If someone from the 1950s suddenly appeared, what would be the mot difficult thing to explain?

[Are_grits_groceries]

Ha!
I can haz kitteh pictures?

[Ron Green]

1. The lack of Flying Cars

would be hard to explain. We were always promised Flying Cars.

[theKed]

6. Avery Brooks agrees

m.youtube.com/watch?client=mv-google&hl=en&gl=CA&v=vzm6pvHPSGo&fulldescription=1

[SugarShack]

33. By far, the "family unit".

[hunter]

56. Here, I embedded your link...

Personally, I'm glad we don't have flying cars. I don't want idiot or intoxicated drivers and their victims raining down on my roof.

[nilram]

193. OMG, Lotus is still around? Is it still as slow as a snail drinking molasses on a winter's day?

And as difficult to configure as a gordion knot?

At least someone from the 1980's will feel at home, if not the 1950's.

[alcibiades_mystery]

11. I'm always amazed by how deeply stupid an idea "flying cars" is

It's bad enough we have tens of thousands of traffic deaths a year on what is essentially a flat surface.

The flying car people want to add another dimension to the mix? So now we have hover craft smashing into each other and dropping out of the sky on to our heads?

Best development of "the future": the complete lack of flying cars!

[lunatica]

162. I once saw a documentary about travel lanes in the air where

people would leave their house or work and use something like a GPS to lock in their destination and magnetic 'highways' would do the driving. people like today's aircraft controllers would be monitoring and controlling these 'highways'.

It's not so far fetched.

[jberryhill]

207. auto-piloted, networked, intelligent flying cars

California has made the first move toward street-legal self-navigating cars.

[Drahthaardogs]

2. Reagan = President

No one would believe that shit.

[MineralMan]

3. Time travel. That's always hard to explain.

The funny thing is that I'm from the 50s. I have no trouble comprehending the 2010s. We have lots of people here from the 50s. That's not so long ago.

[Voice for Peace]

177. lolol long long ago, the fifties

back when we were little kids

[RoverSuswade]

4. The lack of basic human courtesy to one another.

And "respect for elders."
(I was a teenager in the 50s).

[AndyA]

30. Agree, as well as people's lack of concern for their personal appearance today

I'm sick of going to restaurants to see people sitting around wearing flip flops with dirty feet, and men wearing athletic shirts with their sweaty armpit hair sticking out. That's not courteous to others in the restaurant.

In the 1950s, people used to take more pride in their appearance. I think someone from back then would be shocked at the way people dress in public these days.

[northoftheborder]

45. very true; from a "fifties" person; I have finally learned how comfortable "sloppy" can be.

I fully expected flying cars, but one little card sized wireless implement is a camera, phone, computer, map, has two-way access to the world's media and information? No, could not have, did not, even imagine.

[Jenoch]

104. The smartphone technology

wasn't even imagined much later in the 80s and 90s. The Star Trek communication devices did not have access to their computers or have a video component.

[MADem]

137. When they put Ronnie Reagan's casket in the rotunda at the Capitol when he died, that is when I

really noticed the "ultra casual Friday" attitude that so many people have.

I'll be the first to admit, I'm retired, and when I'm out and about, I dress comfortably, but if I'm going to an "event," even if it's something as simple as tromping past the casket of a dead president, I'd put on a nice suit of clothing, and look like I was at least going to a business meeting.

I didn't go to the rotunda to see old Ronnie's casket, but I did watch the C-Span coverage, and I was stunned at the ripped jeans, dirty tees, crappy tennis shoes, and slovenly appearance of so many of the mourners and curiosity seekers. It looked like a fanny pack convention up in there!!!

It's a different world, though--no point in getting all crotchety and complaining about how "the kids" do things now, it's their world and they make their own rules and set their own priorities. I will still "get correct" when I have to go somewhere that matters, though! I'd feel uncomfortable otherwise...

[PennsylvaniaMatt]

150. I'm a senior in high school and I completely agree with you

One of my biggest pet peeves is the way people, especially members of my generation, dress - even in situations where a little bit of formality is expected. I always try to dress presentable to school - button down or other collared shirt with dark jeans that are not ripped and shoes that don't look like I just ran cross country in them. I am amazed at how some of my friends dress - with their sweat pants, ripped jeans, flip flops, etc. And I can understand some people who may come from families that are economically disadvantaged, but many teenagers that dress worse than me come from families that make more money than mine!

Another example is when I went to Christmas mass. I wore a suit and my Democrat blue necktie (I'm probably the only teenager that owns 3 suits!) and I was expecting all of the other men to dress at least a step up from what they normally wear. I was completely wrong. I was amazed how many grown men were wearing jeans, dirty white sneakers, etc. to church on Christmas day. It was a disgrace!

[Freddie]

188. My son is close to your age (22)

And not long ago getting him to wear a shirt with a collar (anything other than a t-shirt or hoodie) was impossible even to church. Now he's a student teacher and had to buy a whole wardrobe of nice shirts, pants and shoes. And he's proud of how nice he looks! His FB pic is "Mr. H--" in his teacher shirt and tie.

[appleannie1]

55. yes. Manners were taught from infancy

[KittyWampus]

83. I agree with you. Complete break down of social etiquette.

[slackmaster]

5. People not using their turn signals while driving would be a tough one

As would open discussions of LGBT issues.

[LiberalFighter]

47. Turn signals? Did they have them back then?

I thought they had to open the window and use their arm to signal.

[RebelOne]

75. Yes, I lived back then and cars had turn signals. n/t

[slackmaster]

93. My dad's 1955 Cadillac Sedan de Ville had turn signals

He bought that tank used when he finished medical school in 1961 just so he could be the first in his class to own a Cadillac.

[Jenoch]

107. My dad had a

1956 Cadillac Biarritz convertable that had a radio with a 'seek' function. (He bought junked and restored it. I wish he still had it).

[slackmaster]

143. The '55 had that too. It didn't work very well. You pushed the left knob in to make it search.

Vacuum tube radios in cars were a real hassle.

[appleannie1]

58. They did not have turn signals. They used hand signals.

[doc03]

71. They still use some of them

[CrispyQ]

110. ~lol.

I remember the first shooting on a California highway. Some comedian said, "When someone cuts you off you don't shoot them! That's what the bird is for!" Nowadays you could get shot at for flipping the bird.

[MineralMan]

86. Nope. My parents' 1952 Plymouth had turn signals.

Pretty much every car did by then. You'll maybe a couple of decades off, really.

[WinkyDink]

95. Our '57 Ford didn't.

[Mr.Bill]

140. My first car was a '57 Ford.

Like all cars by then, it had turn signals.

[frazzled]

7. Um, I'm from the 1950s

Born in the year 1950, to be exact. I don't feel any explanations are necessary. (I have an iPhone and iPad and all that jazz; however, I really don't see the interest in Twitter or Pinterest or much of all that. I am aware of what they are.)

ON EDIT: What I meant to convey here is that the 1950s is a weird decade to choose. My father was born in 1916, so he is "from the 1950s" (he would have been in his 40s then); he also needs no explanations, at age 96.

[SpartanDem]

80. If your dad had missed the last 50 years

the world would make sense to him?

[frazzled]

112. It's the question that makes no sense

It needs to be rewritten.

Plenty of "people from the 1950s" appear every day, though perhaps not "suddenly." The question should be "What if someone who had not lived past the 1950s suddenly appeared?"

I knew what it meant. I was merely pointing out it was a badly conceived question.

[lpbk2713]

8. Hate Radio

... and the mere existence of Limbaugh in particular.

[graham4anything]

41. This existed back then, however it was called propaganda or worst,

as it was the era of the KKK and the John Birch society then
and depending on location, and all

[SpartanDem]

74. Umm.. that's not new

what's new is the national syndication, but there was no shortage of local loon types railing against the Jews, the blacks,etc

[KittyWampus]

85. Father Coughlin was on the radio in the 50's. I learned about him on DU.

[former9thward]

125. Father Coughlin was on the radio in the 1930s.

He left the air in 1940. Because of his opposition to American involvement in WW II the Catholic Church ordered him to be just a parish priest and do nothing more.

[LeftishBrit]

166. People from the 50s would understand that -they had Joe McCarthy

[Tutonic]

9. What happened to the Twinkie...oh and Montgomery Ward.

[graham4anything]

37. and Montgomery Clift and who is Eleanor Clift?

[Control-Z]

50. Woolworth's

What happened to Woolworth's?

[GP6971]

54. And Montgomery Ward. n/t

[MineralMan]

79. Oh, you mean Walmart?

Same thing. Different name.

[GP6971]

96. Wasn't aware of that. n/t

[MineralMan]

103. Walmart and Montgomery Ward

had the same effect on local merchants. At one time, every small town and city had its own department store, usually bearing the name of some family. Sears and Wards were the deathknell of those stores, just like Walmart is today for other types of store.

Both Sears and Wards were predatory businesses, pricing local businesses out of the marketplace. Same shit, different decade.

[Graybeard]

10. Why everything costs so damned much.

Subway was .15 cents is now $2.50.

Bridge tolls were paid with a quarter are now
$9.-$10. even $13 dollars on NY.

Cigarettes are $11. dollars a pack in NYC.

We pay to watch TV (that was free in the 50s).

[RKP5637]

38. You're reading my mind! I just got back from the store, some toilet paper, some

vitamins and a few other bare essentials. $25.00 !!!

[UnrepentantLiberal]

195. The toll for the George Washington Bridge is $13.00

because they spent the money on real estate projects. http://www.city-journal.org/2012/22_4_port-authority.html

[Fumesucker]

12. Justin Bieber n/t

[eallen]

151. I'm from the present, and don't get that one.

[karynnj]

13. The huge social changes

As they happen slowly and with great struggle, it is easy to forget how much change there has been since 1950.

Just for starters, we have a President Barak Obama, who is black. There are several states where gays, who were very definitely in the closet in 1950 for the most part, can get married - and even have the announcement of it in the NYT. They would also be stunned by the far greater diversity in the people they see.

There are now more woman college graduates than male college graduates. In the mid 60s in Indiana when our high school Health and Guidance class was working on future careers, I was told I could not take the mathematics folder. This in spite of being a top student. (By 1972 when I graduated with a double major in math/economics the world had already changed enough that it was easy to get a job.)

The other thing that would stun them is that in 1950, there were "poor" and "wealthy" and a large range in the middle where most people were. Most of that middle group, owned a home and one car and the wives stayed home. Both the mega mansions and the dilapidated areas of towns would likely stun them.

My guess - even if returned to their home town, they likely would not recognize it and in some places guess they were in another country.

[Johonny]

18. spot on

My grandparents upper middle class neighborhood is a slum now.

My grandparents would be blown away with a black president and simply the number of minority actors, writers, musicians, accountants, doctors... the world is radically changed in opportunity for minorities at the same time upward mobility is really, really low. The collision of these two concepts would be a major thing for them. Isn't this exactly what drives the hate in the teaparty? You have a massive decrease in the reality of "white male" privilege but at the same time a massive decrease in the economic ability of any to obtain upward mobility.

Of course the biggest shock to them would be as Irish and Italian Catholics the sudden welcoming of them as being considered "white" and totally accepted as part of the WAS(P) majority

[amandabeech]

63. Don't discount the changes of the role of women in society.

My Mom, who will be 91 later this month, and her mother, now deceased but was born in 1893 and died in 1990, have and had exclaimed about women going into the profession, politics and business with considerable success.

My grandmother had a hard time with my former legal career. Interestingly, her a bit younger sister and brother were very proud of me.

When I'm home with Mom in rural Michigan, I watch the PBS Newshour. My Mom always remarks about the incredibly intelligent women panelists. She doesn't comment on the hosts, but on the panelists.

Part of my family is Catholic and part Protestant, and there were all kinds of problems up until WWII. The Klan burned a cross in the field by my Catholic ancestor's farm house in the brief Klan revival of the 1920s even though my grandfather and his brother were WWI vets, and his brother received the Purple Heart. There were many fewer problems after The Big One. It was longer and really took the effort of everyone. I think that WWII is now underestimated as an event that pushed social change here.

[Mrs. Overall]

14. Why in comparison to 21st century Republicans, Ike (Eisenhower) seems like a lefty radical.

[hay rick]

23. Ike was also a lefty radical compared to most current Democrats. nt

[Mrs. Overall]

25. You're right!

[JaneyVee]

15. Barack Obama.

[enough]

19. +1 (nt)

[Dash87]

16. Dubstep

[Mrs. Overall]

17. That Rock Hudson was gay.

[graham4anything]

36. this is a great answer

[hunter]

114. My grandparents, who had strong connections to Hollywood, knew he was gay all along.

They simply didn't talk about it. I think my grandma, had she lived long enough to see it, would have been delighted to celebrate gay marriages, most especially Hollywood gay marriages.

My grandfather was a military officer. He wanted to fly or work on aircraft during World War II but the Army Air Force decided he should manage various "misfits" who were deemed essential to the war effort. They were mostly alcoholics, addicts, and homosexuals. Sadly, as soon as the war ended the whole lot of them, including my grandfather, were among the first to be kicked to the curb. Nazi scientists and engineers fared better than some of the people my grandfather worked with.

[Mrs. Overall]

158. That's cool that your grandparents were opened minded in the 50's--my mother was shocked

when Rock Hudson went public.

Also, that is really sad about your grandfather. I didn't know that the military had a special section of "misfits"--that just seems bizarre. I always think of the military taking care of WWII vets (as opposed to today's vets), so your grandfather's story is especially poignant. I hope everything turned out well for him eventually.

[WinkyDink]

20. HELLO?! Did my Boomer Generation/your Grandparents disappear?! I'M FROM 1949!!

THERE IS NO NEED TO "EXPLAIN" ANYTHING WE'VE OBVIOUSLY LIVED THROUGH AND WITH.

[Control-Z]

51. +1000 (nt)

[temporary311]

72. You missed the key phrase in the OP

"suddenly appeared."

[WinkyDink]

91. Um, no, I didn't. Did you miss the misuse of "from"?

[jeff47]

99. Yes, you did.

The point of the question is the person did not live through the intervening years, thus not experiencing the gradual transition to our current state of affairs.

[kskiska]

21. I'm from the 50s

born in the mid-40s, actually. I think one of the greatest changes is the lack of privacy due to cell phones, especially. There's no such thing as a vacation from connnectivity, no down time from a job, or much time to just get away from it all with no interruptions. Another thing is family life. The need for both parents to work puts small children in daycare all day, which would have been unthinkable in the 50s. Children were taken care of by family members or babysitters for short times when parents went out for an evening. Families no longer sit down together at the dinner table every night or watch TV together before bedtime.

[RomneyLies]

26. You've experienced all the time in between.

If you had been propelled from 1956 to today, things would be quite shocking.

[RebelOne]

77. I was a teenager in the 1950s. I was born in 1939.

So I know ll about the 1950s.

[Jenoch]

124. What I find amusing

is that telephone booths were created to give privacy while on the phone. When was the last time you saw a pay phone, let alone a pay phone in a telephone booth.

Also, you're right, few families watch TV together. Too many TVs, too many channels with little that is worthwhile to watch, too many activities. I'm not opposed to giving up TV viewing, just the family togetherness. When I was a kid, the family watched TV together and my dad pretty much chose what we would watch.

[WinkyDink]

22. OP MEANS: "If someone who DIED in the 50's returned,......"

[stuntcat]

24. What we watch on TV

All I have to do to be horrified at humanity is watch a little tv.

[Nevernose]

27. Black people using the front door

It might not be the most difficult question, but would probably be among the first. Also, the Internets.

[Cleita]

28. I am from the fifties and was taught that there would never be a Great Depression again

because all the abuses and policies that caused it have been removed. My Republican parents told me there would never be a Republican President like Hoover again. So explain to me what happened?

[RKP5637]

32. Yep, similar here, except my parents were democrats. And after FDR many thought the

atrocities were fixed and would be prevented into the future.

[Prophet 451]

98. Market fundementalism came back into fashion

and all the abuses and policies were put back into place again.

[RKP5637]

29. Why we are still so backward in some ways! n/t

[tavernier]

31. pants on the ground

[KittyWampus]

88. LOL!

[graham4anything]

34. President Barack Obama for a good example

and how Batman, Superman, Spider Man are still thriving

and how all the old tv shows are watched by anyone wanting to see them

so a person from then can be comforted seeing Leave it to Beaver or the Honeymooners or Lucy again and feel at home

(and that Elvis's Meatloaf and mashed potatoes can be purchased still in Graceland)

Of course, racism is rampant and a person from the 50s would think some things never change.

but the worst they might find is the whining that goes on in America now.
They might think that people need to grow up
and know how bad it was in the past

And they would marvel that say "Tom and Jerry" the recording duo became Simon and Garfunkel and that Simon's lyrics still have relevance all the years later

and who were the Beatles?

(there was a Twilight zone that dealt with this)

[marybourg]

205. *My* parents would be amazed that Arthur and little Paul,

who sang "Earth Angel" in the schoolyard of P.S. 87 in Flushing, Queens, in 1955 had become famous.

[graham4anything]

211. Hey Little Schoolgirl 1957

[Spider Jerusalem]

35. Everything

the 1950's were a vastly different time, socially and technologically. The Internet, racial integration, social acceptance of interracial and same-sex relationships, 24-hour news media, environmentalism, equal rights for women, minorities, and LGBT, demographic change, sexual liberation, health-consciousness...to the mythical average American from 1950 the world of 60 years later would be a totally strange and alien place.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

39. The U.S. virtually canceling space program and hitching

Rides with Russians (who are no longer called Soviets).

[farminator3000]

40. why we make 99% of our food out of CHEMICALS???

[derby378]

61. Well, there's always Soylent Green...

But yeah, I agree with you 100% on this one.

[RKP5637]

42. Why our cars don't look like this !!!

[Orrex]

43. Women as CEOs, as well as serving in the House & Senate

Not to mention our President and the fact that African Americans don't have to ride at the back of the bus, etc.

[amandabeech]

67. The change in the role of women of all racial and ethnic groups has been huge. n/t

[Jenoch]

119. I understand the role of women has

changed significantly since the 50s but the first female US House member was elected more than three years before the 19th Amendment was ratified. Of course it was not commonplace to have females serving in the congress but it did happen. A curious side note, the first five females US House members were all Republicans. The first several female US Senators were Democrats.

[Orrex]

120. You know, almost immediately after I posted that...

I wondered if I'd gotten the dates wrong.

Thanks for the info!

[Jenoch]

122. I remember reading about

Minnesota's first US House member elected in the 50s and served two yerms. Her name was Coya Knutson and the way she got beat was the Republins got her husband to write an open letter to her (printed in the newspapers) "Coya Come Home". He was a drunk and the reason she got involved in politics was to get away from him.

[Music Man]

44. How that person came back to life

[Cleita]

48. He never died. He was put in suspended animation for a space experiment

and they forgot about him until now. Oops!

[KittyWampus]

90. Was just remembering The Spy Who Shagged Me & laughing at Dr.Evil's "One Million Dollars"

and Robert Wagner's response. LOL!

[GoCubsGo]

109. It reminds me of "Back to the Future".

In reverse. It would be like someone he met in the 1950s returning to 1985 with him, or in this case, 2013.

[Rex]

46. The incredible inequality between rich and poor.

The 1980s.

[eShirl]

49. Explaining what happened to all the ashtrays.

[Mrs. Overall]

68. +1

[JEFF9K]

52. talk radio

The Republican dishonest talk-radio monopoly would be a tough one.

[IDemo]

53. That the height of human space exploration would occur in the following decade and a half n/t

[bluedigger]

57. The economy.

I imagine the lack of a US manufacturing base, the ascendance of the financial sector, and our dependence on the importation of domestic goods from Communist China would confound most transplants from the Fifties. Technology would be relatively easy to adapt to.

[kydo]

59. republicans

the 1950 ver of rethugs is no where near what it is now. I think they might have a hard time with the whole dems are the old repugs and teabagger is not something you use to make tea.

[datasuspect]

62. how people have become so fucking stupid.

[smirkymonkey]

198. +10.000

[appleannie1]

64. The lack of atomic bomb drills in schools.

[MyshkinCommaPrince]

65. When in the fifties?

Did the time traveler already experience the cultural impact of rock and roll and Kinsey and the earlier developments of the civil rights movement? How much has television already affected them? How old are they, how much education do they have, when were they educated? Seems like all of these things and more would influence how difficult it might be for them to grasp different aspects of contemporary life.

Can we think about so many of our RW opponents as people who think they have suddenly arrived from the fifties, with no experience of the time between then and now, or think like such a person? Hmm.

[appleannie1]

66. Kids are not taught math tables.

[Orrex]

78. Do you mean log tables? Because they've been absolutely 100% useless for decades

At least, they've been useless for the great majority of people.

If you're talking about multiplication tables, then I can tell you that they do still teach them in public school, because my son is learning them right now.

[doc03]

69. What happened to unions n/t

[GP6971]

70. Seeing people walking around

apparently talking to themselves (hands free cell phones)

[tableturner]

73. Song by Donald Fagen (of Steely Dan Fame) addresses it, but in reverse......

Donald Fagen's song I.G.Y (linked below the lyrics) was written in the early eighties by a child of the fifties and sixties, from the standpoint of how society in 1957, the international geophysical year, thought life would be like twenty years later around the time of the next international geophysical year. The lyrics portray great irony (as planned), since none of the predictions came true. Of course this thread is about how much has changed, so this song addresses this subject from the opposite angle.

I.G.Y. (International Geophysical Year) lyrics:

Standing tough under stars and stripes
We can tell
This dream's in sight
You've got to admit it
At this point in time that it's clear
The future looks bright
On that train all graphite and glitter < This did not happen
Undersea by rail < This did not happen
Ninety minutes from New York to Paris < This did not happen
Well by seventy-six we'll be A.O.K.

What a beautiful world this will be
What a glorious time to be free <People in general are no more free than in the 50’s

Get your ticket to that wheel in space < This did not happen
While there's time
The fix is in
You'll be a witness to that game of chance in the sky
You know we've got to win
Here at home we'll play in the city
Powered by the sun < This did not happen
Perfect weather for a streamlined world < This did not happen
There'll be spandex jackets one for everyone <We had reverted to preppy wear when song was written

What a beautiful world this will be
What a glorious time to be free <People in general are no more free than in the 50’s

On that train all graphite and glitter < This did not happen
Undersea by rail < This did not happen
Ninety minutes from New York to Paris < This did not happen
A just machine to make big decisions < This did not happen
Programmed by fellows with compassion and vision <We are not more compassionate/visionary
We'll be clean when their work is done < This did not happen
We'll be eternally free yes and eternally young <We're neither eternally free nor eternally young

What a beautiful world this will be
What a glorious time to be free <People in general are no more free than in the 50’s

Here is the song on YouTube:

[LeftishBrit]

170. Actually 'undersea by rail' has happened in my part of the world..

the Channel Tunnel and Eurostar.

[JHB]

76. That (s)he lived in a "socialist" country

[Tikki]

81. 3D printed cars....

They'll have to deal with 3D..(just emerging in the 50's), printed: like a mimeograph? and cars
were suppose to fly by now...Who even thought about gas mileage (until the late 50's) or eco-friendly?




Tikki

[Lucinda]

82. LOL ~ Sooo true about the cats and the arguments!

[kestrel91316]

84. How women completely took over veterinary medicine.

They tried so hard, for so long, to shut us out. And when they finally opened the floodgates..........well, picture a tsunami.

[chelsea0011]

87. All my remote controls for the TV

[RebelOne]

129. In the '50s, there was no such thing as a TV remote control.

We would have to get up from the nice comfy couch to change channels. I do not know hoe I survived those years without remote controls. I have a remote control for my TV, air conditioning and space heater. I do not have to get off the couch to adjust anything. No wonder we Americans are becoming so fat.

[Fumesucker]

133. Sure there was a remote control for the TV

I should know, I was one.

[missingthebigdog]

89. Starbucks!

[Mrs. Overall]

92. The multicultural crew of the USS Enterprise.

And Captain James T. Kirk kissing Nyota Uhura--the first scripted interracial kiss on American television.

[KittyWampus]

94. What really freaks me out (I'm 50 yrs old) is how people are glued to their phones

and totally unable to disconnect from them.

I just don't understand people who are on their cell phones constantly.

Nor do I understand texting.

[WinkyDink]

100. Excellent PR.

Many people can't accept that some people have no jobs (by choice), siblings/children/grandchildren, fondness for computer games, or any other reason to have a "smartphone."

[GoCubsGo]

113. I think it's really sad.

So many people are too busy talking on their cell phones, of looking at their damn smart phones that they don't notice what is going on in the world around them. I really don't get it either. And, half the time, it's fucking rude. Every time I go into a store, there's at least one person stopped right in the middle of an aisle yakking away on their phone. They are blocking everyone who is trying to get by and do their business. And, don't get me started about the ones who talk or text and drive...

I have a cell phone, but it's only for emergencies. I leave it turned off, otherwise. I do understand texting, however. Some things just don't warrant a phone call. And, in some places reception might be so weak that only a text message can get through.

[truegrit44]

136. Believe it or not I do NOT have a cellphone

I hate them! My husband has one and rarely uses it. Only thing they are good for would be an emergency while on the road. He always tries to get me to take it when I go to town (we live 10 miles out) but I refuse it, longer trips I do take it. Text messaging that is totally crazy. Facebook no way........but I live for my pc mostly because I sell and make money with it

[WinkyDink]

97. Try this: "If a name on The Wall came back, explain vacations now in Vietnam."

[Nay]

101. The lack of leisure time, and the number of people who have no instructive hobbies. nt

[truebluegreen]

102. Lack of prosperity for the average American. nt

[TheKentuckian]

171. I was thinking "what the fuck happened to the unions?" but yours is more accurate.

[truebluegreen]

179. Closely related tho, for sure...

I remember billboards bragging about the Highest Standard of Living in the World.



My father-in-law, a not very successful insurance salesman, was able to support his wife and four children, with an average home in Bozeman, a 2-3 yr old car, a cabin at Canyon Ferry Lake, a boat, skiing in the winter, etc etc etc.

[thelordofhell]

105. 50's?? Try the 90's...........

[gateley]

111. +1!

[CrispyQ]

106. "...and while looking at kitteh photos, I plunge head first into a water feature."

[subterranean]

108. That the Soviet Union has ceased to exist

and that it happened without any nuclear weapons being dropped or even any large-scale war.

[SpartanDem]

115. Sexual attitudes.

you couldn't even say the word pregnant on TV on the 50's, couples slept in separate beds. I'm pretty sure late night Cinemax would give them a heart attack. In the real world, I think it'd be very shocking to go from a world where women pretty much only wore dresses to women walking own the street in tight shirts and jeans.

[mainstreetonce]

116. Viagra commercials

Cable TV. Reality TV. Honey Boo Boo

[dickthegrouch]

117. The disappearance of integrity

So many people think it's only illegal if you get convicted.
Wrong: the law usually says it is illegal or is an offense, conviction is ONLY the means to punishment.

People used to take pride in the truth, now it is difficult to get the law even to enforce telling the truth, far less requiring it.

[richmwill]

118. My parents were born in the 1950's, I'll go ask them...

But on a serious answer, I would say the internet and iPhones, iPads, iPods, etc.

[Retrograde]

121. I was born in the 1950s

I'd say the availability of reliable birth control - which in turn opened up career opportunities for more women in addition to being mothers.

[CTyankee]

186. The Pill in 1960 really changed America forever. I remember it as a young woman.

Worlds of opportunity opened up then and women could purse those worlds without fear of getting pregnant if they didn't want to be...

[Adsos Letter]

123. The disappearance of Curb feelers/Curb finders on cars.

[IMG][/IMG]


EDIT: I understand they can still be had thru Amazon, etc., for vintage cars. Don't see much of them out on the street.

[Freddie]

190. My brother had those on his 1963 Dodge Dart

In the early 70s. A few years later when I learned to drive...you could live years in this town and never have to parallel park, and they did not require it for the drivers license test like they do now.

[jemsan]

126. We allow people to live on the sidewalk. No such thing in the 50's

Thank Ronald Reagan for that. I remember the day they closed the psychiatric hospitals. Just opened the doors.

[graywarrior]

127. Honey Boo Boo

[NoOneMan]

128. Their promise of future utopia morphed into climate change's promise of a decimated civilization

[Drunken Irishman]

130. Why everything is in color...

Wait, you mean it was all in color back then too? Well when I see videos and photos ... it looks all black and white to me!

[MichiganVote]

131. Prolly the music. Or sex scandal in the church, school shootings, u know, the little things.

[Drunken Irishman]

132. Who is this black man on my TV speaking from what looks to be the Oval Office?

[asjr]

134. Someone would say to me Wow, you have really aged!

[AgingAmerican]

135. climate change

[Nye Bevan]

138. A President who is not white (nt)

[Mr.Bill]

139. That we went to the moon and haven't bothered to go back for forty years. n/t

[wandy]

141. The modern day republican tea party....

I can picture myself explaining the tea party to my uncle.
Me: See heres their web page.
Uncle: Oh! You mean the John Birch Society.
Me: Look this is how they view the United Nations.
Uncle: Yes! You mean the John Birch Society.
Me: No, No, here let's look at another web page we'll try Free Republic.
Uncle: Yup. Still carrying on about prying something from their cold dead fingers. John Birch Society!
Me: Let's try again. Here, World Net Daily.
Uncle: My god you have a black president. Tell you what kid. If you got any of those Birchers in congress you ain't ever gonna get any bills passed.
Me: Ok one more try. Here rense.com.
Uncle: I just never understood the JBS thing about florid. What's a smart meter? Looks like they get all pisey about them too.

Fortunately my uncle was a car lover. Large dangerous things that moved fast.
Going to take him out and show him a Sicon IQ. That will be something he thought he would never see.
He'd already had a preview of the modern republican party.

[Ikonoklast]

142. "Why is everyone so damn fat?"

[CTyankee]

164. I know. We have a photo of my husband's family, circa 1948 and no one was fat.

The grandparents were a bit heavy around the middle but the other adults and the children were normal size. Some we might consider a bit too thin! And these were people of German stock...

[SheilaT]

144. The incredible amount of violence

on TV and in movies. Really graphic violence. And sex scenes that would only have been in porno films, also on TV and in movies. The casual swearing.


The internets. Everything, good and bad available on the internets.


There are so many things we now take for granted, even those of us who grew up in the 1950's, that it's somewhat difficult to actually name everything that is different. Overall, it's the technology -- cell phones and answering machines and computers -- that have altered so much. Recently I read a novel that was written a couple of years ago, but most of it takes place in the early 1970's and in it the characters are constantly having to hang out to wait for phone calls. It felt bizarre.

While we are a very long way from a perfect world, the level of equality between genders and races is astonishing compared to the 1950's. As late as 1969 the company I worked for laid off a woman they knew was pregnant in a down-sizing, rather than the less senior woman who was not pregnant. And, as so many have already pointed out, we have a black man in the White House.

[CTyankee]

145. I think we would have been less surprised by the technical stuff and more surprised

at gay marriage, legal and constitutional abortion, women soldiers and pilots, and being able to vote for a woman for president (as I was able to do in our CT primary back in 08).

[JI7]

149. yes, more surprise at seeing different races mixing , openly gay couples , Obama as President

i don't think they would be too surprised by things like the phones we have just because so many of them were making great predictions at that take that we haven't lived up to.

[CTyankee]

161. well, maybe Google. I'm still amazed that I can just type in something in Google and

get a whole world of stuff.

I grew up in segregated Texas so a black president would definitely have been a huge surprise. The fact that he was the offspring of a white mother and black father AND conceived before marriage would have been a big cultural shock too. In those days, young women would have "premature" babies, some weighing 8 lbs and everybody snickered!

[CTyankee]

178. And, I forgot, smoking bans! I wanted to smoke when I was in high school in the 50s

and in college. I gave it up in 1980 for good. I had associated smoking with adulthood and sophistication when I was a teenager growing up so I started smoking when I was in college. It seems so stupid to me now and it's unbelievable to me that kids today want to smoke! How crazy is that?

[JI7]

146. how old would this person be ? what year were they born in ? also we would need to know their

background. also when would they have died ?

[Cleita]

154. I was born in 1940 and lived through WWII, post war, the Korean war and I was

ages 11 to 19 in the fifties, in other words I would have fit into the Anderson family, (Father Knows Best) if my family had been such a generic fifties family. They weren't. Actually very few were but it was an ideal that white fifties families believed they could achieve. I started noticing things going awry around 1970 economically, not war wise and civil rights wise, so I would have him die by 1975. We were still five years away from institutionalized and accepted homelessness then too. That actually was my very first real shock that things were going bad. It's when I walked out the door one day to find ragged people walking around with shopping bags, talking and screaming to themselves and sleeping on the streets. I remember saying to my husband, "Have we become Calcutta?" Then, I thought this situation would be fixed soon enough. I'm still waiting 33 years later.

[Little Star]

147. You made me laugh. k&r

[WeekendWarrior]

148. Why technology has progressed but humanity hasn't. nt.

[NYC Liberal]

152. As others have said, the social changes probably would be "most difficult".

Yes modern technology would seem amazing and all, but I don't think there's much that would have been totally unforeseeable. Much of what we have today is an evolution of what already existed even then. Cell phones are just portable telephones; televisions are pretty much the same but bigger and much higher quality; the pervasiveness of computers might be a shocker but still, a lot of it was imagined if not thought likely.

I think you'd have to go back a lot further to find people who would be truly confused or bewildered by modern society, like from the 18th or 19th centuries. Imagine showing a computer or television to Thomas Jefferson, or an airplane to George Washington.

[randome]

153. "Where's your jet pack?"

"When's the next ferry to the Moon?"

"A planet where Conservatives evolved from men?"

[Frustratedlady]

155. The price of gas at the pump and the cost of childbirth,

OBGYN coverage. and hospital stay...not to mention college education.

[Marrah_G]

156. LOL

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

157. I was a kid during the '50s, and if I'd done a Rip Van Winkle in 1959 and just woke up,

what would probably surprise me the most (apart from suddenly discovering I was old) would be computers, smartphones, the Internet, and huge flat-screen HDTVs with wireless remote controls and the ability to watch almost any movie at any time on them.

And LOLcats.

[-..__...]

159. Shaving pubic hair.

I think that's progress most could agree upon.

[Matariki]

160. How both men and women work 40+ hours to support their families

and still have a hard time paying their mortgage and medical bills.

[lunatica]

163. They'd have to be taught all our modern jargon as if it were a second language

It would take a while, since many of us today have a great deal of difficulty with it too.

[rainy]

165. The fact that we are drugging our kids and

that there are more with psychoses.

[Coyotl]

167. The DU Lounge.

kidding

[Laura PourMeADrink]

168. How we let people get away with creating for-profit middlemen between us and

our doctors so that someone profits (other than the doctor) for no reason whatsoever whenever we visit a doctor. (Sorry for the convoluted sentence).

[LeftishBrit]

169. The Internet; and that we haven't colonized space

which was the preoccupation of people interested in futuristic technology even in the 70s.

Also the 'war on terror' replacing the Cold War; and the whole global warming issue.

[stevenleser]

172. How the vast majority simply allowed pensions to be taken away from them

without a peep.

[demwing]

173. UPC symbols or QR codes

there are so many underlying technologies that you would have to explain first, just to explain something simple like the buying of a loaf of bread. The degree that we work hard in order to avoid hard work would blow a 50's era mind.

[crazyjoe]

174. civil rights, gay marrage, no smoking in hosptials or airplanes, black president,

cell phones, high definition TV,..... I could go on all night.

[KoKo]

175. That "Old Joe McCarthy" was Still in Power.........

plus some other things that folks here would get me banned for saying.

Just saying.

[Kablooie]

176. The most difficult thing would be to explain how he happened to appear here.

[valerief]

180. Breast implants. And botox. They'd be, like, WTF? nt

[CTyankee]

185. Oh, I don't know. My mother had a face lift in the 1950s or early 1960s and her

company health insurance paid for it! AMAZING!

[valerief]

196. Facelifts are one thing. Basketball boobies from implants and those oversized frozen cheeks

from Botox are another.

[CTyankee]

197. But it was kinda mymother's fault. She sunbathed in the hot Texas sun for YEARS...

she always looked great with her tans until the sun damage took its toll. Which is why I never go out into the sun without sunscreen and never to lie there soaking it up...I prefer being pale and relatively smooth skinned...

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

181. It would be hard to explain why nuclear energy hasn't made humanity problem-free.

Nuclear energy solving the world energy problems was a big push/belief in the 50's. It would be difficult for me to explain why some people get their panties/underpants in a wad about any discussion involving atomic energy. It would be difficult to outline how fear-based and emotional arguments are more powerful than logic in this modern era. I just can't personally relate to that sort of behavior, so it would be pretty difficult to convey.

[JustAnotherGen]

182. I love to cook

I own cookbooks. I even have my grandmother's Better Homes and Garden from 1946. Cooking is a thing in my mom's family - its my thing too!

I think if my grandma (d 1982) and Gramfeathers (d 1994) could see me flip open my iPad, type in a key ingredient, and get 100 recipes with videos and how to pics - they would be amazed. My mom is 65 and saw me doing this - and now she wants a tablet.

[Raine]

183. Incivility in our society that comes from the top and drifts downward. nt

[peace13]

184. Hunger,hate and homelessness . Nt

[billbailey19448jj]

187. I can think of several things

1. We've elected a half-black man as the US President not once, but TWICE
2. People can listen to hours of music wherever they go with an Ipod
3. The Republican Party has gone batshit insane
4. The internet, and its impact on society.

[NoPasaran]

189. Smoking has become socially unnacceptable

[Freddie]

191. Hundreds of channels on TV

And still not much good to watch.

[Fumesucker]

192. If the person was say, Isaac Asimov or Arthur Clarke, then very little would be hard to explain

Indeed, in about an hour he'd be explaining stuff to you.

ETA: You could say the same of Ursula Le Guin, Alice Andre Norton or Leigh Brackett.

[JoeyT]

194. Why all these crazy-ass future doctors won't recommend a cigarette brand for them. n/t

[LeftInTX]

199. The fitness craze, health clubs etc

My mom who was born in 1932 did not know who to run or ride a bike.

[Art_from_Ark]

200. Why nearly everything at the 5-and-dime store,

which is now called a dollar store, is now made in (ostensibly) Communist China.

[Skittles]

201. there's a whole party that wants to go back to that time

[brettdale]

202. The lack of Hoverboards

Mcfly!!!!

[unblock]

203. that republicans are now more conservative but call themselves "democrats";

that nazis are less overtly violent but call themselves "republicans";

that democrats haven't really changed but call themselves "senator sanders".

[lib2DaBone]

204. They would be amazed to learn.. that Congress and Senate no longer serve "We The People"

30,000 lobbyists from Big Banking to Big Pharm to Big OIL.. control our govt. at every level.

[RagAss]

206. How we landed on the moon in 1969....

and quit.

[Stardust]

208. Why pot is still illegal.

[Claybrains]

209. What happened to music

Music today is just regurgitated crap.

[cecilfirefox]

210. Probably the gay marriage. nt