Why were the 70s such a tacky decade?

[LizzieMaine]

I had never really thought about it before, but I'd have to say this is true for me as well...for the most part, anyway. I was born in 1961 and, as such, most of my memories of the 1960s relate specifically to my childhood rather than the era and/or the world at large, so I have a causal interest in that decade. Otherwise, I lived through the 1970s, 1980s, etc., and have no real desire to revisit those times.

I'm two years younger than you, but I was very interested in the outside world even as a kid -- my mother tells me I refused to go to bed as a three-year-old until I had heard "Rockite" (Walter Cronkite) "tell me a story." When I was a little older than that I was furiously interested in the space program, and used to give overhead projector talks to the rest of the class about it. I got in trouble in 1972 for putting a McGovern campaign sticker on my desk, I was an avid viewer of the Watergate hearings, and I remember how we all cheered the night Nixon resigned. So I wasn't exactly disconnected from what was going on in the world. I'm still interested in the history of those times, although I tend to view the postwar era more as a betrayal of the promise of the prewar period than as something I get nostalgic about.

What I was disconnected from was popular culture. I had absolutely zero interest in the music and the fads and the fashions of my childhood era -- I was interested in the thirties as far back as I can remember. The first record I ever bought as a kid was the Benny Goodman Sextet.

 

[Big J]

Precisely. Privilege isn't something that stems from any effort of your own. It's something society gives you because of the way society is structured. There are all kinds of privilege -- racial privilege, gender privilege, class privilege, heterosexual privilege, ability privilege, linguistic privilege, even right-handed privilege -- and none of them proceed from any effort or merit on the part of the person who receives them. They're simply built into the essential structure of the society in question. Here is an excellent article that explains, using the metaphor of right-handed privilege, exactly how privilege works.

I think you're absolutely right. These 'privileges' are taken so much for granted by most of those that have them, that they often don't even understand that they are benefitting from them. I'm a white, able-bodied, straight man. I took it all for granted until I came to live in Japan, where I stick out as a minority. I don't take my privileges for granted anymore, and my wife has realized that she has hers. I wonder how my kids will feel when they grow up?

 

[AmateisGal]

I had never really thought about it before, but I'd have to say this is true for me as well...for the most part, anyway. I was born in 1961 and, as such, most of my memories of the 1960s relate specifically to my childhood rather than the era and/or the world at large, so I have a causal interest in that decade. Otherwise, I lived through the 1970s, 1980s, etc., and have no real desire to revisit those times.

I grew up in the late '70s (I was born in '75), 80s, and 90s. I never had much interest for my current "present." I was really big into studying the American Civil War, loved Regency England, and Revolutionary France. I have -zero- desire to study much of anything in the 20th century after about 1946.

 

[Fading Fast]

Ability vs. disability. The privilege those of us who are able-bodied enjoy over those who have disabilities.

Understood - thank you.

 

[Edward]

Conversations take different paths all the time. I don't see a problem with it.

Frankly, speaking as one of those non-Americans in these parts, this turn in the discussion (which does indeed follow on directly, as Lizzie pointed out), is an awful lot more interesting than the tedious "waa waa waa, I hate the Seventies" stuff with which it started.

On the other hand, if all people want to do is point and jeer at people who dress differently than they do, the folks at Film Noir Buff have just what you're looking for.

Ha! Them and every other silly little forum started by people who didn't like it here / got shown the door and think they're so much cooler than fuddy duddies like us. :lol:

 

[Fading Fast]

...Ha! Them and every other silly little forum started by people who didn't like it here / got shown the door and think they're so much cooler than fuddy duddies like us. :lol:

What's funny is my girlfriend pointed this forum out to me several years back and said that she thought I'd enjoy it. I've never seen another vintage / Golden Era forum because I've never looked, but apparently they are out there and with a chip on their shoulder, I guess. Was this an early / the early one on the topic?

 

[LizzieMaine]

The Lounge has been rather like an old established religion -- there have been various schisms and setting up of rival sects, most of which have either fizzled out or mutated into something else when the proprietors got bored. Most of them have tended to revolve around prominent former posters who've either left in a huff or been given the bum's rush, and few have lasted for very long. We had a very big schism here in the summer of 2008, but the forum established in the wake of that has long since died off. When the only thing holding you together is your dislike for somebody else, it doesn't make for a very permanent community.

Most of the anti-Lounge snarking nowadays is found on what their habitues tend to refer to as "the fora," a small clutch of men's-fashion forums occupied by Internet Gentlemen who call us "the Capone Kiddies" and like names, and think it's the pinnacle of wit to hot-link a picture of some random Lounger from the What Are You Wearing Today thread and make ripe fun of his suit, hat, tie, shoes, height, weight, or haircut. Fifth graders will have their fun.

I can remember running across an Era-oriented forum called "Atomic Cafe" or some such several years before I found the Lounge, but I never got involved with it -- it seemed more dancing-rockabilly oriented than anything else, and that's not really in my area of interest.

 

[Benzadmiral]

I grew up in the late '70s (I was born in '75), 80s, and 90s. I never had much interest for my current "present." I was really big into studying the American Civil War, loved Regency England, and Revolutionary France. I have -zero- desire to study much of anything in the 20th century after about 1946.

Oh, I study the various trends and things since the late Sixties, but I'm more interested in 1962 and earlier -- and ancient Rome.

(Imagine a "Fedora Lounge"-style forum in Vespasian's time. "Which public baths are the best?" "Which is your favorite legion?" Outerwear: "Best material for a new toga?" Observation Bar: "Empire or Republic? Compare and contrast." Though that last one might have gotten you ostracized, exiled, or tossed into a dungeon, depending on the emperor's mood at the time.)

 

[jamespowers]

Oh, that wouldn't be so bad! I'd love the cheap cheese, bacon, and steak!
Or maybe I should apply for citizenship? Then they'd be stuck with me!

:rofl: You're killing me.

 

[AmateisGal]

Oh, I study the various trends and things since the late Sixties, but I'm more interested in 1962 and earlier -- and ancient Rome.

(Imagine a "Fedora Lounge"-style forum in Vespasian's time. "Which public baths are the best?" "Which is your favorite legion?" Outerwear: "Best material for a new toga?" Observation Bar: "Empire or Republic? Compare and contrast." Though that last one might have gotten you ostracized, exiled, or tossed into a dungeon, depending on the emperor's mood at the time.)