Eight reasons why the 50's are unfairly maligned

[WolfeMacleod]

Got this from here:
http://www.newcriterion.com/weblog/2007/04/then-and-now-or-8-more-reasons-1950s.html


4.14.2007

Then and now, or 8 (more) reasons the 1950s are unfairly maligned
[Posted 4:19 PM by Roger Kimball]


A friend in Chicago sent these 8 scenarios comparing life in 1956 and today. We are always told how repressive, staid, homogenizing, and uncreative the 1950s were. These comparisons suggest how far off-base that stereotype is.

1. Scenario: Jack pulls into school parking lot with rifle in gun rack.

1956 - Vice Principal comes over, takes a look at Jack's rifle, goes to his car and gets his to show Jack.
2006 - School goes into lockdown, FBI called, Jack hauled off to jail and never sees his truck or gun again. Counselors called in for traumatized students and teachers.

2. Scenario: Johnny and Mark get into a fist fight after school.
1956 - Crowd gathers. Mark wins. Johnny and Mark shake hands and end up best friends. Nobody goes to jail, nobody arrested, nobody expelled.
2006 - Police called, SWAT team arrives, arrests Johnny and Mark. Charge them with assault, both expelled even though Johnny started it.

3. Scenario: Jason won't sit still in class, disrupts other students.
1956 - Jason sent to office and given a good paddling by Principal. Sits still in class.
2006 - Jason given huge doses of Ritalin. Becomes a zombie. School gets extra money from state because Jason has a disability.

4. Scenario: Billy breaks a window in his father's car and his Dad gives him a whipping.
1956 - Billy is more careful next time, grows up normal, goes to college, and becomes a successful businessman.
2006 - Billy's Dad is arrested for child abuse. Billy removed to foster care and joins a gang. Billy's sister is told by state psychologist that she remembers being abused herself and their Dad goes to prison. Billy's mom has affair with psychologist.

5. Scenario: Mark gets a headache and takes some headache medicine to school.
1956 - Mark shares headache medicine with Principal out on the smoking dock.
2006 - Police called, Mark expelled from school for drug violations. Car searched for drugs and weapons.

6. Scenario: Pedro fails high school English.
1956 : Pedro goes to summer school, passes English, goes to college.
2006 : Pedro's cause is taken up by state democratic party. Newspaper articles appear nationally explaining that teaching English as a requirement for graduation is racist. ACLU files class action lawsuit against state school system and Pedro's English teacher. English banned from core curriculum. Pedro given diploma anyway but ends up mowing lawns for a living because he can't speak English.

7. Scenario: Johnny takes apart leftover firecrackers from the 4th of July, puts them in a model airplane paint bottle, blows up a red ant bed.
1956 - Ants die.
2006 - BATF, Homeland Security, FBI called. Johnny charged with domestic terrorism, FBI investigates parents, siblings removed from home, computers confiscated, Johnny's Dad goes on a terror watch list and is never allowed to fly again.

8. Scenario: Johnny falls while running during recess and scrapes his knee. He is found crying by his teacher, Mary. Mary, hugs him to comfort him.
1956 - In a short time Johnny feels better and goes on playing.
2006 - Mary is accused of being a sexual predator and loses her job. She faces 3 years in State Prison.

[stomachmonkey]

Add to 8.

School district is sued because play area was not made out of rubber.

[Moneyguy1]

I am glad I was a kid back in the days when kids had a bit of freedom and life wasn't regulated.

PC has GOT to GO!!!!

[Dan in Pasadena]

I'm glad I wasn't a black kid back in the 50's.

[gprsh924]

This is getting a little bit odd. The two forums I frequent keep talking about the exact same subjects, to an eerie degree.

Talk about recognize1956

Another theme you guys may recognize: Clicky

[Shuie]

The guitars were a lot better in the '50s

[Tim Hancock]

In the late 70's/early 80's as young teens, we would buy gunpowder and to make pipe bombs and .22 shells from the local gun shop. Half the crap I did as a kid for fun, now would make national headlines.

America has been ruined by political correctness, over protective parents, litigation etc etc. Wussification indeed!!!!!!

[lendaddy]

Yep, we made dozens of pipe bombs and smaller "home-made pyrotechnics" for our 11th grade project(and as a general course of entertainment). We did a 30 minute Vietnam movie, I was in charge of special effects. It was unreal including a five pound FFF black powder finally. Under todays laws I might be getting out about now

We got an A+ and our teacher (a peace activist nutball) said it was the best he'd seen in his 20 years. I gotta dig that thing up again

[nostatic]

Originally posted by Dan in Pasadena
I'm glad I wasn't a black kid back in the 50's.

Or any number of other minorities...

Or a woman for that matter.

Yeah, great time for white males. Them was the days...

[hytem]

David Halberstam wrote a best-selling book about the 50s a while back, and it's recognized as one of the best decades in American history.

First of all, it was a rapid growth period following WWII, when a lot of GIs had gotten an education courtesy of the GI Bill and were ready for careers. Second, mainstream music was at a much higher level than now--with jazz, adult pop led by the old bandsingers of the 40s still in their prime, and the beginnings of rock with Elvis, Bill Haley et al. Hollywood and TV were in their golden ages--Brando and James Dean were big in Hollywood, Sinatra was inventing LP concept albums for swingin' lovers and college tuitions were $750(!). TV reflected the level of the artists, and not the audience. Ike was President ( an American hero President? rarety now) and they were still writing hit musicals on Broadway. People even dressed better. The kids didn't wear jeans to school (except in college!).

It was a rich cultural period for America. The negatives? First and foremost, civil rights. Segregation still existed in the South. Blacks weren't getting a fair shake. Women weren't making the same salary in industry as men for comparable jobs.

Except for technology and civil rights advances, things are worse today than they were then. Take it from somebody who has lived through both eras. The middle class is in worse shape today.

[nostatic]

The 50's were the golden age of TV? You've got to be kidding...

Jazz kicked ass in the 50's (but ask the seminal musicians how they were treated). The beat generation was cool. But mainstream was pablum, just like it is today. The ground-breaking stuff was co-opted just like it is today. Revisionist history is great...people always talk of "the good old days..."

If you were a white male it was a great time. For everyone else, there were serious issues...

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Originally posted by Tim Hancock
In the late 70's/early 80's as young teens, we would buy gunpowder and to make pipe bombs and .22 shells from the local gun shop. Half the crap I did as a kid for fun, now would make national headlines.

America has been ruined by political correctness, over protective parents, litigation etc etc. Wussification indeed!!!!!!

Ain't that the truth! Between blowing stuff up with "modified" model rockets and fireworks, etc. I wonder if (by today's standards) I should be allowed in society at all, much less hold any sort of position of authority/trust. Nowadays half the stuff I attribute to "just being a stupid kid" would land one in secret prison - they'd just "disappear" for a few years.

[WolfeMacleod]

Originally posted by Porsche-O-Phile
I wonder if (by today's standards) I should be allowed in society at all, much less hold any sort of position of authority/trust.

Funny you should mention that. The old man who taught me knife and sword making were just discussing the virtues of being socially unacceptable last weekend. 84 years old, and still an outcast because of his lifestyle.

[lendaddy]

Originally posted by nostatic

If you were a white male it was a great time. For everyone else, there were serious issues...

Yea we get it, we had bigotry issues. No one was celebrating that aspect of the 50's.

Why not bring up polio Debbie Downer?

[on2wheels52]

Our national identity wasn't so diversified in the pre-do your own thing era. Was the right time for me to be a kid.
Jim

[David]

When I was kid in the late 70's I wanted to make firecrackers but I didn't have any gunpowder. No problem, I got out the encyclopedia and looked up gun powder. It said I needed Potasium Nitrate, I figured that sound's like something to get at the pharmacy. I asked my local pharmacist for some and she asked if needed it for cooking. I said no, I'm making firecrackers. She said OK, and sold it to a 12 yo. Think that would happen today?

[MikeSid]

Originally posted by nostatic

Jazz kicked ass in the 50's (but ask the seminal musicians how they were treated).

In the 50's we had "seminal" musicians. Now half of these same musicians must be referred to as "ovarian".

[Dan in Pasadena]

Originally posted by 125shifter
...I asked my local pharmacist for some and she asked if needed it for cooking. I said no, I'm making firecrackers. She said OK, and sold it to a 12 yo. Think that would happen today?

No, just asking but do you think it SHOULD?

I "get" that everyone is all nostalgic, all warm and fuzzy about times they think were so much "better" than today. I'm sure in some ways things were but not many things and not for many. Whether they were better is pretty much a function of who you were and where you lived in those days.

The semi-annoyed retort above that there were "bigotry issues"? My response is, No... TODAY we have bigotry issues. In the Fifties if your skin wasn't white you could get beaten, castrated, and hung from a tree in many parts of this country for saying something for which white boys got a wink of an eye from a pretty woman. That isn't "bigotry" that is insitutionalized hatred and murder.

As a minority, I "get" that reminding people of those things makes people testy, I really do. They're too busy fondly remembering "Ozzie & Harriet" or "Father Knows Best". But along with hand churned vanilla ice cream and home made pipe bombs we should remember that the world never, ever REALLY looked the way it was shown us in movies or TV. If you think it did, you'd better take a look in the mirror.

[lendaddy]

Sounds like you had a rough go of things in the 50's Dan.

Perhaps we could agree as a nation to never speak of the 50's again? Well.....fondly that is.

[Dan in Pasadena]

Nope, just millions of other people.

Len, I'm not proposing "not speaking of"... any specific time. I'm just saying there's more to the 50's than the superficial images we typically see..which is why the 50's are sometimes "much maligned" as the original poster claimed.

Personally, I don't think the 50's ARE maligned all that much. I guess it depends what you are prompted to focus on. Most of the time the images of the 50's I see are from polar opposites of the spectrum. Either Elvis on the Ed Sullivan show, Howdy Doody or Emmit Till.

I grew up in the late 50's and early 60's but here in Southern California so it was probably much different than in other parts of the country. I could go wherever I wanted, do anything I wanted. But my Dad told me of going to a bar outside of Shepherd Field(sic?), Texas during the war and seeing a sign that read, "No Dogs or Mexicans Allowed". It pissed me off as a kid and still does.

I dated and married an Anglo girl in 1978 but her Uncle from Des Moines refused to shake my hand when I met him...I was 19 years old, he was 70 something. So, yeah, I guess I (like many minorities) see things through a different lens. Only sharing that your experience (not YOU Len, the communal "you") isn't the only one from which to judge. Walk a mile in the other guy's shoes.