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The early 80's was the start of a major music shift. It was during this time that the "new wave", or punk bands from the UK and other areas starting getting attention in the US. Also MTV, at that time only had these new bands videos to play. This changed a whole generations way of dress, hair style, and body pierceing was just startng up. It was also a time of letting go of the the 70's attutide of do only for myself, and the whole 80 social movement was focused on helping the world to be a better place for all. It took our view as Americans only, and gave us a world view, mostly from music and writing of the time.

Goth got it birth it the late 70's in the UK, but came to the US in the 80s. It was not the main stream it is today at all. I was a classic new wave guy then, got out of HS in 1983. I can't stress enough that the 80's where about music, and concerts - huge things then, prices where cheap for tickets! Rap music soon arrived in the 80's but was just an infant and never got off the ground totally.

Another major shift that happened in the 80's was that of sexuality, during late 1982 Time magazine did a huge piece of the AIDS virus, and it scared everyone sexless . This lead to a huge rise in the attitude of the general populace against gay men, as at that time it seemed they were easy to blame for this. The AIDS virus lead to many more couples staying together and slowed the divorce rate down for a bit.

Cable TV, was spreading like wildfire in the early 80's, and with the introduction of HBO, and other channels we now hand TV around the clock this was much different than ever before, when TV stations went off the air around 2-4am.

Most important event in the 80's was the decline of world tensions as we no longer hatted the USSR (Russia), but the younger generation saw they as an oppressed nation, that wanted freedom.

You can find a great deal of information on the 80's in wikipedia.com