The "Breakdown of Morals in America"

[KensPen]

Conservatives love to lament the breakdown of morals in American Society....
BUT,
when was this golden age of American Morals supposed to have existed?

During the early years of the colonies and our young nation, the founding fathers such as Jefferson had children out of wedlock with women they bought.

Every expanding frontier was met with a thriving prostitution industry.

Some of the first images caught on moving pictures were stip tease and burlesque acts.

World War II was famous for it's pin up girls posted by the men in service,

The Fifties saw Marilyn Monroe and Jane Mansfield in Hollywood, and the pages of Playboy.

So I wish they would tell me what era they are holding up as the pinnacle of American Virtue.

[Solomon]

1. This is easy. Mostly it was when blacks knew their

place. You know, shut up and sit in the back of the bus. You can't marry white girls, etc. etc. etc.

[Fovea]

3. And women

Yeah, it must have been sometime when there was
racial segregation, prohibition, no crime, and women had not yet won the vote. And no taxes either...

That would be neverwhen.

[kodi]

8. the Great Compromise with blacks being 3/5's a person was moral?

america was never moral, it has always been expedient.

the essential document of this nation incorporated immoral behavior.

[Atman]

2. The Fakie Fifties

Pinacle of the Nanny Years the repubs love. Colleges acted as surrogate parents. Loving, married couples could not be shown to even share a bed in their own bedrooms on TV. And, perhaps one of the biggest lies about the fifties -- our chaste Ward Cleaver morality. The Fifties boasted the HIGHEST TEEN PREGNANCY RATES on record. But the GOP still wants to blame it on Clenis.

[KensPen]

4. Agreed....

The fifties were some of the most censored years for mass media.
America was portrayed as a place that didn't exist.
"under god" was added to the pledge.
McCarthy was running wild.....

Basically government was trying to enforce a moral code...
and if it couldn't legislate it into the real world,
it could at least enforce it into portrayals.....

Kinda like Powell's kid and Congress are seeking to do again.

[Vogon_Glory]

7. More On the Fifties

People forget that the Fifties were a very atypical time in American history. Those World War II and Korean War generation couples who moved to suburbia had lived through at least part of the Great Depression and World War II and were more than willing to buy into the mythos of "normalcy." Mind you, things had never been quite "normal," even in the 1920's when half of the US lived in poverty.

Here in Texas, the Fifties were when social conservatives attempted to put "normalcy" into practice. Prior to about 1950 or so, there was a lot of gambling, prostitution, and strip tease here in Texas before the state and local authorities initiated a crackdown. Galveston, Texas was practically a wide-open port town (And it still hasn't quite recovered from the crackdown), a number of well-known road houses and clubs were shut down, and at least one upper-crust country club I know of had its slot machines carted away. The political and religious moralists decided that the hypocritical illusion should be made real.

When the public morals started "declining" again in the 1960's and 1970's, it was at much because people in general started to go back to doing what people generally do when they decide to behave badly.

[PVnRT]

5. The myth of the 1950's

is what they hold to be ideal. You know, mom, apple pie, crew cuts, "Yes, sir!" and such. This is a ridiculous ideal that has been held up in movies, TV, and so on for years.

Of course, back then, we had "No Niggers Allowed" signs everywhere, women were routinely beaten at home, the tax rate was mujch higher for the wealthy (this is a good thing, actually, but goes against what the social conservatives want us to believe) and a host of other societal problems that go largely unreported. God knows how many teenage girls were date raped during those days and just told to shut up about it to avoid a scandal.

[Mari333]

6. Yep and believe me, the 60s happened

because of the 50s!
what a weird time to grow up..not that all of the 50s were bad, I miss milk in bottles with cream on top, corner grocery stores, small businesses owned by human beings who were not part of a large inhumane corporation, etc
But I remember well the damage done by ridiculous preconcieved stereotypes of what women were supposed to be...and sitting in front of the TV watching movies of women walking around in stilted high heels and torpedo bras and ads in magazines to douche with Lysol...gads!!! I knew, when I was a little kid, there was NO WAY I was going to grow up and be one of those women..not in a million years...
oh and Bob Keeshan was something GOOD from the 50s.
otherwise, it was a suckass time for women and black folks..and gay folks...gads, what a farce as mom and dad swilled martinis and popped valium to get thru it all..