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Would you be unerved if you were taken to a 1950s Style Town where everybody is happy and everything is perfect?

Would you be suspicious of a 1950s style Town where everything is perfect?

  • Yes - something has to be going on here.

    Votes: 232 79.5%

  • No - doesn't seem suspicious

    Votes: 14 4.8%

  • Maybe - might be something going on here but might just be a freindly town

    Votes: 46 15.8%
  • Total voters
    292
TheGamingNewsGuy

TheGamingNewsGuy

One Winged Slayer
Member
Nov 5, 2017
31,617
So recently i was reading a fanfiction of charcters going to a 1950s style town where everything is bright and happy and it got to me thinking - if i was put in the same suitation where i knew all my history before hand and then i went to this 1950s down where everything is perfect and everyone is consantly happy all the time. Would i accept it or would i be extremely unerved - thinking to myself "there has to be some sort of catch behind it on why everything is perfect 100% of the time". I would probalby lean to the second option but i would curious to know what other pepole think.

1950s-main-street-of-small-town-america-vintage-images.jpg
 
Qikz

Qikz

Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,563
I'd definitely worry something was wrong, but then I'd think probably everyone is just friendly. Places like that even exist now it's just they're very rare.
 

Norwegian Rudo

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
1,078
Do people actually believe the 50's were like that? I've always just considered it nostalgia and people willfully forgetting all the bad parts.
 
Z-Beat

Z-Beat

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
31,920
Either someone made a faustian bargain for some Hot Fuzz shit or they're all ghosts who died in a fire when the town's coal mine exploded
 
OP
OP
TheGamingNewsGuy

TheGamingNewsGuy

One Winged Slayer
Member
Nov 5, 2017
31,617
Norwegian Rudo said:
Do people actually believe the 50's were like that? I've always just considered it nostalgia and people willfully forgetting all the bad parts.
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A little bit of both. Not sure this is a bad thing to say but i feel like a lot of the stereotyped views of the respective decades comes mostly from an Amercian perspective of how it was like in that decade/probably nostalgia of that decade. For example if you lived in the 80s in the UK alot of it doesn't fit the perceived stereotypes of the 80s.
 
Messofanego

Messofanego

Member
Oct 25, 2017
26,379
UK
I'd probably be murdered the second I stepped in there.

Also movies and TV shows satirise that now because that sort of vision was advertising propaganda for american exceptionalism and capitalism at the time rather than the reality in 1950s America. The only happiness was the fact that after World War 2, white Americans got lots of support to move into suburbs and get homes, get jobs, good wages, and social welfare. It's telling when American conservatives think it's the "good old days" when it was racist (sundown towns), ableist (disabled kids were put into institutions and sterilised or lobotomised), and misogynist (and divorces were hard to do, hence low divorce rates rather than people were happier in marriages) but that support they got was thanks to government assistance rather than any "bootstraps" mentality. Pensions were actual pensions, there was job security, and everyone consumed the same media (hence why watercooler conversations became a thing). It is interesting to read/watch about the reality back then.

www.nytimes.com

Opinion | The Not-So-Good Old Days (Published 2013)

The idyllic 1950s and ’60s? Wages went further, but rights and opportunities for many were severely limited.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
 
Dyno

Dyno

AVALANCHE
The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
13,432
I find it hard to imagine the 1950s were anywhere near perfectly happy. Maybe white guys bit it was a ahit time to be anyone else I'd bet.
 
bionic77

bionic77

Member
Oct 25, 2017
30,900
Dyno said:
I find it hard to imagine the 1950s were anywhere near perfectly happy. Maybe white guys bit it was a ahit time to be anyone else I'd bet.
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For unskilled white men and their families that was a good time. You were pretty much guaranteed to get a good paying job out of high school that would pay you enough to own a house in the suburbs and get a new cars every 5-7 years. For the American empire that was the peak for a specific subset of people.
 
MickeyKnox

MickeyKnox

Member
Oct 28, 2017
589
Echoing what has already been brought up here but any representation of an American town from the dawn of television as "perfect" is either intentionally racist or at best white privelage racism (discounting satire obviously)
 

finfinfin

The Fallen
Jul 26, 2018
1,373
I would smile and happily fit in and not even hint at any suspicions, then get the fuck out of there and either be turned around on my way out of town by a polite and smiling police officer or brutally murdered. There is no escape.
 
Red

Red

Member
Oct 26, 2017
11,786
Towns like this still exist. People like to keep up appearances. The racism is still there. Some of them remain sundown towns. But the facade is in place.
 
Razmos

Razmos

Unshakeable One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 28, 2017
15,890
My first thought was its probably openly racist, homophobic and sexist so no, definitely not
 
Tavernade

Tavernade

Tavernade
Moderator
Sep 18, 2018
8,735
Depends on how long I'm there and under what circumstances. If I lived there I wouldn't notice if there was working WiFi. If I had to go there to deliver something or set something up or whatever it'd probably give me the heebie jeebies.
 

Deleted member 31873

Banned
Nov 8, 2017
3,532
The town in that photo is not even close to perfect. Way too many cars and roads, and no cycle lanes or any signs of public transport. It actually looks pretty awful.
 
OP
OP
TheGamingNewsGuy

TheGamingNewsGuy

One Winged Slayer
Member
Nov 5, 2017
31,617
The question was more - would you be unerved aka worried and concerned if you were taken to a 1950s town where things seemed perfect and less - would you want to stay in a 1950s town.
 
Daysean

Daysean

Member
Nov 15, 2017
7,400
Everybody is happy and everyone is perfect and there is a sign at the towns entrance mentioning that it is a "sundown" town whatever that is
 
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