The general consensus seems to be that the noughties was a very suspect time for all of us. Personally, I was sporting my older cousins’ hand-me-down leggings that were miles too big, singing along to Steps (my dad disapproved of the Spice Girls) and had my four front teeth missing.
So if I was so well dressed, how could it possibly have gone wrong? We witnessed 9/11, the Iraq war, the credit crunch, the introduction of the euro and the Internet becoming huge. Although a lot of these events were hugely tragic and caused enormous destruction and devastation, many of the things that happened brought us closer together. The British became determined not to lose the pound; we united in our remembrance of the victims of war; and we started Googling and stopped Asking Jeeves (although my mum still says this).
LGBT rights have expanded hugely; same-sex marriage is now legal in seventeen countries and people are bravely fighting worldwide for the prejudices to end. School dinners have had a complete facelift with Jamie Oliver scrapping the turkey twizzlers—the child in me is still not over this, I loved those curly bastards.
Along with the demise of the turkey twizzler came the surge in technology. Many say that the rise in technology is driving us apart. However, it helped me stay in touch with my boyfriend when he was 6000 miles away for a whole year (yes we are still together, thank you Skype). It means I sent a friend a message of support with regards to her mum who had breast cancer when I’d lost her number, it means we can have people the other side of the world in the same room and feel like they never left.
So what did the noughties leave us with? Some hilarious photographic evidence of a lot of people in very suspicious clothing, the ability to communicate without even saying a word and we’re all that little bit closer to finally having equal rights (feminists, our time will come).
