They were better from the perspective of being young because when one is young the bones don't hurt when moving, the mind races ahead and doesn't move like frozen honey, one actually can understand new concepts and not jump in fright as his mind ricochets over anything that came after one's 40th birthday or when one visits the doctor only once per year and only for 10 minutes and do not spend half a year bedridden in a hospital.

They blame the age they live currently live in, instead of blaming circumstances: aging/death and the uncaring cosmos.

Humans have an archetypal Stockholm syndrome for Death and Aging interwoven into every single piece of culture and article of faith we ever created, and anyone not a fanatical materialist does not acknowledge it.

And this trope goes way back to the dawn of the written word, with even Aristotle complaining in his final years how everything sucks balls with the current youth. Yes. Because one gets old.