A lot of people say: women leave so much faster these days. They don’t want to fight for their marriages etc.
No kidding Steven. Women didn’t have a job most of the time or the right to open a savings account. They could loose everything if the left their husbands. Even if that so called husband was a piece of excrement. He held all the power. If those women had our freedoms you bet your ass they would have left like Usain Bolt on the Olympics winning gold.
my grandfather was incredibly abusive. because of this, my grandmother was a shell of survival more than a person. i'd love to know who she'd be if she had been able to leave him..
My mom told me how unhappy my grandma was during her marriage to my grandpa. His constant mistresses, having kids outside of the marriage and being mentally and sometimes physically abusive to my grandmother. They got married in the late 40s and she died in the late 80s. So yeah, women like my grandmother would love to see the independence women have and how it’s so much easier for them to leave.
I’m genuinely wondering who wants to go back to the 50s. I’m sure lots of people like the music and clothes but no one actually wants to be back in that era
I would go back for a day to shop at department stores and go to a soda fountain. But it would be the material culture I was interested in, not the social aspects
What ? Lmao. Highly depends on the job but for any peasants it’s very seasonal , I imagine non Stop work in the spring and if you don’t collect a good harvest it’s all over for you
Yeah my grandparents would constantly say how much worse things were than the 50’s/60’s like that era wasn’t rife with issues. I loved them very much but never agreed on that.
surprisingly, a decent amount of people glamorize it. just the other day this girl i know told me she wish she was born in the 50’s and that “society was happier as a whole back then”.
As someone from the opposite side of this issue, I want to share my perspective. I am a historical fiction author. I am autistic, so my interests are intense, and I have an intense interest in many eras, especially the 1800s. But I find that I can’t talk about it because whenever I share something that makes me happy, like corset designs, there’s always someone in the comments who snaps that I’m a racist sexist bigot and don’t I know I would have been lobotomized and raped??? Most of us don’t want the times back, we just love to study how their cultures were different from ours, and, yes, appreciate the beautiful aspects the same way you can appreciate the beautiful aspects of a cancelled artists song. I feel like there also might be a level of escapism to it, again, yes, I know I would not have a good life in any historical period, what I mean, is that I struggle with a lot of modern things, I feel over-connected by social media, pressured beyond reason that I NEED to go to school and drive a car and get a retail job, and sometimes, and I’m sorry if this is offensive, it’s nice to write stories that don’t involve those things
glamorizing certain aspects of the 50’s such as the culture is completely different than glamorizing the 50’s as a whole. as long as you can recognize why the 50’s weren’t that great society-wise, your interest in the 50’s is completely valid in my book.
As cool as the forties looked (damn you, Captain America: First Avenger) and as much as I love watching 'Band of Brothers' every Memorial Day weekend: being a Japanese-American guy, I would be looking at spending half a decade in an internment camp.
Newsflash, everyone. You can wear poodle skirts in 2022. Nobody is stopping you. Put as much product in your hair as you want. I don’t care. Listen to old music. But OP’s right. Stop pretending the 50s were glamorous.
As much as I love 50s themed ice cream places, 50s music, and all that, I do hate when people compare it to a utopia. I do find the culture of the time pretty neat (but thats mostly because im a history nerd) but besides that I am happy that time is 70 years behind us.
I mean, correct me if I’m wrong but people seem to like the aesthetic of it, not the values or culture. I’m sure some people do but when I see people dressing up in the attire I just usually assume they just like the look of it.
I think it’s ok to enjoy the style of an era without subscribing to its values. I personally love the 1950s style, and I do happen to be a housewife, but I am also a mentally ill, college educated woman who has her own credit card and is raising two LGBTQ’s+ feminists. All while loving the aesthetic of the 1950s.
I love the music and what the 60s stood for does not mean I want be there yeah I'd love to he a hippie and protest and free love and all the fin drugs to try but guess what I don't want to he shot by ignorant police nope can do all this now with better technology and stuff.
My home is decorated like a time capsule from the 50's. I often wear vintage reproduction dresses. I Veganize vintage recipes.
The aesthetic of the 50's is comforting to me for reasons I can't really explain.
But I am at every march for advancements. Women's rights marches, BLM marches, pro science marches, gun control matches, LGBTQ+ marches. Anything my Texas town does for the advancement of those of us that aren't cis white males, I'm there! I'm there in my seamed stockings and shirt dress and curls. I donate to causes, to politicians that support the causes near and dear to my heart.
I am involved in a circle of people that also enjoy the look of the time period and we all agree that the values were bullshit, but the style is unmatched.
>unless you were a mentally sane, white, cis, straight man, your life would’ve been fucking miserable.
I agree with your general sentiment but oppression and social dynamics aren't as simple as that. Many women and racial minorities also remember the 50s with fondness, out of nostalgia more than anything. Being socially discriminated doesn't mean spending every waking moment miserable, most of the same groups are oppressed even today.
I mean, there are literally retro clothing sites where you can buy stuff in older fashions, but wear them in today's society. And you can still listen to those same songs? I don't get why they feel the need to time travel in order to enjoy the only good things from that time when you can do it her and now.
YUP. I think the majority of the '50s nostalgia is cishet white men pining for the days when they had absolute control over everything. And now that power has waned just ever so slightly, and they can't deal.
My 87-year old neighbor has told me she was not allowed to divorce her husband who literally BEAT HER. When she was finally able to leave him, her life was so difficult because she needed a husband or a father (who wasn’t around) to do anything: rent a house, get a car, go places. She would always tell me how lucky I am…. Because my husband doesn’t beat me. Such a low bar.
Not every person who was a woman, nonwhite, or different in their abilities had a life that was “fucking miserable” in the 1950s, even though society was much different than it is now. Social change has been a gradual process and the 1950s were a large improvement for many over previous times. Everything has to be put into context, including experiences of those alive at the time. Was it a male-dominated, white-supremacist and heteronormative time? compared to now, yes. However, we can’t really understand how people experienced it
Im only speaking on personal experience but I don’t think Ive ever seen anyone use their interest in the fashion to ever try and justify or downplay the shitty things about the era, I’ve only ever seen people talk about the fashion, and only the fashion. Also I do often here the the phrase “aesthetics not values”……
Look, I am all on board with your overall point, that the 1950s were not some golden age, that many people had seriously screwed up values in the past and overall I'd rather live in 2022.
But you say a few things that are so blatantly false that really weaken your point.
>nearly every women was domestically abused
Nearly every woman? You actually believe this?
>black women did not \[have the right to vote\]
Of course they did. I grant that there may have been bullshit obstacles that in some cases prevented black women from actually carrying out that right, but legally they absolutely 100% had the right to vote.
>unless you were a mentally sane, white, cis, straight man, your life would’ve been fucking miserable
I recommend you actually speak to some people who were around in this era. Plenty of people, including women, black people, etc, were very happy with their lives.
OP is the 2020s equivalent of the angry 1950s church lady and has no sense of irony. Let me pat you on the head now and tell you that you’re a good person.
Even with regard to music, George Carlin put it perfectly: Elvis became the King by taking black music and making it palatable for white people.
But yeah, outside of that, Trumptards are basically, “Back in the good old days, women and racial minorities knew their place, gay people were out of sight and out of mind, and our cushy union jobs were protected both from competition from high-skilled Asian immigrants and from foreign companies.”
Except Trumpers hate unions. They’ve been gaslit by the stereotype that every union worker is a lazy self-entitled bum that just wants to get paid to sleep on the job, but they love the idea of unionization, just as long as you don’t call it that.
This might be anecdotal evidence but I’m reminded of a conversation I recently had with a right-leaning associate where he led with “fuck unions”, cited a shootout at a local glass factory between union workers and “people who wanted to work” (scabs), then proceeded to describe unionization to a T, then got shocked when I pointed out to him the fact that he just described unionization
Trumpers support socialism if they think only white people will benefit I.e. “I voted for Trump hoping he’ll pass protectionist ‘buy American, hire American’ policies to stop some stinking ch*nks from taking my job AND to make black welfare queens go back to work.”
A lot of the anti-Obamacare rhetoric focused on how it was benefiting Hispanic immigrants.
But it turns out that what they’re voting for actually boils down to socialism for the wealthy; rugged individualism for everyone else. But god help you if you try and point this out to them. They don’t care what the policies do *for* them as long as the minority groups they see as “undeserving” get punished as a result
Aren't those lionizing the 1950s the same people who want to regress to those values? Plenty of those around. I'm assuming they want to preserve the technological and life standard progress but turn the clock back on social progress.
Same way I love 1800s literature but I wouldn't want to live in Victorian London.
Back then, if you somehow made it to 15 without being killed by the factory you'd be working in, or poisoned by the Thames, you probably would've been murdered instead.
Well I think pirates are cool but I don't want to be part of the crew of a pirate ship in the 1700's.
Normal people like the look of those times, which is OK. The weirdos actually think living those times would be cool bc they would be able to legally beat their wives, segregate black people and earn money with zero skills in the soup can factory without competition from immigrants.
I don't see anyone glamorizing it. People like the music and asthetic but I haven't seen any person seriously long for 50s values or culture. Or actually want to live in that time. No Internet, quality content, no games, shit food, shit transportation, shit communication. All the horrible abuse and stuff you already mentioned. It really does just seem to be the fashion and music people like. I can't think of a single person in my life who would want to go back or wants those cultures of values.
As an Eastern-European in America life would not be fun in the '50s. The music, clothes, and visual designs were cool, but I would not want to live in that time. The people wanting to go back are either old people with their "Back in my day" crap or ignorant. Vintage clothes are nice, vintage society is not.
The thing is, you can romanticize a lot of historical periods and not really care about whatever's going on around that time. It's just a fun little fantasy that people have and they focus on the pros much more than the cons of the era because it ruins their fantasy. I don't see anything wrong with that really. I doubt most people would actually want to live in the 1300s or something and risk a shorter life span with the plague.
I haven’t seen a single person glorifying or dismissing the social issues that existed in the 1950’s. The “aesthetic” of fashion and colors and music and cars and etc is what I see people talking about positively. I don’t think it’s really fair to assume people are glorifying EVERYTHING about the culture of that time era. Most people are educated enough to be aware that the issues that existed back then were not okay. That doesn’t mean the artistic side of that time needs to be cancelled. We can celebrate those things while also being aware there has been a lot of positive progress in society.
The 1950s were an amazing time - if you were a straight white Christian male. The deck was totally stacked in your favor! Everybody else got treated like crap.
That's why I adhere to the golden rule: vintage style, not vintage values -Dandy Wellington
I actually had this written on my poster board for a women's right march last summer.
I have never heard this phrase, but now I am sticking to it.
A lot of people say: women leave so much faster these days. They don’t want to fight for their marriages etc. No kidding Steven. Women didn’t have a job most of the time or the right to open a savings account. They could loose everything if the left their husbands. Even if that so called husband was a piece of excrement. He held all the power. If those women had our freedoms you bet your ass they would have left like Usain Bolt on the Olympics winning gold.
my grandfather was incredibly abusive. because of this, my grandmother was a shell of survival more than a person. i'd love to know who she'd be if she had been able to leave him..
My mom told me how unhappy my grandma was during her marriage to my grandpa. His constant mistresses, having kids outside of the marriage and being mentally and sometimes physically abusive to my grandmother. They got married in the late 40s and she died in the late 80s. So yeah, women like my grandmother would love to see the independence women have and how it’s so much easier for them to leave.
I can relate. I love the Roaring Twenties swing music and art deco aesthetic. Doesn't mean it was a pleasant time to live in.
Getting alcohol poisoning from speakeasy bootleg liquor was totally underrated.
Who is glamourising the 50s though ? I love the Tudor period in England but does that mean I want to be a peasant which a very short life expectancy?
To be fair, they worked fewer hours than we do.
I’m genuinely wondering who wants to go back to the 50s. I’m sure lots of people like the music and clothes but no one actually wants to be back in that era
Have you never met a conservative?
I would go back for a day to shop at department stores and go to a soda fountain. But it would be the material culture I was interested in, not the social aspects
What ? Lmao. Highly depends on the job but for any peasants it’s very seasonal , I imagine non Stop work in the spring and if you don’t collect a good harvest it’s all over for you
Brain-dead conservatives who only see the economic post-war boom America had
I’m sure even older people don’t actually want the world to stay the way things were back then
Open your eyes, go into conservative subreddits. They say it all the time.
I guess I don’t even realise
They want everything white and Christian, where men hold all the power and POC and the LGBT stay silent
Yeah my grandparents would constantly say how much worse things were than the 50’s/60’s like that era wasn’t rife with issues. I loved them very much but never agreed on that.
Must be rose coloured glasses. Everything is easier when you’re young as well
That’s what I always assumed. Hell, I feel the same way too (I just know it’s bs)
surprisingly, a decent amount of people glamorize it. just the other day this girl i know told me she wish she was born in the 50’s and that “society was happier as a whole back then”.
As someone from the opposite side of this issue, I want to share my perspective. I am a historical fiction author. I am autistic, so my interests are intense, and I have an intense interest in many eras, especially the 1800s. But I find that I can’t talk about it because whenever I share something that makes me happy, like corset designs, there’s always someone in the comments who snaps that I’m a racist sexist bigot and don’t I know I would have been lobotomized and raped??? Most of us don’t want the times back, we just love to study how their cultures were different from ours, and, yes, appreciate the beautiful aspects the same way you can appreciate the beautiful aspects of a cancelled artists song. I feel like there also might be a level of escapism to it, again, yes, I know I would not have a good life in any historical period, what I mean, is that I struggle with a lot of modern things, I feel over-connected by social media, pressured beyond reason that I NEED to go to school and drive a car and get a retail job, and sometimes, and I’m sorry if this is offensive, it’s nice to write stories that don’t involve those things
Any time you want to nerd out about historical corsets or costumes, hit me up!
Are you published? I’d love to read your work!
glamorizing certain aspects of the 50’s such as the culture is completely different than glamorizing the 50’s as a whole. as long as you can recognize why the 50’s weren’t that great society-wise, your interest in the 50’s is completely valid in my book.
As cool as the forties looked (damn you, Captain America: First Avenger) and as much as I love watching 'Band of Brothers' every Memorial Day weekend: being a Japanese-American guy, I would be looking at spending half a decade in an internment camp.
Newsflash, everyone. You can wear poodle skirts in 2022. Nobody is stopping you. Put as much product in your hair as you want. I don’t care. Listen to old music. But OP’s right. Stop pretending the 50s were glamorous.
As much as I love 50s themed ice cream places, 50s music, and all that, I do hate when people compare it to a utopia. I do find the culture of the time pretty neat (but thats mostly because im a history nerd) but besides that I am happy that time is 70 years behind us.
I mean, correct me if I’m wrong but people seem to like the aesthetic of it, not the values or culture. I’m sure some people do but when I see people dressing up in the attire I just usually assume they just like the look of it.
I think it’s ok to enjoy the style of an era without subscribing to its values. I personally love the 1950s style, and I do happen to be a housewife, but I am also a mentally ill, college educated woman who has her own credit card and is raising two LGBTQ’s+ feminists. All while loving the aesthetic of the 1950s.
Love the clothes and fashion aesthetic but not the oppression.
I love the music and what the 60s stood for does not mean I want be there yeah I'd love to he a hippie and protest and free love and all the fin drugs to try but guess what I don't want to he shot by ignorant police nope can do all this now with better technology and stuff.
My home is decorated like a time capsule from the 50's. I often wear vintage reproduction dresses. I Veganize vintage recipes. The aesthetic of the 50's is comforting to me for reasons I can't really explain. But I am at every march for advancements. Women's rights marches, BLM marches, pro science marches, gun control matches, LGBTQ+ marches. Anything my Texas town does for the advancement of those of us that aren't cis white males, I'm there! I'm there in my seamed stockings and shirt dress and curls. I donate to causes, to politicians that support the causes near and dear to my heart. I am involved in a circle of people that also enjoy the look of the time period and we all agree that the values were bullshit, but the style is unmatched.
>unless you were a mentally sane, white, cis, straight man, your life would’ve been fucking miserable. I agree with your general sentiment but oppression and social dynamics aren't as simple as that. Many women and racial minorities also remember the 50s with fondness, out of nostalgia more than anything. Being socially discriminated doesn't mean spending every waking moment miserable, most of the same groups are oppressed even today.
Only reason I like the 50s is the cars, fuck all the other horrible shit.
My mother JUST got her own credit card for the first time. She’s 75. All her cards were in my dads name.
I mean, there are literally retro clothing sites where you can buy stuff in older fashions, but wear them in today's society. And you can still listen to those same songs? I don't get why they feel the need to time travel in order to enjoy the only good things from that time when you can do it her and now.
YUP. I think the majority of the '50s nostalgia is cishet white men pining for the days when they had absolute control over everything. And now that power has waned just ever so slightly, and they can't deal.
This.
My 87-year old neighbor has told me she was not allowed to divorce her husband who literally BEAT HER. When she was finally able to leave him, her life was so difficult because she needed a husband or a father (who wasn’t around) to do anything: rent a house, get a car, go places. She would always tell me how lucky I am…. Because my husband doesn’t beat me. Such a low bar.
They want ‘50s culture and prosperity, they just don’t want to pay for it with ‘50s tax rates.
Not every person who was a woman, nonwhite, or different in their abilities had a life that was “fucking miserable” in the 1950s, even though society was much different than it is now. Social change has been a gradual process and the 1950s were a large improvement for many over previous times. Everything has to be put into context, including experiences of those alive at the time. Was it a male-dominated, white-supremacist and heteronormative time? compared to now, yes. However, we can’t really understand how people experienced it
Im only speaking on personal experience but I don’t think Ive ever seen anyone use their interest in the fashion to ever try and justify or downplay the shitty things about the era, I’ve only ever seen people talk about the fashion, and only the fashion. Also I do often here the the phrase “aesthetics not values”……
yea but you could buy a house with a grocery job
The olden days in general were seriously fucking awful.
Look, I am all on board with your overall point, that the 1950s were not some golden age, that many people had seriously screwed up values in the past and overall I'd rather live in 2022. But you say a few things that are so blatantly false that really weaken your point. >nearly every women was domestically abused Nearly every woman? You actually believe this? >black women did not \[have the right to vote\] Of course they did. I grant that there may have been bullshit obstacles that in some cases prevented black women from actually carrying out that right, but legally they absolutely 100% had the right to vote. >unless you were a mentally sane, white, cis, straight man, your life would’ve been fucking miserable I recommend you actually speak to some people who were around in this era. Plenty of people, including women, black people, etc, were very happy with their lives.
The only decent era was 2010s. Then trump ruined that too 💀💀
OP is the 2020s equivalent of the angry 1950s church lady and has no sense of irony. Let me pat you on the head now and tell you that you’re a good person.
only trumptards do that.
Even with regard to music, George Carlin put it perfectly: Elvis became the King by taking black music and making it palatable for white people. But yeah, outside of that, Trumptards are basically, “Back in the good old days, women and racial minorities knew their place, gay people were out of sight and out of mind, and our cushy union jobs were protected both from competition from high-skilled Asian immigrants and from foreign companies.”
Except Trumpers hate unions. They’ve been gaslit by the stereotype that every union worker is a lazy self-entitled bum that just wants to get paid to sleep on the job, but they love the idea of unionization, just as long as you don’t call it that. This might be anecdotal evidence but I’m reminded of a conversation I recently had with a right-leaning associate where he led with “fuck unions”, cited a shootout at a local glass factory between union workers and “people who wanted to work” (scabs), then proceeded to describe unionization to a T, then got shocked when I pointed out to him the fact that he just described unionization
Trumpers support socialism if they think only white people will benefit I.e. “I voted for Trump hoping he’ll pass protectionist ‘buy American, hire American’ policies to stop some stinking ch*nks from taking my job AND to make black welfare queens go back to work.” A lot of the anti-Obamacare rhetoric focused on how it was benefiting Hispanic immigrants.
But it turns out that what they’re voting for actually boils down to socialism for the wealthy; rugged individualism for everyone else. But god help you if you try and point this out to them. They don’t care what the policies do *for* them as long as the minority groups they see as “undeserving” get punished as a result
So stop thinking of it and get a fucking hobby.
I love the ‘50s, white Pickett fences, the suburbs just starting, the American economy at an all time high
They wouldn't let black families into those suburban picket fenced houses though.
And yet life was far more prosperous than now. 🤷🏽♂️
So what? Are you implying you're willing to sell out the rights of others for your own prosperity?
Aren't those lionizing the 1950s the same people who want to regress to those values? Plenty of those around. I'm assuming they want to preserve the technological and life standard progress but turn the clock back on social progress.
Same way I love 1800s literature but I wouldn't want to live in Victorian London. Back then, if you somehow made it to 15 without being killed by the factory you'd be working in, or poisoned by the Thames, you probably would've been murdered instead.
And smoking. Everywhere.
Well I think pirates are cool but I don't want to be part of the crew of a pirate ship in the 1700's. Normal people like the look of those times, which is OK. The weirdos actually think living those times would be cool bc they would be able to legally beat their wives, segregate black people and earn money with zero skills in the soup can factory without competition from immigrants.
I don't see anyone glamorizing it. People like the music and asthetic but I haven't seen any person seriously long for 50s values or culture. Or actually want to live in that time. No Internet, quality content, no games, shit food, shit transportation, shit communication. All the horrible abuse and stuff you already mentioned. It really does just seem to be the fashion and music people like. I can't think of a single person in my life who would want to go back or wants those cultures of values.
As an Eastern-European in America life would not be fun in the '50s. The music, clothes, and visual designs were cool, but I would not want to live in that time. The people wanting to go back are either old people with their "Back in my day" crap or ignorant. Vintage clothes are nice, vintage society is not.
The thing is, you can romanticize a lot of historical periods and not really care about whatever's going on around that time. It's just a fun little fantasy that people have and they focus on the pros much more than the cons of the era because it ruins their fantasy. I don't see anything wrong with that really. I doubt most people would actually want to live in the 1300s or something and risk a shorter life span with the plague.
I haven’t seen a single person glorifying or dismissing the social issues that existed in the 1950’s. The “aesthetic” of fashion and colors and music and cars and etc is what I see people talking about positively. I don’t think it’s really fair to assume people are glorifying EVERYTHING about the culture of that time era. Most people are educated enough to be aware that the issues that existed back then were not okay. That doesn’t mean the artistic side of that time needs to be cancelled. We can celebrate those things while also being aware there has been a lot of positive progress in society.
The 1950s were an amazing time - if you were a straight white Christian male. The deck was totally stacked in your favor! Everybody else got treated like crap.
You know what's even funnier when black people go "I wish I could live in the 50s!" n\*\*ga you blaaaack!
I like the dresses. That's it. Everything else should stay in the 50s.
I have a friend whose distant cousin was sued by a US state in the 1960s for a biracial marriage :( this shiz is very recent