I don’t think it would be a shock to anyone to point out that traditionalists often romanticize, even idolize, 1950s American culture. Why?
I think the allure lies in nostalgia, even nostalgia for a time we’ve never experienced. It’s easy to romanticize an era which we think embodies our values and lifestyle dreams. In reality, there were definitely good things about the ’50s we could bring back. And of course, there were a number of dangerous societal trends that gained traction in this decade, too. Let’s explore a few and see why we tend to idolize the ’50s, and whether we should reframe our perspective.
’50s Trends to Bring Back
A celebration of the male and female dichotomy. After the end of WWII, the young male population returned to their home country and home lives. This long-awaited masculine return resulted, of course, in the baby boom: the generation we know now as “boomers.” It also had ripple effects through pretty much all of daily life.
Women were able to leave the workforce and return to a home-centered lifestyle, to raise children, to cook and clean and socialize. Men returned to a workforce bolstered by government programs, to fatherhood and breadwinning, to building businesses and the economy. Married couples got to live out masculinity and femininity in their day-to-day lives since the war was over and massive national poverty had ended. Compare this to today, when the dichotomy of male and female is not just overlooked but downright villainized.
A booming economy of affordability and comfort. Adjusted for inflation, the average 1950s house cost about $90,000 in today’s U.S. dollar, a living standard well within reach and sustainability for most suburban families. Many young couples were able to marry, start a family, and buy a house relatively quickly due to the low cost of housing—the average house cost only three years of pre-tax income for the average family.
With the blossoming economy came many comforts previously difficult to access. Beauty parlors hosted women regularly, and many women spent an average of two hours at a salon every week. Movie theaters, soda shops, roller rinks, dance halls, and sports events were regular activities for students and young adults. Colleges, too, were affordable to attend. As my paternal grandfather once said, “the 1950s was the best time to be alive.” Pay was good, living was cheap, and dozens of daily comforts opened their doors to the average citizen.
A classic aesthetic. One of the first things almost any traditionalist is drawn to is a classy, objectively beautiful aesthetic. And the decade of the ’50s had it in spades.
Likely this aesthetic has its roots in the celebration of male versus female. How many traditionalists say things like “back when men looked like men and women dressed like women”? Fashion choices reverted from war-ration creativity to flamboyantly fun clothes for daily wear, even for stay-at-home mothers and school children.
The wildly popular fashions were amplified on the silver screen, of course. Enter the golden age of Hollywood, which revolved around beautiful cinematography and color film, stunning actresses like Audrey Hepburn, and newfangled music stars like Elvis Presley. Films and music in this time set the standard for the future, and many hits from back then are still audience favorites today.
’50s Trends to Leave in the Past
Rampant materialism and commercialism. Arguably, the rise of materialism was a response to the back-to-back crises of the Great Depression and WWII in previous decades, when basic necessities were scarce and luxuries unthinkable. Due to the booming economy, the ’50s saw a skyrocketing focus on consumerism and materialism.
Companies capitalized on commercialism by marketing heavily in popular aesthetics, as well as targeting their ads toward stay-at-home mothers who did the majority of shopping for households. Society in general began setting a high value on image, appearances, and the latest trendy products of the day.
Whereas previous decades may have promoted more solidarity and support through the trials of need and war, this consumerism of the ’50s sowed seeds of comparison and “keeping up with the Joneses.”
The daily division of the nuclear family. During the average daily hours, a father was at work and away from home, all the children were in public school separated from each other based on age, and a mother was home alone or out and about with a social calendar.
In previous decades, of course, men were often primary breadwinners; but in this era began the idea of the daily commute, thus removing men from coming home to eat meals with their families. Women in previous decades often worked jobs based from home, but in this decade, many didn’t have to earn an income at all. Their free time often turned into social calendars, charity work, and women’s events… few of which would include their children or husbands. Other women chose to retain their jobs from the previous decade’s wartime, further removing all family members from the home.
Public schools exploded in both enrollment and physical size, to accommodate the baby boomers’ growing up. Another major influence in the public school system was 1954’s Brown vs Board Of Education, which resulted in the federal desegregation of schools. While, of course, desegregation was a positive, it was also a shock to an unprepared school system: This contributed to increased class sizes, school needs, job demands for teachers, and increasing need for school busing commutes.
One result of these bigger classes, changing social dynamics, and a larger teacher-student ratio was the explosion of teen culture. This unique young adult clique began to wield enormous power via peer pressure to levels hitherto unforeseen in American childhoods.
An emotionally promiscuous dating scene. With the rise of teen culture came an unprecedented lack of supervision in the dating world. Possibly in an effort to just let kids be kids, the prevailing attitude around dating became “just have fun!” Generally, most of society agreed on keeping sexual chastity, but at the same time, media and society encouraged young people to date around at younger and younger ages and to worry about committing to a spouse later.
Interestingly, despite condemning sexual promiscuity, society developed a sort of emotional hookup culture. It actually was quite common to have multiple boyfriends or girlfriends, to secretly date someone else’s “steady,” and to engage in plenty of “parking” and “necking.” I personally can see how this may have set the stage for the sexual revolution of the ’60s and ’70s.
It’s also worth noting that by the 1950s, Margaret Sanger had founded abortion birth control mogul Planned Parenthood, and in the ’50s, Hugh Hefner began Playboy magazine. Both companies attacked fundamental gender roles and societal standards even while these roles and standards were prized in fashion, social circles, and commercial marketing.
In the end, we can ask ourselves a number of questions: Was beautiful fashion worth the skyrocketing media reliance? Does a booming economy justify materialism? We might consider many answers. Overall, though, I think it’s safe to say one thing: No historical era was perfect.
Traditionalists shouldn’t look at the past with rosy lenses and wish themselves back in time. Every generation had strengths and weaknesses, good ideas and bad mistakes. Why? Humanity is still human, and we always have been and always will be. Let’s not do our current generation the disservice of claiming previous ones were so much better.
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Image credit: Pexels
28 comments
28 Comments
JCambias
October 29, 2024, 12:21 pmI don't know that traditionalists actually do revere the 1950s. Rather, the "conformist, consumerist, conservative" 1950s has been a convenient strawman for leftists since about 1967 or so. If there's a decade that modern conservatives look to more than others, I'd say it's the 1980s, though there's a growing sense that the country started going wrong when Wilson got elected so maybe the nineteen-aughts deserve another look.
REPLYCadence McManimon @JCambias
October 29, 2024, 3:33 pmA good point of leftist focus, too–interesting so many are focused on this decade, but others skate under the radar more! Thank you for reading.
REPLYBill Babbitt@JCambias
October 30, 2024, 11:49 amIn the 59s Communism was illegal (and should still be). There were no communists in government, and the country was a great place to live in. Now our universities are infected with this vermin, and the poison has spread to all levels of government and schools. Every year we inch further into a dystopian era.
REPLYbill Babbitt@Bill Babbitt
October 30, 2024, 11:51 amThat should have been 50s not 59s. Arthritis makes it hard to type very well.
REPLYCadence McManimon @bill Babbitt
October 30, 2024, 3:44 pmI hope you've read the ITO article published not long ago about Karl Marx and his Satanist ties–it was informative and relates to your points here. Thank you for commenting and reading!
REPLYSwissarge
October 29, 2024, 1:33 pmAS someone in his 80's and lived in the 1950's, let me be clear : There never has been in the history of the world, a more perfect time than the USA"s 1950's. Period!
Don't try to show or explain why it wasn't great, especially if you didn't experience it, as it only exposes your ignorance.
REPLYCadence McManimon @Swissarge
October 29, 2024, 3:34 pmMy wonderful grandparents of your generation have many wonderful stories of this time, and shared many difficult struggles too, as does every era. Thank you for reading!
REPLYKay@Swissarge
October 29, 2024, 3:45 pmI was born in 1947. The fifties was a wonderful period to live in. My father commuted to work and was home nearly every night for dinner. And he was around on the weekends, so plenty of dad time. My mother stayed home. We children had enormous freedom and were outdoors much of the time. I could saddle up one of our horses and go riding by myself. Boys could be gone all day, from after breakfast to dinner time, doing boy things. Very few children got into trouble with all that freedom. Crime wasn’t a concern. The culture was wholesome.
Please don’t knock what you never experienced.
REPLYCadence McManimon @Kay
October 29, 2024, 6:03 pmI'm glad your childhood was so lovely–as stated in the article, there were many wonderful qualities of this era worth emulating. And every decade has unique struggles, too. Thank you for reading!
REPLYAlfred White
October 30, 2024, 3:35 amRomanticizing the past or desiring to return to a golden age that never really existed is a very human and understandable thing to do. I am often guilty of reminiscing about the "good old days", having been born in 1953. It is an easy temptation to fall into. The 1950s was pretty much like any other era in human history; an mixture of good and evil, right and wrong, wisdom and foolishness, virtue and vice, happiness and suffering. Growing up in Deer Park, Long Island was not hell, but it was not paradise either.
REPLYCadence McManimon @Alfred White
October 30, 2024, 8:41 amThank you for your insight, you offer a valuable perspective. Thanks for reading!
REPLYJ.W.
October 30, 2024, 8:58 amYou forgot to mention the lack of ‘diversity’ back then.
Except this:
“ While, of course, desegregation was a positive…”
Prove it.
REPLYCadence McManimon @J.W.
October 30, 2024, 10:35 amI didn't mention this topic because this article focused on things unique to only the decade, rather than societal practices that spanned many decades or centuries of American history. Thank you for reading!
REPLYJ.W.@Cadence McManimon
October 30, 2024, 1:50 pmOkay – I appreciate your reply.
Many whites in the US have noticed that the more non-whites that are involved in our country (and other formerly majority white countries) the less we have of all the things you mention.
Add to that the fact that, for some reason, whites are not allowed to mention this fact and face many layers of abuse and exclusion when they do, and it’s difficult not to conclude that there is an intent to infiltrate our cultures and expel us from any and all meaningful opportunities to participate in any societal influence.
All of our historical figures and cultural contributions are being ‘colored’ as our children are told how evil they are.
These things are all connected and, in my estimation, are the primary reason many US whites are looking to the last prosperous time we had in which we could be ourselves without relentless outside influence and coercion.
This observation and belief is routinely called hateful but I’d wish the same ability on any and all groups to develop their own societies and cultures and be themselves, then share what they are and what they’ve built with the world in a truly diverse way.
People are different and we should all have a space to call our own.
REPLYCadence McManimon @J.W.
October 30, 2024, 3:37 pmYou bring up some deep and necessary social elements we ought to be reflecting on and considering for our modern era. I hope you reach out to the publishing team here in ITO–your points and clarity of writing style lead me to think you could pen a thought provoking article!
REPLYJ.W.@Cadence McManimon
October 31, 2024, 6:14 pmThank you for the compliment!
I’m currently writing a book about such things. Articles are great and I enjoy reading the thoughts of others but I would probably not work well with editors who tell me to add/subtract things from whatever piece I wrote.
If I put my name on it I’d want it to be my words rather than those of someone else.
REPLYKen B.@J.W.
October 31, 2024, 12:10 amWell said J.W.
REPLYJ.W.@Ken B.
October 31, 2024, 6:14 pmThank you!
REPLYCadence McManimon @J.W.
October 30, 2024, 10:43 amI should mention the exclusion of this topic was discussed at length between myself and the publishing team; the phrase you quote was added at the discretion of the editors.
REPLYBillBabbitt
October 30, 2024, 11:34 amI lived through the 1950's and loved that time. There was no "Woke" crap, criminals weren't coddled, men didn't play on women's sports teams or use women's restrooms, cars had class, people had manners, movies and music were far better, wives raise their own kids, and everything seemed more secure and friendly. We didn't get television until the later years and that was okay; we had the radio and used our imagination. Kids played outside all day and into the dark. In the Winter, I went hunting before and after school and put my shotgun in my school locker. No one even thought about shooting up the school. Cowboys were my idols, and we played cowboys and Indians with our cap guns. We had our chores and hated them. But that gave us a sense of responsibility and work ethic. We helped our neighbors and never even thought about asking to be paid. There was a general sense of well-being in that decade that has gradually eroded to where we seem to distrust any stranger. There will never be an era such as the 50s, and that is a tragedy
REPLYCadence McManimon @BillBabbitt
October 30, 2024, 3:30 pmThere were many wonderful things about the era, as you so well illustrate! Some would be well worth bringing back. Thank you for reading!
REPLYBill Babbutt@Cadence McManimon
October 31, 2024, 11:58 amWell, Cadence, I would love for the country to return to the ways of the 1950s. Unfortunately, that could never happen, and the reason is technology. Yes, technology has been changing societies since humans left the trees and discovered the use of tools. With each technological advance comes social change. Fire taught us to cook food, and we evolved to no longer tolerate raw meat. We became gourmets. The domesticated horse enabled us to move and travel longer distances. Fast forward to the 50s and we have electricity. Cars are ubiquitous and now vary in design, refrigerated food is prevalent, telephones and radios facilitate greater communication, and television has become the standard for entertainment.
It is that very technological advance that sealed the end of the 50s era for good. The constant killing and presentation of dead bodies on television inured us to killing. Gory video games gave us a great high when taking out an opponent or even scores of the enemy. The daily news of evildoers has led us to distrust strangers. Our ability to travel as far and frequently as we like has made our homes less of a castle and more like an Airbnb. We can't even acknowledge those sitting with us at the dinner table because we are fixated on our smartphones.
No, the 50s are but a pleasant memory that can never be repeated. The scary part is that technology will continue to advance, but what social changes will accompany it?
REPLYTim Castricone@BillBabbitt
November 2, 2024, 9:34 amI was born in 1957. My parents and extended family believed that they survived the depression, won WW2 and were enjoying the fruits of victory.
REPLYCadence McManimon @Tim Castricone
November 2, 2024, 11:47 amHistory always has ups and downs, and the previous two decades certainly were massive struggles. Thank you for reading!
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