The Tarnished Age

Let's get something out of the way: the past sucked.

As a history major, I see a lot of historical "analysis" that bugs me. It's an occupation hazard. Watching politicians, the media, tourists, or journalists make historical comparisons is cringeworthy in most cases, because it generally totally ignores historical complexity, usually boiling down to ridiculous surface level comparisons. A is like B because both involve C, and let's leave it at that. Never mind that the political and socieoeconomic circumstances were completely different.

One historical fallacy I see a lot is nostalgia. People somehow think that "back then," whether it be the 1940s or 50s or 1800s, was a simpler, more wholesome time. It wasn't.

The problem is that no one in the mainstream wants to envision a past with elements that were just as shitty, or shittier, than today's societal elements. While perusing Facebook, I found this example: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-honig/golden-age-thinking_b_1178176.html.

This is a classic example of older people grumbling about "kids these days." (That happened a lot in the past too.) But the historical bubble this man is living in is one fabricated by the very media that makes up a huge part of his complaint. The reality is that the past featured a lot more death, destruction, hatred, and oppression than we like to acknowledge, and far more than exists today.

Let's examine this author's claim that "life was better" in the past. He is using the 1940s as a reference point, so let's look at what life was like in the 1940s. If you were a woman, you stayed in the house and probably didn't have access to a higher education or a career. You'd get married as a young woman if not as a teenager. You were more or less expected to take care of your husband and kids. Your likelihood of being beaten or raped was far higher than it is today, and you would have less of a chance legal recourse.

Of course, that's only if you were a white woman, because if you were a black woman, you'd have all that and probably a job as a domestic servant for white people.

If you were a black man, you were a second-class citizen, higher only than the black woman.

Those were the good options, of course. If you lived in parts of Europe, you might be either starving or being executed by your national government or the German government. Or both.

Ah the good old days.

What this amateur historian doesn't realize is that the past to which he's referring never existed. The advances in technology he blames for making people "rude" basically help us to do literally everything faster, including cure medical ailments, grow food, transmit information, and travel the globe. But, oh no! Kids are ruder! Ok, I admit, that's bad, but you know what's worse? THE HOLOCAUST.

People like this would be laughed out of a 100-level undergrad history class, and for that reason, maybe they should stop with the nostalgia. They're not really qualified to make these kinds of analyses, and when they do, they usually fuck it up. If you want to try, I encourage you to, but please at least read a book or two, because when you start saying things like the 1940s were better because people wore suits to the movies, and ignore things like one of the biggest genocides of all time, you look like a massive, massive moron. The good old days are now. 100 years from now, they will be then. That's how progress works. If you don't like it, Mr. Honig, then fine. Try living without 21st century amenities for a week.

Actually, that's a great idea. Maybe then people who publish columns like this on the Internet, won't. That's something I, and would think the rest of the professional historical community, could really get behind.