Things you weren't allowed as a kid

[monster]

gum
cola
jeans
sneakers/trainers except plimsolls for gym

[xoxoxoBruce]

At least Plimsolls aren't embarrassing, but it's too bad you couldn't wear them all the time instead of just for gym.

[monster]

They looked just like that and were horribly embarrassing. Especially when you did something PT like outside of school and they were they only suitable shoes you had That or hiking boots. I always opted for hiking boots unless they were going to get wet (or there was a chance I'd loose them )

Wasn't there anything your parents didn't allow you that most other kids of similarly placed families were allowed?

[xoxoxoBruce]

They didn't have to as we lived in the sticks, access to temptations were miles away. Of course when I was miles away where temptations were, they often weren't... just don't take it home.

One thing I didn't have is jeans. We couldn't wear them to school so I had a ton of chino pants, all khaki, every damn day. Then when summer came she reasoned I should wear out the school pants because I'd get new ones for school in the fall.

There were cool things that certain people got, that I couldn't have, but nothing everyone had but me.
Oh, wait, everyone could stay up to watch the Untouchables, but me. At least they said they could.

[limey]

We weren't allowed bikes. And I had to wear skirts to school long after uniform was dropped by the school and everyone else was in jeans.

Sent by thought transference

[Sundae]

All of the below were monitored and strictly rationed. So not outright prohibited, but definitely supervised in a way they weren't in friends' houses:

Heating
Biscuits
Any food between meals actually
All chocolate even at Easter and Christmas - yeah, thanks Steven, the year you ate a whole Selection Pack before Christmas Dinner and the year you threw up chocolate all over your bedroom on Easter Sunday caused that little restriction.

Expressly forbidden:

Boiled sweets
Milk bottles on the table or side - it had to be poured from the bottle into a jug
Eating or drinking in the street
Drinking from a can
Reading at the table, even breakfast or a casual sandwich lunch
Leaving any food on your plate

[Carruthers]

I don't recall too many restrictions but bizarrely, although I was allowed chewing gum, I wasn't allowed bubble gum.
Some of my childhood friends could blow Olympic standard bubbles which only served to provoke envy.

Dwellars on this side of the Atlantic might recall Beech Nut® chewing gum which was dispensed from a vending machine of sorts.
Every fourth turn of the control on the side produced a bonus pack.
At one (old) penny a time, it was good value especially if you were lucky enough to be in line for the bonus.

[Gravdigr]

Originally Posted by Sundae

Boiled sweets...

Translation, please?

[Carruthers]

Originally Posted by Gravdigr

Translation, please?

It seems that they are known as hard candy in the US.

Wiki article.

[Gravdigr]

Thank you, sir.

[Clodfobble]

I think I've told the story before, but in one of my Radio-TV-Film classes the professor said, "Show of hands, how many of you were not allowed to watch television as a child?" and something like 85% of the hands in the room went up.

Forbid your kids a thing that is generally allowed in society, and just watch their obsession bloom...

[it]

Almost all candy and sweets or junk food or anything that wasn't my mom's idea of health-foods... The main result was developing the instinct that whenever I did get an opportunity to enjoy those those things at friend's houses or parties or whatnot, I'd go at them because who knows when I'll ever get the opportunity again... Not sure that habit ever quite left me.

Cola... Kind of. My mom wouldn't allow it in the house except she loved it her self and she knew I liked it, so whenever she'd succumbed to it's glorious chemical temptation and I was around she'd get me one too.

Watching movies with rating more then my age, which my mother to this day believes they are rated by a team of certified child psychologists, but my father shared me love for horror flicks and we'd watch them together whenever they were on anyway.

For awhile between 12yo and 14yo - MMORPGs. I would sneak into my dad's office (Where we had an internet connection earlier on) and get lost in them completely for nights at a time. Both my parents would get worried and then get me off the credit card. The ones that I remember from those days were Ultima Online & Dark age of Camelot. Out of the above, this is probably the only one where I'd now react the same as them as a parent and get worried in that situation, but perhaps not finding the answer in a complete cut-off.

[Undertoad]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

Forbid your kids a thing that is generally allowed in society, and just watch their obsession bloom...

Yes,

We had a ratty small B&W because Katkeeper's theory was it would be better if the TV was less realistic.

Right now I support some of the most complex video installations in the world, with the largest sizes and highest resolutions. There are 9 screens in my office and I look at screens 14 hours a day.

[it]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

I think I've told the story before, but in one of my Radio-TV-Film classes the professor said, "Show of hands, how many of you were not allowed to watch television as a child?" and something like 85% of the hands in the room went up.

Forbid your kids a thing that is generally allowed in society, and just watch their obsession bloom...

I love that story... I am going to keep telling that story. You shell now be known as Clod, the one from Film class.

[Big Sarge]

A skull. The kids across the street had one from an Indian mound that was dozed while a road bed was cut. Parents wouldn't get me one. I had to always go play with theirs.

BTW, this was long before the pc era about Native American graves and they are very common in my area. Now they are treated with respect and quickly repatriated to tribal authorities.