When conservatives start on about how great things were back in the “good old days”, keep in mind that only 100 years ago…
The average life expectancy was 47 years.
Fuel for the 1909 Ford was only sold in drug stores.
Only 14 percent of the homes had a bathtub.
Only 8 percent of the homes had a telephone.
There were only 8,000 cars and only 144 miles of paved roads.
The maximum speed limit in most cities was 10 mph.
The tallest structure in the world was the Eiffel Tower.
The average wage in 1909 was 22 cents per hour.
The average worker made between $200 and $400 per year.
A competent accountant could expect to earn $2000 per year, a dentist $2,500 per year, a veterinarian between $1,500 and $4,000 per year, and a mechanical engineer about $5,000 per year.
More than 95 percent of all births took place at HOME .
Ninety percent of all doctors had NO COLLEGE EDUCATION! Instead, they attended so-called medical schools, many of which were condemned in the press AND the government as ‘substandard.. ‘
Canada passed a law that prohibited poor people from entering into their country for any reason.
Five leading causes of death were:
1. Pneumonia and influenza
2. Tuberculosis
3. Diarrhea
4. Heart disease
5. Stroke
Two out of every 10 adults couldn’t read or write.
Only 6 percent of all Americans had graduated from high school.
Marijuana, heroin, and morphine were all available over the counter at the local corner drugstores. Back then pharmacists said, ‘Heroin clears the complexion, gives buoyancy to the mind, regulates the stomach and bowels, and is, in fact, a perfect guardian of health.’ Coca-cola contained cocaine and was famous for refreshing you when you were tired…
Eighteen percent of households had at least one full-time servant or domestic help.
Anyone over the age of 47 needs to read that again, especially before kissing their kids good night…Yep, those were the good old days…
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{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
“Don’t look to the past; look to the future and to trying to bring out the best in it.”
Yet you clearly use the past to imply the troubles of today. You can’t have it both ways. Either it was terrible 100 years ago, or it was a time of growth both economically and socially. Trying to use the past to justify a progressive now is redonkulous.
J:
Nutty? Well, later for that. Now, I want to address your comment, the “Church of Ideas”?
My blogging brother, I think I misjudged you. I had imagined you as a white knight sitting a top a stumbling, clumsy elephant, with sharp lance in one hand and dented shield in the other, sallying forward to fight the fight for right-wingers in every crawl space in our land. Now, I see — and you gave us many hints “J” — that you are a Jeremiah, a wild man of the wilderness, following behind a horde of unruly elephants,, shouting to high Heaven the gospel of the right-wing. Should I address you as your Hole-ly-ness, a prophet for the right, whose ideas are full of holes? Peace, brother.
J,
By “enemy”, I meant those who wear the label of “feminist extremist” and just how they think. Feminist does not equal “men-hating, womyn-first.” Not black does not equal white.
L,
I DO NOT consider you my enemy! Far from it, I really like you. I think you are a good person, and on a personal note, I care about you and your son. You are on my family list we pray over.
However, you are child-like (Liberal) in your thinking. I enjoy sparring with you, and mean sounding barbs are for humor if you look closely.
But we are here to share and hopefully influence each other and all who are drawn to this “Church of Ideas”.
Many of your points are sound, but the way in which you process them, I beleive, are just nutty (more for Dfunzy, although I owe him one, so will leave him out of this).
I have commented too much on this entry, so I will try again to convert readers in another post. I just didn’t like the enemy comment.
J,
Nowhere did I say that previous generations achieved nothing. Ingratitude would be to not take up the mantle of hard work and striving to make this world the best we can. Ingratitude would be to say “You did it all, now let’s just rest on your laurels and follow your example, no matter how flawed.” They did not sit back and let respect for the past excuse them from moving forward as shown by the many examples mentioned by Dfunzy. Taking risks, making bold and courageous steps into the unknown in the direction of a shining future- what about that part of the American tradition? Didn’t the groups and causes D mentiooned do just that? America needs liberals and progressives to move us forward as well as conservatives to make us liberals slow down when we are moving too fast. But fast or slow, this nation needs to march forward.
J,
If I am a feninist extremist in your eyes, then you really don’t know what one is. Educate yourself on your supposed “enemy” and you may be surprised by what you find.
Do some digging in the past and look for yourself-the facts are what they are. The conditions and attitudes of the time were what they were-it doesn’t matter what color of glasses you view them from. Start with the conditions for blacks in the South and rural areas, immigrants and factory workers in the inner cities and work your way from there. How “great “of a generation could they have been in 1909 if these conditions were right in their face and the majority did nothing? No better than ours, yet we still have the chance to change things and move forward. It is our job to learn from their mistakes and to do and be better. We have not fallen from the pinnacle of perfection found in 1909 or in any other yesteryear. That generation (and we) are just a step in the continuing evolution of mankind.
You can’t move forward very well if you are too busy looking backward. Try it while walking and you’ll see that.
D,
I made a mistake in a past response, wrote in to admit it and give you something to hang your hat on. From now on your right and I’m wrong.
L,
Your further response only solidifies my point. Ingratitude is not a very attractive quality.
Since when does a contrary opinion equal a pissing contest?
Like many in the feminist extremist camp, you focus on your obvious prejudice against men in general and white men specifically. How sad you feel our greatest generations had a disregard for women and children.
You stand on what was built, and curse the builders.
Ingratitude and entitlement are the weak pillars of the new building you seek to erect.
Sorry about that last word, I don’t want to rub you wrong. (Just inserting humor)
D,
Amen, brother. My blood is just as red as any other American’s in this country, as is yours.
Don’t look to the past; look to the future and to trying to bring out the best in it. The past is done, the past is dead-whether the past was good or bad. The present and the future is all we have to work with and all we can change. Our ancestors created their destinies. It is our job to create our own.
J:
Three things in your comment stand out. You compare liberals to children, and in your analogy, imply that liberals don’t appreciate hard work, and that liberals reject the principles that made the country. Who are these liberals? Where are these lazy bums?
It’s good to see you back participating. Knowing, after reading a couple of the posts which you made earlier, that the sickly elephant you have been riding may have thrown you for a fall, I don’t want to tax you with too many questions. If these questions pose too much of a burden during your recovery, please don’t try to answer them. I shall understand.
My blogging brother, are you saying that there were no liberals among the Founders? Are you saying, the abolitionists were all conservatives? Are you saying that the union organizers, whose work improved the lives of working men and women in this country, were all conservatives? Are you saying that the suffagates were all conservatives? Are you saying that only American conservatives have served in the armed forces? Are you saying that only conservatives have laid down their lives for their country? Are you saying that every member of the civil rights movement, the women’s rights movement, the human rights movement, were all conservatives? I guess then, that by that reasoning, every one who loves this country and who proudly salutes its flag is a conservative, and that no liberals are allowed to pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States? Brother, are you saying that every American who gets up and catches the early bus, to go to work at a hard blue collar job, is a conservative? That no liberals are allowed on that bus?
Well, I hope the questions aren’t too difficult.
J,
If I wanted some sort of pissing contest, I could get the facts about child labor, the number of hours people worked to earn their $200-400, the number of on the job deaths and disfiguring accidents, number of deaths from childbirth, etc. but I won’t because it won’t make a difference to you. Numbers on abuse, missing and exploited children, rape, etc. would not be available because people either accepted it (like spousal and child abuse), didn’t talk about it (rape and sexual abuse), or it wasn’t really even a crime (rape was a crime against a woman’s father or husband, not the woman.) The powers that be thought women were not capable of the proper judgment necessary to vote, hold office, own property on our own, etc. Without a man (father or husband,) a woman was nothing. Of course all these figures are only relevant when you are discussing white people.
As far as the number of murders- of course there were less murders, there were less people but how many of the deaths recorded were murders and were never categorized as murders? Forensic science barely existed. Murder in the underclasses was not exactly an investigative priority. Look at the number of missing, if you can find them, to get a real idea of the number of murders that took place.
Life in 1909 was not The Waltons. Life in 1909 was hard. Was it terrible? No, it wasn’t. Were there some things about life in 1909 that we could learn from? Sure there are, but it was not the idyll that people who just look at figures, pictures and never lived it might want to believe it is. Those false idylls are not what you should point to and say that that is what life is supposed to be like and that is what life today should be, because that false idyll never was.
J Byron Swain,
Well put. I believe the best line for this came from a movie. “Life is not fair Virginia.”
Laura,
“Life is pain princess, anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something.” – Princess Bride
I also received this e-mail.
It’s funny how two people can receive the same information and see it so differently. The only common thought is probably shock over how vastly different “and better” things are.
Let me try to quickly focus with an example.
My children see that everyone drives a newer car, all their friends have a tv and laptop and designer clothes. When I tell them that “when I was a kid”, 1/2 the cars were old used beaters, color tv’s were for the rich neighbors and many times our family ate beans for dinner to make ends meet. OH, and our Christmas toys were sooo lame! They pity me and thank God they didn’t live way back then.
My children, much like liberals, don’t appreciate that I worked very hard to achieve a standard of living they now enjoy.
Similarly our grandparents worked hard, evil drug companies invested obscene profits into new drugs, mean old white men risked everything to open new industries “for profit” which resulted in higher paying jobs for the poor masses and with every generation two types of children grew up. The conservatives who saw the sacrifices of the generations before them and built upon them holding tight to what was good and the liberals who like children only took what was given and rejected the principles that got them there, upset about the rich neighbors who had color tv’s when they did not.
Recently our country has finally come to the point where there are more kids upset about not having the color tv, and instead of holding fast to our prior generations foundational principles of hard work and profit, they just want the government to help everyone get the color tv.
Please don’t misunderstand, my kids are wonderful people. There are sweet and loving, but they are children. In their minds, everyone should have everything. It’s not fair otherwise. As adults we must realize the principles that result in growth “never” change, hard honest work and the Golden Rule. That’s what will result in good character and real wealth.
Laura, why did you erase the fact that nationally there were only 237 murders? Could it be that fact says a lot more about our conservative roots than the rest of the facts listed?