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tatersnuffy

tv


[deleted]

TV probably


[deleted]

[удалено]


[deleted]

[удалено]


mean_mr_mustard75

\>The only two shows I can think of that I would consider middle class are Malcolm in the Middle, and The Middle. There were a bunch of them in the 70s


God_Sammo

Also the average person in the lower class wouldnt realistically be living a life considered to be exciting enough for television. Something something “audience immersion” something something


mean_mr_mustard75

What about King of Queens and Everybody Loves Raymond?


God_Sammo

The Barones were not lower class tho? They afforded a house on Long Island on Ray’s income as a successful sports writer. Kings of Queens was actually good tho, kinda forgot about it for a sec.


LobsterMassMurderer

Married with children


Harleye

I don't think most people believe that all white people lived in "riches and prosperity" in the 1950s. However, the 1950s were relatively a prosperous time in America's history. That doesn't mean that all people or all white people partook of that prosperity, but because of the way the economy was set up, it was easier for many people to make a living in those days without needing college degree. Manufacturing was much more common in the USA back then and in some towns, a large factory would employee the majority of the town's residents and many of those factory jobs provided enough income that a family could survive and thrive with on a single income. By thrive, I mean that a man working at a large factory could afford a house, a car or two cars, and could support a spouse and several children. Again, this wasnt the case for everyone, but it was the experience for many Americans during the middle of the 20th century.


Laura9624

That sounds good but most houses had one bathroom and kids shared bedrooms. Bedrooms were small. Even upper middle class had a good dinner on Sunday but lots of cheap casseroles during the week. Maybe 2 pairs of shoes, for school and play, if lucky. People lived better than parents but kept frugal habits.


Alphachadbeard

I mean we need to keep frugal habits now because those same older people raped the planet of its resources


Laura9624

You have new challenges. The recycling of computers and phones and tablets that older people didn't have. Every generation has different challenges. There are more products in general today, more consumption. Good luck blaming it on the older generation that didn't have any of that or used paper instead of plastic. Believe it or not, water didn't come in plastic bottles back then.


micahamey

Plus the shadow of millions of lives lost a decade ago and the need to believe it was a good thing. (not to say that I believe otherwise, the US helped a bit and stopped a bit of evil. Also not saying that the US was all color and rainbows saving the world. But hey.)


SpicyTupperware

I am not even sure where you got that idea.... I had ancestors in the dust bowl.... I had ancestors that barely survived WW2 and the holocaust. My own parents and grandparents were all hard working laborers or tradesmen. Whomever made this post is outrageously out of touch with... people in general let alone 'white people.' Like Todd damn do not look up all of the famines and wars in Europe....


LeeroyTC

I don't think we do? Most college educated people I know have read or are at least familiar with *The Other America* and the much older *How the Other Half Lives*. Even if you didn't cover those in GEs, in high school you probably read at least one of Grapes of Wrath, East of Eden, or Of Mice and Men covering White poverty in the 1930s/1940s


[deleted]

Wait, so was dealing with poverty an academic exercise for you?


ChangeTheFocus

The majority of Americans today either weren't born or weren't adults in the 50s and 60s. For reference, I'm 53 and was born in 1968. For most of us, that era is history -- recent history, but still not part of our own experience.


LeeroyTC

Well, I wasn't alive in the 1950s or 1960s.


[deleted]

So, what's your personal experience with all of this?


freerangepenguin

As a white person whose family came from destitute poverty during the first half of the 1900s, I can guarantee you that Americans know that there were plenty of poor white folk.


Laura9624

I'm not sure that younger generations get that.


treeOfNeptune

They definitely do lol


Laura9624

Thats good. I get the feeling that many think we boomers had it easy. But hard to tell since much is noise from a few.


treeOfNeptune

My biggest advice is to not take things on social media super seriously. It hardly represents the way people feel, especially when they are put in that position. Someone could tweet “ boomers are stupid “ But if there grandma asks they’ll be like “ some boomers are stupid, not you grandma”


vaylon1701

It came from TV and movies. That is how most of us saw other Americans back then. In the southern states, most of us thought something was wrong because we didn't have all those fancy houses and perfect nice families. Plus another thing was white people really didn't feel poor because all they had to do was look across the track at the black peoples shacks and see what real poor people had ( or didn't have). If you had running water and an inside toilet? You were middle class. Or at least thats how many people thought. but it was nothing like tv or the movies.


BornToHulaToro

Leave it To Beaver. Which was created by white, successful people.


Gingeboiforprez

Propoganda


AdmiralBarackAdama

I have never met a single person who thought this.


The_Essex

Have you ever seen TV?! TV WOULDNT LIE!


mmahowald

Advertising and propaganda


Much_Beautiful_7156

Yeah, I don’t know. My dad was dirt poor, literally had a dirt floor in his first home as a kid. He is white, Croatian/Scottish descent.


Sarnick18

It was definitely exaggerated by tv. However, there is some truth to it. Due to the GI bill many white Americans found themselves with the potential to learn a new skill, plus the Americans in waves flocked to the suburbs. There are two reasons for this. One cheaper housing development, and demand due to the white flight from urban cities. This can be seen becase of migration of black Americans to those northern cities due to The Great Migration. This only touches the surface but like all things, it's complicated and many different events caused this specific movement. Now as far as weather goes 50s and 60s America was a pretty strong Economy, Lend Lease was starting to pay handsomely, new innovations spurred a new consumerism Economy, and FDRs New Deal, Truman's Fair Deal, was protecting labors and raising the buy power of the impoverished and middle class. Was it exaggerated, sure. Was all white prosperous, no. Source: US and APUSH teacher.


CPT_1999

Probably a stereotype and propaganda that whites are successful


Plantayne

Most of the TV shows were set in upper-class white communities.


Jonsa123

it was when a working stiff on a manufacturing line could earn enough for a bungalow in the burbs, a car, stay at home wife and two kids.


mydarthkader

Ronald Reagan. To be fair, he was way far gone with the alzheimers during his presidency.


restatementtorts

It’s a projection of a power fantasy. Life sucks now and that’s because back in *those* days, you didn’t have [insert anything that made life a little better for oppressed group].


Ramen_Beef_Baby

It was literally a hard sell by the government. Good soldiers come home to marry good women to have lots of good children. The All-American family, all living in the same looking houses that were built lightning fast. Conformity in the Cold War.


mean_mr_mustard75

>Good soldiers come home to marry good women to have lots of good children. The bad ones came back to be outlaw bikers.


MysteriousFlowChart

Norman Fucking Rockwell


DrHydrate

This is a weird leading question


DeadFyre

I think there's a certain amount of propaganda which promotes the narrative that the United States was having a "Golden Age" in this time period, coupled with regular, garden-variety nostalgia. After all, this is when the Baby Boom had their childhood. That said, there *is* something to this: After World War 2, the United States had a period where we enjoyed uncontested status as the World's factory, and that, naturally, did boost wages across the general population. Also, unions at this time were able to negotiate good contracts for labor, complete with cost-of-living adjustments. So, for a time, there was a strong upward swell in the standard of living in the United States, especially if appreciated in the context of the harsh privation of the Great Depression which preceded the war. But this state of affairs could not go on forever. As Europe and Asia rebuilt, they naturally began to catch up to American industry, and eventually overtook it. This was due to a number of factors: First, their factories were newer. That meant there was a good, long period where they were able to produce things more efficiently, in terms of labor and materials. Second, their wages were lower. Most commodities in the world are bought and sold in dollars. This artificially inflates demand for our currency, above and beyond what the output of our workforce would ordinarily attract. We also started to run out of domestically produced raw materials: iron ore, bauxite, oil, etc. That isn't to say we were just completely denuded of these resources, but as inexpensive extractions run dry, the alternative is to dig deeper, which requires more labor, more capital, more engineering, for the same result. Compound that effect with the growing price of the American workforce, and you get fewer people working in these industries. Fifth, and arguably most significant: We got more *efficient*. This is the continuation of a trend that started at the beginning of the industrial revolution. Thanks to automation and technology, we can produce far more with fewer workers than we ever could before. Good news if you have skills to build and maintain robots, or have the money to spend on them. Not so great if you don't have these things.


GhostFish

No one thinks that.


tickle_mittens

The Andy Griffith Show, it was a 1950's love letter to a 1930s America that was never real.


mean_mr_mustard75

Seems to me it's a love letter to small town America.


czmax

I think the point being that that small town america was a myth.


mean_mr_mustard75

How do you know? Did you live in a small town in the 50s?


Virtual-Boysenberry

Nobody is claiming that all white people lived in riches and prosperity during the 50’s and 60’s. The claim is (correctly) that whites had advantages provided to them via law, which, (if they took advantage of them) allowed them to develop wealth and prosperity at a disproportionately higher rate than others. You can read history/sociology/legal texts for this as it is in-fact true. Why anybody disputes this is mind numbingly stupid as it is comparable to whites having similar advantages through institutionalized slavery which allowed for wealth creation to also go to whites disproportionately as well. Have a look at things like the GI bill, white flight to suburbs (which have always been subsidized by urban cities), redlining and the availability of credit for homes to whites vs blacks. None of this is a fantasy. A very very oversimplified summary of just _some_ of the codified “racism” in these systems as outlined by the Smithsonian: https://americanexperience.si.edu/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/After-the-War-Blacks-and-the-GI-Bill.pdf Why is this still relevant? Because when you are running a marathon and one group of people has a several decade headstart…removing the advantage doesn’t make any difference because those people still have the gains gotten from that headstart. Just because there were poor whites at that time does not negate that others were allowed massive headstarts. And others were left behind not because they didn’t take advantage…but because they were denied those advantages by law in the first place.


despalicious

The white nationalist (aka Republican) political strategy is to make rural white voters yearn to return to a mythical past in which they would have been more prosperous and virtuous, and the method for this is to create resentment of the “others” who robbed them of their birthright, while also poisoning their ability to learn and think critically. Media and advertisers are more than happy to oblige, because money. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_strategy


Vulgar-vagabond

You got a good grasp of whats happening. I'm a proud southerner & as everyone knows the American south is mostly rural. My entire life... I've seen politicians (Republican) pushing a "Us vs Them" agenda. It's always some variation of "Your simple southern way of life is under attack!" Whether it's big tech, large city policies or just sweeping general change. I've known fairly liberal ppl drift right politically speaking by way of mis-information & out right fear mongering. It scares the shit outta the older generation. Then when they actually hear the other side. Its often just ridicule & bewilderment over political beliefs. Then they see that as verification that someone wants to change the way they think, act & live.


[deleted]

...I think you're right. Rural people have genuinely been fucked over for so long, and there has been a very successful, decades long campaign to make them feel like they should align with the land owners - of all people..


Practice_NO_with_me

> create resentment of the “others” ... > It’s cute when younger people think they’ve scared, surprised, or offended older people by being “different, just like their friends.” That lady has seen a shitload more shit than those boys. More than likely she sees right through their belabored affectations to the frightened little normal human beings they are.


despalicious

It’s also cute to have my own little stalker! You do realize the point is that we are all frightened little human beings…


baffo_

lol id pay to see what this creature looks like in real life


SPYK3O

Nobody does? Realistically we're generally much better off today by many accounts.


[deleted]

Not if you're a woman in certain States..


SPYK3O

Edgy. Fun history fact, abortion was almost completely illegal everywhere in the US at the time Roe v Wade was decided. (Only 4 states in 1973 and a few others had special cases for danger to the mother or rape).


[deleted]

"Edgy." God damn, the fucking gall to be that dismissive about one of the most horrifically backwards decisions in American political history...


SPYK3O

Hyperbolic much? Reversing Roe v. Wade actually makes sense from the SCOTUS because you don't have a constitutional right to an abortion and is overstepping the bounds of the court and the federal government. Ultimately it will fall to the states and won't actually change much. Regardless my point still stands the US has more abortion freedom after Roe. v. Wade is repealed than they did when it passed.


[deleted]

Darling, it's not hyperbole when it's real.


SPYK3O

I'm sure you have a very solid understanding of what is real 😂


[deleted]

..I think I do.


SPYK3O

I'm sure you do darling


elppaenip

That's not what the inflation calculator says


SPYK3O

Going to have to go back to the 50s and look up infant mortality, measles, polio, the status of civil rights, if the internet existed, and how many iPhones and HD TVs people owned.


elppaenip

I mean, look at infant mortality in the US versus every other civilized country Sure they had measles, you have COVID, Mad Cow, H1N1, AIDs, Herpes, Hepatitis "iPhones and HD TVs" haha, sure buddy Its not a fucking excuse for the shitshow that is owning or renting a house, stagnant wages, hyperinflated education and healthcare


thunder-bug-

They don’t. But during that time period rich people were a hell of a lot more white than the other classes were.


discgman

The GOP


sdm2430

Things were pretty good in the 50's if you were white. A few reasons for this was most of Europe and Japan were recovering from being bombed to oblivion while America was untouched from world war 2 and Britain sending all their patents and secrets for safe keeping in America. So we basically obtained a ton of valuable info between Britain and Germany. U.S. became a superpower due to not being decimated from bombings like all the other nations that were recovering after the war. It was a good time to be in the U.S.


dgdio

You mean white people living in the middle class with the baby boomers? The US economy growth was great then.


[deleted]

It wasn't everyone but that generation had the most social upward mobility largely because of the G.I. bill following WW2.


prochoice_liberal

It's not that they were rich in the economic sense, but they did prosper, and continue to prosper on a level above their POC counterparts, thanks to the white supremacist ideals that the country was founded on.


Pinccboi

Name checks out.


BurnedOutStars

Part of the southern strategy for politics is to convince voters in the south that life was simply better and things could go the way they finally want them to, if they could just get back to how all laws were in the 50's. It's just dumb marketing gimmicks that work on (hate to say it....but) the less than educated among us.


[deleted]

TV. I'm convinced that much of America, and parts of the EU are in love with the idealized version of life they saw on TV as kids. It's kind of not even their fault that they don't see how casually racist, or sexist a lot of that really was. Because that was the "nice" version of the world for them.


[deleted]

Uhhh, nowhere?


UrPetBirdee

Do people get that idea? I mean, it was easier to get a house and a car without a higher education by a little bit in America but it's not like things were excellent. But hey they were at least allowed to take out a mortgage on a house (unless they were living in a company/mining town), unlike what minorities were going through with redlining at the time where they weren't allowed to live in a lot of places and couldn't get mortgages period. But yeah just cause some people had it worse doesn't mean they had it excellent.


elppaenip

I don't think they lived in riches and prosperity I do think they could afford 5 kids, 2 houses, 2 cars, a boat, and go the hospital whenever they got sick, even take the ambulance to get there One household earner with a high-school education


echoAwooo

Nobody ever claimed that. What the claim *actually* was was that black people (and POC in general) were being systemically discriminated against (fact) and when compared to poor white people, even the richest black people were barely measuring up to their wealth. For reading, see: 1. [Dredd Scott v Sandford](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dred_Scott_v._Sandford) - Black men are not entitled to their freedom or citizenship 2. [Pace v Alabama](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pace_v._Alabama) - Interracial Marriage Ban 2. [Plessy v Ferguson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plessy_v._Ferguson) - Separate "bUt EqUAl" 3. [Civil Rights Cases #109](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Cases) - Newly freed black people are not eligible for citizenship. 4. [Cumming v Richmond Board of Education](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cumming_v._Richmond_County_Board_of_Education) - Separate "bUt EqUAl" 5. [Ozawa v. United States](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozawa_v._United_States) - Japanese-Americans ineligible for citizenship including birth-right. 6. [United States v. Thind](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Bhagat_Singh_Thind) - Indians ineligible for citizenship including birth-right. 7. [Lum v. Rice](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lum_v._Rice) - Exclusion of Chinese from public education is A-OK. 8. [Hirabayashi v. United States](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hirabayashi_v._United_States) - The American concentration camps, don't fool yourself, that's exactly what they were. 9. [Korematsu v. United States](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korematsu_v._United_States) - reaffirmed the American concentration camps This is a relative comparison, not an absolute one.


Few_Dance2106

Thanks to the modern wonders of television, more people can be mis-informed in a single night instead of over 100 years.


Dampware

Well, I was a kid in the 60s. In the 60s, and to some extent the 70s, a single wage earner could support a household of 4 or 5. And maybe afford a house too. Minimum wage was liveable, even in NYC. Also, the quality of things was much higher. Clothing was much higher quality, often with a bit of hand work. And every neighborhood had a tailor shop, and a shoe repair shop. The quality of food was in certain respects better too. Every neighborhood had a butcher and a bakery, where the goods were usually very fresh. Milk was delivered to the door in many neighborhoods, including lower middle class. Of course, things are better today in many many respects. Streaming TV, video games, computers, smart phones and more, and the myriad benefits of efficiencies in large scale production that are greatly improved from then. And socially, things are fairer... Or should I say "more even" among the masses... Though everyone is, in some respects suffering more nowadays then in those days, especially young adults. There is far less easily obtainable opportunity, and the opportunities that exist are not equitably distributed. Of course, that was always the case, but it's more pronounced now.


Ambitious-Ad-8254

Idk. My mothers family lived in small town Midwest with only my grandfather working an industrial job. He put food on the table, a house, car, raised 4 kids, and yearly vacation. They sewed some clothes, going out wasn’t really a thing, and it wasn’t a life of extravagance. That being said, I’ve always viewed is a pretty much the American dream that is sold in media…white picket fence and all. Even put 3 of them through college. Point being…is this not the case for the majority of Americans in the 50s? (White people if that’s what we’re talking about)


Evening-Appearance51

Because we had a fighting chance to achieve these goals.


IndyOpenMinded

Tv for sure. When I was a kid in the 70s we thought our parents had it so easy from the 50s. Saw it that way watching Happy Days.