The lustre of the 50s
Derb has a post tracking reaction to a previous post about Robert Heinlein. The essence of the more recent post is that the 50s were a special time, characterised by ‘Civilisational Confidence’ (although Derb, as a recent American, has dropped the British ’s’ from ‘civilisation’ in his preference for an American ‘z’):
The main reason the 1950s looks so good to so many of us is that in moving from the old order to the new, we lost much of our civilizational confidence. You may say that that confidence was misplaced, or an illusion; you may even say that it was obnoxious, and good riddance to it; and you may be right on all points. There is something awfully attractive about civilizational confidence though. Like innocence, once gone, it can’t be recaptured. Those of us who recall it shouldn’t be blamed for missing it.
I wonder if part of the appeal of the 50s to a certain generation (not Derb so much, presumably, as he was not in the US at the time, although I imagine he had an opinion about 1950s America from his situation across the Atlantic) is that it is remembered through the eyes of one’s early childhood. I feel the same about the 70s, to some extent, yet no one is going to claim the 70s as a time of great plenty (excepting enthusiasts for early heavy metal and punk music, I guess). Indeed, watching this video (or the other one from the same concert, the third video that I linked in this post) filled me with a great deal of nostalgic enthusiasm for the England of my youth (although I wasn’t born in 1970, things didn’t look very different in my earliest memories), for no good reason (although I love the music).
Personally, I think that the 50s marked the last period when the USA was a place where someone could win or lose everything based on merit and luck. Increasing regimentation and creeping government intrusion (which didn’t start in the 50s, mind) gradually started to bite, so far as entreprenurial opportunity was concerned. For me, that opportunity-laden nature was the signal characteristic of America’s greatness as a nation. Sure, it’s still a lot better than most of the rest of the world in that regard, which is something Americans should celebrate, but it’s not as good as it was. In particular, I think that it’s a mistake to fixate on the 50s, because they weren’t so much the highpoint as the point at which the road turned inexorably downards; there’s no point yearning for that time again, because it already contained the seeds of what was to come. Then again, I’m not bothered about ‘civilisational confidence’ in the way that Derb is, although I know that some significantly older British people I’ve met through the years, who still remembered the Great Days of Empire, probably feel the same about an even earlier period in history, for Britain. Perhaps the 50s really was a US highpoint in that regard, ‘Civilisational Confidence’, although it seems as likely to me as reflecting a combination of power and outward-looking, wheras prior to that, attention was not directed so far out; people may just not have worried so much about ‘Civilisational Status’ before then.
In any case, for a lot of us, the past always looks better; it’s safely gone, after all, and not about to unexpectedly disappoint us, which might explain, in part, the objections often offered to ‘revisionism’ in history, which objections often seem to kick in before the merits of the case being made are actually considered. I’d prefer to look forward; not because I think that the future will be better, but because it’ll happen whether or not I’m ready for it. The best any of us can hope for is to preserve our favourite parts from the character of our immediate surroundings and to do that, we need to be prepared, which means looking ahead.
Rambling Diatribe Of The Day Status: Complete.