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Meh, if they have a few kids maybe one or two will be ok. There are still decent families raising decent kids. It is much more difficult now but committed parents can home school, live in certain areas with like minded people, teach kids basic skills like cooking and using tools, use discipline in parenting, etc. Dad has to be a strong role model and willing to sacrifice for his family or it fails.
You can't run away forever. The walls are closing in around you.
If you do not change the system, all your efforts will eventually be in vain. Maybe not today, or tomorrow, or even in your lifetime. But time is not on your side.
You must slay the beast. As long as it lives, no one is safe. But you must first understand who the beast is.
The economy was humming along due to the pent up demand caused by the war.
Blacks and whites played together in our part of rural east Texas until the kids started school. Schools were segregated.
We were transferred to St Louis in the mid 60s. Webster Groves is the only place I have ever lived where a real estate agent had a contract to buy from an AA couple. Before she took it to the seller's agent she called her friend in the neighborhood. The community collected enough money to buy the house that night. By morning she had two contracts to present to the seller agent. She called the seller agent. The contract from the AA couple was never presented. They were told the house sold before she could present the contract.
When we were buying the agents were really good at steering. Our agent, a friend from church, told me to drive my favorite neighborhood after school before we turned in a contract. That's when we got a new agent. It was when we sold that house that we kept a buyer's earnest money. The buyer wanted out of the contract when he discovered our behind neighbors were not white. We let him out of the contact but kept his earnest money. That was late 80s.
Incidents like Ferguson do not surprise me.
I think a lot of people don't realize what a huge role a post-war economy played in the way things were in the 50s, in terms of prosperity. Millions of young couples who had waited to marry until the war was over were buying homes and things to fill them, starting families, etc. A lot of the rest of the world was in shambles, and devoted all their energy to rebuilding, while our factories, untouched by bombs, were churning out refrigerators, televisions, and cars for those newlyweds. That kind of demand isn't likely to be repeated unless the circumstances that created them is repeated. Oh...bringing back unions might help, too. It amazes me that people who cry a river about the loss of "traditional" gender roles are so often the very same ones that oppose both unions and a minimum wage that would allow a man to have a stay-at-home mom as a wife, if they agreed on that.
As for the rest...in the late 80s, I remember looking for an apartment in a neighborhood that was convenient to my work and most of the places I liked to hang out. It was a racially mixed neighborhood, near downtown, with which I was familiar, and found desirable. The guy showing me the apartments (they had several buildings) tried his pushiest best to get me to look at another rental in a "nice, working-class" neighborhood where he was sure I would be more "comfortable." It was on the other end of the city, far from any and all cultural attractions, and would have added at least 20 minutes to my drive time, but hey...it was really white, and I guess that's what he thought would make me feel at home. After repeatedly telling him that this location was just fine, I ended up leaving in disgust, determined not to give this man my business in ANY neighborhood.
Location: Born & Raised DC > Carolinas > Seattle > Denver
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JAMS14
And women?
And the answer is, of course they do. That's exactly the time they are longing for--when women and non-whites had no power and no voice. You know, the good old days.
Precisely.
And I'm sure most of us realize that some of the far right posters here in the political section would definitely prefer it that way.
Some see only the good from that era, others see only the bad and few see both. The big question I think is whether we could have fixed what was bad without sacrificing what was good. We'll never know though because in our haste we decided to just flip everything upside down without considering the consequences.
It's important though to remember that those who are lamenting the loss of the good are not necessarily trying to bring back that which was bad. That assumption always seems to create animosity in these sorts of discussions where it is not warranted.
I tend to be a realist, and look more at the positive side of things. My previous post showed that the residents of Detroit in 1960 were the highest paid per capita of any city in the nation. It was a thriving city. Now look at it. Such a shame what it has become.
Now that being said, sure there were social problems, just like now. Some have been resolved while others have manifested. We are a nation of individuals, there are always going to be social problems. Back then, we at least had a strong economy, a strong nation, and the opportunities to succeed were more plentiful for all races. (speaking of Detroit again)
Now we have kids graduating college 6 figures in debt with no real jobs , hundreds of thousands working minimum wage jobs, families that have both parents working one or more jobs, skyrocketing debt, unaffordable health care...etc. And still have social issues. It definitely seems like we are in worse shape now.
And I don't want to hear that World War II was the reason for all this wealth, sure in some part it was but Detroit was prosperous long before the automotive industry. Detroit was once the 'Stove Capital of the World'
When I see videos like this...I can't help but think. Do folks REALLY want things to go back to the way they were in the 50s?
DO THEY REMEMBER WHAT AMERICA WAS LIKE FOR MANY PEOPLE IN THE 50S?! Specifically, non-whites?
The only positive import from that era is purchasing power. You cannot live on a single income and raise a family in 2017. 1955? Sure and you could do it with relatively menial work.
Now? Even college degrees are sinking people and holding them back, but the alternative is no better
I grew up in Lakewood which is located in Los Angeles County. It has a huge housing development similar to Levittown NY. Most of it was built in the 50's.
If you were black and wanted to buy a house, you were steered to nearby Compton. If you were Mexican, you had to pretend to be Spanish. If you were Jewish and could not afford to live in the Country Club section, no dice.
And then there was redlining, which was a common practice in NYC, supposedly one of the most racially diverse places in the country.
I don't even believe spousal abuse was higher in the past than it is today(though we should define what we mean by abuse).
Husbands were allowed to rape their wives in those days. Domestic violence was considered to be a private matter between a husband and wife, and there were few if any laws against it.
The world of Donna Reed, the Nelsons, and the Cleavers was reality. It was Not!
Granted, we were the economic power house that was literally untouched. That continued to give the WW II vets a standard of living the world has never seen. The really good times rolled up to around the early seventies when OPEC let us know that there were consequences that go with our alliances. It wasn't the end though. A good education still got you a prosperous living. Keep in mind that the top tax rate was over 90%. That level of taxation financed the interstate highway system.
Then there was the internet. Your job could now be done in India for peanuts. At first it hit the engineers. They were afraid to mess with the programmers, because the coming millennium bug would explode transformers and drop planes from the sky. Y2K came and went. No planes dropped from the sky. No transformers exploded. It was time for open warfare on the American worker. High school diplomas got you a job cleaning toilets. IT degrees got you two years of looking before you maybe got something. Entry level accountants make less than $10 per hour if they work in an accounting sweat shop.
Now they are proposing new tax cuts for corporations which will further depress federal revenues. The middle class might get thrown a bone. But once again the prime rib will go to the wealthy. Say goodbye to infrastructure repair and the good jobs that it will bring.
Are you starting to catch on, or are you going to go back to watch Miss America lie to you on FOX News?
Husbands were allowed to rape their wives in those days. Domestic violence was considered to be a private matter between a husband and wife, and there were few if any laws against it.
I ran across an old episode of The Andy Griffith Show a few months back, and in it Barney was lamenting that the Post Office had all the good criminal wanted posters, and all they had were a few wife beaters--you know, nothing of consequence. They repeated this line at least three times in the course of that episode, how inconsequential the crime of beating your wife was.
I was stunned and appalled, but also very grateful that we live in a time where the crime of beating your wife is no longer a crime of no consequence or importance. THAT is the era many of the posters here apparently long to return to.
I tend to be a realist, and look more at the positive side of things. My previous post showed that the residents of Detroit in 1960 were the highest paid per capita of any city in the nation. It was a thriving city. Now look at it. Such a shame what it has become.
Now that being said, sure there were social problems, just like now. Some have been resolved while others have manifested. We are a nation of individuals, there are always going to be social problems. Back then, we at least had a strong economy, a strong nation, and the opportunities to succeed were more plentiful for all races. (speaking of Detroit again)
Now we have kids graduating college 6 figures in debt with no real jobs , hundreds of thousands working minimum wage jobs, families that have both parents working one or more jobs, skyrocketing debt, unaffordable health care...etc. And still have social issues. It definitely seems like we are in worse shape now.
And I don't want to hear that World War II was the reason for all this wealth, sure in some part it was but Detroit was prosperous long before the automotive industry. Detroit was once the 'Stove Capital of the World'
The only way to revive cities like Detroit now is through gentrification. That mostly benefits the wealthy and upper middle class.
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