THE NINETEEN EIGHTIES
The 1980s began with the defeat of incum-
bent president Jimmy Carter and the election
of Ronald Reagan, a Hollywood actor turned
politician. Reagan’s presidency marked a
new conservative attitude throughout much
of the country and in popular culture. In
his speeches and public remarks, Reagan
evoked images of America’s idyllic past, and
his amiable, “grandfatherly” style helped
many regain their confidence in government
after Watergate and the Iran hostage crisis.
Reagan’s economic policy was driven by
“­supply-​­side economics”—lower taxes on
wealthy Americans that would, arguably,
inspire everyone to work harder (because
they’d be keeping more income). His foreign
policy embraced building up American mili-
tary forces and weapons systems. Reagan
believed that an arms race would cripple the
Soviet Union (which he referred to as the “evil
empire”), whose economy could not afford to
keep pace with American advances. However,
in the midst of this Cold War buildup, Mikhail
Gorbachev became leader of the Commu-
nist Party in 1985, advocating policies of
­glasnost (openness) and perestroika (restruc-
turing of Soviet government along Western
lines). Historians differ on who gets credit for
it, but in November 1989 (almost a year after
Reagan left office), the Berlin ­Wall—​­a sym-
bol of the division between the Soviet Union
and the Western ­powers—​­fell, signaling an
end to a cold war that had lasted almost half
a century. By 1991, the Soviet Union had
broken apart and the United States emerged
as the world’s leading superpower.
The 1980s also marked the emergence
and growth of the AIDS epidemic, with more
*Statistics compiled from AVERT: www.avert.org/usa-statistics.htm
than 150,000 cases diagnosed and more
than 90,000 ­AIDS-​­related deaths reported
in the United States from 1981 to 1989.*
AIDS was made most publicly visible by
movie star Rock Hudson, who died from the
disease in 1985. Hudson had been a lead-
ing man in romantic comedies for years,
and his homosexuality came as a surprise
to many of his fans. Despite the sensa-
tionalism following the disclosure of Hud-
son’s sexuality, many Americans learned
about AIDS for the first time, leading to
an increased awareness of the disease and
its seriousness. In 1991, Queen frontman
Freddie Mercury succumbed to the disease,
further raising the music world’s awareness
of AIDS.
The American economy grew in many
ways during the 1980s, but no sector
advanced as impressively and publicly as
high tech. The space program had provided
many ­ spin-​­
off benefits and technologies,
and the development of ­ever-​­smaller, more
powerful computers made it possible for
home computers to be useful and afford-
able to most Americans. The earliest Apple
computers from the m ­ id-​­1970s were made
from kits. By the early 1980s, however,
Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak were mar-
keting a more refined home unit, while
Microsoft founders Bill Gates and Paul
­
Allen were offering the M­ S-​­DOS operating
system for the IBM  PC.  In 1984, a ­now-​
­famous commercial during the Super Bowl
announced the arrival of the Macintosh
computer, and by 1985, the first version
of Windows was available for the PC. These
years also marked the beginning of I­nternet
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 use by the general public; CompuServe
offered home email in 1979 and ­real-​­time
chat in 1980, and the number of users
increased throughout the decade, though
the real Internet explosion would not occur
until the 1990s.
While many benefited from technolo-
gies developed by NASA, the space agency
also experienced one of its greatest disas-
ters in 1986. The space shuttle Chal-
lenger exploded minutes after taking off,
killing all the astronauts aboard, including
Christa McAuliffe. McAuliffe was a high
school teacher who was making the jour-
ney in order to bring aspects of the space
program into more direct contact with
schoolchildren.
Another technology that experienced dra-
matic growth during the decade was cable
television. By m ­ id-​­decade, many American
homes were wired to receive premium mov-
ies, news, and sports from channels like
HBO, CNN, and ESPN. Most important for
the history of rock music, MTV was launched,
creating competition for FM radio, which
had been the central way to expose the
music to a large body of listeners. And just
as it was forced to share its audience with
MTV, FM was also losing sponsors to a new
kind of radio emerging on the AM band: talk
radio. Taking advantage of the neglect into
AIDS victims and activists in
the March on Washington for
Lesbian and Gay Rights, 1987.
More than 150,000 cases of
AIDS were diagnosed between
1981 and 1989. Many AIDS
activists did not think the Reagan
administration sufficiently
supported their cause.
402
which many AM stations had fallen, entre-
preneurial broadcasters such as Rush Lim-
baugh began offering hours of daily political
and cultural commentary, sometimes from
the left of the political spectrum, but most
often from the right. Soon Limbaugh and
others built up syndication networks, in a
sense reinventing the radio networks of the
’30s and ’40s, as millions of listeners heard
the same programming across the country
(though National Public Radio had also been
doing the same thing on the FM band for
years).
Television reflected America’s renewed
fascination with money and power. Per-
haps no show captured this more vividly
than Dallas, which debuted in 1978 and
focused on a rich Texas oil family led by
the shifty J. R. Ewing. Viewers got caught
up in the cliffhanger ending to the show’s
second season, and during the summer of
1980 the phrase “Who shot  J.  R.?” satu-
rated the media. Family Ties also reflected
this new conservative trend, featuring a
­middle-​­aged liberal couple bantering with
their conservative and financially astute
son, Alex.
If Family Ties underscored the changes
taking place in the white middle class, The
Cosby Show reinforced shifts occurring
in the black community. The show’s main
characters, Cliff and Clair Huxtable, were
both professionals (he was a doctor, she
was a lawyer), and the comedy turned on
family issues arising among them and their
several ­ school-​­
age children, but never on
issues of race (unlike The Jeffersons in the
1970s, for instance). The Huxtables lived in
a nice home in a desirable part of town, and
their markedly ­upper-​­middle-​­class stand-
ing emphasized the rise and visibility of
the black middle class during the decade.
­Middle-​­class values were in for a completely
different treatment, however, when The
Simpsons debuted in 1989. This animated
­prime-​­time comedy irreverently lampooned
almost every dimension of American life;
playing no political favorites and pulling few
punches, it established the model for many
animated series in the 1990s.
As the hippies got older, the gen-
eral cultural ­middle-​­class transformation
from 1970s idealistic dreamers into ­ well-​
appointed 1980s Yuppies (young urban
­ Likewise, though rock music benefited
professionals) created a cultural crisis for
some. Such ­ hand-​­
wringing over identity
and authenticity is captured effectively in
The Big Chill. In this 1983 film, set to the
beat of late 1960s rock and soul, a group
of ­thirty-​­
something college friends reunite
for the funeral of a friend. While there, each
takes in the changes that have occurred in
their lives over the years. Amid the success
that some of these friends have achieved,
the viewer senses that they have lost touch
with the things that originally inspired and
motivated them.
The idea of selling out arises much more
obviously and forcefully in Oliver Stone’s
1987 film Wall Street. Stone set out to cap-
ture the ruthless lust for money and power
that he believed characterized stock market
professionals. Epitomized by the phrase
“greed is good,” the film provided a glimpse
into the dark side of the Reagan years and
illustrated how the conservative 1980s were
viewed by those with 1960s sensibilities.
For the generation that came of age in the
1980s, ­youth-​­oriented films like The Break-
fast Club and St.  Elmo’s Fire grappled with
the social issues of young adult life and
helped define new cultural attitudes free
from the baggage of the 1960s and 1970s
ideologies.
from the wealth and technology of the times,
it still often displayed the critical stance
of the 1960s and 1970s. ­Hyper-​­marketed
pop stars competed with musicians criti-
cal of the growing divide between rich and
poor, and the continued gaps between black
and white, straight and gay, and male and
female.
While shows like Family Ties and
The Cosby Show reflect some of
the cultural changes of the 1980s,
The Simpsons updated the idea of
the animated situation comedy in a
markedly ironic and irreverent way.
Shown here are (clockwise from left)
Lisa, Homer, Marge, Maggie, and
Bart Simpson.
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