“Boy, I wish we lived in the 1950s.” “We are definitely in the last days.” “The amount of sin and unrighteousness has tripled since I was a young man in the 1950s.” “I’d prefer to live in the 1950s.” Those are popular sentiments I often hear in my church -- High Priest -- meetings. (I kid my fellow High Priests, these sentiments are not exclusive to my elder graybeards -- some of whom have less gray than me.)
I’d kind of like to visit the 1950s for a couple of days. It’d be cool to take in a doubleheader at the Polo Grounds, or Ebbetts Field, watch the Hollywood Stars play baseball, catch a fight card at The Olympic Auditorium, or St. Nicks in NYC. But I couldn’t live in any era where I couldn’t travel 15 minutes and enjoy Schezwan chicken. Try that in the 1950s. (Actually, since I've gone gluten-, soy- and dairy-free I don't eat Schezwan chicken anymore).
I just read an interesting book, “Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960 to 2010,” by Charles Murray, and it’s got me thinking about life then and life today. I jotted down a few positives and negatives about the 1950s to early ‘60s, I jotted down a few positives and negatives about the 1950s, whether secular, political, cultural, religious … In the 1950s, most of the professions were off limits to women. My LDS Church was 20-plus years away from allowing blacks the priesthood and temple privileges. There were very few LDS temples. Many Mormons had no access to the faith’s General Conference. (In fact, when I was a missionary in Peru 29 years ago, there was no access to LDS General Conference as well). Members didn’t have the access to church materials, or interests such as genealogy, that are available via our Internet or TVs.
In the 1950s, homosexuality was considered a mental disorder; Salt Lake City was a long way from being regarded a gay-friendly city. People smoked liked chimneys and as a result, lots of us lived shorter lives. Medicine didn’t have near the ability it has now to relieve chronic pain and more from cancer and other illness.
May children may have played outdoors more in the 1950s, but I’d want them to be exposed to the tolerance of today’s culture and benefit from the advances in science, technology, engineering, and other areas that we have experienced the past 40 years due to an increased egalitarianism within the universities, the culture, and workplace.
On the plus side, the food had fewer preservatives in the 1950s. On the bad side, there wasn’t much variety. Whether Indian, Chinese, or many other specialties, there are so many more culinary offerings today. Consider the Internet: We can reach just about anywhere in the world in a split second, face to face; we can watch — in real time — events scores of thousands of miles away.
We have the potential to buy virtually anything we need or just want. TV: We have the ability to watch hundreds of channels, either via our digital TV or on the Internet. ( I was flipping channels Saturday and discovered the Aussie cricket on in the early AM, live; that’s crazy) There are hundreds, if not thousands, of more events, contests, sports offerings today than what was available 50-plus years ago.
Vehicles were inferior to those today. Gas wasn’t as cheap as we remember. Based on today’s prices, a gallon of gas in the early 1960s, for example, was above $2 a gallon.
The level of sports was not as strong as today. No offense boxing purists, but Deontay Wilder would easily KO Rocky Marciano. The movies may have been cleaner, but there weren’t nearly as many available. If you missed a film for a couple of weeks, you needed to hope that it would be on TV in a couple of years.
And even with our LDS religion, how can we live sans instant access to even videos of past General Conferences, many, many books, even from the 1900s and all the lessons, songs, history, etc. we want.
We remember our past fondly. We romanticize it and we devour books and film that details the past, usually in its most alluring forms. But seriously, you gotta be crazy to want to swap 2017 for the 1950s.
-- Doug Gibson
Originally published at StandardBlogs
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