Who here wishes for the 40's-50's lifestyle?

You know, there’s still white-picket fences. Move to the suburbs if that sort of lifestyle appeals to you.

But let’s clear up some misconceptions you seem to be operating under. The image of the ‘50s you have in your head is a sanitized, Hollywood version that been polished for 60 years, made to seem more appealing than it actually was. The ‘’’white picket fence’’ version of the 1950s is about as realistic as thinking that in the 1880s, everyone wore a six-shooter, Main Street was always a dirt road, and everyone was either a cowboy or an outlaw.

Don’t forget the 1950s was also the period of institutional racism, rampant sexism, race riots, lynching, the Cold War, nuclear proliferation, McCarthyism, the Korean War, the crackdown against ‘’indecent’’ music , the rise of Castro…

and just to put that ridiculous notion of ‘’well-behaved’’ children to rest once and for all, sociologists mark the 1950s as the decade with the greatest level of juvenile delinquency in the history of the United States. Why? Because authoritarian adults were desperately trying to maintain a false and unrealistic culture of morality and order at the expense of free speech and individuality, causing their children to rebel in unprecedented numbers.

Everything you mentioned was aesthetics only. You long for an oil painting of the ‘50s representing a culture that never actually existed. Go watch Pleasantville again.

I have always wanted to live in the 50’s