The Way We Were Not.....

The author of this BLOG will never suppose that America has ever enjoyed a sinless Golden Age of saintly virtue. To varying degrees, crime, sin, vice and immoral depravity have always been with us since the fall of man in the Garden of Eden. Still, those old enough to remember the decade of the 1950s--as this blogger does--are compelled by the facts to admit that 21st century America has witnessed a dramatic downward morality shift by comparison to where it was sixty years ago, to wit:

1)In the 1950s, children obeyed immediately the commands of their parents without question or debate. THOU SHALT HONOR THY FATHER AND THY MOTHER was still a command, not a mere suggestion.

2)Divorce and extramarital sex were comparatively rare in the 1950s by today's standards, albeit that it certainly existed then as well. Still, divorce and extramarital sex were shameful sixty years ago, while today, they are brazenly shameless and mainstream: what is the big deal here?

3)Pornography and other overt reference to sex was almost non-existent sixty years ago as relatively taboo topics of conversation. Today, those topics are shamelessly mainstream. Yesterday's "hard core" pornography is today's "soft core" pornography, if indeed considered pornographic at all.

4)Sixty years ago, parents did not fear to spank their unruly and rebellious children. But today, thanks to Dr. Benjamin Spock, parents can go to prison for doing the same, on charge of assault and battery, and of child abuse.

5)Sixty years ago, the notion of "political correctness" was unheard-of, and unlike today, people did not fear to speak their honest minds. Today, "political correctness" has trumped our supposed First Amendment right of free speech.

6)Homosexuality was virtually unheard-of sixty years ago, and to date, a "gay gene" has yet to be discovered. Anyone suggesting sixty years ago that two persons of the same sex should be permitted to marry would have been laughed out of town!

7)Traditional male chivalry towards women, unquestioned sixty years ago, is now subject to controversy and debate. "Liberated" women now say women need men like fish need bicycles.

8)Senior citizens. once unquestionably respected sixty and more years ago, are now contemptuously viewed by younger generations as being half-dead old fogies who do not know which end is up. They should all just die quickly, and get out of the way, to give more living space to the young. Age is no longer respected: youth call their elders by first name with no accompanying title of respect.

9)In the 1950s, Christian churches were full on Sundays. Today, in churches not requiring attendance by their members, pews are half-empty, while shopping malls do a brisk business on Sundays.

10)American patriotism and belief in American exceptionalism, once strong in America sixty and more years ago, is today sneered at in contempt by most Americans(especially the foreign-born). John Wayne is dead, and globalist multiculturalism tells us America is "just another country among many", nothing special.

11)Between 1950 and 1980, America bravely fought wars against Communism in Korea and Viet Nam, only now to have Communism advocated by pointy-headed pseudo-intellectual college "professors" on university campuses. In education, Communist indoctrination has replaced honest education.

12)In the 1950s, the man was the unquestioned ruler and master of his own house, and all who were in it with him. Since then, extremist radical feminists have unequivocally declared to American maledom, "We have taken over your office, and here's a list of our demands!" Men are slowly but surely being deprived of their manhood because of this sexual revolution. On the TV show JAG, was Admiral Chegwidden wrong, to tell Colonel Sarah McKenzie that there will never be any female Navy SEALS? This blogger wonders when the U.S. Navy will sing, "Anchors aweigh, my girls, anchors aweigh...."

13)Repair shops were plentiful in the 1950s. One could take broken TVs, radios, watches, shoes and bicycles to them to be repaired. But today, we have become such a throw-away society that such repairs are no longer done. The afore-mentioned commodities, when broken, now must be discarded and new replacements for them bought. Repair shops of yester-year are now gone, and things are no longer valued and conserved as they were by our parents and grandparents who grew up in the disastrous 1930s Great Depression years. It might be well to remember that the earthly profession of Jesus Christ was that of carpenter: where would He be today, in this throw-away society of ours? This blogger believes that His ministry of restoration and redemption of human souls was at least in part inspired by the physical example of his carpentry, i.e. repair of broken pieces of furniture.

14)In the 1950s, the worst things kids did in school was run down the halls, shoot paper-wads with rubber bands in class, and maybe put a live hop-toad in the teacher's lunch box. Today, police are required to be on school property, with cameras and metal detectors installed, out of fear of students committing violent crimes against other students, teachers and school administrators.

15)The tradition of marriage of the 1950s is not quite yet completely gone, but the number of young couples "shacking up" together without formal marriage is now on the increase. Shamefully, governments extend to them all the same benefits they give to validly-married couples.

In conclusion, America is morally going to hell in a hand-basket with younger Americans totally impervious to that danger, i.e. they have no living memory of earlier decades, nor have any sense of historic obligation to the past socio-political and moral values of their once-great country.

-LKM