Culture Wars - Is THIS the golden era?

The Coffee Shop
1

This is partially inspired by my buddy and mentor Art Franke, who recently wrote this:

“…The process that changes society is the changing of hearts and minds through the raising of awareness. That is what Rev. King did…”

That along with the correlation of declining religion and rising iligitamacy in France.

I was recently thinking about comments regarding the Mayflower voyage, the first settlers, the writers of the constitution, WWII veterans, etc. all the people who have done the “heavy lifting” to get us to where we are to day. But, as evidenced in the quote above, society was still changing…for the better, at least with regard to civil rights.

However, do you think that if these people who gave us what we have today could be resurrected to see who we are…or even what our ideals are…do you think they’d approve?

In otherwords, this question is pointed at the Bill O’Riley brand of “traditionalist,” if you are so opposed to cultural change in this country, are you claiming that THIS…here and now…is THE “golden era?” If not, then when? The 1600s? The 50s? The Regan years? If you have an answer, can you objectively say that it is something more than just a product of what you are used to and what you have always been taught and/or believed what was “right.?”

I’d be interested in any commentary regarding this, even if you have to reword the question to fit the point you wish to make.

2

If you look at any generation it always laments the situation today and looks back with nostalgia at previous generations. Hell the Renaissance was just one long look back at the “Golden age of Greece and Rome”. But we all too often idealize the past and look at those values that we think are lost but tend to ignore those values which are contradictory to how we live our lives today.

Are we to return to the 50’s sure it was great if you were a white male but pretty much sucked if you were gay or a woman or a minority.

Turn of the century perhaps? No vote for women, brutal working conditions, influenza. No thanks.

That’s the problem with social change. In the process of changing one thing (equal rights) we inadvertently change other aspects of our society that we did not expect to change. It’s a constant struggle to maintain those aspects that we value while changing.

Unfortunately there is no going back, there is only the move forward and more change. Society and culture are not immutable, they are organic like language, they change hopefully for the betterment of most but sometimes in unexpected ways.

Wishing for the “good old days” is nostalgic foolishness and anyone who advocates a “return to values” should be ignored since they are clearly deluded.

3

Good post.

I know I have a deep nostalgia for the 70s…even though I was no older than 7. I have my own buttons for what I think the “ills of society are.” One of my major sticking points is about how much people center their lives around the TV. I can’t help but think that the world would be a better place if we went back to 3 channels. I freely admit that this may be a rediculous notion, and who really cares if people just vegetate in front of the boob tube as long as it makes them happy, but it still bugs me.

But inevitably our societies coulture will continue to change a lot over the next feww 100 years and I’m sure most of us would disaprove of their lives just as much as Rosevelt, Jeffersonm, or the Pilgrims would disaprove of ours (no matter how right or left wing one of us is). But should it matter that our future Americans may think that having a nanny raise your kids, or sending them off to boarding school, or raising kids with your siblings rather than your husband would be the way they think the family unit should work? I’m not saying it should or should not one way or another, only that what people think is appropriate is governed pretty much by…well…what they think is appropriate.

4

anyone who advocates a “return to values” should be ignored since they are clearly deluded.

It’s a constant struggle to maintain those aspects that we value while changing.

I’m not sure I’m following here. Seems to me that the above two statements contradict themselves. Are there no “Past values” that we should return to? Have we not lost some decent values that we need to or would be better off returning to?

Certainly pining for the “Good old days” is nostalgic foolishness as you point out because we all conveniently forget that a mere 20 years ago people where loosing limbs to cancer that today are regularly saved and that’s merely the tip of the iceberg. OTOH many values are cast aside that most definitely are negatively affecting our society as a whole, at least IMHO. These can and should be brought back.

~Matt

5

Barry, I think the answer to your question is more “yes” now than any point in the past I can think of. What convinced me more than anything else were two books - First, far and away, was Stephanie Coontz’ book “The Way We never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap”. The book is very well documented to the point that following the links to the references in the footnotes and bibliography became exhausting after a while. The second was “The Optimism Gap” which also explored in more depth some unusual phenomena that popped up when people were asked more detailed and probing questions as to why they thought many aspects of American life were declining.

6

I’m not saying it should or should not one way or another, only that what people think is appropriate is governed pretty much by…well…what they think is appropriate.

But just because a group or individual thinks something is “Appropriate” does not make it right, especially in a society sense. A murderer may think they are justified in their actions, yet society as a whole say’s these actions are wrong.

In many cases society goes in a direction they WANT to despite the fact that it’s known to be damaging. Look at environmental or even your example of family values. I’ll think you be hard pressed to find a plethora of information out there stating that having a solid core family is worse condition to raise a child in than a broken home where both parties are bringing in BF’s and GF’s to introduce as the new Mommy/Daddy on a weekly basis. Yet the later is often times the case and is significantly more accepted than 40-50 years ago.

Most definitely we have had changes for the better on the same front. Child abuse is more harshly looked upon than 40-50 years ago and women are held in much higher esteem. Point is however we could most definitely keep our “New” values AND bring back a societal desire to keep families together.

~Matt

7

“…The process that changes society is the changing of hearts and minds through the raising of awareness. That is what Rev. King did…”

This is partially true. If the above statement was true folks would not smoke, folks would not drive while being heavily under the influence, etc…
Awareness plays a role, but there is more to it.

"However, do you think that if these people who gave us what we have today could be resurrected to see who we are…or even what our ideals are…do you think they’d approve? "
I do not believe, it can be as simple as: here is a snapshot of today, what do you think.
Fundementally I do not believe “a lot” has changed:
“regular war” have always been here
“religous war” have exited for quite some time…
etc…
I think what has changed his our awarness and access via technology + history + geology/geography. How many people back then where aware of the “Crusades” & if they everybody would have been aware of it (similar to everybody being aware of 9/11), how many would have actually cared? Probably not that much because it was in no way going to affect immediatly their daily life. The fact the “Crusades” could be one of the pieces that created the current middle east situation and some other tensions would explain the history piece.

“if you are so opposed to cultural change in this country”
That is a scary thought!

Fred.

8

OTOH many values are cast aside that most definitely are negatively affecting our society as a whole, at least IMHO. These can and should be brought back.
And on the surface that might be nice. Unfortunately sometimes those values that we wish we could return to simply cannot exist in the world that we have created. Hence the conflict.

Take for example the nuclear family. I think most people would agree that stable families with one parent working and the other caring for children leads to a more stable family. But who are supposed to fulfil these roles? Traditionally we’d say it was the man who worked and the woman who cared for the children. But in this day of dual income families those roles aren’t as well defined. A simple wish like this has a huge impact on society and the workforce.

9

Take for example the nuclear family. I think most people would agree that stable families with one parent working and the other caring for children leads to a more stable family. But who are supposed to fulfil these roles? Traditionally we’d say it was the man who worked and the woman who cared for the children. But in this day of dual income families those roles aren’t as well defined. A simple wish like this has a huge impact on society and the workforce.

There are other tradeoffs as well that are not completely understood.

Who is more likely to get addicted to crack:

  1. The latchkey kid who has two working parents?

  2. The kid who’s mother stays at home, but because of their single income they live in a poor neighborhood and attend a run down public school. Crime, drugs, and bad influences surround them?

OR…what’s better for your kids, and their kids:

  1. Stay at home and raise the kids, but receive a mediocre education and can’t afford to send them to college, or at least not a good one?

  2. Two incomes leading to affording good schools and being able to pay for that Ivy League education, hopefully opening up opportunities for the next generation to jump up a social class?

I’ll contend they aren’t easy answers.

10

I’ll contend they aren’t easy answers.

I’ll contend that they are very easy answers, but the wrong question. The question is not whether or not there is a two parent family, rich, poor, dual income or well fare. The question is, is there a core family that nurtures the children?

I’ll take a single mother home, living in the ghetto that loves her kids over a upper class DI family that treats their kids likes objects.

I think the past 30-40 years we’ve gained the very positive belief that kids are more than just kids, they are tiny humans with most of the needs, desires, emotions etc that adults have. However I think we’ve lost the mentality that “Family” is supposed to be about providing love, guidance and a stable home, not about providing an Xbox, good education and a car when they turn 16.

~Matt

11

Who is more likely to get addicted to crack:

  1. The latchkey kid who has two working parents?
  2. The kid who’s mother stays at home, but because of their single income they live in a poor neighborhood and attend a run down public school. Crime, drugs, and bad influences surround them?

These kinds of hypotheticals have little relation to reality. It is not as if there are plenty of kids in the inner cities getting addicted to crack because mom stays home while dad goes to work.

12

I think most people would agree that stable families with one parent working and the other caring for children leads to a more stable family.

I think most would agree to that, that’s my point, but most don’t attempt to do that.

But who are supposed to fulfil these roles?

Thankfully one of the good perspectives we’ve picked up is that it doesn’t matter. As long as that stability is there it makes no difference.

Traditionally we’d say it was the man who worked and the woman who cared for the children.

Again this has been something we’ve learned to be untrue. The tradition doesn’t matter, we can create a nuclear family in any numbers of ways.

A simple wish like this has a huge impact on society and the workforce.

And I disagree. We learned we no longer have to limit the terms of “Nuclear family” to Dad works, mom takes care of the kids. In some case it may actually be in the interest of the children that both Mom and Dad work, maybe Grandma takes care of the kids.

My point here is that I think people get WAY to caught up in the material aspect of providing for the kids and forget the other, IMHO, more important aspects of providing for your kids. Society has put a greater importance on “income” and providing material things than on simply raising normal healthy kids. I’m guessing your average kid would be better off without the XBox, 2 TV’s, Wheelies, yada yada yada, but with a parent at home.

OTOH I FULLY understand that in a lot of cases that both parents simply must work. That doesn’t mean that the kid has to be thrown into a mass daycare at 3 months.

I guess all I’m saying is that I think our society would be far better served putting a little more emphasis on the importance of family and less on the “things” surrounding the family. This is an “Old” value that can most definitely be re-adopted into our new society, IMHO.

~Matt

13

These kinds of hypotheticals have little relation to reality.

Correct…the relationship is small, but still there. “Peer pressure” and environment (beyond the home) are but only two of many factors that influence the decisions a child makes.

My parents bankrupted themselves to get us into a better neighborhood and into a better school (there were other factors that bankrupted them as well, but one was moving into a house they couldn’t afford). Odds are had we stayed in the old school district, I may not have gone to college and my brother almost certainly would not have gone to college. Not to mention, drugs and crime were a bigger problem in the old neighborhood, and though I can’t be certain that I would have been any worse off, some of my old friends ended up in jail. I’ve been known to have done stupid things as a result of the people I hung around. I can’t say that I wouldn’t have been snorting coke as well had we stayed back there.

Nevertheless, make of the stats what you will, you can’t neglect that there is a tradeoff. You may have you opinion as to which is more important, but the fact remains that having a parent stay at home costs you money that could be spent providing for your child’s future. If we were to have kids tomorrow and my wife stayed at home (for 18 years), that would cost us well over a million dollars.

14

Nevertheless, make of the stats what you will, you can’t neglect that there is a tradeoff.

But I can- at least the ludicrous trade-off that you posit. It’s fantasy.

15

Society is a constantly changing entity. Sometime there are good reasons for change but also sometimes it seems to change just for the sake of changing, without any particular reason. Change is often good, but not always. But you can’t ever go back.

Bottom line: There is no time like the present.

16

“I can’t help but think that the world would be a better place if we went back to 3 channels.”

Using that as a metaphor for your larger question, I don’t think it’s a matter that the 3-channel world was better than our current n-channel one, but rather that some of us in the older generations still feel some nostalgic attachment to the 3-channel environment. Younger generations, in contrast, would find the old 3-channel environment restrictive and uncomfortable. Similarly, if you or I were transported back to the eighteenth century, we would no doubt find ourselves intensely frustrated by the loss of the accustomed conveniences of modernity. OTOH, if an eighteenth-century person were transported to today’s world, he/she would undoubtedly suffer a severe case of future shock at the bewildering array of possibilities that were suddenly opened. Because every human being carries with him (her) the psychological baggage of his own era, it becomes exceptionally difficult to make objective comparisons among different eras.

If you want to find happiness in today’s world of rapidly accelerating change, you have to make a focused effort to adapt to the bewildering array of channels available (and I’m obviously not just talking about TV). You have to transform yourself, to push yourself to grow beyond your 3-channel past. But for those who are willing to undergo that adaptation, I would contend, our current environment is the best that human beings have ever been able to enjoy. That’s not to deny that some things have taken turns for the worse, especially on the political front. But the alternatives that are available to us today (and those that are now on the horizon), if we merely use our intelligence to choose wisely among them, make possible to us a level of existence that is the very antithesis of the “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short” life once accorded our ancestors.

17

But I can- at least the ludicrous trade-off that you posit. It’s fantasy.

So its a fantasy that a 2 income family can put their kids into better schools and live in nicer neighborhoods than that same family with half the money?

18

Care to comment on the trade-offs I mentioned?

19

No, as I said, it’s fantasy that there are kids out there addicted to crack because mom stays home while dad works.

But you knew that.

What are the stats on family income for two-income households versus families with stay-at-home moms?

20

No, as I said, it’s fantasy that there are kids out there addicted to crack because mom stays home while dad works.

I could make the argument that it has happened (because of the neighborhood they could afford…not because th emom stayed home and rasied them). I currently have a coworker who moved into a high crime, low income area with terrible schools because that was the best he could afford while taking care of his wife and three kids. Yes, his kids stand a better chance than the fatherless kids in the neighborhood, but you can’t ignore the fact that his kids are more likely to run into drug dealers, crime, and possibly th estray bullet.

In addition, my brother got his ass kicked at least once a week at the bus stop when he was in elementary school. I was invited to come out and play once while an 18 yo kid waited around the corner to kick my ass. This same kid put people in the hospital. He was a real toughguy, but eventually got shot by the drug dealer down the street. His girlfriend’s brother got beat up by my “friend”, then went home and got his ass kicked by his dad for getting beat up by a white kid. This same “friend” went to jail for “kidnapping and torture” because another kid in the neighborhood stole his cocaine.

My mom started working again and we moved out to get away from all of this. The nice family that bought our house walked out a week later to see “Niggers” spray painted on their car.

The school I went to was the lowest achieving school in our state. ~20% of the population went to college. I had to worry about getting my ass kicked on any given day in that school by either a radom thug or random neo-nazi…just because they could.

We were NOT safe, we were NOT receiving a good education, and we were NOT in an environment that would encourage one to go to college.

My mom took a job and we moved. EVERYTHING changed.

But no Vitus, I did not become a crack addict because my mom stayed home.

What are the stats on family income for two-income households versus families with stay-at-home moms?

I don’t have stats. I don’t know if anyone does. You can just as easily point to situations where kids moved into a rich neighborhood and/or attended private school and discovered cocaine while there.

I’m not asking for a “which is better” answer. All I’m asking is that you either accept or deny that tradeoffs DO exist.

My brother and his wife felt adamantly that there were no tradeoffs. Someone has to stay at home and rasie the kids. 1 year later they find themselves with $10K in credit card debt. She went to work the following year. The only thing that really even keeps them a float is the fact that she comes from money (we certainly don’t) and that her parents/grandparents have donated the occasional $5-10K to help them out. Many people aren’t so fortunate.