I LOVE THE 90S, BUT . . .

Dean Esmay loved the 90s, and he’s happy to tell you why:

The ’90s were the first decade when all the music and fashion (except for Lenny Kravitz, who by the way was also mondo cool) wasn’t imitative of the ’60s. When suddenly popular music didn’t have to be overproduced and slick. When it was okay to be nasty again. When rap music went from cheap to mainstream. When the Martini made a comeback. When Squirrel Nut Zipper and Brian Setzer reminded us why the big bands were cool after all. When computers went from something spastic geeks loved to something that everyone wanted. When “nigga” went from a epithet to a term of endearment. When women discovered that it was okay to be powerful and self-assured and yet still be feminine and still like guys to be guys. When that the whole “gender difference” thing was something fun rather than something to be railed against. When the Internet became something that everyone wanted to be a part of. When investing in the stock market stopped being something for greedy slick-haired weasels and became (through 401ks) something that everyone could be a part of. When the President was a regular guy everyone could relate to–hell even if you hated him you still related to him.

Sgt. Stryker says the 90s were good to him, but the decade as a whole was pretty reprehensible:

When I think of the 90’s, the impression that immediately comes to mind is: Bitchfest. The decade seemed like one long whine. The first few notes from Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit were the birth cry of that decade, but little did we know that the anger-infused sound of ‘91 would give way to the pussies of Staind and Limp Bizkit at the end of the decade.

And Michele just throws the whole decade under the bus.

I say any decade which brought me my first requited love and my first taste of good bourbon can’t be all bad, but yes, there were some things about the 90s that I just couldn’t stand. Here they are, in the form of a ten-point list, which is one of the things many people can’t stand about this decade.

10 Things I Hated About The 90s

1. Pearl Jam. They were so promising, and an alternative nation turned its lonely eyes to them after Kurt Cobain’s unfortunate lunch selection. But instead, Ed Ved used his bully pulpit to express his continuing hatred of all things non-Californian, while the band invested all its energy in a battle against TicketMaster. In the long run they changed nothing, which will be their ultimate legacy in more than one field of endeavor. “Jeremy” was great, though.
2. ‘Fusion’ cooking. From Cajun Stir-Fried Meatballs to quesadillas with duck confit to the horrible, ubiquitous “Southwestern egg rolls,” this was one bad idea that’s fortunately receding like my hairline. There is a good reason why nobody ever put bratwurst and pico de gallo in a won-ton prior to 1996 or so.
3. The ‘So-and-so just doesn’t get it’ meme. Remember this rhetorical Molotov cocktail from about ‘92ish? Probably the greatest example of intellectual dishonesty ever perpetrated by (and on) supposedly smart people. If you can’t refute the argument, claim your opponent is fundamentally incapable of understanding the issue. Remember, kids: all totalitarian systems of thought must, by necessity, define their opponents into a condition of disease or inferiority.
4. People who thought Kurt Cobain was a great guitar player. A great songwriter? Probably one of the best since Lennon and/or McCartney. A great vocalist? Within his genre, yes. A great guitar player? There are middle-managers with $180 Guitar Center Stratocasters in their basements who are better.
5. The proliferation of identical ‘bohemian’ lifestyles. Whether it’s yuppies trying to acquire some plausible deniability by crafting brand-new “old” houses with the help of Restoration Hardware and homeowner’s associations, or people my age who thought that owning a Guatemalan hoodie and a Phish CD made you a hippie, no decade did more to promote the idea of ‘I wanna be different just like everybody else’ than the 90s did. At least we got a good book out of it, though.
6. Coffee snobs. I could say I’m one of them, but nobody who drinks IGA “100% Colombian” deserves the title. Not that I care. I'’m not about to import a $600 coffee grinder or a $10,000 Italian espresso machine, which the most mucusoidal coffee snots contend is absolutely necessary if you don’t want your home joe to taste like gas-station gut varnish. Thanks, but I’m not burdened with five figures of cash to make my coffee taste 5% better.
7. Cigars. You like ‘em? Good. Smoke away, even in my presence–I don’t care. Just don’t talk about them, or expect me to think that you can actually tell the difference between one and another, because from where I’m sitting, they all smell like flaming muskrats.
8. Rush Limbaugh. At one time, he served a purpose; the media really was doing a pretty good job of marginalizing conservative viewpoints. But now–it’s like the old joke ends: “You’re really not in this for the hunting, are you, Bob?” We get it. We’ve all learned to be a little more critical of the media. And if he really was so influential and spoke for so many people, why did we elect Clinton twice? He was frequently entertaining. He was more frequently annoying. And even when I agreed with him (more often than you might think), I was never quite comfortable saying “ditto.” There was always something about the guy that more-than-vaguely creeped me out.
9. Irony. Ha ha, can you believe we used to watch the Brady Bunch? Let’s spend $200 dollars buying broken Brady Bunch crap on eBay! And then display it around our domicile so everybody can walk in here and see what we think we’re better than! Hey, do you want to watch Pulp Fiction for the 247th time, or should we watch The Usual Suspects for the 173rd? Ooh, I know! Turn up the lounge music CD and let’s all drink “Manhattans!” Ha ha, can you believe people actually used to drink this stuff? Let’s have three more! Hey, where’s my Rubik’s Cube? Or my tape of Body Of Evidence? That movie is so bad I can’t stop watching it! And what do you mean “you eventually become the thing you mock”? Did you read that in The Family Circus or something? I always loved it when they’d show the dead grandparents, how effed-up is that . . .
10. Peeing Calvin stickers. These just barely made the cut, since they served as a kind of distant early warning that the vehicle to which they were affixed probably contained someone around whom you should make no sudden moves. The first one I ever saw was slightly funny. By #24,212 the charm has worn off considerably.