangely loyal to performing daily trivia until ultimately we become enslaved by it." And again, human nature being what it is, you end up like this:

http://i.imgur.com/mS6yB.jpg

One of the other changes we've done is dump cable TV & our Tivo. We have Netflix & have digitized the movies we own and just use a Roku now. It's definitely cut down on the amount of TV we watch. I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with watching television, but we'd record tons of shows and then sit around and watch an endless stream of shows all the time instead of going on trips or doing stuff outside or doing stuff together. So, props to this guy for getting serious about taking on a cool project. That's pretty neat!
Click to expand...

Good points, when I was a kid, (yea, I'm old) we all gathered to play street-hockey or stickball in the streets, not only was it good physical activity but it also provided social interaction the way it was meant to be, person to person. Weirdest part of it was my Dad owned a TV sales/repair shop so there was a TV in every room but with 3 channels (and a few UHF one's) there was nothing to watch in the afternoon but soap operas so we played outside. The future is kinda dim as in all this lack of exercise will eventually lead to a lot of people with crappy health later in life.
 
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