Why do conservatives believe that the past was more moral than the present?
I work with this one person who is conservative he keeps telling me that in the past (A period of time of which he was not born yet) how family values prevailed and people were more religious. Yet from what I have read in history books, and done some research on my own. I found that people had no more of a corner on family values then as they do now, nor were they any more religious then as now.
I think you’d have to present a cite that the majority of conservatives feel this way.
You do have a point, though, at least with regards to some issues. I have heard some conservatives bemoan the loss of teacher led prayers in public schools, for instance.
I think that some people have a somewhat romantic view of an era which superficially seemed safer, more homogenized and less threatening-- an era without internet porn or South Park or gay marriage. An era where people didn’t question creationism or pierce their tongues and you didn’t hear profanity on televison.
This view ignores some of the more obvious moral problems with the era, of course, stuff like Jim Crow laws, sexism, religious insensitivity, subtle (and unsubtle) anti-semitism, more limited freedom of expression and institutionalized homophobia.
Even the good stuff is somewhat exaggerated. The world of Beaver Cleaver is a mythological one. Families functioned no better or worse at that time than they do now. They still had domestic violence, child abuse, alcoholism, poverty and loveless marriages.
I think the wish to return to the good old days is a wistful desire for a world as portrayed bt television more than a world that really existed.
Poor memories.
I can’t see how your friend came to this conclusion and to generalize conservatives as holding this as their view is a bit of a stretch I feel.
I once in another thread had a similar discussion on why religious people thought today was less moral than the past. Especially before the 20th century where random violence was way larger and children mistreated.
One kid who wanted to become a priest said the 50’s were overall more moral and better than today.
I think women and children wouldnt agree with that blanket statement thou. Women were secondary citizens at best... children might have a mom at home but certainly werent cared for in terms of health and education as today. I argued that in fact both eras arent that different in terms of morality... that the 50's were very hypocritical and all the wrong stuff (cheating, adultery and corruption) were just hidden away. That nowdays we know too much thru TV and news and really beleive times are worse.
I say I prefer current open minded and open info lifestyle. We might be "sinning" more... but we certainly are living better.My co-worker keeps saying, thing were better than to hear him you would think the past was some kind of moral utopia.
I keep telling him and others that like him that it is a matter of media awareness, and the past just appears to be better than it really was. I also tell him to stop listening to that Rush Limbaugh.
I don’t.
Well, let’s see, women knew that their place was in the kitchen and if they didn’t agree they were beaten within an inch of their lives, and nothing was done to their attackers, and black people were kept in their rightful place by Jim Crow laws/ segregation, thereby preventing their evil perverted styles of music and dancing from infecting white teenagers ears and minds.:rolleyes:
By any objective standard, “pop” culture wasn’t nearly as debased - music, television and movies were quite different. Venereal diseases are at much higher rates, along with teen pregnancy and illegitmate births.
Pointing out the strides made for women’s rights or civil rights seems a lame attempt at deflecting the issue.
Since you know that everyone who listens to Rush Limbaugh feel this way and everyone who feels this way listens to Rush Limbaugh.
This is something I’ve noticed for awhile and always bugs me. It isn’t conservatives soley I hear saying this but people from all different political persuasions. I’m a conservative and I don’t feel that way. Statements like “nowadays” or “in the past…” are just way too common and made without any kind of knowledge.
1.) What do you mean by “debased?”
2.) Cite for the VD claim and the teen pregnancy? (also, please define “illegitimate births.”)
3.) What “issue” is being deflected? What’s worse, dirty words on a record or Jim Crow laws?
Isn’t trading institutionalized racism, sexism and homophbia for naughty words in a rap song a net moral gain for a society?
I will step up and admit that I think the music was far better in my day and that now pretty much all new music sucks. 
I guess that’s not a moral issue, though.
“Why do conservatives believe that the past was more moral than the present?”
We do?
Ah, sophistry at its finest.
No, it is a request for clarifications of your assertions. To claim that pop culture is “debased” is semantically meaningless in a debate because there is no objective definition for “debased.” Essentially you’re making a tautological arument. “Pop culture is less moral because it has become less moral.”
You’re assertions about STDs and teen pregnancies are factual assertions. There is nothing sophistic about asking you to support them.
I’ll grant that women were typically relegated to the kitchen, but I must question the rest of what you said.
On what basis do you say that the practice of beating such women to within an inch of their lives was widespread and commonly accepted?
Just anecdotal evidence here, but I know personally women who (back in the day) were abused by their husbands and who had the nerve to compain about it. The general attitude of many was, “Well, you must have done something awful to have made him to that.” By no means was this universal, but the attitude existed to a far greater extent than it did now. IMHO those who yearn for “the old days” are mostly looking at it through the rose-colored glasses of nostalgia.
I do think that there is much more blatant sexuality now in media and entertainment, and a good deal of it is neither moral nor attractive. But then I’m an old fogey. The kinds of things chanted about in gangster rap, for example, I find disgusting. Our parent thought Elvis and the Beatles were disgusting and they declared how immoral things were becoming. I hear that ancient Greek philosophers bemoaned the same thing.
I was just about to argue that things weren’t THAT bad, and then I read the next post:
and I remembered, if things weren’t that bad for you, you were just lucky.
Don’t get me wrong, I hate rap and sub-woofers AND I really did walk miles uphill in snow to get to school and I WAS glad to do it (I hate buses). I am older; I take comfort in things with which I am most familiar. (Music peaked with the original Motown Sound.)
But I DON’T think that makes them morally better.
I suspected STDs are just tracked better and reported more.
Frankly, I think healthy teen-age girls are better at giving birth; their joints are more flexible on the whole (no, I don’t have a cite handy.) Single parent families are better than one abuser, multiple abusee families. And if one counts grandparents, non-bio non-married parents, siblings and close friends as the co-parents they often are, I bet there are DAMN few truly single parent families.
And you can preach for family values all you want, but don’t you dare try to force your nasty narrow little definition of family down my life.
Now, can we listen to a little Motown?
Huh, and to think I just had a three hour discussion of this matter tonight.
I’ve not seen any historical records that indicate that people have ever actually been more moral, only that they talked about things some consider immoral less (like whispering about sex with trusted companions rather than being able to have characters discuss it during prime time shows).
AFAIK humans have acted largely the same for recorded history. An Orwellian code on public conduct or speech doesn’t change what people did to each other, only what was said about it in the media, at work, and so on. Witness the conception of Victorian times as prim and proper, when there was of course all sorts of things still going on behind the scenes.
Finally, I think this rose-colored view of the past is not endemic to conservatives, but simply people who let their own perspectives dominate the facts of existence that they find inconvenient to their worldview. My grandmother is hardly a conservative, but of course everything is wrong with the world today.
What act that some might consider immoral isn’t recorded in the bible? So if we were aware of these issues over two thousand years ago, I would be quite surprised to find that there was some glorious few years in all of human history where we avoided the perils of being human. Very surprised indeed.
I’m willing to listen to anyone that would care to make the case, of course.
That really bugs me. And I don’t think it is a “conservatives” thing. Actually fairly young and quite liberal people fall for the same crap.
I have a friend my own age (32) with whom I have a few discussions about it. The funny thing is that no matter how much I point out how the farther back you go the less consistent with the modern notion of morality things were she keeps insisting that we are going down the drain. I don’t know how an otherwise intelligent person really thinks that 100 years ago humanity had any higher standards. I sure as hell prefer living now and not in the 16th century.