The Myth of the 1950s

The past ain't what it used to be.
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The really high quality footage of Soho in 1956 was upscaled by @livinghistoryaienhanced, who has a great catalogue of similar videos from all around the world, go check them out.

[@BritMonkey]

Full disclosure: I have never read the Hagakure, I saw the quote in the movie Ghost Dog starring Forest Whitaker

[@2totabon]

“Even if one's head were to be suddenly cut off, he should be able to do one more action with certainty. With martial valor, if one becomes like a revengeful ghost and shows great determination, though his head is cut off, he should not die.”

[@mrdupreez9061]

Ghost dog!

[@aGentlemanFromDelaware]

bruh

[@masscreationbroadcasts]

I... Really? A 15 minute Progressive "ha, don't Conservatives know their nostalgia about the past isn't how the past was like" video in which you use as half your conclusion a quote from a book you never read? Good thing you admit it, but that's what's worth 2 videos in 5 months? A 13 minute recap and slight expansion of your Georgism video from 4 years ago and this unoriginal shlock? I've probably seen 4 videos with this very message already. Answer honestly, did you lose your vision? Ok, not every video you make can be a "Bangladesh" or a "Packed in Thailand" or a "Housing Crisis" or a "Graffiti" tier quality, but THIS couldn't have taken more than 3 days script righting, sourcing, recording and editing. I mean it. Do you need an inspiration?

[@vistagreat9994]

@@masscreationbroadcasts I mean, probably. He'll make a banger video next time, but this is not our christmas present, chief.

[@aprilmg7072]

According to my grandma, the 50's was full of rampant adultery, interfamilial theft, tragic avoidable deaths, domestic abuse, alcohol abuse, and use of prostitutes.

[@WolfgangSourdeau]

Those were the good old days! ;-)

[@BrazenBull001]

What the hell was your grandma doing back then

[@srpokz]

​@@BrazenBull001visiting prostitutes

[@mikaelos]

Your grandma has very good memory, not heavily affected by nostalgia

[@Simon-sr3cn]

Sounds expensive

[@GhettoGuide-wg7gd]

There’s an old saying “life is better remembered than lived” and that statement holds true throughout history

[@JmKrokY]

I mean that's literally how our brains remember, we mostly remember the happy and the good times in our life

[@VikingTeddy]

You kids don't realize how bad things really are, you just don't know any better. Back in my day they made clothes that fit, sofas that were easy to get up from, and beds that didn't leave you tired. They've now put something in the water that makes you get up several times to pee in the night. And the tv shows talk about things no one understands!

[@GhettoGuide-wg7gd]

@@VikingTeddy looking at your profile picture, i would say that couch thing worked in you

[@VikingTeddy]

@@GhettoGuide-wg7gd Oh, that's me like 8 years ago. Been doing a lot of "bodybuilding" since...

[@clementpoon120]

i do like the look of people in the 50s though

[@GrzegorzBrzeczyszczykiew-kr8sn]

People in the 1950s thought the 1920s were better, people in the 1920s thought the 1800s were better and people in the 1800s thought the 1700s were better. Humanity has been suffering from nostalgia since the beginning. The Epic of Gilgamesh, one of the oldest stories, opens up with “In those ancient days…”

[@user-xf1sm1lv4n]

Humanity has being declining for centuries read about kali yuga

[@Dennis-nc3vw]

@@user-xf1sm1lv4n So you'd rather live in 1600?

[@iamcryingbecauseimababy3223]

​@@user-xf1sm1lv4nwhy do you sanghis need to bring hinduism everywhere?

[@weronika2463]

Cave people - great!

[@PoisonelleMisty4311]

This observation highlights the timeless nature of nostalgia and our tendency to romanticize the past. Throughout history, people have consistently looked back at earlier periods with a sense of longing or admiration. The reference to the Epic of Gilgamesh, one of the oldest known literary works, further emphasizes this point. Nostalgia often arises from a longing for a perceived simplicity, authenticity, or idealized past. Each generation may feel dissatisfied with the present and yearn for what they believe were better times. However, this nostalgic perspective is subjective and often overlooks the complexities and challenges of past eras. It is important to recognize that nostalgia can be both positive and detrimental. While reminiscing about the past can provide a sense of comfort and connection, it can also hinder progress, as it may prevent people from fully embracing the opportunities and advancements of the present. Understanding our tendency towards nostalgia enables us to approach it with a critical mindset. It allows us to appreciate the value of history and tradition while also recognizing the need for growth and adaptation to the ever-changing world.

[@thatsmallcessna8300]

Theres actually a really good movie that has this message called Midnight in Paris. The main character is obsessed with 1920s era Paris and thinks it is the golden age. When he gets the opportunity to go back to the 20s, he realizes that a lot of the people idolize the 1800s and "wish they could back." This makes him realize that there is no perfect point in history, so he stops idolizing the past and learns to make the most of the time he lives in.

[@AWlpsSHOW36]

That is honestly so beautiful. I need to watch that. I appreciate a movie like this!

[@amarylisesquilin1433]

Everyone who is able to should see it, I found it very educational, since I had heard my grandmother talk about the 1900s and 20s, she was born 1895 and my parents in the 20s, there is a lot I learned about the 1900, 20s, 30s and the beginning of the 40s, there is a lot I remember from when I was 3 y/o, I was born in 1942.

[@arnoldhemsley9317]

Amen.!

[@WitchKing-Of-Angmar]

So let me get this straight.., a modern film made a fake version of a real time period, and presented it like it really was the time period and you believed it.

[@pgb3156]

​@@WitchKing-Of-Angmarwere you there?

[@Kodeb8]

The ancient Greeks idolized the past and believed they were only a few years away from seeing a total societal collapse. The opening line in The Epic Of Gilgamesh (oldest recorded story) is reminiscing about "the ancient times" before the invention of bread.

[@coolbutnotverycool1440]

any criticism of modern life or adoration of a certain aspect of the past is illegitimate because sometimes people in the past did so as well. got it mr Shinji profile picture, i bet a neon genysis enjoyer or whatever it's called is pretty satisfied with his life right no way you'd be depressed🤯

[@Kodeb8]

@@coolbutnotverycool1440 Bro calm down, I literally posted another comment somewhat agreeing with you. I do think a lot of things were better in the past, however I also recognize the past wasn't a perfect world. The reason I made this comment was the funny irony that even as far back as in ancient Greece, people were ranting about "the good ol days". The reality is we always see the past as better because we only remember the good things. This is a pretty well-known phenomena. But if it makes you feel any better, I don't think "progress" is always good, there are many things I miss that I wish hadn't changed, and I constantly find myself wishing I could travel back to a few years ago.

[@coolbutnotverycool1440]

@@Kodeb8 you do agree that people that watch that show are usually depressed though right

[@charlethemagne5466]

@@coolbutnotverycool1440 man you autistically fixating on what show he watches and completely disregarding his well written reply is pathetic.

[@RRRR-jr1gp]

Uh the epic of gilgamesh is mesopotamyan

[@brianarbenz1329]

"Never compare your life with someone else's highlight reel." That advice can be used in a chronological sense as well: "Never compare today's reality with yesterday's highlight reel."

[@herr_crustovsky]

Many things are indeed better left in the past, but it's also foolish to think we had a linear evolution and there's nothing that we could look back on and try again. I think that's the most moderate view.

[@brianarbenz1329]

@@herr_crustovsky Almost always, the problems of the present were planted firmly by the decisions of the past. For example, TV was made fully commercial and aimed at children by the powers of the '50s. The lower literacy and rise in instant gratification of the '70s should be blamed on those '50s policies, but seldom were.

[@stregalilith]

@@brianarbenz1329 Good example. But there was PBS with Mr. Rogers who really showed the kids good values, a sense of justice and a bit of how to tell truth from fiction (BS advertising, etc.). But overall, you're right and we're all suffering for it.

[@classicmoviesvault]

That is very wise

[@user-yl6jt4kf7b]

Hear Hear!🎉

[@user-de3mg1hg5l]

What people really miss is being a child, not worrying about money or bills. Being young again and having your parents take care of you.

[@MarshallTheArtist]

People forget how terrible their own childhoods were too. They don't want to remember how it really felt.

[@griffins750]

Depends on what people miss, for people who like cars, like me- yes they were much less safe, but cars were also much more involving and mechanical in nature something that appeals to people who enjoy the experience of driving… And unlike with clothing it’s difficult to enjoy things like that today because of continuously evolving emissions regulations.

[@Anubis424242]

I wish I had never been born in the first place. My mom should've gotten an abortion, but she was too stupid to realize it was better that way.

[@ramaraksha01]

That is the concept of Heaven - a metaphor for the womb, childhood Religion says we can run back to the past, back to mommy A Nanny God will feed, protect, shelter, care for us and keep us in a nice bubble far, far away from real life and all its harsh realities Our OWN loved ones could be suffering, starving, sick, homeless, caught in a war facing rape, torture but we care no more! No one mentions any work being done in Heaven, no one even asks! An idle, lazy, useless, pointless, uncaring, shameless, cowardly freeloader existence for eternity! God's Grand Plan! It is not just Cons who want to run back to those good old days, we do too!

[@iISkyGameIi]

@@ramaraksha01what did you smoke to come up with that

[@ahyesname3283]

They miss the culture, not the lifestyle.

[@TiagoGomez-hb9te]

Why do you say the culture?

[@Ivan-pr7ku]

History's final lesson: Reject nostalgia, embrace wisdom, build a better future.

[@Carcajou72]

Oh, come on. You can do better than that. Your description is all BS.

[@CimarronaMotions]

no

[@user-ks9oj7zo4p]

💯💯

[@auntymarushkafah]

If you think the 50s were so great, you missed the nuclear drills.

[@DeathnoteBB]

What happened here

[@Heligoland360]

I think it's reasonable to point out some things were better in the past without having to defend the position that everything was better in the past.

[@bloodbarage]

This is just a hit piece on the past. Id rather die of cancer in a factory than die of cancer in a time of great prosperity. Heart disease kills most blacks today. We still, in this “golden age of technology” still have hundreds if not thousands of unavoidable deaths every year. And the population is getting so stupid, we have had to put tide pods behind a glass wall.

[@mweleme]

With all the clever comments on this video, this one stands out as being relevant and correct. And if I may add, it also depends on the geographical location back then as is now. I remember things in the 80's and early 90's that it would be gold to see them happen again, while others such as the extreme subjugation of women and domestic violence (that was quite rampant and much frequent) that I wouldn't want to see again. It was heart-breaking.

[@nukeputin420]

This... it's pretty hard to ignore the fact that people earned significantly more for less work in the 50's. People who came of age in the 1970's talk about paying for entire college degrees with a part-time summer job. Of course younger people are getting fucked.

[@neoqwerty]

@@nukeputin420 My dad was from around that point and his job was risking life and limb in a lumber mill at 16, then getting lucky getting into the rock cover band scene and basically living in a station wagon while becoming an alcoholic to fund himself through basic med school classes and going cold turkey to qualify as a paramedic, and regretting to the end of his days that he wasn't there for me from when I was born until I was 7 and he had to retire due to a disability and he had to learn enough law to take people to court for his disability benefits. If my dad hadn't been this brilliant and good at teaching himself, or able to drag himself out of his alcoholism without support, he'd never have made it out of his 20s, and that's if he had the luck of not getting killed at 16 in a sawmill. That whole "earned more for less work" isn't an universal, my dad was still barely living through on odd jobs and gigs until he got his paramedic job that haunted him mentally even when I was a teen and he finally told me he was scared I never knew how much he loved me because he was never home when I was awake. Don't trust the "it was better"-- most people paid for that financial stability with emotional and mental damage.

[@borntoclimb7116]

Some things was better, Lot of things nowadays are better

[@jacksont9455]

The internet: “Everybody wants to return to the 50s!” Black people and women: “… 👀”

[@DoggyBingBong]

Very few women were actually beaten or abused because normal people ARENT MONSTERS LIKE THE MEDIA WANTS YOU TO THINK

[@zenothemeano4381]

@@DoggyBingBong You would be surprised how many people likely got away with such activity back in the day however.

[@ann6878]

Every minority: 🤮💀🤨

[@MicahAubert-of1ej]

Tbh women had it good in some ways. Why would you not want 50% of the population to treat you like royalty. You did not have to work, did not have to open your own door, had help getting down from things, did not have pay the bills, did not have to drive, did not have to fix anything, did not pay for the dates in a relationship, had a body guard every where you went being most men who where in the area, where not drafted, I mean besides not being able to open a checking account and having too much free time it sounds good to me.

[@MicahAubert-of1ej]

@@bisous101 why dose everyone think that every man is a wife beating pice of crap and that it was acceptable back then.

[@curtisowen3233]

Old people are nostalgic about being young and healthy and full of dreams no matter how shitty the circumstances were at that time. Rose colored glasses through and through.

[@Fluxwux]

It’s the same thing for Gen Z starting to romanticize 2016 (even if everyone at the time called it “the worst year ever”) because most were in middle school or high school care free and social media wasn’t as toxic and draining

[@JF-wp2rz]

​@@Fluxwux I don't understand it either. I was bullied in school and still miss 2016 for some reason. I don't miss 2015 or 2017 though. Just 2016 for some resson.

[@jeremynewcombe3422]

@@JF-wp2rz It's because 2016 was the internet's best year. Afterwards, memes grew stale - the first meme of 2017 was somebody toucha my spaghett, falling way short from 2016's memes like dat boi and internet trends like vaporwave reshaping the internet. You had all sorts of KZbin drama, commentary channels like h3h3 and idubbz were actually good. Trump generated a lot of content, but it everyone found it funny because he was just a candidate at the time. In 2017 he became president and everything started becoming a lot more political. He had become so ingrained in America's and the internet's consciousness that they couldn't detach once he stopped being an amusing private citizen, and it all became so toxic. The next biggest decline in internet quality wouldn't be until the Tumblr exodus of 2018, where the incessant userbase that had been hitherto well-contained burst out into every other forum, saturating content across the web. Then there was 2020 when everyone's brains melted from COVID. Now we're still experiencing the after effects.

[@gameboygamer6498]

My grandma remembers the 50s. She was repeatedly denied by her father to go to college despite her academic achievements. Her dad sent her brother instead only because he was a man. My grandma now describes her brother (who lives in a trailer off of social security) a failure.

[@nathanseper8738]

That's a good anti-nostalgia story.

[@yamataichul]

I'm happy your grandmother lived to tell the story. I'm getting nauseous hearing boys be live: there are biological differences 🤮

[@HowieHoward-ti3dx]

Your grandma must be a feminist. Also, you wouldn't be born if she went to college. So think about it and thank your great granddad.

[@theminecraft_gamersxx2815]

@@yamataichul Are you stupid? Men are biologically stronger, its a literal fact. Bro its literally taught in health in like around 5th to 7th grade 💀Theres a reason why a extreme majority of frontline roles in militaries are held by men and not women. Theres a reason why most construction workers are men.

[@Innocenttazlet]

My dad had that with his eldest brother. He always got the hand me downs and such clothes toys, bikes etc.. there just the money for his brother to go to university, though my dad got into the grammar schools. There was aways a deep resentment there because of that. To think of people only having the money to invest all in a single oldest male child in hopes they will earn a good wage.

[@the_pinkerton]

It's incredible how at this point many Europeans think that life was better just a few years after the war

[@Polska_Edits]

Not in Eastern Europe generally

[@Floedekage]

​@@Polska_Editsfair point

[@the_pinkerton]

​@@Polska_Editsyes, but some from my country still think that life in the 1920/30s was better

[@shadowcelica5554]

@@europa818 Paris in the 1950s had litteral miles of slums people didnt have access to electricity and running water

[@NamePending9]

@@shadowcelica5554 They are just being a thinly veiled racist no need to engage with them

[@zeusvalentine3638]

Houses in the 50s still beat the tent cities of today

[@bedro_0]

didja watch the vido?

[@zeusvalentine3638]

@@bedro_0 just had to highlight an important point. without affordable housing all your points are moot

[@noahgeo5192]

@@bedro_0Ya, the guy was wrong on about 90% of the things he said

[@Jakov-or7fp]

​@@bedro_0He cherrypicked

[@kcharles7637]

I have a great grandma, who was born in 1924. She told me all the stories. She belives we live now a healthier physical life but extremely unhealty mental life. She thinks it was truly better to live in the 1960s.

[@jessip8654]

There's some things that have definitely gotten worse over the last 30 years, like housing costs going crazy and an epidemic of loneliness, but yeah a lot of things have gotten WAY better, and I admit even I sometimes get caught up in the doomerism.

[@nathanseper8738]

Doomerism and nostalgia are understandable reactions to the problems you mentioned. But the mistake we're making is electing demagogues who, in trying to bring back the supposed good times, will send us backward and even make those problems worse. The antidote to this feeling of despair is to find solutions rather than give in to populist nonsense.

[@TheOsamaBahama]

For the price of housing, watch his video on housing (The Housing Crisis is the Everything Crisis) to understand why it's so expensive.

[@Tommyleini]

Yep, 90s in the UK house prices were 3.5x median annual income, now it's 9 times. Back then people worked full-time for 3-5 years, then bought property big enough for 2 adults and 2-3 children, before the age of 30. Try that now.

[@longiusaescius2537]

@TheOsamaBahama "Actually I'm pretty sure importing infinity migrants into finite space has more to do with that but whatever"

[@moosesandmeese969]

@@TheOsamaBahama TLDR unnecessary restrictions on housing construction that led to housing supply being set far behind demand due to population growth

[@Jester23456]

That “I don’t feel alive” line actually gave me chills

[@new-lviv]

She was depressed, no jokes. Not having purpose in life that you believe in with your heart, not understanding why you woke up today. To the point at the end of the video: the big w@r might be coming to West to refresh those old timer feelings. After it went here I don't believe the 3rd WW is not possible anymore. Greetings from Ukraine.

[@lemsavage9473]

Holy shit I read this before I got to that point. Now I have that was chilling

[@michelmoreno8233]

​@@new-lviv I feel so sorry for her, not only did she not understand what was happening, talking about it was very taboo and people probably told her to just get it over with

[@vapordreams983]

Capitalism

[@danhurst9048]

And that doean't happen today?

[@jonnyholmberg]

And let us not forget the amount of blatant, unchallenged racism, sexism and structural oppression of anyone who didn’t fit into the dominating norms, e.g. as far as sexuality was concerned. Btw, DDT kills all bugs like a dream and smoking is cool and totally harmless, even kind of healthy.

[@rano12321]

That was the case everywhere

[@Grymbaldknight]

There's no such thing as a singular "Golden Age". Every era has its strengths and weaknesses. Not every innovation is a net positive, but neither is every tradition. The best way to live is to find a happy middle ground, where the genuinely dysfunctional and ugly things are replaced, but the wholesome traditions and antiques are preserved.

[@nathanseper8738]

"Every great empire reaches a point where going backward can seem more appealing than going forward. When the world is changing so fast, it makes us yearn for the old ways when life seemed simpler. But it doesn't mean those old ideas are good for us now."-Randy Marsh, philosopher.

[@rat_king-]

"No matter how golden an age, there will always be someone complaining that everything looks too yellow." - Randall Jarrell

[@nathanseper8738]

@@rat_king- That's a good line and it shows a golden age ain't golden for everyone.

[@rat_king-]

@@nathanseper8738 It also can imply, "You will always get complainers, no matter how good it gets."

[@nathanseper8738]

@@rat_king- Yeah that's true. XD

[@jegga9199]

*It's not about new or old ideas it's about obeying God's word and genuinely turning from your sin to Christ, something most people of all times do not do.*

[@bigbud8182]

I remember in one of Ricky gervais’ comedy specials a couple years ago when he said something like “…. Well of course things were better then, you were a kid!” It seems that people are nostalgic for the past when they were kids because of how they felt and the lack of responsibilities they had.

[@USSAnimeNCC-]

Childhood innocence is the greatest rose tainted glasses of all

[@AngelaMastrodonato]

Since most of the people still alive who lived through the ‘50s were kids back then, this makes sense. Another culprit is the remaining media content at the time, easily accessible on KZbin, which like today’s media was created to sell things. We’re left with survival bias from the memories of old people’s childhoods and the propaganda of the time.

[@MrChristianDT]

I think that's coupled with the fact that people were just less generally aware of how bad things could get with some people & kids would be even less aware than the adults.

[@mr.x2567]

That’s why we shouldn’t lie to our kids over the world being a good place.

[@theking8347]

@@mr.x2567 Telling them the truth is worse. Just because something is true doesn't mean it's a good thing to tell kids.

[@anonymouswatcher37]

This " Well alshually" moment was sponsored by, Reddit.

[@Guy-cb1oh]

While I do generally agree with Mantra "The past was the worst", that we generally have it better today, and that alot of people tend to cherry-pick the good parts of the past to make it look better. I do still think there are things we can learn from the past and even a few things that were even better than today..

[@EternalFlameOfGod]

What do you mean cherry pick the good parts, I hope if you ever debate someone who prefers the good ol' days you don't expect them to say "oh I'd like some of that slavery/Jim crow again" cause that's ridiculous. Of course when ppl say they prefer the good ol' days it's because they prefer the good stuff about it like simpler livin, better community relations, more active & social children, deeper faith, more freedom & liberty less restraint & regulations etc. it's common sense ppl are only gonna want the good.

[@giorgialadashvili4771]

Cheaper real estate is not a minor "cherry-picked" part though, but rather a huge factor in anyone's life.

[@Kim_Miller]

My wife and I married in 1975, and bought a house in 1978. One of the houses we looked had no inside toilet. It was built with one (here in Australia every house had inside toilets) but the English couple who later bought it and were now selling said to us, "There shouldn't be a toilet inside the house. So we had it removed." They'd got a plumber to install a toilet outside the back porch. Even in 1978 this couple thought that life in England in the 930s with the toilet in the back garden was the authority on household plumbing.

[@SMATF5]

HAHAHA! I think we're all susceptible to it to some degree, but this really shows just how much some people fall into the "What I'm familiar with = the right way" mindset.

[@meganhuggins7494]

We bought our first house in 1975 and it had a very nice bathroom complete with indoor plumbing! Our second house in 1979 had two bathrooms and one en suite shower room. No, we didn’t have a lot of money, all houses were built with indoor plumbing by the 60’s ( in the UK anyway) 😊

[@namechangerfre7296]

Every house in Australia didn't necessarily have inside toilets in the 70's. My grandparents, on both sides, still had outside loos in houses built in the 50's (in Melbourne) back then, as did their neighbours. We moved into a 'new build' in 1974 (in outback Aust) which had an inside toilet, but lots of older houses didn't if the owners couldn't afford to get the work done or just weren't bothered living with what they were used to.

[@chicagotypewriter2094]

Leon Leyson, the youngest person saved by Oskar Schindler, wrote an autobiography and he moved from a small town called Narewka to Krakow (large city in Poland) because of his dad’s work. It’s funny because the book - The Boy on the Wooden Box - hypes the small town up for values like family and merrymaking as a kid, but you realize how different comfort was when he moves to the city He was astounded by lightbulbs but was gobsmacked by indoor plumbing bc that meant no more cold filthy outhouses

[@eedragonr]

​@@meganhuggins7494what is more profitable to do it? Repair it or tear it down and rebuild it?

[@darkworlddenizen]

Seeing those old outtakes was intriguing. When the acting slips off it shows how they really were back then and how they actually talked versus the over dramatized fast talk as seen in old movies. It really makes them seem more human in that light.

[@mariomulder3153]

No shit Sherlock, it's called acting

[@MaSoNGaMeR115]

Did you know that toby maguire can't actually produce webs from his wrists?

[@jacksont9455]

I REQUIRE more videos of those outtakes. That was hilarious. Also, it sounds like they used “son of a b” as more of an interjection swear back then, whereas now we use it more as a name to call someone. Subtle changes in language are so fascinating. It’s also funny to hear them go from their trans-Atlantic accent back to their normal accent

[@randomjunkohyeah1]

@mariomulder3153@@MaSoNGaMeR115 congrats on missing the point

[@devilishramen2166]

​@@mariomulder3153yes, of course. But for some of us, especially when it comes to old black and white film, it's hard to remember they're actors, and not the character theyre playing.

[@rcjdeanna5282]

I have a million stories. My favorite and most inspiring was from a Marine I worked with in the college cafeteria. He married in haste before shipping out and signed all his pay over to his young wife, whom he scarcely knew. When he returned to San Diego and looked her up she presented him with a bank account with all his combat pay. He told me she was one in a million because most didn't expect them to return alive. He was a dish washer and drank a bit and the marriage didn't last but 20 years later, in 1965, he was so proud of her and loved to tell the story.

[@user-bf1ds9cc8l]

Reject nostalgia. Embrace living in the present moment!

[@meeemeee8577]

My granny now 96 years old, often talks fondly about her childhood. Yes she had good parents and lots of siblings, miracolously all but one still alive today, might I add due to the marvel of modern medicine. When she talks about the past her storys often revolve around her dad tucking her into the hay in the Bergmäder (don't know the english word, don't think there is one) so she wouldn't literally frezze to death. Her bedchamber, that she shared with all her female siblings being unheated and had frost on the pillows and blankets. A tin of sardines that she sent to her younger siblings from her workplace that they fought over because they were hungry. Forced laborers, during ww2 her dad brought potato peels and vegetables in secret and how they devoured it hungrily. The doctors household she worked in later in live and how she marveled at the abundance of food. The old sheep they used to slaughter once a year and how it tasted of sheep and fat. Her younger sibling getting pneumonia and they had to drive her on a horse ridden carriage, in the dead of winter to the doctor a few villages away and how she survived. Sure she talks about it fondly, but let's be for real this is not a live of glamour to be romanticised, it's her memories and I absolutely love to hear her talk about them, but any sane person would recognize that the lifestyle that was forced upon her is nothing to envy.

[@seabreeze4559]

All the degenerates still want antibiotics.

[@YoYo-gt5iq]

A hay bed and a living father who loves you: heance. the good old days. A good dad trumps a hard life.

[@meeemeee8577]

@@YoYo-gt5iq yeah sure, he died when she was in her 20s though of an old wound from ww1 that started to bother him again. She said she was away at work and a letter came and told her to return because her father was sick. She said when she returned the puss from his leg was so much it had to be collected bucketwise. Anyway in the end he died pretty young.

[@windsofmarchjourneyperrytr2823]

There was a series on life in various decades. The most fascinating was 1940s House. They agree to live as people in 4os for 9 weeks. They said it was difficult but brought them closer together.

[@Kris-wo4pj]

​@@YoYo-gt5iqnot really

[@enta_nae_mere7590]

I believe the "peasants had more time off" is two-fold. They had more designated religious holidays but those were days of prayer, fasting etc, not exactly free-time. And secondly they may have had less work hours but they had significantly more unpaid domestic labour and little to no disposable income.

[@blugaledoh2669]

Peasant didn’t have much luxuries anyway so having disposable doesn’t matter too much except as savings.

[@WalnutOW]

Because a priest would go to everyone’s house and hit them with a stick if they weren’t fasting and praying

[@niono1587]

its apples to oranges, it's a different lifestyle not comparable to ours but that doesn't mean its better or worse necessarily.

[@theowainwright7406]

I know someone who runs a farm basically solo, it is an almost 24 hour a day job and makes no money

[@lug358]

Well some people were not christians before all that many festivities were pagan. I think thats the same thing this video talks about, maybe they seemed very religious but at the core they were as human as we are today

[@Kevnadian]

There are roman writings from the first century talking about the "good old days, and this new generation doesn't know what hard work and obedience is, etc"

[@Novumvir]

No rational man would claim that every aspect of the 1950s was better, but most would agree that that decade had something we've lost: Hope.

[@randomjunkohyeah1]

Please explain to me how “hope” can house, clothe, or feed anybody, or guarantee them their civil rights.

[@TheTheTheTheTheThe]

Hope comes from within. You’re blaming external factors for an internal struggle

[@user-xf1sm1lv4n]

​@@randomjunkohyeah1F#$% so called civil rights

[@davidjames2910]

Maybe - WW2 was grim. Recovering from that isn’t something to desire.

[@cruzgomes5660]

​@@TheTheTheTheTheTheAnd if we can say that hypothetically hope has decreased en masse on a societal scale, then we can attribute the lack of hope not as a personal psychological issue but a sociological issue.

[@adamkatolik1633]

Being nostalgic for a time that never actually existed seems to be a common human condition. Our brains are weird in that we only remember the good from the past.

[@mr.x2567]

That’s why I don’t see humans as an intelligent species.

[@electron8262]

I think it's an evolutionary reason, but I'm not a psychologist so I don't know why.

[@yukiko_5051]

If human can also remember tons of bad things from the past, i doubt said human can move on to be better

[@HackersSun]

Except I remember a time when people weren't using social media as heavily and we were better for it National parks are overrun by self absored assholes that litter the parks just for the instagram shot. So my preference is 2000s style where everything with tech was placed in moderation

[@adamkatolik1633]

@@HackersSun well there are good ways to use iPhones as well, for example going on a walk while listening to audiobooks or long form podcasts. I miss the 2000s the least because wouldn’t want to see bush again

[@bjones8470]

Growing up as a child in the 70s I remember living in California and having school called off because it was a “smog day”. One of those times my father took us into the mountains and you could see the cloud of pollution just hanging over the city. By the mid 70s all of the fast food restaurants used styrofoam containers for everything and people would order drive thru, eat and just toss the trash out the car window on the drive home. The main streets that ran through the city in Michigan I was living in were just lined with trash everywhere

[@MrChristianDT]

I remember just being a child in the country in Ohio in the 90s. About a mile & a half section of road with all of 8 properties on it & a quarter mile section of woods that crossed a river. The ditches were as deep as I was tall & they were filled twice my height with trash, until someone cleaned it up around the early 2000s. The bridge was covered in graffiti, too.

[@PoisonelleMisty4311]

It's interesting to hear about your first-hand experiences growing up in the 70s. The issue of smog and pollution was indeed a significant concern during that time, especially in heavily industrialized areas like California. Smog days and school closures due to air pollution were not uncommon back then. The use of styrofoam containers by fast food restaurants and littering were also prevalent in that era. Styrofoam was commonly used because of its lightweight and insulating properties, but it posed environmental problems due to its non-biodegradable nature. Littering was a widespread problem not only in Michigan but also in various parts of the country. Fortunately, there has been a gradual shift in public awareness and attitudes towards environmental issues since then. Environmental regulations and campaigns have been instrumental in reducing air pollution, waste generation, and encouraging responsible disposal practices. It is important to continue striving for a cleaner and more sustainable future.

[@Fido-vm9zi]

Thinking back decades ago, I do believe there was more litter.

[@StoneUnturned]

@@PoisonelleMisty4311 this dumbo keeps responding with these chatgpt messages, noone cares what you have to say, shoo

[@camilamirandabraga8200]

Sounds pretty much like today’s São Paulo. 😂

[@butcherpete2286]

The lesson here? Live in the now. Not the past, that is romanticized. Not the future, that you think you need to act now to change. Just. Live. Now.

[@jacksquatt6082]

I think one thing the past did better was personal privacy. If you screw up one time today it can get plastered all over social media and the general public will rip you to shreds over it.

[@jeepmega629]

“Couples were more romantic back then” Husbands back then when dinner was a bit cold:

[@AngryReptileKeeper]

And it was fashionable to refer to you wife as a "ball and chain."

[@USSAnimeNCC-]

As much as we moved forward I remember some video I seen form the queer kiwi and I can’t believe the thought of the other sex and gender people have this day or that nofap thing I learn about recently when I came across Noan video on it and dear god what wrong with some people I have metals illness and yet these guy and girl are somehow more insane than me

[@xRetroWAVE]

​​@@USSAnimeNCC-Stop lying, it was fringe minority of men that beat their women

[@stevenp4597]

@@xRetroWAVEan extremely laughable claim

[@xRetroWAVE]

@@stevenp4597 BritMonkey is literally the definition of "cherry-picking". Yes, prostitution, cursing, pervert movies and other bad things existed in 50s. But guess what? It wasn't that common back then.

[@captainuseless3806]

I understand that you’re saying that life wasn’t perfect back then but I think there’s a reason people want to go back. My grandfather has been a sheep farmer his whole life and worked small part time jobs, he raised five kids like this and had a house and 100 acres he was able to maintain and renovate, always had new technology and nice vehicles. Within the last 25 years or so that lifestyle has become totally unsustainable to the point he couldn’t even just pay his groceries, gas and bills for himself and my grandmother and they’ve had to sell the farm

[@karenryder6317]

Compared to the 1950s, income inequity is quite horrible today, (and growing worse). Balance this though, against the lives of women, blacks and homosexuals in those days. Another balancing factor is that cancer was almost always a death sentence in those years. Some things were better, but many things were worse.

[@captainuseless3806]

@@karenryder6317 i think even a lot of places. In Africa and Asia were better off then, mental health is picking up a lot of cancers slack these days.

[@happyelephant5384]

@@karenryder6317 so, 15% of black people, 4% of lgbt people having their lives better made other 80% having their life economically much worse? What a great country you guys have built!

[@yukiko_5051]

​@@happyelephant5384See, this is why the world suck today. People like them are the real reason why people today always says the past was better. Yet i bet you will be labeled as racist homophobic etc by them clowns

[@mandakhbaatar]

@@karenryder6317 I am not a woman, I am not black, and I am not a homosexual. I also do not have cancer or even plan to live past 50. What should I care about these things, if to (marginally) improve someone else's life, mine and most men's is made unfathomably lonely and outright unbearable?

[@playingmusiconmars]

People just want to be able to have a home, a strong family life and a job that can make those things possible. It's not about the 50s as an era itself but about what made it more special. And most of your points in the video don't disprove anything except for the cities being more polluted. Every other "modernism" you talked about here seemed to be had by less of the majority of people back then.

[@lamaking3002]

Exactly, people for some reason think that humanity is only improving but that sadly this is not true, If the west was Roman Empire, we are in the age of decline.

[@maksimfedoryak]

​@@lamaking3002 How you personally will benefit from "Roman empire"? I mean real Roman empire, not larping shit for incels, who believe that imperial government will give em 12 yr old e-girl slave🌝

[@Jakov-or7fp]

​@@lamaking3002the way the West works is: -Cool civilization does cool stuff -cool civilization declines in culture -they become weak -There is a Revolution and West becomes cool again -repeat

[@johnolmos8670]

You could get a college degree and buy a house with a regular job then. Definitely can’t do that now

[@elblanco7741]

You could be black or gay and be treated well nowadays. Good luck with that in the 50s, but will agree, the economy in the west was amazing.

[@NightAtTheOpera3]

The movie Midnight in Paris nails the concept that "the past was better" can (and will) be felt even by people IN the past. There is no golden era and never has been.

[@karenryder6317]

It must be a very inherent human tendency to see our past years as more innocent because WE were more innocent in those times.

[@srikrishnak196]

Truly said. Romanticizing the past or Underestimating today's problems is not gonna help to change the status quo

[@mr.x2567]

I honestly don’t think any living creature that can feel nostalgia should have their lives matter.

[@Dennis-nc3vw]

@@karenryder6317 Even that's not really true. People are more moral as they get older. Children bully each other, acting with pointless cruelty that would be unthinkable to 99% of adults. Studies even showing that a man 17 - 20 is twice as likely to hit his girlfriend as one 25 - 28.

[@seabreeze4559]

That's andropause. @@Dennis-nc3vw

[@rclrd1]

Recall Dicken’s opening lines of ‘The Tale of Two Cities’: _“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness,...”_ It seems to me that this is true of many historic periods, including that of the present and that of our childhood memories.

[@eedragonr]

It seems they escaped Scrooge at that time

[@theageofaustin]

it was the blurst of times

[@SStupendous]

@@eedragonr Indeed, a Christmas carol is c.1843-44 and this book is 1859. Amazing even in that time how much had changed.

[@ramaraksha01]

Heaven is a metaphor for the womb, childhood A time when we were fed, protected, sheltered, cared for and kept in a bubble away from facing or even seeing the harsh realities of life Religions promise us that we can run back to those happy care-free days! A Nanny God will feed, protect, shelter, care for us and keep us in a nice bubble away from facing or seeing the harsh realities of real life Our OWN loved ones could be starving, sick, homeless, caught in a war facing rape, torture - but we care no more! No one mentions any work being done in Heaven, no one even asks! An idle, lazy, useless, pointless, uncaring, shameless, cowardly freeloader existence for eternity! God's Grand Plan! It is not just these conservatives giving in to these fantasies

[@ziggyciggs5862]

I think the main concern about modern day in my opinion, is that (at least in California) your average house is "worth" over a million dollars. Your average person straight up will be completely unable to purchase a home.

[@recognizesealand572]

But wealth disparity was at its all time lowest in the 1950s that's objectively just a fact

[@NICK....]

I think this ends up being part of a coping mechanism for a lot of people. The present is tangibly better than the past in most cases* but it still has many many problems and those problems can push people into latching themselves on anything that can (at least in their mind) make life better, maybe it's a political ideology, maybe it's religion, or maybe it's a time period. They don't _really_ want to return to the past, they just want friends and family that care about them, a better economy, less work etc etc and in their mind that's synonymous with the past because it's easier to think that salvation is just a couple decades away and that there was a time when we had everything figured out and everyone was happy when that's all just a mirage to the end goal of an actually better world. * I have done 0 research on the subject but I feel that the people of places ravaged by, say, colonialism were quite a lot happier _before_ being ravaged.

[@ibrahimalee23]

Honestly well put

[@RRRR-jr1gp]

Honestly, even when REALLY bad stuff happened things still tended to get better over time - Afghanistan has lower child mortality now than Italy in 1957, Lybia is wealthier now than the US in the 1940s, average lifespan still increased during the fall of the Roman Empire. We'll see if climate change bucks that trend. It did when it caused other mass exctintions...

[@Tommyleini]

Affordability of housing was far far better in the 80s and 90s than today, with average Joe and Jane being able to buy a property before the age of 30 and big enough for 2 adults and 2 kids. But most things are better now, especially medicine and technology. People don't understand how quickly medicine is progressing. But yeah, housing is a huge issue nowadays.

[@Blox117]

In most cases? LOL Look at how bad wokism is in the west, "diversity" being pushed onto and into everything. Interbreeding with certain melanated groups that have lower IQ. The complete absences of privacy in your daily life and the substantial disparity between rich and poor. Algorithms that control everything but that are closed source. You zoomer kiddies have absolutely no clue what you are talking about.

[@tachobrenner]

​@@Tommyleini Then again, you had interest rates of what? 8%? And the McCareer was also all the rage, having a badly paid minimum wage job and not finding fulfilling work was common back then.

[@Brambrew]

The 50s was still pretty bad for the USA; segregation, lead polluting the atmosphere and asbestos polluting the wallpaper, red scares, etc But overall, the 1950s wasn't _that_ bad... if you forget that there's other countries outside the USA

[@robertdowling4673]

Half the world was living under communist rule and the whole planet was recovering from the second world war. If anything the U.S. was one of the better places to live back than.

[@Sam_Sam2]

Keep in mind 50% of the world economy at that time was just the United States. Every other corner of the world was in rags.

[@kenlandon6130]

Europe was still in tatters.

[@vistagreat9994]

It is true that in the 1950s, the USA was the best place to live in, period.

[@Destroyer120296]

Unless you lived in Sweden(plus i guess Norway,Dennmark and Finnland got away quite lightly despite their involvment in the war@@kenlandon6130

[@nickzardiashvili624]

I think there are broadly two aspects to this sentiment: 1. Every person is getting old and approaching death with every next day, so looking back at an idylic time in the past is kind of normal for people. Everything was more exciting in childhood since everything was new, time moved slower because every year was a bigger percentage of our lives. People look back and think they've felt much better in the past and mistake that for the times being better without realising that it had more to do with them being young and full of youthful energy. This is a relatively universal human trait and simply has to be checked. Don't vote for a leader who promises you the good old days just because you miss your youth. You're basically voting for another father since you miss the days when your own parents could shield you from everything. 2. Every genegration brings something new since times change and in old age we're usually less receptive to novelty. There's no shortage of examples of briliant scientists, including Einstein, who were revolutionary when young, but failed to get with the times. Specifically our generation is dealing with a huge challenge of figruing out how we'll live in the digital age. This is a pretty big leap as far generational changes go. But the answer is not to look to the past, but rather to plan for the future better. Whether you want it or not, the future is coming, the technilogy is evolving and instead of diving into nostalgia, we better figure out healthy and functional ways of living in this new world.

[@briancorvello3620]

There was an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer where Principal Flutie gives Buffy a short "When I Was Your Age" lecture, but then admits that when he WAS her age, he was surrounded by old guys telling him how much better things were when THEY were her age.

[@lostonearth7856]

I just want the pre-9/11 fear mongering and paranoia, while also having thee Urban design of the 1930s without the car Brit Monkeym.

[@JustAnotherNamelessGuy]

Same dude

[@EricT01]

I will never forgive Bush for doing 9/11 and ending the 90s!

[@JustAnotherNamelessGuy]

@@EricT01 nah that was his VP

[@rerikm]

I don't think they are taking request at this moment lol

[@RR-gp3qy]

_vice_

[@magnusferdinand]

You have to also account for the fact that the 50’s saw a huge boost in economic growth due to the industry left by WWII, and the “suburban experiment” initially allowed houses to be very affordable for almost everyone at the time.

[@tuftyterror983]

That’s probably why the 50s are seen as a golden era, that and I think that kids had more freedom and innocence then. But like with any decade, things back then weren’t so great and are better now.

[@whatsuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu]

Exactly we want the good parts of the 1950s with modern values and convenience

[@tuftyterror983]

@@whatsuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu yes

[@user-xf1sm1lv4n]

​@@tuftyterror983no

[@user-xf1sm1lv4n]

​@@whatsuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu Screw modern values old ones were better

[@LanielPhoto]

I lived then, I live now. I'll take then. Maybe it was pure ignorance, but we didn't have all the headaches and worries of today. And people didn't even walk into walls while blankly staring into their cellphones.

[@ComradeKits]

In regards to you bringing up modern life being boring, I was reminded of a quote from the first Red Dead Redemption. "Sure, civilization may be dull, but the alternative, Mr. Marston, is hell." - Edgar Ross

[@ijon-y4549]

I think the best way of thinking about it, is: "Some things were better in the past, some things are better today, let's find a synthesis to create the best possible future"

[@Stockbrot_]

That certainly would have been a better conclusion than "life now is superior to everything in the past".

[@rodrigoribeiro387]

Magnific position

[@kevinolsen8779]

Oh dear, people will never embrace such a logical idea.

[@Dempsey1873]

​@@Stockbrot_fr tho. This narrator sounds bitter and copious tbh. People were much more sociable back then that's just undeniable

[@jolly_39]

About the crime rates of the past: Those graphs often only feature the data of reported crimes rather than the actual crime rates. In the 1950ies most people did not have phones at home and thus could only report a crime by either going to the police station themselves or going to a phone booth. Theft is most common in poor areas with bad infrastructure and for the people living there buying a bus ticket to reach the next police station or paying money to use a phone booth could have often been enough of a hurdle to not inform the police of a crime like theft. With mobile phones it is just easier to report a crime nowadays.

[@joshuakhaos4451]

Oh theft happened for sure. Ive heard multiple stories about how the tail lights on the fins of 59 Cadillacs were big targets for thieves. I also read years ago when I lived in Denver, They did a "This day in Denver..." article that recalled a night in 1956 where 3 15 year olds stole a new Chevy coupe, robbed multiple stores, got into a high speed chase through town and then crashed. The crash killed 1 and the driver and other passenger died in the following shootout with police. All teengers were white btw. There was also the story about how in 1957, some rich womans son committed a terrorist attack in order to get his moms inheritance by setting a timed explosive in his moms luggage. Somehow it lasted to the point she boarded the plane and made it just outside of the Denver metro before exploding. Killing everyone on board.

[@wildfire9280]

@@joshuakhaos4451 That last one is quite elaborate, surprised it isn’t more well known.

[@josephpatrickprescott562]

Sorry, the 1950’s and early 1960’s were NOT a myth. I lived it and was raised in a home of all adults who were raised in the 1920’s. The myth that “everything was better” is just that…a myth, but as a civilization the chaos and rampant disrespect of the past 15-20 years…is much worse. There are a thousand stories that I could share about our neighborhood and the families, their strong values, work ethic and dedication to their Faith. I was Blessed to be a 3 sport athlete and I travelled from an early age across Our Country and up in Canada. Traditions and values that had been respected for over 100 years began to slip at the end of the 1960’s. In the past 15-20 years, I must ask…what traditions or values survive❓

[@TiagoGomez-hb9te]

Are you saying that America has gotten way more political?

[@BennyDV9]

General living wasn’t better back then, but for the most part, culture was much better then than it is today

[@gerarduspoppel2831]

I have to admit. The fashion in the 50s to 70s was beautiful..

[@brooklyn8745]

yup

[@evertonporter7887]

Indeed. As was the music... right up to the 90s😃

[@grassytramtracks]

It's so easy to fall into the nostalgia trap, I find myself feeling nostalgic for the COVD pandemic because life felt simpler, everything slowed down and felt more open. When I remember how miserable and anxiety-inducing it was wallowing around at home procrastinating all my schoolwork and wondering if this purgatory will ever end, I noticed that I've been looking back way too rosily

[@user-ks9oj7zo4p]

With me it was the 2000s (I'm older Gen Z, born in '99) until watched video essays and read articles how the 2000s were disrespectful towards women and girls (Britney Spears and other female celebrities) and there was less representation of POC and neurodivergent people like myself and Islamophobia (I'm on the spectrum and a Jamaican-American Muslim).

[@ursulasmith6402]

Covid is a fake virus fabricated by the European union.

[@MerlinTheCommenter]

​@@user-ks9oj7zo4p😂 The 2000s were OK, it was mainly Indians and Pakistanis who got the brunt of racism back then. The 90s, 80s and 70s were absolutely awesome, on the otherhand. It's all about the kind of person you were. If you are some politically obsessed dweeb using feminism as a coping mechanism for being an incel, then yeah, those eras would suck for you. Every era, actually, kinda sucks for you, in that case. What's the saying? "If you're a loaer today, you'd be a loser yesterday." Something like that.

[@retrocomputing]

@@user-ks9oj7zo4p why do you need representation as a neurodivergent? Let's say, now we don't have representation of people with Cerebral palsy anywhere, in movies, games, on TV. What does it really mean to you?

[@raphaellavictoria01]

I already want to go back to 2010! not bc of any marriage thing, but bc everything was just normal. No one was looking to be offended, no one was claiming to be a victim (a victim, therefore the world owes them), there was no censorship on social media, we had freedom of speech and opinion. Everything was GREAT! 2000-2018 forever!

[@kdmusic10]

My grandpa was born in the 50's and raised in a cole minor's town, he told me that they still had outhouses and in the winter, it'd get cold to the point where icicles were in the house

[@TheGamingPolitician]

Rose tinted goggles are a powerful thing

[@martinledermann1862]

Whilst overidealizing the past is wrong, we should also not fall for the trap of believing the things just perpetually get better and better ad infinitum...

[@Daniel-gm1gk]

Fr

[@griffins750]

Exactly, certain aspects have gotten better and certain aspects have gotten worse… Cars for example were definitely death traps, but there was also a level of freedom and creativity that is no longer possible due to the technology within vehicles today… For people who enjoy driving modern cars are boring and disconnected compared to cars from 10-15 years ago let alone 30-40-50 years ago…

[@martinledermann1862]

@@griffins750 Yup, things like that too but also more important stuff such as college tuition fees or housing being much more affordable when boomers or Gen X were young; those older generations also didn’t worry about climate change or the threat of AI or mass immigration or low birth rates, so in terms of life for your average Joe, at least here in the West the prospects for young people nowadays seem less optimistic than back then or at least in my humble opinion that seems to be the case…

[@griffins750]

@@martinledermann1862 Yeah I definitely agree!

[@Anubis424242]

My opinion is that life has always been garbage, just for different reasons and for different people. It wouldn't matter what generation I was born into, I would still want to exit life.

[@springss1861]

Omg, the behind the scenes of the actors just makes them so much more human. They speak like normal people we would see today. The weird tone thing just vanishes. Really puts into perspective how that type of spoken mannerism was just stylistic choice and not how actually people spoke back then

[@dagreek3480]

"Humans back then where still humans". No shit Sherlock. Let me guess you also believe that the average man was abusing his wife.

[@shawn576]

A lot of the TV speaking was a holdover from plays. When you're on a stage, you need to speak loud and clearly so everyone can hear you, and a lot of TV actors were play actors before that. Now that we have microphones (or better microphones), actors can just talk like normal people and we can still hear what they are saying. Sound equipment in the past was incredibly shitty, so a person talking in a normal voice might not be picked up properly, or it might not be recorded properly on the media available at the time. When the Beatles were recording music, sound equipment was so primitive that they would physically get closer to the microphone or farther from the microphone to do a fading in or out effect. Now, you just record that on separate tracks then fade them in or out with software. A lot of things in the past seem stupid, but they were doing it because they were trying to get around technical issues or a lack of technology available.

[@SharonElizabethWhitfield]

For one, every member of 😅the family didn’t have a cell phone, tablet and car. There was only one land line phone. And only one car for the whole family. People went to the public library to check out books. Boys would deliver newspapers and mow lawns in order to have money to do the things they wanted. Older boys would get part time jobs. Girls would babysit. Televisions had only 3 channels. People only went out to eat on special occasions. Children had school clothes, church clothes and play clothes. This enabled their clothes to last longer.

[@user-rt6rf9mt8n]

The Costs Of living back then were far more better than today

[@olivercharles2930]

What good is a cheap house if you are hung or have to live with a husband that treats you like a punching bag?

[@freddyhollingsworth5945]

My Grandma told me back in the 50s crime was bad, rape was covered up and things like kids being molested was a considered a "family" issue to be worked out by the family...

[@Fido-vm9zi]

I believe you are right.

[@Turkish_Productions2007]

That's disgusting.

[@mehomeboymi411]

Your grandma lies. I was there and that is bs.

[@olivercharles2930]

@@mehomeboymi411 Nah, you are the one lying.

[@inquisitorkrieger8171]

I smell BS

[@krombopulos_michael]

Old people just miss being young (that includes people who are 25 and miss being 10), and young people who never actually remembered the time they romanticise are basing their recollections on a handful of small details and very often literal propaganda and advertising from that period, or to some extent popular media from/about that time which will inherently show more interesting things than the mundane day to day experience most people at any time have lived.

[@actualturtle2421]

Even the propaganda back then was better than it is now

[@Blox117]

i think we can all agree that young people today are the most ignorant and mentally ill they have ever been. they dont even know what gender they are anymore

[@spaghettiisyummy.3623]

@@actualturtle2421 Actually, fair point. Propaganda & Advertizing were much more exciting back then. Now it's all about "Subtle manipulation". Why can't we have ads like "SEGA DOES WHAT NINTENDON'T!" Anymore?

[@thunderspark1536]

@@spaghettiisyummy.3623 I mean the counterpoint to that is whenever a big figure messes up we can all see it, the recent US presidents are hilarious for all the wrong reasons

[@mr.x2567]

@@thunderspark1536Rioting and going against society should be promoted more often then.

[@patbrennan6572]

The only good thing about the fifties is that we were younger, when a day seemed like a long time and a week would never end and a month was a lifetime, and a year seemed like an eternity. Now we just keep saying, 'time flies'

[@squamish4244]

My grandmother's boyfriend was killed in Italy, and she never really got over his death. She married my grandfather out of convenience. She kept the mink stole he gave her in a chest at the top of her stairs for 60 years until her death. My other grandmother's high school boyfriend was also killed in the war, I believe at Dieppe. She found genuine love when she met my grandfather in a war factory. My one grandfather was in the navy and spared too much war trauma, although my mother says there was stuff he never talked about, like friends who died and pulling frozen bodies out of the North Atlantic. My other grandfather was deaf in one ear and tried to get into the army, navy and air force, and they caught him every time. After the war, he said he was glad he didn't go, because his friends who went came back were not the same people anymore. And you cannot avoid the 1950s without the spectre of WW2 in the background. My family was one of the lucky ones. So yeah, that was the 1950s for you. All this "Gen X, Millennials, Gen Z, wa wa waaaa..." Cut the shit. Get real. You can go back if you want to. Not me.

[@sirechubs]

That Malawi line hit hard because I literally live there😢😢

[@L.internet8]

I wish the best for you guys.

[@hailgiratinathetruegod7564]

What you go about it. Cry ??? Go in the lake and catch some bass. Cry again because you let the fish burn in the kitchen bevause you were bussy crying.

[@aaadi1890]

​@@hailgiratinathetruegod7564???

[@BasedBelkan8492]

i hope it gets brighter out there, man

[@devindouzstuff_8250]

you sound miserable​@@hailgiratinathetruegod7564

[@MMaximmachinegun]

Honestly a solid video, but I think I have to still give a few points to 50’s people. For example I think the 50s fashion, architecture and automobile designs looked fabulous. Of course, excluding the fact that those cars lacked any safety features.

[@sitontik710]

Yes, I like the ☆aesthetic☆ of some of the old decades. I always feel that it might be fun to visit, but I'd hate to live there!

[@chadbusch8541]

And literally no one is stopping you from looking that asthetic! If you wanna be a dapper dan with his gal than by gum put on yournsunday shoes and go and do it!

[@karenryder6317]

I think if I had to sacrifice car safety features by going back to the way less slobby 50s dress standards, I'd choose to stay put right here where we are.

[@ieronymos9265]

@karenryder6317, okay, slob.

[@MMaximmachinegun]

@@chadbusch8541 Sounds great but it'd be hardly socially acceptable

[@sonaterese799]

The video would have made more sense if the presenter had reported on 1950's America or 1950's Britain - jumping between the two countires made everything a nonsense

[@aes1373]

The thing is, this will never change. The human brain will always find ways to look at a tougher past with nostalgia. It's a literal defensive mechanism, apparently. As said in the video, modern life does seem bland, so we latch onto these aesthetics and think things were better.

[@apex_llama]

I keep on telling people that "the good old days" is not the best days, and that all they can do is move forward. Thank you for making this video

[@PADARM]

My Grandma remembers the "Good Old Days" when she fled Poland.

[@hggpi]

I must keep moving forward

[@new-lviv]

Weirdly, in recent years I lost feeling of nostalgia. I just don't believe there were things better in general that I can't live through again, or if feeling like that has any meaning. It happened before the invasion, but the w4r emphasized it. Greetings from Ukraine.

[@whiteeye3453]

Because of communism

[@quronmccovery881]

​@@whiteeye3453 How is communism to blame? Dumb shit. 🤦🏽‍♂️

[@Rossscow]

The ending with the samurai, reminds me why teaching the horrors of war and the history is so important.

[@longiusaescius2537]

@Rossscow war is cool cry about it

[@TheOnlyCelciAndDontYouForgetIt]

​​@@longiusaescius2537Than you'll be glad to be on the frontlines if you're ever in one I'm sure

[@longiusaescius2537]

@@TheOnlyCelciAndDontYouForgetIt as long as it's like the emergency and not the canal crisis

[@mandakhbaatar]

a teacher who teaches something he is he himself ignorant about should be put into jail. Take your kids to talk to combat veterans, don't pull stuff out your comfortable professor's ass about how horrible it is

[@TheOnlyCelciAndDontYouForgetIt]

@skemmdarvagr Believe it or not you don't need to talk to a veteran to understand why things like Agent Orange are atrocious

[@1978Prime]

I remember back in the 80 and 90s, the narrative was "These are bad and the old days were good". But now, people my age good back at the 80s and 90s with nostalgia like they were the good old days, even though no one was saying that at the time. Back then, we even looked forward to the future of computers, fast internet and streaming services ect. But now people are nostalgia about outdated technology like video stores and tapes. Sometimes, I am temped to be nostalgic about the eighties, but that's only because I was a kid watching cartoons and playing in the backyard and having mum do everything for me. In my mind, the best cartoons were around then. But an adult at the time who had responsibilities like jobs and a family to worry about might not feel that way and look back at their carefree childhood. I think often, the good old days are a memory of the good things about their carefree youth rather than an accurate memory of how things actually were in society.

[@daviddufresne9905]

No, it was more like these are good days but not as good as the fifties. Now it is: this is like those dystopian movies! Nostalgia was more like wasn't it simpler back then? Now its like, damn I wished I lived back then so I wouldn't have to pay hundreds of thousands in college tuition to maybe enter the middle class.

[@bobjacobson858]

This is an interesting and provocative video. However, one thing wasn't emphasized enough--freedom from crime, which is something that's disappearing in modern times. I noticed that when the former East Germans rated the importance of various aspects of life, freedom from crime appeared to be the one they treasured most during the communist days (as seen in the graphic at 11:41)--but the narrator made absolutely no reference to this. A lot of the other things don't matter if one doesn't feel safe. In the US, many people didn't even lock doors years ago, but now many people have various security systems, etc. We didn't have school and other public shootings years ago even though probably as many or more people had guns. In short, the moral fabric of our society has broken down considerably.

[@PADARM]

People miss their childhood. that's it

[@badart3204]

Nah, some things were objectively better. Social atomization is the big one that ruins modernity. I mean look at the suicide rate and tell me this is a healthy society

[@Battlefield1918]

Not really, kids are able to get on pornography, it's one click away, this society is literally poisoning the hearts and minds of the younger generations and it is disgusting and sinister. Dating is a disaster, femininity and masculinity has been completely destroyed, we have allowed over 60 million abortions, we allow kids to get life changing surgeries without the consent of their parents, 50's didn't seem to have any of this.

[@kissedbysun2517]

I think you hit the nail on the head. I had a very rough childhood and I never miss those so called good old days.

[@Battlefield1918]

@@kissedbysun2517 Experience is different for all of us. The world was never perfect, but it definitely wasn't as bad as it is today. It's up to the parents and the will of the few to do what is best to protect the children of this and future generations.

[@Flyingclam]

I had a crappy childhood. Not terrible but I only have distain for that wasted period

[@sterlinsilver]

I think the thing with the 50s is while they certainly werent better, they LOOKED better. Designwise i feel it was a highpoint in humanity. The cars, the signs, the buildings, the radios. So much effort was focused on the design (because, really there wasnt much else to focus on!)

[@MsSarahJosephine]

*stares over at concrete smothering brutalist architecture* ........right. *I know there's a whole bunch of good philosophy and social points to be made about Brutalism especially in regards to postwar housing but it still doesn't change the fact that to me it's the fugliest style to come out of the 20th century

[@sterlinsilver]

@@MsSarahJosephine brutalism was more a product of the 60s and 70s and wasn't focused on the common man. I'm thinking more of the googie architecture. Look up stuff designed by armet and Davis, that's the style I'm thinking of.

[@johndavis8669]

5:48 My grandmother had to work. She had to help pay her in-law to take care of her son from an affair she had with some other man who had died from TB. You wonder why she and my grandfather didn't divorce. Because her family believed Divorce was sinful and the divorce would had been messy. My Grandmother would had died from the effects of TB that only came back with Lung Cancer after being cleared of the disease in 1946 but to die of its return 40 years afterwards. The lung cancer she had was inoperable and wasn't worth getting treatment.

[@Mr.Coffee576]

You mean my quest for a trad wife was a lie ?

[@dimplesd8931]

I’m a POC and my paternal grandmother went to work as soon as my dad and his siblings went to college. She loved it. My maternal grandmother worked after my grandfather died of a heart attack in his 40’s. My mom worked and I work. I’m grateful for the women who showed me how to work and be in a good marriage with children and still be able to have some economic independence. The past will always look better, while actually being worse than we remember.

[@francegamer]

"Here is the secret: there is no love in the past. Only the present. The past is made of static images, distorted memories, demented nostalgia. This, the present - with all its possibilities, innumerable hits and misses - is far superior. It is a *living* organism." - Measurehead, disco elysium

[@longiusaescius2537]

@francegamer furry copium

[@heisen-bones]

@@longiusaescius2537 go back to making sigma edits in your mom's basement

[@francegamer]

@@longiusaescius2537 hmm. Looking at your KZbin comments history you seem to be a very angry fella. Do you want to talk about it? Cuddles maybe? I care! :3

[@longiusaescius2537]

@@francegamer< Changi resident

[@francegamer]

@@longiusaescius2537 Thas okey then :3

[@heronimousbrapson863]

I find that most people who long for "the good old days" never actually lived in "the good old days".

[@igors1234]

But I've interacted with the people who were born in "the good old days" and with the younger generation. The zoomers are monkeys compared to their ancestors.

[@theghostofspookwagen4715]

Re: the old grandmothers waxing lyrical about their quaint old knives - part of it is simply that those things are forever associated with memories of things that we may not experience today, or just brought us joy at some point.

[@heronimousbrapson863]

When I was a kid in the late 1950's, polio had waned due to the vaccine, however, there were quite a few older kids in leg braces from having had polio earlier in the decade. Diseases such as mumps, rubella, chicken pox and measles still ran rampant through the schools every winter as there were no vaccines for those yet.

[@benjaminwilson2945]

My dad who was born in the late 60s had whooping cough as a toddler. So grateful for medical advances.

[@bloodbarage]

We have STDs…. Yesterdays diseases were even cooler than today’s.

[@windsofmarchjourneyperrytr2823]

Still isn't one for Scarlet fever and I think it made my grandmother deaf in one ear.

[@Tgogators]

Yes. The wealthier people (what we’d call middle to upper middle today) had access to good medicine and care. Rural areas not always the case. If a family (as often was the case) had 5 or more kids, it was not uncommon for one or more to die from early childhood illness.

[@janetkizer5956]

Yes. I had mumps, both kinds of measles, and chickenpox. None of those diseases were fun, believe me. I can still remember the pain.

[@danielwalsh9748]

The quote from Hagakure "he yearns for a return to conflict" really hit me, reminding me of a different video "This video will change how you see Eren", particularly the point where Eren says "If the danger doesn’t exist… Then I could just cause it myself". I feel that taken these two quotes together, we see an encapsulation of human nature, namely that conflict is inherent in our nature. I think Orwell said it best: "War is Peace" - we will never be content with the realization of anything, but only find happiness (when we look back in retrospect) in the constant struggle.

[@danielwalsh9748]

I just remembered another great animated video from After Skool "How to Have a Life Worth Living - Jordan Peterson" which touches upon the same idea. In it, Peterson recount's Dostoevsky's "Notes from the Underground": (I'm paraphrasing) "If you gave people everything they wanted and all they had to do was laze around eating cake and sit in warm pools, then within a week, they would smash everything up just so they had something interesting to do".

[@thejuiceking2219]

okay, proposed solution we end war by replacing it with violent video games

[@danielwalsh9748]

Ender's Game？ 😅@@thejuiceking2219

[@mateus9741]

This reminds me of the scene in the movie Fight Club where Tyler Durden talks about how their generation is lost because no big war or economic crisis happened while they were alive.

[@danielwalsh9748]

Eyyyy! Like Ender's Game? Proxy war through video games 😆@@thejuiceking2219

[@xx-yd5mm]

My great great grandma was afraid of electricity and refused to add it to her house, much to my grandma's horror. My grandma loves her big car, apple products, electric beauty tools, and all sorts of modern conveniences now!

[@theovonsilvatici2324]

You can’t say the good ol days where worse because they didn’t have stuff, the experience is what makes it nice and the memories are stronger and better than nowdays cellfone anti social woke “choice” life. Having no choice is good sometimes the nostalgia proves that.

[@WitchKing-Of-Angmar]

This idiot didn't even live then. The 1950s, especially the 1930s, was a majestry of amazement in the USA. Advanced, modern, and very held together, with love between every person.

[@ElizabethUkeh]

As a Nigerian, I'm shocked at that life expectancy. Half of my grandparents died old and the other half are still alive. My great-grandmother is alive at 100😊

[@MaSoNGaMeR115]

the goal of every nigerian on earth is to live in a country built by white people

[@Eladnih]

Life expectancy is heavily influenced by child birth safety. I'd imagine Nigeria isn't up to 1st world hospital code but idk.

[@Dennis-nc3vw]

Life expectancy is highly influenced by infant and child mortality. If one person lives until 80 and his brother dies as a baby, they are have a life expectancy of 40 between them.

[@nk1560]

This is a big issue when people cite life expectancy as an indicator of societal well-being. In a lot of countries, life expectancy is skewed downwards by high infant mortality. Most people take avg life expectancy to mean that the majority die early, while in reality, the people who make it to adulthood may live comparable lifespans to developed countries.

[@Zeresenayxvb34]

Probably because of infant and maternal mortality

[@reversefulfillment9189]

For one thing, my son has a kidney disorder that without medication developed in the 70s he would be sent home to slowly drown in fluids that would collect in his lungs. He's now 18, he still takes heavy medication that made his teenage years more subdued than mine, but I thank modern science for so many things.

[@samwindmill8264]

0:25 gotta love putting that caption in the bottom left over a picture of what essentially amounted to an assault

[@woodytheone99]

Imagine if people in 50 years look back on the media of the 2020s and thought that's how life was. People basically do the same thing with the 1950s, 60s, etc. Movies and TV shows don't realistically reflect the way of life during the period. My grandfather, god rest his soul, was born in 1933. And he told me the 50s were full of prostitution,rampant alcoholism, domestic abuse, organized crime, horrible working conditions, racism, and deaths from diseases that are completely treatable/preventable nowadays. It's literally a case of looking at the world through rose colored glasses.

[@karlkrump6634]

Every era sucks to some degree. However, traditionalism has always been about focusing on the principles and values that unite groups of people, albeit sometimes placing severe limits. As a history guy, I love reading back through history and looking at all the good stuff that came out of those years of struggle. I have a deep appreciation for people that were able to overcome the odds and be of service to their fellow man. That is the thing though with history, you have to take the good and the bad together. One is meaningless without the other. There is a sort of paradox in the ever ongoing quest for paradise. The Star Trek universe for example did not achieve a Utopia until basically going through WW3 and a long series of other atrocities before resulting in a new (mostly unified) humanity.

[@aktuellyattee8265]

"I could never live in the '50s. How would I live my life without my Avengers funko pops on my desk?"

[@pixelatedxenon9579]

consoom funko pop get excited for next funko pop

[@sixels5550]

consume goyslop

[@mindgames7411]

If that’s all you got from this video then you lack critical thinking skills

[@aktuellyattee8265]

@@mindgames7411 wdym? like really. I'm actually asking, it's not all I got from the video

[@new-lviv]

@@mindgames7411 Fun and irony is not for you, Mr. (or Mrs., or Mlrs).

[@careforjusticealways]

this video was all over the place and lacked coherence

[@yanfrias946]

there is definently something off abt this video, no one in their right mind can say these days are more fulfilling than before the turn of the millenia

[@olivercharles2930]

Wrong. Today is absolutely the best time to be alive.

[@falsificationism]

I half agree with this, I think. Face-to-face communication has its merits. Old urbanism allowed for 3rd places, encouraging community. Those things were real, but we suburbanized and isolated our families from our communities, eroding trust. I think that's real and things are much, much worse. I think there's a way we can take what worked from the past and keep our iPhones.

[@honkhonk8009]

Thats the big reason. Also the fact that jobs were just more real. Now its hard to say the same.

[@falsificationism]

agreed @@honkhonk8009

[@railroadforest30]

That’s true

[@Stockbrot_]

I'm surprised BritMonkey didn't mention this at all in this video, although he talked about it in other videos. Either his opinions aren't coherent or he has a very short memory. I mean, obviously people today have more material wealth but that's not the point.

[@falsificationism]

@@Stockbrot_ you know, I think that’s fair. I’ve heard him talk about these things too, which is why some of the inferences I detected in this one didn’t feel like they added up. Often happens when we’re trying to integrate new ideas I’m sure, so I give it a pass. Just had to give a little pushback!

[@thesenate1844]

When we look back at the 50s, we know how history played out, but if you lived back then, for all you knew the entire world could go up in nuclear flames at any moment

[@rezandrarizkyirianto-1933]

I mean, that sentiment is still the same today

[@thunderspark1536]

@@rezandrarizkyirianto-1933 Every generation thinks they are the last. Jesus was literally a doomsday proclaimer.

[@friedfrawg]

I'm glad your generation got to live in a world with 5 cent burgers and 13 cent gallons of gasoline to deal with the threat of nuclear Armageddon. Younger generations dealing with the same threat have to party with stagnate wages and 20 dollar burgers.

[@friedfrawg]

Must have been hard to start businesses back then. With only half the government of today and barely any environmental laws.

[@Iamnottheplatypus]

I remember feeling bad for those kids who had to do these drills in order to not get nuked.

[@simonhaas6480]

You make the 50s Sound even better