Ever wish it was the 50's again?

I suspect that if this thread continues to turn to a political bent, it's lifespan will be shortly curtailed.

The 50's had style, and stuff was built to last... today is just a throw away.

blackhawk wrote in post #9609483
The 50's had style, and stuff was built to last... today is just a throw away.

And, may I add, Haw, haw haw!!!!

Geezus Chreist!

My '52 Chevrolet was trash at 35,000 miles, which is why my parents gave it to me. It was six years old and couldn't be trusted beyond towing range.

After an engine rebuild and two transmission overhauls I sold it for $50. Still running, barely, at about 50K.

What planet are you from?

number six wrote in post #9610960


And, may I add, Haw, haw haw!!!!

Geezus Chreist!

My '52 Chevrolet was trash at 35,000 miles, which is why my parents gave it to me. It was six years old and couldn't be trusted beyond towing range.

After an engine rebuild and two transmission overhauls I sold it for $50. Still running, barely, at about 50K.

What planet are you from?

The planet that still has refrigerators that are running that are older than me... I never said chevy's were any good.:p

I understand the point of your post. My first SLR was given to me in 2000. I lived in Sarasota, Florida at the time. I was in a local camera shop weekly. Where I currently live, there are no local camera shops. I really miss that resource and connection.

OP I hear you. I wasn't born til the mid 60's though...but I do miss the small town "everybody knows your name" style of living. Saving $ has been good...so to speak...but when I have to talk to someone in another country (no offense to anyone in other countries) that I cannot understand (and vice versa) and have waited 20min or more to speak to, in order to get "quality" customer service...it drives me nuts.

birdfromboat wrote in post #9602354
I wasn't around in the fifties, so no. But even since the seventies I have seen changes i wish we could reverse but know we won't. The anonimity of being part of an ever increasing population with ever widening avenues of interaction has brought an element of rudeness that will be part of our lives for the duration I am afraid. If someone gave you the finger in traffic in the seventies, there was a good chance it would be a problem for them in the near future, but now a finger isn't even given a thought and any retribution would be an act of aggression that society would be more likely to punish.
We are able to anonamously treat each other rudely with no fear of consequence, in traffic, in public, and especially on the internet. Small wonder that service and accountability also suffer, there is a generation of kids coming up that have never even seen it.
I don't miss the fifties, but politeness and mutual respect will always be missed.
One thing never changes, old codgers have been singing this song forever. If anyone on here is old enough, they miss the thirties and think the fifties were the start of todays sorry state. And so it goes....

great post!

My girlfriend and I are about 16 years apart: she was born in early '51 and I was born in late '66. It is funny how our expectations differ while shopping. Having grown up in the Midwest during the 1950s and 1960s, she has the total "Mayberry" approach to shopping: she is extremely polite - she goes into a store and introduces herself, calls people by their name, etc. She likes "the clerks" to wait on her, make suggestions, walk her to the register, sometimes help her to her car. She has a select number of local places that she shops and she doesn't care if their prices are higher as long as their customer service is good. If a person is helpful, she will compliment him or her, offer a tip, etc. If they are extra nice (and it's hard not to be nice to her because she is so sweet), she will actually take the time to write a nice letter to the manager complimenting the person who helped her!

Having grown up in the 1970s and 1980s, I am the complete opposite. I find most retail interaction extremely annoying and a complete waste of time. I do my research ahead of time and I only want to talk to a person if it is absolutely necessary! In my opinion, the best invention in the world (next to on-line shopping) is the self-checkout counter.

When I see threads like this I wonder what vacuum people live in, for they have no sense of history.

You can't just pick and choose the good while ingoring the ugly as in "Beaver". Beaver wasn't reality, as has been said.
There was Korea, and A-Bomb alarm drills (where we all hid under the desks), racism, sexism, and isms until the cows come home, and a whole lot more difficulties.

Socrates said some thousands of years ago that the youth were going to hell in a handbasket (paraphrasing). Well, they still are, just like I did and you will.

Give me that washing machine and diswasher and computer and all the other stuff that technology gives me and you keep the clothesline and washboard and whatever.

I never saw the 50's - heck I wasnt around until 13 years after the decade (1973 for the hard of thinking) finished but every generation has looked back and said "It was better in.....".

There are better things (social interaction, manners etc) but there were the bad things (extreme racism, Cold War etc).

We currently have terrorists as an international worry, we had nuclear war as our worry before.

If there is one thing history can show, its that things generally dont get better or worse - the problems are just exchanged for different ones!

District_History_Fan wrote in post #9607987
Honestly, telling only a small, extreme part of history and acting as if it were the norm is taking history out of context. Abuses happened. There is no excuse for them, but those you describe were rare.

Where I was, abuses were 100% of the time, every day. They permeated existance and dictated all social behavior. It was the norm for millions of people.

But from your point of view, it was "only a small extreme part of history."

Veemac wrote in post #9606024
Great post and well said. There have been a lot of sociological implications as we moved from a "nuclear society" to an "industrial society", and I agree 100% about the correlation between anonymity and rudeness. I wasn't around in the 50's either (came onto the scene in the 60's), and while the 50's may not have been Nirvana in every aspect of life, I would certainly like to go back to "simpler" times.

Check out Episode 10 sometime.

Back to the point. Although I was born way after '50s ended, being a history buff, I have a BA in it, after all, the '50s were not without their own baggage (Cold War anyone?).

Plus, we have shiny toys today!

RDKirk wrote in post #9577874
The 50s sucked from where I was.

i'm glad i was not there, being born in the 70s, and i certainly would not be where i am today were it not for the civil rights movement.

Mark_Cohran wrote in post #9609142
I suspect that if this thread continues to turn to a political bent, it's lifespan will be shortly curtailed.

Yep, I think it is time...

Well, since politics still seems to be a recurring theme, it looks like this thread is done.