MovieChat Forums > General Discussion > I hate how the media misrepresents the 5...

I hate how the media misrepresents the 50s and 60s

posted 5 years ago by [deleted]
27 replies | jump to latest

They make out like it was an era of innocence and everyone was uptight and prudes, etc.

Instead there was still high crime rates. People weren’t all church going folks. Womanising and cheating seemed to be a big part of the culture. There were gay bars and gay couples, people just didn’t put pride flags out.

Yes, people dressed better and took more pride in their appearance. But guess what? They wanted to.

Or when they say that they say Kennedy died America lost her innocence. I’d say WWII meant that they weren’t innocent or nieve, they’d seen it all.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

As a fan of old films as in from the 30's to 50's I am still surprised at how many "controversial" topics they deal with or explore at times. As you say the portrayal is very different where life was like a Disney film.

I think overall standard's were higher but also as you mention better clothing that is because there were tailors and also sweatshops which made these clothes at an affordable price. Now people tend to wear sweat pants and sneakers everywhere.

I think WW2 ended a lot of innocence for the West as well. Men and women came back with a different outlook on life, new skills etc.

The 50's and 60's was also the start of being more open about sex, at least in certain Western countries, the make out culture, which probably existed before that as well but I think it became more acceptable. By the late 60's you start getting the hippies and free love.

Whatever WW2 didn't change, Vietnam finished.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

I think there was a bit “keeping up appearances” of “happy families” and “moral lifestyles”, and the late 60s and 70s was all about “why bother? Why pretend?”

I see the shift as letting go of pretences, not necessarily drastically changing what they had done before.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

I think it was a gradual shift. Even when I grew up in the late 70's and 80's there were still a lot of boundaries or standards in place. I don't think it is all necessarily a bad thing. It just needs balance like most things in life.

I think what we have now is a mess though.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

what do you think is a mess? The lack of discipline? Lack of respect?

[–] chilone (18324) 5 years ago

Cell phones.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

I think it's gone too far. There needs to be some element of order for it to work. The balance is gone.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

I think overall standard's were higher but also as you mention better clothing that is because there were tailors and also sweatshops which made these clothes at an affordable price.

Clothes were not made in "sweatshops" then. They were made by New Yorkers in what used to be called the Garment District. I forgot what the statistics were but a majority of all clothing sold in the United States was sewn here (I'm from NYC). I actually went to a trade high school that taught sewing and tailoring because the clothing industry here needed "fresh meat." In the YouTube clip below, go to the 19:50 mark, and you'll see tons of people pushing clothing on racks and hauling fur coats: https://youtu.be/Q0oY0qqXy44?t=1195

[–] slimone (7996) 5 years ago

Probably because most of them were not born yet. The 60s were great, especially in San Francisco. They had great music, night clubs like the Jazz Workshop. I was a great time!

[–] BillHicksFan (10716) 5 years ago

comedy, too.... movies were SO much better than the last 40 years.

Who gives a fuck about clothes?

[–] chilone (18324) 5 years ago

The media misrepresents EVERYTHING.

[–] Kowalski (79090) 5 years ago

UGH.

[–] snepts (11123) 5 years ago

I see The Andy Griffith Show being rerun a lot, and I would think it influences how people perceive that time period. I'm not sure what you mean by "the media" and it's portrayal of that era. I'm sure a lot of things have changed in ways that aren't beneficial to the culture, but I doubt this is a 180 degree turnaround either.

[–] chilidoggg (14601) 5 years ago

Holy crap the Andy Griffith Show has ALWAYS been rerun a lot.

How about Gomer Pyle?

[–] snepts (11123) 5 years ago

I think "media" as the OP suggests, perhaps did have a sanitized view of life back then. But is this a bad thing? We watch the Flintstones, the Jetsons, the Munsters. Very escapist. We may not have realized nor wanted to grapple with how difficult and complex the world really is.

There are other examples where films were more nuanced, (All That Heaven Allows, Rebel Without A Cause). But we didn't have a French or Italian Neo-Realist mind-set back then.
I'm not surprised people think we were suppressed but I'm not sure it was a bad thing.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

check out Far From Heaven 2002

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

Did you grow up in the 50s?

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

No but I'm knowledgable about history and feel that people misrepresent the era, probably because they were young and innocent themselves in the 50s and believe the world existed as they experienced it.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

The only people who are reliably knowledgeable about history are those who lived through it.

What are you basing your objection on, movies that unrealistically portray that era, or people from that era who are unrealistically nostalgic about it?

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

Documentaries and news stories. The era looks innocent through our eyes, and television was crazy conservative, but that doesn't mean it was. I think people had more affairs back then. Bosses slept with their secretaries. Kennedy, for example, was a sexual degenerate who raped women by today's standards.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

"Documentaries and news stories". That's not a good way to become knowledgeable about history, ITN. As I said, the only way to have a reliable knowledge of history, (or anything), is to experience it yourself. Without that, you're just like a person giving an opinion about, say, people in the 17th century. We haven't got a clue what that era was really like, we've only got history books. The same goes for the 1950s, for people who aren't old enough to have lived them.

[–] kspkap (13629) 5 years ago

I did live the ‘50’s and it was a better time except for Blacks. WW2 wasn’t the cause of loss of innocence. Believe it or not WW2 was a romantic time due to that military member making the most of every day especially before shipping out. My deceased aunt confirmed my thoughts. I’ve always been drawn to the ‘40’s. We definitely respected our military. Not so today for some folks.

The ‘50’s came along and the military was still respected. We also continued to respect law enforcement. Calling police officers pigs came later. Civil discourse continued along with proper dress for the occasion. Men treated women with respect because it was taught to them. They wouldn’t use foul language in earshot of women. I blame the women wanting equal parity which led to disrespect. Today they don’t care how many men they’ve slept with and on the first date! Hell bells the most we did on that first date was hold hands...not even a kiss. Neighbors would discipline other people’s kids without fear they were going to be called every name in the book laced with profanity! Sure the hanky panky was going on as it always had been since time immortal, but behind closed doors. If a girl got pregnant the guy married her or she was away visiting grandparents, etc.

The ‘60’s came along and the country awoke, but not to the good. Vietnam caused the loss of innocence. Free love became the norm. Returning military were spat upon, police officers became “pigs”, drugs became the choice for recreation. It was as if a can of worms was opened as evidenced by that continuous drug laced party held on a dairy farm....Woodstock! Civil discourse and genteel manners went out the door! I hated the ‘60’s, but some things changed to the good especially for Blacks.

Yes, discipline and respect were no more. Too bad....

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

Thanks, Kspkap, that was a very nice commentary. :)

[–] kspkap (13629) 5 years ago

You are quite welcome! I could have wrote so much more, but I had to be succinct due to text limitation. There was so much discord, turmoil, violence in the ‘60’s. It was the decade of assassinations. President Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Robert Kennedy, Kent State shootings, I still cannot comprehend our National Guard firing on college students....4 dead and many wounded.

I cannot comprehend law enforcement turning dogs loose on Blacks, but today they stand by and let the terrorist group Antifa run amuck. I can’t comprehend 4 people murdered and buried by a damn just for registering Blacks to vote. The mass shooting from a University Texas tower. Eight nurses in Chicago slaughtered by Richard Speck: the Manson murders.

To repeat I hated the turbulent ‘60’s. We had lost our innocence, our ability to have discipline and respect......and it has only got worse.

[–] Bigcat (259) 5 years ago

You know what show that still works today? The Waltons. Never saw the show until the last few months as it was before my time. But Its crazy how many topics they covered back then that could play today and they were suppose to be dealing with issues from like the 1930s.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

Regardless of which era a show is set in it will always be about the era it was made in. MASH was about Vietnam even though it was set in the Korean war for example. It will always have modern values and ethics in it, which is a shame as I would prefer a little more authenticity.

But also the show still works because the issues it dealt with were never resolved so it still works now.

[–] GreenGoblinsOck8 (7986) 5 years ago

Well Back to the future and Driving miss Daisy portrayed it better with showing actual racism. If I had a time machine I would never go back to before the equal rights ammendment. I wouldn't want to see a bunch of racist stupid people going around talking about their fellow human beings as less than human.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

America really was divided during segregation. It's still racially divided in many regards, but not enforced which makes a huge difference.