11 things the government took away and hoped nobody would notice...

1. Toys in cereal packets
2. Soft porn on Channel 5
3. Slush puppies
4. Elm trees
5. Bar billiard tables
6. Jim Davidson
7. Fizzy Chewits
8. Hovercrafts
9. Communists
10. Those candy sweets that looked like cigarettes and helped ease kids into smoking from a young age
11. Freedom

Those of us who live with our eyes open will know that this is not merely a list of things that went out of fashion and faded away naturally (like brown cars and pogs) but rather a list of things that were taken away by our Norman overlords to keep us suitably oppressed and sedated and less inclined towards a possible uprising. You will have forgotten this but some time in the early to mid-90s, the government carried out an evil and sinister experiment to test how much the average prole pays attention to the world around him and, subsequently, find out how much they could get away with.
The experiment was simple: change the colour of Walkers' salt and vinegar crisp packets from blue (as is proper) to green (as is wrong) and swap cheese and onion from green (proper) to blue (wrong) and see how many people notice. Unfortunately for us, very few people did notice at the time and those that did were quickly brainwashed into believing that Walkers' salt and vinegar had never been blue. To help with the subterfuge, pressure was quickly put on other crisps to follow suit and they all did (except Golden Wonder, which resisted admirably and has since been virtually stomped out of existence by the Norman capitalists). Then, having successfully wiped this period of crisp history from people's minds, all that remained was to wipe it from the history books (a search for this cover-up on Google yields suspiciously few results). The results of the crisp experiment were bad news for us because it gave the government cart blanche to chip away at our freedoms one by one (a process that has started but is by no means finished). This erosion happens slowly (just like coastal erosion). First they ban smoking on airplanes, then trains, then in cinemas, then restaurants, then cafes, then pubs, then public places, then your own car and eventually your own home. But it happens so gradually that we do not notice and so do not fight.
Anything with the potential to excite or amuse us is quickly wiped out. Toys in cereal packets (the only thin ray of sunshine in the common man's life and the only real incentive to get out of bed in the morning) were deemed to be far too stimulating, and slush puppies, coupled with the hot summers and carefree spirit of the Britpop years, were a revolution waiting to happen. And don’t think for one minute that drugs are illegal because they are dangerous. They are illegal because they are fun and they make people happy and that is one thing that the Establishment simply cannot allow. In order for them to feel safe we need to be kept in a subdued state of tired apathy. We’re allowed to do things as long as they don’t get us too excitable and rouse us into action (that’s why mind expanding drugs are illegal and car boot sales are not). You see, the masters treat the masses like parents treat children. Give them just enough sustenance and entertainment to keep them alive but for Christ’s sake don’t give them any sugar!