Teens Watch '90s Music Videos & We Feel Old

In this new video from Buzzfeed, teenagers born in the mid- to late-1990s watch '90s music videos and their reactions sufficiently make us all feel old and decrepit. As they watch classics by the likes of Britney Spears, Missy Elliot, Sisqó, Eiffel 65, and Shania Twain, these teens marvel at the bizarre fashions and strange conventions of late-20th century music videos. Some of their reactions are surprisingly on point (like one girl’s comment that Shania Twain is “like Taylor Swift in leopard print"), while others are more of the “face palm” variety.

One thing I find really funny about their reactions is that many of them assume that the 1990s was some sort of conservative, pre-sexual-revolution age, an innocent time before the debauchery of the 21st century. One teen watching the video for Sisqó's “Thong Song” knowingly points out that in the '90s, all their “[bikini] bathing suits was really scandalous [sic], and now it’s normal.” At the beginning of the video, one respondent expresses surprise that the whole “objectifying-women-in-music-videos” thing started before the new millennium, saying “I though that, like, it was more like 2010 that, like, women were being objectified, but I feel like it started earlier than I thought.” Oh, you sweet, scrumptious little lamb. Women being objectified in music videos is a proud tradition extending back to the dawn of the music video itself. Would MTV even have existed without the aid of naked women? Doubtful.

Image: YouTube