As the 2010s come to a close, biography-writing service StoryTerrace reviews the most important cultural tales of the last 10 years in America
This holiday period represents the final few days of 2019, and with it the close of a decade. The 2010s have seen incredible social transformations and several landmark events, but which of these phenomena had the most influence on our society as we know it today?
Rutger Bruining, CEO of StoryTerrace, has made a career out of documenting the life stories of everyday American citizens. Rutger and his team of professional writers have written the biographies and memoirs of some incredible individual stories across the US; now, Rutger shares the most important stories of the past decade which have influenced and impacted the lives of millions of Americans.
The Presidency – from Obama to Trump
2016 saw one of the biggest shifts in the political landscape and arguably one of the most defining stories of the decade worldwide, when former President Barack Obama handed over the keys of the White House to Donald Trump.
Trump, a businessman and TV personality with no prior experience in public service, won the election to become the 45th president of the United States, and immediately inspired the Women’s March which became one of the largest single-day demonstrations in the nation’s history. “Make America Great Again” has transformed into one of the most recognizable and culturally divisive phrases in our language today, and has garnered attention the world over.
#MeToo
“MeToo” was a phrase and movement initially coined in 2006 on MySpace by activist Tarana Burke. However, as the nation learned of the Harvey Weinstein sexual abuse allegations in 2017, the MeToo Movement transformed into a widespread cultural phenomenon. The hashtag #MeToo was born, and became an empowering movement for survivors of sexual abuse across America, and the world. The phrase has now become fully embedded in our modern vernacular and has grown to include both men and women of all colors and ages, as it continues to support marginalized people in marginalized communities.
The Instagram Economy
Instagram has morphed drastically since its launch in October 2010—from a quirky and personal photo sharing app for the eyes of friends and family, to an advertising and marketing behemoth that demands our constant attention. It has created an entirely new economy based on a variety of imbalanced factors of influence. Whether you view it as good or bad for our society, the app has had an immeasurable impact on our culture and how we present ourselves publicly, how we interpret others, and the products and services we surround ourselves with.
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BlackLivesMatter
In 2013, #BlackLivesMatter was born following the acquittal of George Zimmerman, who shot and killed an unarmed black teen Trayvon Martin in 2012, and the movement exploded across 2014 and 2015 as a consequence of the deaths of several black men killed by police. The slogan has helped bring racial inequality and discrimination to the forefront throughout the decade and, much like #MeToo, has shown the power of social media in raising social issues. BlackLivesMatter has also sparked attention for many other movements highlighting racial injustice in the US, including Colin Kaepernick’s stand against the NFL, by taking a knee during the national anthem as a tribute to the lives of black Americans lost at the hands of police officers.
Same-sex Marriage legalized across all 50 states
In 2015, the US Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage across all fifty states, which represented a huge step forward for LGBTQ+ rights across the US. The decade also saw gay-marriage legalized in several countries around the world, including the UK, Australia, Germany, France, Brazil, Colombia and Argentina. The fight for true equality will continue well beyond the turn of the new decade, but this was a landmark moment for the LGBTQ+ community and for the human race altogether.
Rise of YouTube
In the 2000s, the idea of becoming a celebrity and achieving fame using YouTube was unfathomable to most. People watched YouTube from their desktops and the first YouTube account to reach one million subscribers only came right at the end of the decade. Fast forward to 2019, and YouTube has more than two billion monthly users, and the platform has provided the foundation from which a new generation of celebrities and stars has grown; this represents a socio-technological revolution of epic proportions and the platform now enables millions of unique stories to be told every day.
Simone Biles’ record-breaking Olympic triumph
The Rio Olympics in 2016 played host to many sporting achievements, as does every Olympic games. However, one American gymnast put on a performance of such greatness that she took the world by storm and inspired the nation. In 2016, at the young age of 19, she broke the American record for most gold medals in women’s gymnastics at a single Games, and equaled a number of other records, all while coining several signature moves which only she can perform due to their complexity. She has gone on to speak out against gender discrimination and sexual abuse, and this past year broke the world record for most World Championship titles held by any gymnast ever, man or woman.
Collapse of Blockbuster and rise of streaming services
In 2007, a little company called Netflix began streaming movies and television shows. At that time, Blockbuster Video was still a giant atop the video retail industry. By the end of 2010, Blockbuster Video had collapsed. In the space of a decade, Netflix has grown into a giant, spending $12 billion on programming this year alone to entertain more than 158 million subscribers worldwide, and has inspired a slew of other streaming services such as Amazon Prime, Hulu and Apple TV. Even the old guard are getting in on the action – Disney+ was made available to consumers in November of this year.
A recent study by Leichtman Research Group discovered that 74% of U.S. Households now pay for one of the US’ three largest streaming services; Either Netflix, Amazon or Hulu. A new era of entertainment and media is here.
Meme Culture
The 2010s have truly become the “Decade of the Meme”. Internet memes began in their earliest form in the 90s, and video memes began to spread in the late 2000s due to YouTube. But in the past decade, these videos and images have exploded into popular culture, spreading like wildfire across the Internet. They are no longer just a way to react to a post on Facebook or a way to pass the time in the toilet – memes have become a cornerstone of our communication online and a representation of popular culture.
The End to Cannabis Prohibition?
Since 2012, 11 states and Washington D.C. have made recreational cannabis use legal, with medical use legal in 33 other states. Many other states including New Jersey, New York and Arizona could potentially be the next states to make recreational use legal either through ballot initiatives or state legislatures. Despite the widespread pro-cannabis mentality that many states seem to harbor, cannabis use is still illegal at the federal level. Though many politicians aim to change this in the coming years due to how the war on drugs has contributed to mass incarceration and overflowing prisons in the US. The Marijuana Justice Act, introduced by Senator Cory Booker in the Senate intends to decriminalize cannabis nationwide and expunge the records of millions of people incarcerated for cannabis use or possession.
CEO of StoryTerrace, Rutger Bruining, comments on his picks and discusses why these events are so important above others:
“This list represents some of the most impactful social phenomena of the last decade. Despite there being such a wide variety of landmark events and social transformations that took place in the past 10 years, I believe that these are the stories which had the most impact on millions of American lives, and in many cases, billions more worldwide.
In years to come, people will look back on this decade to remember these incredible events, tell tales of how they were involved, and how their lives were affected as a result. Each individual who lived through these times and who has experienced the effects of such staggering social phenomena will be able to speak of their importance, and I am excited to see how these times are documented when people of our generation and younger come to tell their life stories.”
