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Not making light of his life, but from what I've heard about war, most of these men were thrilled to live mundane lives after surviving all of that overseas.
True, but as a black man he was going to be denied the opportunity to be a pilot for an airline, for example, in the same way his white counterparts could have post service.
I grew up in the 50s and looking back, the mood was optimistic. The war was over and life got back to normal. Jobs were plentiful. My parents bought their first house right after my dad got out of the Air Force in 1949. They had 3 kids and my dad moved up in his job and my mother stayed home and kept house. My mom learned to drive. She got a clothes dryer. All was rosy.
my parents got to enjoy some things that we will never know again (a less polluted world and a general innocence about the outside world) but for most the 1950s seemed like a drag.
Less polluted? The air where I grew up in the 50's was frequently brown colored and so thick... you'd swear you could cut it with a knife. Made your throat burn and eyes water.
Thanks to catalytic converters and whatnot, the air today is extremely clean by comparison. Where did you hear that there was less pollution then?
There's a philosophical term known as "making perfect the enemy of the good". Aka moving the goalposts. We see this in the environmental movement today IMHO.
A number of years ago, I read a book which focused on growing up in the 1950s in the US. The title is "Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen." Its author is Alix Kates Shulman. The narrative of this book is based on her 'coming of age' during that decade.
Ms. Shulman characterized the 1950s as 'conformist, prosperity driven, and communism obsessed.'
As someone who also lived through the 1950s, I concur with her conclusions.
A number of years ago, I read a book which focused on growing up in the 1950s in the US. The title is "Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen." Its author is Alix Kates Shulman. The narrative of this book is based on her 'coming of age' during that decade.
Ms. Shulman characterized the 1950s as 'conformist, prosperity driven, and communism obsessed.'
As someone who also lived through the 1950s, I concur with her conclusions.
Conformist with a capital C. That was an underlying rule as to how to live and get along. The houses in my suburban subdivision were so similar that I walked into the wrong house coming home from school one day. The kids were in huge herds at school, little league, scouts, Sunday school, the local pool -- we did almost nothing alone. When the counterculture arrived as a rebellion to conformity, we did that in herds, too. Conformity got looser but was still the rule -- we just had a larger menu. I'm not sure how much things have changed.
Conformist with a capital C. That was an underlying rule as to how to live and get along. The houses in my suburban subdivision were so similar that I walked into the wrong house coming home from school one day. The kids were in huge herds at school, little league, scouts, Sunday school, the local pool -- we did almost nothing alone. When the counterculture arrived as a rebellion to conformity, we did that in herds, too. Conformity got looser but was still the rule -- we just had a larger menu. I'm not sure how much things have changed.
Not making light of his life, but from what I've heard about war, most of these men were thrilled to live mundane lives after surviving all of that overseas.
You're saying a highly-trained fighter pilot was thrilled to live a mundane life in a menial job in peacetime, just because they could put the war behind them?
If that was so thrilling, why didn't White combat war vets rush to grab jobs as elevator operators, trash collectors and street sweepers? Most were too busy going to college on the GI Bill. Guess who got left out of the GI Bill?
How easy do you think it is to get married and support a family on an elevator operator's wage, to say nothing of buying a house, like the fresh-out-of-college war vets did, and those who got decent-paying industrial jobs?
You're saying a highly-trained fighter pilot was thrilled to live a mundane life in a menial job in peacetime, just because they could put the war behind them?
If that was so thrilling, why didn't White combat war vets rush to grab jobs as elevator operators, trash collectors and street sweepers? Most were too busy going to college on the GI Bill. Guess who got left out of the GI Bill?
How easy do you think it is to get married and support a family on an elevator operator's wage, to say nothing of buying a house, like the fresh-out-of-college war vets did, and those who got decent-paying industrial jobs?
Yeah, we get it - it was wrong.
What would you like to be done about it now?
Can you acknowledge that things were corrected and that 'opportunity' came along for everybody?
This country has bent over backwards to correct their 'original sin.'
I grew up in the 50s and looking back, the mood was optimistic. The war was over and life got back to normal. Jobs were plentiful. My parents bought their first house right after my dad got out of the Air Force in 1949. They had 3 kids and my dad moved up in his job and my mother stayed home and kept house. My mom learned to drive. She got a clothes dryer. All was rosy.
That's kind of a child's perspective. What was on the news? What did folks argue about? What were adults worried about during the fifties?
Less polluted? The air where I grew up in the 50's was frequently brown colored and so thick... you'd swear you could cut it with a knife. Made your throat burn and eyes water.
Thanks to catalytic converters and whatnot, the air today is extremely clean by comparison. Where did you hear that there was less pollution then?
There's a philosophical term known as "making perfect the enemy of the good". Aka moving the goalposts. We see this in the environmental movement today IMHO.
A lot of our perceptions of the '50s come from the old TV sitcoms that were popular at the time. In those shows, everything was always portrayed as clean and pristine. However, if you lived in a big city, the 50s through the 70s were the worst time for air quality.
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