If the 1990s are viewed as a peak, then what can be said about the the 2000s?
As we see more nostalgia for the 2000s, a simple thought kept circling in the back of my head was if the 1990s were the “peak”, then what was the 2000s?
Before the 2000s could even start, the fear of Y2k was everywhere, but then nothing happened when the clock hit midnight. Workers across the globe worked tirelessly to make sure computer systems were updated, but when I was a child the common understanding of Y2k was that it was an overblown hoax. Bill Clinton signed the U.S.–China Relations Act of 2000 into law, which led to China entering the WTO. This law was the actual nail in the coffin for US manufacturing. Yet, you will constantly hear that it was NAFTA that shipped jobs overseas and ruined everything even though it was China being allowed in WTO that was the final death blow.
In Nov 2000, we had the super infamous Bush-Gore election. An election that may be the most important one for the last 30yrs. The Supreme Court on a power trip that they themselves knew they could never be allowed to do again, the subverting of voting, the massive backlash and protests that have been largely somewhat forgotten, Gore believing he needed to “save” the soul of the nation and conceding etc. Then within less than a year of the “election” 9/11. The only memory I have of 9/11 was coming home earlier, my mother crying while watching the TV and begging me to go upstairs and play in my room. Not even 2 yrs into the decade and we have some much going on and yet somehow it was only going to get worse with the war on terror. Bush and salivating neocons across this nation decided to use a terrorist attack to justify destabilizing the middle east and killing hundreds of thousands if not millions.
There is so much that went wrong in the 00s, from Kerry's mediocre campaign against Bush in 04, Katrina, the financial crisis and the start of the painful slow recovery that ended the decade. I could make several substack articles or several youtube videos dissecting and analyzing how much of a mess the 00s were, may I will who knows?
As I watch 00s nostalgia start to rear its ugly head, I am also watching that mess of a decade being flattened and its issues being glossed over and I hate it. I hate how there is somehow a yearning for the 2000s. I need the 00s to be remembered for what it actually was, it was a not a last hurrah or decade worth yearning over, it was a gigantic mess.