Why do I hate the 1970s so much?

[HadleyH]

Dynasty? You should love that. It was the best dressed show on TV and still is compared to what is on now. Aaron Spelling used to complain about the clothing budget and in particular about Amanda's wedding episode---"It costs more to film and clothe than if I were to pay for my own daughter's wedding."

Regards,

J

I know jamespowers, but if only it 'd been set in the 20s or 30s, (sigh...)

 

[Diamondback]

Oh no!!! but it is not the politics that I dislike from the 80s
It's the fashion and music and things like that...you know, all those TV soap operas like "Dynasty",the punk musical groups like the "Sex Pistols" and "Kiss" etc... It's not the people that were born during that decade. [huh]

I hear that, "modern culture" was something the '80s needed very badly and never got. The only reasons I'm ever nostalgic for any of it myself other than childhood favorites on TV are that none of us had any idea how bad things would really get!

 

[jamespowers]

I know jamespowers, but if only it 'd been set in the 20s or 30s, (sigh...)

all I can say is:

If I wanted to see poor people, I could stay home.

 

[Senator Jack]

God Save The Sex Pistols​

Punk saved me from becoming the bourgeois. How boeing would that life have been?

 

[jamespowers]

God Save The Sex Pistols​

Punk saved me from becoming the bourgeois. How boeing would that life have been?

Rivals GQ. Very inspirational dress.

 

[Senator Jack]

 

[jamespowers]

How did politics get into this?! :eusa_doh:
Funny thing is if they eat the rich or take everything from them they won't have a job to buy those signs---wait, I forgot---they don't work. :eusa_doh:

 

[HadleyH]

God Save The Sex Pistols​

Punk saved me from becoming the bourgeois. How boeing would that life have been?

WAY to go Senator!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! way to go!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(shall I cry? shall i laugh? Let's do both lol lol )

 

[Lincsong]

Elton John

 

[Sefton]

God Save The Sex Pistols​

Punk saved me from becoming the bourgeois. How boeing would that life have been?

That's funny...being bourgeois saved me from becoming a punk.

Which one is Elton?

 

[Parallel Guy]

Ok, here's one from the 70's that if you don't like I see no hope: Carol Burnett and Tim Conway. Oh, what the heck, Bob Newhart, too.

 

[Dr Doran]

That's funny...being bourgeois saved me from becoming a punk.

Heh heh. Nice.

In Jack's defense, though, I absolutely loved punk and the sex pistols. I can sing any song they sang, word for word, note for note. Ditto for the Germs and many, many other punk bands.

What some of y'all don't understand is that punk rebelled against the hippy thing just as we, who wear suits and fedoras, are in many or all respects also essentially rebelling against the hippy thing. Yes, the rebellions are different, but there is that one thing in common. Probably a few more commonalities I can't think of at the moment as well. Plus, Sid Vicious covered Frank Sinatra's "My Way." And my presently estranged brother Charles, who had been a DJ at Cal State Chico, mixed Frank's and Sid's versions in a recording that wended its way all over Hollywood in the late 80s and early 90s.

 

[Senator Jack]

Thanks, Doran. Funny, when The Pistols came around, they were diagnosed as having an unhealthy hatred of everything. I should wonder what could be said about The Loungers.

Regards,
Senator Jack

 

[Salv]

Thanks, Doran. Funny, when The Pistols came around, they were diagnosed as having an unhealthy hatred of everything. I should wonder what could be said about The Loungers.

Regards,
Senator Jack

Some Loungers are just like members of any sub-culture, anywhere, anytime, hating that which is not like them.

What some of y'all don't understand is that punk rebelled against the hippy thing...

Punks, as I said before, were just another youth sub-culture, trying to annoy their predecessors and their parents, and they managed it perfectly. They were no different to Teds, mods, greasers, skinheads or hippies in that sense. Yes, they could be seen as anti-hippy, but they were just as much anti- any previous generations of rock fans and musicians. Remember, there should be "No Elvis, Beatles or The Rolling Stones ... in 1977" - words which certainly struck a chord with me.

 

[RedPop4]

Lots of truth in that post, Salv.

 

[Dr Doran]

Some Loungers are just like members of any sub-culture, anywhere, anytime, hating that which is not like them.

Hate? or a little distaste? I suppose I have used the word "hate" but what I meant was "intense distaste."
I have already apologized if I stepped on anyone's good memories of the 70s, and specifically to you, Salv, in a previous post, so I hope that apology is taken seriously. I did not really mean to repel people who had good times in the chronological period from 1970-80, only to express distaste for certain styles prevalent from about 1968 until the 1979.

I think your statement is basically accurate except I would modify it slightly: technically speaking, in sociological terms, it is countercultures who hate or at least consciously oppose the mainstream culture. Subcultures are simply undercultures, existing below the main stream but not necessarily consciously opposed to it or dedicated to subverting it -- examples would be British immigrants in San Francisco who hold on to their ethnic identity, or aficionadoes of rare books. I think that you are right that some Loungers (and I am not always innocent of this, alas) verge into a countercultural stance rather than a more positive subcultural stance. I suppose the ideal is to be neither subcultural or countercultural but to be an upholder of Culture with the capital C. However, ever since the popularization of anthropological "cultural relativism," which may have been valuable in the 1930s but has somewhat outlived its usefulness for serious philosophical and historical discussion, it has been considered forbidden to talk in terms of High Culture vs. low (popular) culture. I do not think this forbidding is entirely a good idea. I think more got lost than got gained. And the moment in which popular culture began to massively replace high culture in the hearts of the people and in the academic curricula in the universities was -- the 1970s. A miracle of transsubstantiation: in America, no one -- I mean no one reads Aeschylus anymore, even in translation, because he is not taught anymore; and there are classes offered in most universities, including the top ones, in Madonna and hip-hop.

Punks, as I said before, were just another youth sub-culture, trying to annoy their predecessors and their parents, and they managed it perfectly. They were no different to Teds, mods, greasers, skinheads or hippies in that sense. Yes, they could be seen as anti-hippy, but they were just as much anti- any previous generations of rock fans and musicians. Remember, there should be "No Elvis, Beatles or The Rolling Stones ... in 1977" - words which certainly struck a chord with me.

True as well, except the precise modes of rebellion peculiar to each subculture were pretty different. And therein lies the point of interest.

 

[Salv]

Hate? or a little distaste? I suppose I have used the word "hate" but what I meant was "intense distaste."
I have already apologized if I stepped on anyone's good memories of the 70s, and specifically to you, Salv, in a previous post, so I hope that apology is taken seriously. I did not really mean to repel people who had good times in the chronological period from 1970-80, only to express distaste for certain styles prevalent from about 1968 until the 1979.

Your posts have been well thought out and well argued, and I certainly wasn't offended by anything you've written, but there is an extraordinary amount of bile directed specifically at hippies on this thread, and to a lesser degree at disco music, which seems to go well beyond "intense distaste".

I think your statement is basically accurate except I would modify it slightly: technically speaking, in sociological terms, it is countercultures who hate or at least consciously oppose the mainstream culture. Subcultures are simply undercultures, existing below the main stream but not necessarily consciously opposed to it or dedicated to subverting it

I don't think it's quite that simple with youth cults though. Of the youth cultures that I mentioned it's only the hippies who were ever concerned with being a counterculture. The well established and recognizable British youth cults - Teds, Mods, rockers, skinheads, soulboys, punks, casuals, New Romantics - were not strictly opposed to mainstream culture, but were instead simply not interested in the mainstream - it seems to me they truly are/were subcultures rather than countercultures. Any hatred felt by those youth cults comes from the tribal mentality that goes hand in hand with youth cults, and that dictates that hatred for rival cults is expected. There is disdain and contempt for the mainstream, but youth cults tend to only hate members of other youth cults. I don't think this hatred is necessarily part of being a counterculture - it's just kids being tribal...

All the Brit youth cults wanted something that was uniquely theirs, that was different from what had come before - they didn't want to overturn the establishment, because it was usually the establishment that employed them and gave them the funds to create and enjoy their unique culture. Mods especially made use of the mainstream while staying apart from it: working in offices, visiting their tailor to be measured up for a bespoke suit, becoming "consumers"; and at the same time ingesting copious amounts of illegal stimulants, dancing to music made by ... shock, horror! in a Britain recently scarred by race riots ... black people, getting into fights with rival youth cults, and generally annoying the crap out of their parents and elders.

 

[Lincsong]

and they were singing;
bye bye Miss American Pie,
drove my Chevy to the levy
and the Chevy died
those good old boys just shook their head and sighed
boy you bought into a lie
boy you bought into a lie

 

[sarah smith]

has anyone made what I love about the 70's thread?

 

[Diamondback]

Not yet, but I did have an "is there anything you liked about the 70s" angle in here trying to tone down the negativity a little. (Not that I really liked much myself, just trying to cut down on the bile a little.)