Why the 50s

[nolongerIFBx]

This was alluded to in "The Typical Fundie Male Look":

I always think they look like they came out of the 1950s, aka "Leave it to Beaver" . . . There's something Stepford wife-ish (but I guess husband-ish) about them.

and I shortly have to write a response in my Religion in Science Fiction course about why the 50s were used as the setting for Perky Pat land in The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch by Philip K. Dick. No need to have read the book. Why were the 50s so idealized?

I have ideas of my own but I'd welcome other thoughts. Mods, if this needs to be moved, feel free, but since fundies do seem to idealize the 50s and attempt to re-create it, I'm assuming this is the correct forum.

[Marian the Librarian]

In post-WWII America, the menfolk were back home from the front. Families were settling down in the 'burbs, and it was the "norm" to have a stay-at-home mom/housewife taking care of all the traditionally female jobs - cooking, cleaning, sewing, child care, etc. Fundies eat this idea(l) up with a big spoon.

[ViolaSebastian]

It's interesting, because the 1950s were really a time in which some unusual cultural trends happened. After WWI, women started demanding more rights (the vote, right to own property, have bank accounts) so it was really looked upon as a progressive decade, one in which women were establishing themselves. Of course with the 30s came the Great Depression, and women had to work outside the home or take in laundry/provide childcare within the home--women had to work to provide for the survival of the family. With WWII, women were in the workforce in even greater numbers to work for the war effort. After the war, the men came home and could finally establish themselves economically so that they could be the sole provider in the home--of course, that didn't last long, as these women who had seen decades of improvements in their lot in life and knew what it was to have employment and interests outside the home weren't terribly happy being shoved back into a man's narrow definition of what they could be--and the women's movement of the 1960s and 1970s happened.

I also think there's a lot of idealizing of the 1950s because that was the first decade that brought us the television--and the highly idealized, picture perfect families that went with it. It's easy to think that all families in the 1950s were like the Cleavers or the Ricardos--of course, anyone who actually lived through the decade would tell you that families had just as many problems then as they do now. But it's easy to believe that family life was just idyllic from these television examples.

[docmom]

It was the last decade in which merely being a male, white Christian was enough to pretty much guarantee success. There was little to no competition in the workforce or in higher education from women, people of color or people of a different religion. Discrimination was legal and encouraged. Suddenly having to compete with other across a more (but definitely not completely) level playing field was shocking and they haven't recovered.

[GeoBQn]

And yet, people in the 1950's wished that they could go back to a time when they didn't have to fear nuclear war. They had a lot of nostalgia for the 1920's and the 1880's. People in every time period have looked back fondly on "the good old days."

[BriarRose1122]

And yet, people in the 1950's wished that they could go back to a time when they didn't have to fear nuclear war. They had a lot of nostalgia for the 1920's and the 1880's. People in every time period have looked back fondly on "the good old days."

Your post reminded me of something. Nowadays people have parties with themes like Roaring 20s and 1950s themed.

Back in the fifties, people used to hold "Gay 90's" parties- parties themed like the 1890s.

Back in the 1950s, people idealized the 1890s as the decade of happiness, wholesome, enjoyment etc.

[ViolaSebastian]

And yet, people in the 1950's wished that they could go back to a time when they didn't have to fear nuclear war. They had a lot of nostalgia for the 1920's and the 1880's. People in every time period have looked back fondly on "the good old days."

If there's one thing I've learned studying history, it's that there were no 'good old days.'

People sometimes ask me if I could go back in time to any era, what would it be. I always tell them any time after antibiotics are invented.

[Jana814]

In post-WWII America, the menfolk were back home from the front. Families were settling down in the 'burbs, and it was the "norm" to have a stay-at-home mom/housewife taking care of all the traditionally female jobs - cooking, cleaning, sewing, child care, etc. Fundies eat this idea(l) up with a big spoon.

Yes they do!! It might say 2014 on the calander but in most Fundy families its the 1950's.

[fun2beme]

I agree that TV had a lot to do with it. Donna Reed, the Patty Duke show - they all made families look so perfect and wholesome, unlike shows in the last few decades - Ray Romano, etc., that are much more realistic. Not that it's a bad thing, but for people born in '60s or later, that "perfect life" is pretty much the exposure we have to the 50s. When I look at pics of my parents and family in the '50s, there is a lot of wholesomeness and I have to say, most people dressed a lot better, at least in public. My great-uncle (who worked in the coal mines) had a suit on in every picture. And for me personally, I love love love the fashions of the 50s, the full skirts, colors, etc. Though I'm the first to admit that those skirts would be most unflattering on me.

But my parents both admit that life in the 50s wasn't all sunshine and roses. My mom remembers still going to outhouses when visiting some of her poorer relatives. In her house, she said their toilet was just there, in the middle of the unheated cellar, and they used newspaper instead of toilet paper. And she hated the belts you had to wear with maxi pads.

My dad remembers going to the local appliance store to watch big sporting events. Few people had TVs so the shop owners would turn on the games and put TVs in the window, so people could stand on the street to watch it.

[Loveday]

And yet, people in the 1950's wished that they could go back to a time when they didn't have to fear nuclear war. They had a lot of nostalgia for the 1920's and the 1880's. People in every time period have looked back fondly on "the good old days."

Yep. I was born in the late 50s, so my memories of growing up are of the 60s and 70s. We looked back on the 50s with nostalgia thanks mainly to Happy Days, but now i look on the 60s as if it were the most halcyon of eras--and I KNOW that wasn't the case! I remember seeing images of the Vietnam war on TV, the Civil Rights fight, the assassinations (although I have no memory of JFK's death even though I lived in the DC area at the time; I was six and I think my parents were still keeping me away from the news at that point in my life), not to mention I just lived through it, so why I feel like it was the best of times I just don't know. :think: The Wonder Years syndrome, I suppose. :lol:

[RachelB]

I would guess that the major factors are that the '50s were prior to the Civil Rights movement and second-wave feminism making most of their gains, plus prior to Watergate (and its resultant effects on how benevolent people perceived authority to be).

Also, it was a time of economic prosperity, in comparison to the Great Depression and WW2. It's easier to believe that hard work and clean living lead directly to financial comfort if most of the people you know and like are doing better financially than their parents did (and if you've largely isolated yourself from people who live in poverty, as movement into the suburbs allowed).

[Coco]

It's the decade fundies can look back at that idealized housewives but still had all the modern conveniences like washers, dryers, TVs, pretty much just a wholesome version of modern life, and Father Knows Best! They romanticize pioneer days too but very few women would actually consider churning butter or using a woodstove.

[Bethella]

I'll bet McCarthyism and the desire to have witch-hunts for anyone who doesn't believe exactly the same doctrine as they do also plays a role. Can you imagine a hunt for heathens lead by Gothard or one of the other hard-liners?

[MissA]

It's the decade fundies can look back at that idealized housewives but still had all the modern conveniences like washers, dryers, TVs, pretty much just a wholesome version of modern life, and Father Knows Best! They romanticize pioneer days too but very few women would actually consider churning butter or using a woodstove.

Everybody else has good points but I think this has a lot to do with it too. Housewifing is a hell of a lot more appealing when you don't have to handsew every rag that goes on the backs of your entire family, burn coal/wood/buffalo chips to keep warm, and go out and kill your own chickens for dinner.

I have this great book "The Victorian Home" by Judith Light which is about the middle classes in Victorian London and reading it I am always struck by how much life had to SUCK before modern conveniences. High infant and childhood mortality. Washtub baths. Freezing cold all the time. Toting your own water. And that's not even dealing with the lives of the poor.

[YPestis]

I think people have covered the main reasons for the adulation that the 50s receive. Pre-Civil Rights era, the sitcoms on TV and also the prosperity Americans experienced at that time. The other issue is that America, in general, were feeling pretty cocky. We were a raising superpower. Europe was recovering from the devastation of WWII, the rest of the world were (more or less) poor and developing. America was a young and prosperous nation and things were looking up. The GI Bill meant young men coming back could go to school. Houses were affordable for the masses. Modern conveniences were available. It was modern living without the complications of civil rights and feminism. I would say that it was also the last era before the messiness of the 60s.

Also, as others noted, each generation looks back nostalgically on a certain period. For the people in the 50's, it may have been the 20's or 1890s. For us, living in the 21st century, it was the 50's. Maybe in another fifty years, people will look back on 2014 as an idyllic time. Perhaps the fundies of 2064 will look back at the 2010's as this wondrous period where people only had one spouses and women got pregnant with their uterus' or whatever. Who knows what the future will bring?

[fun2beme]

It's ironic because the 50s were also the start of the Cold War and the kids hiding under desks in air raid drills, but that fear is glossed over. I also wonder how many WW2 vets were suffering from PTSD and how they coped since even now, we don't seem to have proper resources in place to deal with this.

[2xx1xy1JD]

While they were happening, the 50s were actually a time of rapid change. You continued to have a rapid shift of the population from rural to urban. You had the explosive growth of suburbs and highways. Basically, the idea of longer commutes and men working away from home all day really grew during this time. You had a huge rise in consumer culture, processed foods, modern appliances, television, and car ownership. In short - a growth in everything that the fundie homestead culture hates. You had the rise in Communism as it spread from the Soviet Union throughout countries in Eastern Europe. The US had just used atomic bombs in war, and the Soviet Union soon developed them. You had the horror of the Rosenbergs, tried and executed for allegedly passing nuclear secrets to the Soviet Union (although it seems pretty clear that the evidence against Ethel Rosenberg was mostly fabricated by her brother under duress). You had a rise in immigration, after it had slowed to a trickle in the 30s and during WWII.

You get nostalgia because:

- there was a post-war Baby Boom, and many Boomers were born during the 1950s. To them, it was about fond childhood memories.

- those same Boomers became teens in the 1960s, which caused some societal upheaval. In comparison, if you were from one of the groups that wasn't fighting for its rights, the 1950s looks like a period of stability.

- the previous decades had been pretty hideous: the 30s had the Depression, and the 40s had World War 2.

Childhood memories are basically either wonderful or horrible - there's not much in between. Little kids tend to be oblivious to the problems of the outside world, unless it intrudes in a way that is truly traumatic. For example, my memories of the 1970s are fantastic - pretty carefree in the burbs with friendly neighbors and a loving family and lots of playing in the park. I had no idea that my future husband was in a bomb shelter during my 2nd birthday, or that the fall of Saigon coincided with a nice spring day when I was 4, or that the sexual revolution was in full swing, or that there was an energy crisis, or the Watergate scandal. I didn't know that one of those friendly neighbors would later be a convicted child molester, or that my mom was worried about some of the public housing projects. My bubble was all good.

[nolongerIFBx]

Very much along the lines of what I was thinking. TV projected an ideal world (in the fundies' minds) and economically thing were going very well.

[iateallthebrownies]

Coincidentally, I had read this thread and then I just read this article (still finishing it actually):

aeon.co/magazine/psychology/the-warped-world-of-1950s-marriage-counselling/

In particular, this stuck out to me --

The archive of recent ‘Can This Marriage Be Saved?’ columns on the Ladies’ Home Journal website is devoid of the woman-blaming that characterised the rubric’s early decades. Nor is it still acceptable to presume that poor housekeeping is solely a woman’s problem, or that women must endure domestic violence. Of course, there are corners of US culture where being a so-called ‘surrendered wife’ is still a desirable goal. Socially conservative marriage commentators such as the evangelical Christian psychologist James Dobson of Focus on the Family and the US talk radio host Laura Schlessinger, continue to counsel wives to leave their desire for control behind in order to have happier marriages. (In a direct linkage between Popenoe’s ideas and such latter-day conservatives, Dobson spent an early phase of his career at the AIFR.) But these concepts are no longer mainstream in the way they once were.

[GenerationCedarchip]

Very much along the lines of what I was thinking. TV projected an ideal world (in the fundies' minds) and economically thing were going very well.

Exactly. American prosperity + all the modern conveniences + everyone staying in their neat little class/gender/etc... boxes. Also, a lot of the fundie leaders were children or young adults during that time and that probably contributes to the idealization. I certainly remember 50s sock hops and sermons harkening back to the more godly America that supposedly existed then. Though, since this was a reformed church, they also liked to idealize the Puritans and to some degree, parts of the Victorian age.

[ADoyle90815]

It's ironic because the 50s were also the start of the Cold War and the kids hiding under desks in air raid drills, but that fear is glossed over. I also wonder how many WW2 vets were suffering from PTSD and how they coped since even now, we don't seem to have proper resources in place to deal with this.

That's true, the 50's were the start of the Cold War and air raid drills where children were told that a wooden desk would protect them from a nuclear bomb. I love what Lewis Black said about those drills. Language NSFW.[bBvideo 560,340:nz998c81]

[/bBvideo]

[DefraudedByPlaid]

The movie Midnight in Paris deals with this exact issue of longing for past times. A fantastic movie.

[Mitz_]

The movie Midnight in Paris deals with this exact issue of longing for past times. A fantastic movie.

"The Prizewinner of Defiance Ohio" . I have not been able to get a copy of the book but I have watched the movie of the same name. Juliette Lewis and Woody Harrelson are the lead roles in the movie.

I can't tell you how great the movie is. Read it , watch it...you will be glad you did.

[DGayle]

It's easy to think that all families in the 1950s were like the Cleavers or the Ricardos-

June and Lucy are polar opposites. June was happy being the stay-at-home mother who bowed to Ward's authority. Lucy did cook and clean, but she was a go-getter who had no problem telling her husband off, undermining his authority, going behind his back, doing what she wanted, and challenging him every chance she got. She and Ethel even got Ricky and Fred to be the at-home "wives" to prove they had it harder, while Lucy and Ethel went to work because the guys wanted to prove they had it harder instead. June wouldn't have done that.

I've never seen a fundy list Lucy as an icon, but the portrait of June is right up there.

[DGayle]

I have this great book "The Victorian Home" by Judith Light which is about the middle classes in Victorian London and reading it I am always struck by how much life had to SUCK before modern conveniences. High infant and childhood mortality. Washtub baths. Freezing cold all the time. Toting your own water. And that's not even dealing with the lives of the poor.

The Edwardian House, a miniseries about a modern family transported back to life in 1900 complete with the clothing, "modern" conveniences, foods, and everything, showed an upper-middle-class family who had more than most, and it was still hard work! A couple days to wash and press clothes, many hours for the wife of the house to clean and scrub floors, even with a maid, just so much work.