I am admittedly one of the most sentimental people on the planet but I also have a scary good memory. So, while I love to remember things, I also tend to remember a lot of specific details rather just some general, warm, fuzzy experience.

Therefore, while I absolutely love nostalgia and thinking back, I have a very hard time coming up with anything that was really better in the past.

I call this the "Myth of Nostalgia", where human tendency is to romanticize the past; to exaggerate the good and gloss over anything less than pleasant.


Sure, the divorce rate prior to the 70's was virtually nonexistent... But was that better? As a kid (I was born in 1960) I remember so many unhappy marriages, cheating husbands, alcoholism and even domestic abuse. Yet, women didn't have the choice of leaving, primarily for financial reasons. Also, the laws in most states made divorce very difficult.

And of course, we all love to think back on old restaurants but there is no more unreliable memory than that of taste. I happen to think that restaurants -- freshness, education, experience, variety, cooking methods, portion size (and value), service -- are generally way, way better than back in the day. There are perhaps a few exceptions, where there was one person at the stove who was incredibly gifted, but even then I would question how good things really were.

I also think that for anyone over 40 now, there was an issue of scarcity; where you didn't eat out that often, have every toy in the world and generally experience immediate gratification virtually whenever you wanted it. So, that pizza/hamburger/steak/candy bar was much more significant and thus the experience heightened.


Don't mean to rain on the nostalgia parade, just wanting to engage in a conversation about things that may have been truly better back when.

Air quality?

I know air quality in Los Angeles, Denver and cities that used to have terrible smog problems are infinitely better.

There weren't even emission standards on cars - at all! -- until the mid-70's.

Well if you are an ethnic or racial minority, Jewish or some other kind of non-Christian faith, or gay or lesbian, I seriously doubt you think things were a lot better "back in the day."

One thing I love to hear people say was so much better "back then" is cars. Before I go on let me say that I LOVE muscle cars, street rods, hot rods, etc. and have built/flipped many such cars in the last 40 years. New cars are way better off the floor. They make good power with good fuel economy stock. They are good for many hundreds of thousands of miles. A 60s muscle car was shot at 100k miles. Older cars look better but the new models are much better engineered.

I know air quality in Los Angeles, Denver and cities that used to have terrible smog problems are infinitely better.

There weren't even emission standards on cars - at all! -- until the mid-70's.

That depends on when you consider "back then". I was thinking in terms of when I used to visit relatives in the LA area back in the 50's and 60's. My memory may not be the best, but it certainly seems worse now when I visit there than it was then.

I don't believe things were "better" back in the day. I certainly have fond memories of things. Its amazing to me how a smell or a sound will just immediately take me back. Until they stopped a few years ago, to hear the stock cars at the fairgrounds was one of the most relaxing sounds. Thinking about the call sign ads on KOMA also bring back memories.

I think the opportunity for children to be inventive in leisure activities, outdoor game playing, etc. was much better than the pre-programmed computer, cell phone, etc, non thinking activities that most engage in today.

A lot of whether something was "better" - or not - is oviously subjective. With that in mind...(and remember we can't use a "good reason why" as an excuse)...

Here's my stab at a few things I think were better back in the day.

1. Newspapers and local TV news.
2. Good jobs, factories booming in the USA, pensions, a middle class that was vibrant, greater income equality from the richest to the poorest.
3. Radio news departments.
4. By almost all standards "customer service" was better - everywhere.
5. Our physician made house-calls until I was 11 or 12 years old.
6. Young people knew basic civics and history. I've seen the chart on basic knowledge and it has plummeted.
7. Political campaigning for office, at every level, was something that didn't rely on wealthy candidates and outrageous sums of money.
8. Nationwide, parental participation (active) in the USA public schools has dropped from a high of 60 percent in 1961 to less than than 20%(!)
9. Milk, butter, eggs and cheese delivered to your front door.
10. Again, remembering this is subjective...for me -- fewer choices was a better thing.

Ten is a good number to start at. I think things were better in many ways - more than we even realize. That doesn't discount medical and technological advances, but the specific things above - to me, those things were better.

Gas prices were definitely better. The debt load our country and each person carries was better. Years ago you had to twist a man's arm to get him to go into debt. Now all you need is a flashy commerical and most people are in line ready to charge away. Key example Black Friday there will be millions in line spending money they don't have. Many will walk into bankruptcy courts in 2014.

Gas prices were definitely better. The debt load our country and each person carries was better. Years ago you had to twist a man's arm to get him to go into debt. Now all you need is a flashy commerical and most people are in line ready to charge away. Key example Black Friday there will be millions in line spending money they don't have. Many will walk into bankruptcy courts in 2014.

The country's debt situation today is largely the result of the policy decisions in the sixties, continued/expanded for decades since they encapsulate a spectrum of measures from the wants of both sides and the willingness for several decades to knowingly budget more than they would be collecting

Music. People actually played instruments (mostly).

The world seemed a lot more "free" back when I was growing up, from the mid-50's to the mid-60's. Less rules and "helicopter mom" fears (except for the constant threat of nuclear war with the Soviet Union or Red China, of course). Peanuts didn't cause so many allergies. There was a lot more of what could be called "common sense" and people weren't so addled and dumbed down by the flood of information as a result of technology overload.

I like buildings from "back then". I like how they seem to have been designed and constructed with pride.

A lot of whether something was "better" - or not - is oviously subjective. With that in mind...(and remember we can't use a "good reason why" as an excuse)...

Here's my stab at a few things I think were better back in the day.


1. Newspapers and local TV news.
Newspapers were the mouthpieces of wealthy industrialists. They may have employed more people but it's only because there weren't any other local news sources. The Oklahoman in particular was famous for printing incredibly slanted stories and ignoring that which they preferred not to print. Simply, it wasn't news unless they reported it -- with zero other alternatives. How was that better?
As for local TV news, do really miss the weather man that stood in front of a wooden board and did not have the benefit of modern forecasting technologies? How many lives have been saved by present day, much better educated meteorologists??

2. Good jobs, factories booming in the USA, pensions, a middle class that was vibrant, greater income equality from the richest to the poorest.
Due to technology and general advancement, factory jobs have been replaced by educated, white collar jobs. The overall standard of living from just a few decades ago is infinitely higher. People are generally paid much better and have the opportunity to save for their own retirement, even if they choose not to. Total compensation (including pensions) is way higher. Unemployment rates are generally better now, with generally better jobs.

3. Radio news departments.
Replaced by 24-hour TV news on dozens of channels and internet sites that report things much more quickly.

4. By almost all standards "customer service" was better -*everywhere.
Strongly disagree. Expectations are higher now and you have the option of buying goods and services with fantastic customer services OR going for rock-bottom prices and compromising in this area – that is YOUR choice.

5. Our physician made house-calls until I was 11 or 12 years old.
So did mine yet the quality of care in general now – plus the ability to drop by multiple immediate care facilities – is so much better that lifespans have increased significantly.

6. Young people knew basic civics and history. I've seen the chart on basic knowledge and it has plummeted.
Education in general is way, way better. They teach kids things in first grade most of us didn't learn until years later. Standardized test scores are better, a much higher percentage of public school kids go to and finish college, etc.

7. Political campaigning for office, at every level, was something that didn't rely on wealthy candidates and outrageous sums of money.
Politics are much, much less corrupt now than then. The old political bosses and machines used to rule. The bright light of modern media has eliminated much of this. It also allows relative unknowns with no family or political histories (like Obama) to come out of nowhere.

8. Nationwide, parental participation (active) in the USA public schools has dropped from a high of 60 percent in 1961 to less than than 20%(!)
Again, overall education in all aspects is much, much improved.

9. Milk, butter, eggs and cheese delivered to your front door.
There are a bunch of services that will still do this and deliver virtually anything else (not just groceries) to wherever you want. And in adjusted dollars, it's all probably cheaper, too.

10. Again, remembering this is subjective...for me -- fewer choices was a better thing.
I doubt many people would agree with this.

1. Critical thinking skills. They were taken as a granted a generation ago. They are discouraged now.
2. Grammar. We used to care about constructing proper sentences. Now those who care are openly ridiculed as somehow being anal.
3. Our ability to rationalize risk vs reward. Our nation went to the moon a generation ago. Now, we don't even have a manned space program. We're being trained to believe that 0 risk is the only acceptable level for any venture, regardless of the reward.
4. Our ability to be offended. We have allowed our nation to become paralyzed at the behest of the perpetually indignant, engendering an entirely new kind of 21st century fascism. Somewhere, someone along the way conjured the notion that there exists a constitutional right not to be offended.
5. The government. A generation ago, the people controlled the government. Now, the government aims to control the people. It wants to mandate our health insurance, regulate our diet, and in some cases, tell us how much soda we can drink.
6. The family. We once revered it as the cornerstone of a society, now it is ridiculed as an arcane throwback. We hear stories of star athletes and pop culture icons fathering untold numbers of children, and it barely causes the raise of an eyebrow. A generation ago, there was at least the notion that wasn't proper behavior. Now, the consequence of this new "freedom" are seen only in hindsight, in cities like those my daughter visited a couple of years ago on a mission trip out of state, to a small city where entire living complexes are inhabited by older children raising younger children, with no adults to be found, and the children starving for companionship, leadership, and friendship.
7. Fiscal responsibility. There was a notion that, I think, started dying just as I was entering junior high, that you aren't entitled to money. Somehow, the ubiquity of credit cards and easy money and government subsistence created this false security that one was actually entitled to all the things your parents had. There was a degree of social pressure not to take on debt, not to be a spendthrift, and yet that has so thoroughly flipped. The ethos now is spend, spend, and spend more, and if you run out of money, just file bankruptcy and let someone else take care of it.

The "Myth of Nostalgia" is a double-edged sword, because we are more aware of now than we were in the generation we are mythologizing. I wasn't around for a good chunk of the 60's or any decade before, so I can't vouch for how "good" or "bad" it was. If it is true we can over-romanticize the past, we can just as easily ignore its fruit because we weren't there to taste it, and thus don't really know how good or bad it might have been. We have no first-hand knowledge of what we've lost.

Were the 40's/50's/60's (take your pick) the truly idealized Norman Rockwell generation? Of course not. All I know is that I'm thankful my faith in the future does not rely on my hope that society will fix itself.

The debt load our country and each person carries was better. Years ago you had to twist a man's arm to get him to go into debt. Now all you need is a flashy commerical and most people are in line ready to charge away.
Much of consumer debt is hardly choice because wages have stagnated,the medical industry has come under the rule of extortionary profiteers, and young Americans feel forced to go to college to be able to join the middle class, but it's nearly impossible to graduate without debt - a far cry from even the 80's.

The country's debt situation today is largely the result of the policy decisions in the sixties, continued/expanded for decades since they encapsulate a spectrum of measures from the wants of both sides and the willingness for several decades to knowingly budget more than they would be collecting
He specifically mentioned personal debt and you yet again intentionally misinterpret someone in order to blame government policy.


2. Good jobs, factories booming in the USA, pensions, a middle class that was vibrant, greater income equality from the richest to the poorest.
Due to technology and general advancement, factory jobs have been replaced by educated, white collar jobs. The overall standard of living from just a few decades ago is infinitely higher. People are generally paid much better and have the opportunity to save for their own retirement, even if they choose not to. Total compensation (including pensions) is way higher. Unemployment rates are generally better now, with generally better jobs.

Marx's predictions can't be ignored in this context. Labor has been made dirt cheap by technology and the people with bureaucratic, technocratic, or financial industry jobs are the only ones better off. Marx predicted this cheapening and political marginalization of labor as capital (land and productive machinery) gained in power. People with money have more choice than ever and people without are more stigmatized and marginalized than ever.

1. Newspapers and local TV news.
Newspapers were the mouthpieces of wealthy industrialists. They may have employed more people but it's only because there weren't any other local news sources. The Oklahoman in particular was famous for printing incredibly slanted stories and ignoring that which they preferred not to print. Simply, it wasn't news unless they reported it -- with zero other alternatives. How was that better?

That's a fairly sweeping generalization of an entire industry based on one paper. Most cities at the height of the print journalism era had two or more newspapers that offered somewhat competing perspectives.

As for local TV news, do really miss the weather man that stood in front of a wooden board and did not have the benefit of modern forecasting technologies? How many lives have been saved by present day, much better educated meteorologists??

I surely miss the local investigative reporters from as recently as the 80's, like the ones who broke the Oklahoma Industries Authority scandals, the County Commissioner scandals, the DHS scandals from not that many decades ago. You'll never get that kind of investigative journalism on the local level again, as it just jeopardizes advertising dollars and minimizes the time for "Happy Talk."



3. Radio news departments.
Replaced by 24-hour TV news on dozens of channels and internet sites that report things much more quickly.

And ever-decreasing *local* news coverage.


4. By almost all standards "customer service" was better -*everywhere.
Strongly disagree. Expectations are higher now and you have the option of buying goods and services with fantastic customer services OR going for rock-bottom prices and compromising in this area – that is YOUR choice.

Strongly disagree with you here, Pete. Now, if something breaks, your best hope is to get routed on a Call to an automated bot for a chance to speak to someone with incomprehensibly broken English who has not a clue nor a desire on how to help -- they're being marked and pegged for how many calls they can answer, get through a script, and get out while expending the least possible effort.


5. Our physician made house-calls until I was 11 or 12 years old.
So did mine yet the quality of care in general now – plus the ability to drop by multiple immediate care facilities – is so much better that lifespans have increased significantly.

Tsk tsk, Pete, you're trying the ol' trick of bring up an unrelated fact to bolster a point. The loss of physicians performing house calls doesn't really have any bearing on lifespans. C'mon. :) If a doc started making housecalls again, I somehow doubt we'd all live five years less.


6. Young people knew basic civics and history. I've seen the chart on basic knowledge and it has plummeted.
Education in general is way, way better. They teach kids things in first grade most of us didn't learn until years later. Standardized test scores are better, a much higher percentage of public school kids go to and finish college, etc.

I look at what my kids are learning in high school that we substantively covered in the same or a lesser grade. My son went through elementary school taking multiple choice spelling tests, never being challenged to learn syntax, construction, and word formation that leads to the foundations of spelling. The same extension applies to grammar and writing. The reason for the multiple choice tests? Because that's what the standardized tests measure.

Standardized test scores are rising in no small part because the tests are being dumbed down.



8. Nationwide, parental participation (active) in the USA public schools has dropped from a high of 60 percent in 1961 to less than than 20%(!)
Again, overall education in all aspects is much, much improved.

Some aspects? Probably. All aspects? Not by a mile.

1. Critical thinking skills. They were taken as a granted a generation ago. They are discouraged now.
2. Grammar. We used to care about constructing proper sentences. Now those who care are openly ridiculed as somehow being anal.
3. Our ability to rationalize risk vs reward. Our nation went to the moon a generation ago. Now, we don't even have a manned space program. We're being trained to believe that 0 risk is the only acceptable level for any venture, regardless of the reward.
4. Our ability to be offended. We have allowed our nation to become paralyzed at the behest of the perpetually indignant, engendering an entirely new kind of 21st century fascism. Somewhere, someone along the way conjured the notion that there exists a constitutional right not to be offended.
5. The government. A generation ago, the people controlled the government. Now, the government aims to control the people. It wants to mandate our health insurance, regulate our diet, and in some cases, tell us how much soda we can drink.
6. The family. We once revered it as the cornerstone of a society, now it is ridiculed as an arcane throwback. We hear stories of star athletes and pop culture icons fathering untold numbers of children, and it barely causes the raise of an eyebrow. A generation ago, there was at least the notion that wasn't proper behavior. Now, the consequence of this new "freedom" are seen only in hindsight, in cities like those my daughter visited a couple of years ago on a mission trip out of state, to a small city where entire living complexes are inhabited by older children raising younger children, with no adults to be found, and the children starving for companionship, leadership, and friendship.
7. Fiscal responsibility. There was a notion that, I think, started dying just as I was entering junior high, that you aren't entitled to money. Somehow, the ubiquity of credit cards and easy money and government subsistence created this false security that one was actually entitled to all the things your parents had. There was a degree of social pressure not to take on debt, not to be a spendthrift, and yet that has so thoroughly flipped. The ethos now is spend, spend, and spend more, and if you run out of money, just file bankruptcy and let someone else take care of it.

The "Myth of Nostalgia" is a double-edged sword, because we are more aware of now than we were in the generation we are mythologizing. I wasn't around for a good chunk of the 60's or any decade before, so I can't vouch for how "good" or "bad" it was. If it is true we can over-romanticize the past, we can just as easily ignore its fruit because we weren't there to taste it, and thus don't really know how good or bad it might have been. We have no first-hand knowledge of what we've lost.

Were the 40's/50's/60's (take your pick) the truly idealized Norman Rockwell generation? Of course not. All I know is that I'm thankful my faith in the future does not rely on my hope that society will fix itself.

I agree with 1, 2, and 3 for the most part. It seems like critical thinking, intelligence, and even individualism is frowned upon today. As for number 4, sometimes political correctness is taken way too far but sometimes it is also necessary. I disagree with number 5. 40 years ago the government was trying to tell us how to live but in different ways than they are today. They forced our young people to go fight and die in an unjust war in Vietnam for one. The government back then was better if you were white, male, and fundamentalist Christian but if you weren't then it was stacked against you. I disagree with 6 as being a recent thing. Divorce and broken homes, which started really skyrocketing in the 1960s, affects many more people than same sex relationships do. In Oklahoma high value is still placed on marriage and the family, much moreso than in many other parts of the country. As for #7, you have to go back to pre-FDR times to see a nation that lived within its means. The debt problem has been with us many generations, it's just now starting to catch up to us.

1. Critical thinking skills. They were taken as a granted a generation ago. They are discouraged now.
2. Grammar. We used to care about constructing proper sentences. Now those who care are openly ridiculed as somehow being anal.
3. Our ability to rationalize risk vs reward. Our nation went to the moon a generation ago. Now, we don't even have a manned space program. We're being trained to believe that 0 risk is the only acceptable level for any venture, regardless of the reward.
4. Our ability to be offended. We have allowed our nation to become paralyzed at the behest of the perpetually indignant, engendering an entirely new kind of 21st century fascism. Somewhere, someone along the way conjured the notion that there exists a constitutional right not to be offended.
5. The government. A generation ago, the people controlled the government. Now, the government aims to control the people. It wants to mandate our health insurance, regulate our diet, and in some cases, tell us how much soda we can drink.
6. The family. We once revered it as the cornerstone of a society, now it is ridiculed as an arcane throwback. We hear stories of star athletes and pop culture icons fathering untold numbers of children, and it barely causes the raise of an eyebrow. A generation ago, there was at least the notion that wasn't proper behavior. Now, the consequence of this new "freedom" are seen only in hindsight, in cities like those my daughter visited a couple of years ago on a mission trip out of state, to a small city where entire living complexes are inhabited by older children raising younger children, with no adults to be found, and the children starving for companionship, leadership, and friendship.
7. Fiscal responsibility. There was a notion that, I think, started dying just as I was entering junior high, that you aren't entitled to money. Somehow, the ubiquity of credit cards and easy money and government subsistence created this false security that one was actually entitled to all the things your parents had. There was a degree of social pressure not to take on debt, not to be a spendthrift, and yet that has so thoroughly flipped. The ethos now is spend, spend, and spend more, and if you run out of money, just file bankruptcy and let someone else take care of it.

The "Myth of Nostalgia" is a double-edged sword, because we are more aware of now than we were in the generation we are mythologizing. I wasn't around for a good chunk of the 60's or any decade before, so I can't vouch for how "good" or "bad" it was. If it is true we can over-romanticize the past, we can just as easily ignore its fruit because we weren't there to taste it, and thus don't really know how good or bad it might have been. We have no first-hand knowledge of what we've lost.

Were the 40's/50's/60's (take your pick) the truly idealized Norman Rockwell generation? Of course not. All I know is that I'm thankful my faith in the future does not rely on my hope that society will fix itself.

#5 is a little slippery. You seem to be cherry picking what you hate about the government, whilst forgetting what they have done.

#5 is a little slippery. You seem to be cherry picking what you hate about the government, whilst forgetting what they have done.

Hate is your word, not mine.

I believe in a minimalist government, the one the founders created and worked so very hard to construct, and what is being so diligently undermined today.

I started to say more, but I'm not going to turn this into a political thread. Just going to stop it here.

Hate is your word, not mine.

I believe in a minimalist government, the one the founders created and worked so very hard to construct, and what is being so diligently undermined today.

I started to say more, but I'm not going to turn this into a political thread. Just going to stop it here.

Your post has already turned this into a political thread.

Local news is covered better than ever by lots of different mediums. Thank goodness we don't have to rely on two 15-minute broadcasts a day to find out anything, and the depth of coverage is nowhere near what you can find today.

Education is better by any objective measurement: Test scores, college attendance, etc. And before we get all nostalgic about how much better it was when families were more involved in schools (which is highly debatable anyway) I can remember being force-fed political and religious beliefs in the public schools and how grown adults would beat young children with wooden paddles. And how things like molestation went generally unreported and unpunished (this happened to me, BTW).

My point about medical care is you have better options now that trying to reach one GP through an answering service and hoping he'll find time to stop by with his little black bag. You can now go to immediate care facilities 24/7 and get far better care. And that same doc that used to make house calls would also make us wait for hours (no exaggeration) in the waiting room while he was running around dealing with housecalls -- or incredibly late because of them.

As for customer service, there are tons of examples of retailers and service providers that will replace something on the spot, provide instant service, etc. My car buying and service experience with Lexus is light years ahead of anything from 30 years ago; as is dealing with someone like Nordstrom or Costco. Generally speaking, if you to go through a phone tree you still get service, it's just more efficiently delivered. And if you really want personal service, just pay more. Plenty of options in virtually every category. The bottom line is that things are amazingly cheaper and better now and part of that is due to people willing to sacrifice a person answering the phone on the first ring (which by no means meant your issue was more quickly resolved).

And the issues with the Oklahoman were hardly unique. Very typical of how a rich man/family held tight control of the news in almost every town. OKC had two newspapers for quite a while and that didn't change much.

He specifically mentioned personal debt and you yet again intentionally misinterpret someone in order to blame government policy.

He mentioned both the debt of the country and individuals, I was only responding to the government portion, which was why I had bolded the segment of the quote I was responding to.

#5 is a little slippery. You seem to be cherry picking what you hate about the government, whilst forgetting what they have done.

You have to go back to pre-civil war times if you want a time when we truly had minimalistic government. I doubt many people crying for it would be all that happy about it if it was enacted and they lost the entitlements, such as social security and Medicare, that they have come to rely on. Smaller government sounds great and is an excellent rallying cry, but people change their mind when they find out what would be getting cut.

Crime is worse now. It's not relegated to any certain area of town. Where I grew up in the burbs, we didn't lock our doors to the house until around 1975. I can remember us kids going next door when the neighors were gone on vacation just to look around inside their house.....this was back in the middle '60's.

Yeah, saying that local news was covered better in the 60s/70s/80s etc on OKCTalk.com is the definition of irony...

My memory, my vision, my hearing and reaction time was better back then. When you took a vacation kids would actually look out the window and not have their faces buried in a phone or tablet or what ever.

I deleted several posts that were off-topic and personal.

Back to subject, please.

I stand by my list of things I think were truly better back in the day. Different people will always see things differently. How many cups of nostalgia we take with our current plate of reality is really not that big of a deal anyway.

Crime is worse now. It's not relegated to any certain area of town. Where I grew up in the burbs, we didn't lock our doors to the house until around 1975. I can remember us kids going next door when the neighors were gone on vacation just to look around inside their house.....this was back in the middle '60's.

You mean reporting on crime is better, so it seems like there's more of it.

Because actual crime has demonstrably declined for decades. And not just a little.


-----

People thinking things are horribly bad all over the world due to the media blowing things out of proportion for that advertising dollar while competing in a 24x7 news cycle...That hasn't gotten better Pete. The media LOVES to get a microphone in front of the crazies and give them a much larger voice than they should have. Hyperbole is the norm. My wife's grandmother is scared half to death of the Swine Flu/Bird Flu every year...Despite the fact that more people probably die from straining too hard on the toilet in a week than die of the Swine Flu all year. She also likes to throw her "I never wore a seat belt and I'm in my 80's and fine!!" anecdote out there while she texts and drives (we've pretty much broken her of this habit...We think). NO sense of actual risks.

^

The thing that drives me most crazy about this mentality (which is incredibly common) are the people who say, "I'd never let my kid ride their bike around like when I was a kid". Or, "I'd never let my child walk to and from the stop and take the school bus." And then they point to one incident that happened years ago and far away as reasons; or the fact the kiddo complains too much.

So now, you go by any school and there are hundreds of SUV's all lined up and a bunch of kids that stay inside playing video games instead of running around on their bikes.

We all looked through less cynical eyes back then so everything did look better. Now the overload of information and the daily wear and tear of living makes you feel things were better back in the day. I work very hard at taking my Grandkids out on road trips and going to parks, lakes, etc. Someday they will look back and think of this as the good old days.

One of my favorite childhood memories is that we used to have informal block parties on the 4th of July. People would move some grills into their front yards, ice cream would be shared, sparklers would be lit.

When I moved into my home about 10 years ago, someone mentioned that from my street you could see the public fireworks display. So, I organized a few households, I made homemade ice cream and set up some tables, others brought deserts and we just sectioned off a cul-de-sac. We had over 50 the first time and every year after.

One of my neighbors has eight (!) kids and she told me how much they look forward to the little tradition. And I bet they will end up doing something similar when they have homes of their own.

^

The thing that drives me most crazy about this mentality (which is incredibly common) are the people who say, "I'd never let my kid ride their bike around like when I was a kid". Or, "I'd never let my child walk to and from the stop and take the school bus." And then they point to one incident that happened years ago and far away as reasons; or the fact the kiddo complains too much.

So now, you go by any school and there are hundreds of SUV's all lined up and a bunch of kids that stay inside playing video games instead of running around on their bikes.

Very true. There's even a term for it, which is escaping me at the moment.

HOWEVER, in all fairness, if the xBox had been around when I was 10...No way in hell would I have been riding my bike at the park. Asteroids on the Atari was cool and all, but it was no Halo. Have you PLAYED the games the kids get sucked in to? GOOD GOD THEY'RE FRIGGEN AWESOME.

True about video games... Atari came out when I was in high school and I was completely transfixed.

However, we were absolutely not allowed to stay inside during the day. I clearly remember my mom literally chasing us out with a broom on more than one occasion!

I was probably 7 or 8 when I first played an Atari.


My xBox 360 has been collecting dust since my son was born (2.5 years ago), and I'd be lying through my teeth if I didn't admit that I was looking forward to the day where he asks for a Playstation or xBox.

/was chased out of the house with a broom too...Then smacked with it when got home after dark :D

I like buildings from "back then". I like how they seem to have been designed and constructed with pride.

Craftsmanship in the construction trades was definitely way better "back in the day"

Yep, that's a great point... The detail and quality of materials put into older buildings is often amazing and there are few modern examples that can compare.

Craftsmanship in the construction trades was definitely way better "back in the day"

Not sure I agree with this 100%. On the surface, I agree...I mean, just go look at the houses down off 23rd that were built in 1910 or so. I'd kill for that kind of craftsmanship and woodwork. It's amazing.

But...Those weren't cheap houses for the masses. They're 3,000 sq ft McMansions from another era. Us little people didn't buy them. Look at a cheap house from the early 1900's, if you can find one still standing. They're absolute junk. Walls insulated with newspaper, if they even bothered.

My point is...We only see the top-notch stuff from way back then (building/housing wise) because 1) it was built better /cost a lot more which brings 2) it's worth keeping around.


Go look into a brand new $350,000 custom home these days. There's some pretty great craftsmanship to be had in there, and I'd put money on them being around long after all the cheap-o $100,000 homes have fallen in on themselves.


/can't believe I just called a $100,000 home a "cheap-o"...It's a mad world :(


~Edit...I'm thinking more along the lines of homes, not public buildings or commercial architecture...I have no experience in that area

One of my favorite childhood memories is that we used to have informal block parties on the 4th of July. People would move some grills into their front yards, ice cream would be shared, sparklers would be lit.

When I moved into my home about 10 years ago, someone mentioned that from my street you could see the public fireworks display. So, I organized a few households, I made homemade ice cream and set up some tables, others brought deserts and we just sectioned off a cul-de-sac. We had over 50 the first time and every year after.

One of my neighbors has eight (!) kids and she told me how much they look forward to the little tradition. And I bet they will end up doing something similar when they have homes of their own.

Oh yeah, the street and block parties. I grew up a Navy brat and Squids partied back then about dang near anything. Awesome beach parties when I lived in Florida and Norfolk.

Sense of wonder/awe. (First time you saw the ocean or a 14,000 foot peak or a giant redwood.)

Patience/anticipation. (Trying to remember that character's name for hours and hours, Happy Days on Tuesdays, waiting for that person's call, Sunday papers.)

Exploration/expedition. (Sputnik, moon landing, Jaques Cousteau, Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom.)

Observation. (Staring out the car window for hours on end during family vacations.)

Imagination. (Cops and robbers, war, cowboys and indians, baseball with newspapers for bases and wads of tape for a ball.)

Danger. (Riding bikes without helmets, being out of contact with your parents for hours and hours, dirt clod fights, bb gun fights, pocket knives at school, tennis ball cannons.)

To name a few more...

Does anyone still tell their kids to stay outside and play until the street lights come on?

True about video games... Atari came out when I was in high school and I was completely transfixed.

However, we were absolutely not allowed to stay inside during the day. I clearly remember my mom literally chasing us out with a broom on more than one occasion!

I agree about video games as well. Personally I think video games have went way downhill in the most recent era. There is no more creativity and everything is all about the bottom dollar. I liked the original Call of Duty and Battlefield games as well as Counterstrike, the predecessor to the modern online FPS, but personally was burned out on them years ago and the new installations in the series really don't do much for me. This biggest dissapointment is the new SimCity game. As a long time fan of the series I was dissappointed that realism and freedom of design has taken a back seat to the social aspects of the game. It's been a long time since a video game has really captivated me like they used to, Skyrim being an exception. I don't think it's getting older either, I think quality has simply plummeted since the huge for-profit corporations bought up the independent developers.

Does anyone still tell their kids to stay outside and play until the street lights come on?

You know if you kick the pole hard enough...It'll trip the safety and that streetlight will go out for a solid five minutes?

True story.

"But mooooOOOOmmmm..THE LIGHT WAS STILL OFF!!!"

I am admittedly one of the most sentimental people on the planet but I also have a scary good memory. So, while I love to remember things, I also tend to remember a lot of specific details rather just some general, warm, fuzzy experience.

Therefore, while I absolutely love nostalgia and thinking back, I have a very hard time coming up with anything that was really better in the past.

I call this the "Myth of Nostalgia", where human tendency is to romanticize the past; to exaggerate the good and gloss over anything less than pleasant.


Sure, the divorce rate prior to the 70's was virtually nonexistent... But was that better? As a kid (I was born in 1960) I remember so many unhappy marriages, cheating husbands, alcoholism and even domestic abuse. Yet, women didn't have the choice of leaving, primarily for financial reasons. Also, the laws in most states made divorce very difficult.

And of course, we all love to think back on old restaurants but there is no more unreliable memory than that of taste. I happen to think that restaurants -- freshness, education, experience, variety, cooking methods, portion size (and value), service -- are generally way, way better than back in the day. There are perhaps a few exceptions, where there was one person at the stove who was incredibly gifted, but even then I would question how good things really were.

I also think that for anyone over 40 now, there was an issue of scarcity; where you didn't eat out that often, have every toy in the world and generally experience immediate gratification virtually whenever you wanted it. So, that pizza/hamburger/steak/candy bar was much more significant and thus the experience heightened.


Don't mean to rain on the nostalgia parade, just wanting to engage in a conversation about things that may have been truly better back when.How about the women Pete? I think the stereo type housewife of the 40's-60's are freaking hot. Don't know why, that's just me. ;)

How about the women Pete? I think the stereo type housewife of the 40's-60's are freaking hot. Don't know why, that's just me. ;)

I'm not sure about the housewives of the 40's-60's . . .
Yet I know, for sure, that The Cartoons o' The Past were definitely better.
-LCsiWL6gn0

How about the women Pete? I think the stereo type housewife of the 40's-60's are freaking hot. Don't know why, that's just me. ;)

I remember those housewives during the 40's - 60's. Don't believe the hype. LOL

I remember those housewives during the 40's - 60's. Don't believe the hype. LOL

That youngster was a-talkin' 'bout my mom fer cryin' out loud. n that just ain't right!
'course all o' them Mrs. Paul's Fishsticks n Chef Boy-ar-dee spaghetti dinners n
that "Banquet TV Dinner Chicken" might-a skewed my perspective. =)

Yet, all things considered, the women of her age did a magnificent job of parenting.
At least in my opinion.

(sheee-it . . . i was such a picky little tyke back then that i turned up my nose at fresh-caught, mountain lake, trout on account of it was too much trouble to pick around the bones. =)

Donna Reed certainly was a hottie but I never met anyone like that in my childhood. LOL

I'm not sure about the housewives of the 40's-60's . . .
Yet I know, for sure, that The Cartoons o' The Past were definitely better.
-LCsiWL6gn0I love old cartoons. MGM, Hanna Barbra, and the Disney Shorts. Very cool! Watch Boomerang every night.

That youngster was a-talkin' 'bout my mom fer cryin' out loud. n that just ain't right!
'course all o' them Mrs. Paul's Fishsticks n Chef Boy-ar-dee spaghetti dinners n
that "Banquet TV Dinner Chicken" might-a skewed my perspective. =)

Yet, all things considered, the women of her age did a magnificent job of parenting.
At least in my opinion.

(sheee-it . . . i was such a picky little tyke back then that i turned up my nose at fresh-caught, mountain lake, trout on account of it was too much trouble to pick around the bones. =)I say, well I say. . . I'm just givn yo momma a compliment on behalf(bee-have) of all the other beautiful women of the 40s, 50s, and per(haps) the 60s.

Donna Reed certainly was a hottie but I never met anyone like that in my childhood. LOL

My mom (a housewife of the '50s) used to laugh and poke fun at the likes of Barbara Billingsley (leave it to beaver) for wearing pearls to vacuum the rug and make dinner. She had little to say about Donna Reed. From my perspective, Donna was OK but her daughter was somehow better . . .
hIuYd0GzMjs
. . . much like the music. =)

So I suppose the answer to the OP's question is Yes?

I remember those housewives during the 40's - 60's. Don't believe the hype. LOLAre you sure? I'll just have to invent a time machine or perhaps a machine that will transport me to explore other alternate realties. Surely there are alternate realities out there where something happened that contribute to the uni(multi)verses creation and therefore will have allowed me to explore the 40s-60s.

Here is a possible scenario "God stubs his toe when walking past a wooden walking chair that his wife inherited and he thought was an eyesore and out-of-place item and become very upset and screamed ''Nancy, I don tol ya, fer the millionth time, I don't want this damn chair in this damn house no I don't". She refused to move the chair which then God replied "oooohhhh I'm so mad, I'm a leavin and I ain't a commin back neither till this chair makes like your father-in-law's hair and disappears".

Well, that's what I'll do. I'll just invent a machine that will allow me to jump from one universe to the other; I mean, how hard can it be? ;)

My mom (a housewife of the '50s) used to laugh and poke fun at the likes of Barbara Billingsley (leave it to beaver) for wearing pearls to vacuum the rug and make dinner. She had little to say about Donna Reed. From my perspective, Donna was OK but her daughter was somehow better . . .
hIuYd0GzMjs
. . . much like the music. =)
Well, of course Shelly wasn't a mom then, was she? :)

=Plutonic Panda;709798]Are you sure? I'll just have to invent a time machine or perhaps a machine that will transport me to explore other alternate realties. Surely there are alternate realities out there where something happened that contribute to the uni(multi)verses creation and therefore will have allowed me to explore the 40s-60s.

Here is a possible scenario "God stubs his toe when walking past a wooden walking chair that his wife inherited and he thought was an eyesore and out-of-place item and become very upset and screamed ''Nancy, I don tol ya, fer the millionth time, I don't want this damn chair in this damn house no I don't". She refused to move the chair which then God replied "oooohhhh I'm so mad, I'm leaving and I ain't a commin back neither till this chair makes like your father in laws hair and disappears".

Well, that's what I'll do. I'll just invent a machine that will allow me to jump from one universe to the other; I mean, how hard can it be? ;)

Here's an easier--and more cost effective, realistic--path to follow: Locate the book written by Timothy Leary's co-hort, Richard Alpert before he became Baba Ram Dass. Ignore the crapola between the covers of the book and focus on the title printed on the front: Be Here Now. This volume of wisdom used to sell for 3.33, which, at the time, was touted to be The Cosmic Perfect Price (for the book). Then, Just Do It.

Yeah, that was always a major problem with that is the funding. I'll definitely check that book out though. More than likely I won't be reading all of it on the account of my ADHD.

I thought of two more:

People rested more and enjoyed their time off. I don't really think we have gained all that much with everything being available 24/7. With a little planning we can go overnight or 24 hours without buying something. All it has really done for us is make us more irritable as people and more careless with our money.


Hollywood was much better than it is today. You can't get lost in a good story anymore without being bombarded with political messages. Not to mention some of today's actors are just terrible.

Hollywood was better? Music was better? Don't know about that. Each time period has its hits and misses. For every good song or movie from any period you can come up with four real duds. The best music ever is whatever you were listening to when you were 16-23. Everything else is just "meh".

Hollywood was better? Music was better? Don't know about that. Each time period has its hits and misses. For every good song or movie from any period you can come up with four real duds. The best music ever is whatever you were listening to when you were 16-23. Everything else is just "meh".

I think you nailed it in the area of "music appreciation" (or the lack thereof).
(except for notable exceptions like Enya, Diana Krall, Trout Fishing in America and Miley Cyrus)