A question for history and political buffs.

[misanthrope]

I've long believed our historical periods aren't demarcated by the calendar but by events which alter the zeitgeist. Take the decades of the last century for an instance.

The 1920s didn't begin on Jan. 1, 1920 but rather with the November 1918 Armistice of World War I.

The 1930s didn't begin on Jan. 1, 1930 but rather on Black Tuesday in October of 1929.

Likewise, the '40s began Dec. 7, 1941 and lasted until the Korean War.

The 1960s began with the 1963 assassination of JFK and ended with the Manson Trial in June 1970.

The 1980s began when the Iranian Hostage Crisis stirred the nationalism and jingoism that were the crux of the Reagan era and ended when the Berlin Wall fell in autumn of 1989.

The 1990s slammed to a halt on Sept. 11, 2001.

So when did the '00s end and the current decade begin? As an indicator, I asked myself what is the overriding characteristic of the current age? Sadly, I think the current spirit or mood is one of increasing social, political and economic polarization.

So what was the point that I feel this really ramped up? That's easy.

Obama's election in 2008 sent tremors through the old order. The right wing spun into a crazed frenzy, the Tea Party arose, separatist and anti-government movements hit overdrive and far too many white Americans felt an unease they couldn't name. The feelings curried in that period are directly responsible for the Trump phenomenon as the 45th POTUS exploited them throughout the Obama regime.

So let's hear your two-bits on this. Any differences you might have with the points of decade demarcation? When might you place the beginning of our current decade and why?

[NRaleighLiberal]

1. very interesting - good observations. One thing missing for me -

where do you see the incredible rise in narcissism, greed and selfishness? Maybe it is my age (61), but it seems rampant - and I am curious about the catalyst.

I tend to align the devaluation of knowledge, curiosity and disdain for intellect with the Bush years.....

[bettyellen]

4. And the rise of smart phones disconnecting people from living in the moment or contemplating

Anything. A literal sense of wonder has disappeared, as well as respect for knowledge because it's instantly googleable. We rely on phones too much.

[misanthrope]

19. As a journalist, smartphones have been invaluable to my job.

That ease of reference information, addresses, phone numbers, constant contact with email is a godsend when you're running around town, waiting at a crime scene or press conference or in court recess.

[bettyellen]

20. I love them too.... but, as a social phenomenon I think few things compare as to the effect on our

Social landscape. But maybe it's being a city dweller? There are streets in town where I have to dodge one person after another staring at their phone and not looking where they walk, dozens of them. And on public transport in bars and restaurants, forget it- almost every single person is spending time playing with their phone.
It's really isolated a lot of people I think.

[lunasun]

6. To me that started with Reagan much as a black lash to what Carter had been saying as trump was

a backlash to Obama . Remember Carter wanted people to conserve energy, recycle and his speech on how people were consuming and buying too much and we were becoming too materialistic.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106508243

Some listened but others didn't like it and also didn't like sharing or diversity
A Hollywood actor with his wife's Richie Rich taste for the WH and they took down carters solar panels at the WH etc. it was indulge don't conserve and be materialistic it's good plus we think everyone on welfare is cheating so stop it and his crowd of voters was better than poor and blacks bust unions means better stock returns and it was time to be loud about it.
To me the reagans ushered in the greed and narcissism and continued growing to this day

You are correct though BushII brought in the idiot anti intellectual years which helped with a backlash that then gave us a smart president Obama but that alone didn't stop the Bush effect from continuing an attraction to dumbing down and proud of it that also continues to grow
IMO

[misanthrope]

13. Agreed on the Reagan backlash

That's not much of a secret.

[misanthrope]

7. I believe that began in the Big '80s

The Reagan Era, "greed is good" and so on. From what I've gathered both academically and anecdotally, there was more communal spirit and sense of public service through the vast middle portion of the 20th century until the Gipper changed everything.

[marylandblue]

2. If historical periods are decided by the zeitgeist, why divide into decades at all?

I'd say we had one period which began in 1998 with Monica Lewinsky. This was the first news story driven by the internet and also is marker for increasing political polarization and the politics of personal destruction. This period also saw rapid social changes in attitudes to LGBT and the election of our first black president, which liberals saw as progress and conservatives saw as threatening.

This period ended in 2015, with Donald Trump announcing for president, and was the culmination of the political and social trends of the previous period. We are now in a new period where a new conservative model has been born and is waiting for a liberal answer. We'll have to see how this ends.

[misanthrope]

10. I think the zeitgeist post 9/11 was markedly different than it was even months before then.

I also agree with your point about public acceptance of LGBT citizens but I think that actually began to change in the 1990s. I recall running into several socially conservative friends in the wake of the film "Philadelphia" whose reaction to that movie wasn't at all what I anticipated. For a lot of folks, seeing an "everyman" celebrity, a likable fellow like Tom Hanks in that light was startling and I seriously think it made a substantial portion of people in my generation reexamine their attitudes.

By the end of the 1990s, prime-time network TV was populated by gay folks looking for love and lesbian weddings. Most people I knew stopped thinking it was any big deal before then.

I think the Obama presidency created an open stridency among conservatives and pushed a lot more sublimated bigotry and racism to the fore. It finally pulled back the mask on America's remaining racial ugliness.

[Igel]

14. If things are measured in pounds, why use feet at all?

They're different sorts of measurements and are useful for different things.

Even feet and SI are good these days for different things, the difference being that they could be used for the same things.

In this case, both are time, but one measures calendar time and the other social trends. You might want to have decades or years of a consistent length for some purposes. For others, you might want to use social trends. For others, you may want to mark off time not by cultural trends but by technological or economic trends.

Every "dimension" gets it's own scale.

[marylandblue]

21. My point was that you used decade names

The 60s, the 70s, the 80s, then looked for markers that occurred on average every 10 years, and occurring somewhere near the turn of each decade. That's a common way to look at things, but it always seemed arbitrary to me. My response ignored the 10 year averages and looked for markers at any point in time with no attention to an average interval.

[First Speaker]

3. I'm not sure what particular significance the Manson Trial had...

...a way of scapegoating the "counterculture"? Nothing really changed after that...my choice would be the defeat of McGovern, in 1972. By then, the energy of the 60s had drained out of the country, and the re-election of Nixon ratified that. And, while "Watergate" itself, the actual events that culminated in the break-in on June 17, 1972, were intimately connected to the 60s...the scandal itself, which didn't break until late March of 1973, was more the beginning of the 70s. I remember feeling this consciously at the time. As for the 10s...definitely Obama's election. From 9/11 to November, 2008, was a very definite era in our history, and we haven't left the Obama Era yet...so far, Trump is just a kind of coda...

[lunasun]

8. I agree Nixon is the turn of that era

[misanthrope]

12. I've gone back and forth with this one for years

At one point I thought it might be the Apollo 11 lunar landing in July 1969. It goes without saying it was a monumental moment in the history of our species, when our perspective of humanity as Earth-bound shifted for good. I also remember afterwards, the feeling of lunar flights and space missions as so commonplace they seemed almost like background noise is definitely '70s in tone.

Then there's also December 1969. The tragic events at Altamont signaled to many in the '60s counterculture movement that something had soured.

That same month the Manson Family members were arrested and sent horrific tremors through middle-class America who were primed to believe the worst of younger Americans outside status quo norms. However when the trial started six months later, the arrests and crimes shifted from a single point on the news to a daily TV update of ongoing criminal proceedings. The courtroom theatrics and antics by the defendants didn't help quell the morphing image of "hippies" as possibly crazed.

In the past I've also leaned toward Watergate as the start of the 1970s, too.

It's really hard to nail one down in that time period because there was so much going on that was kicking around the collective psyche in those few years.

[ProfessorGAC]

18. The Lunar Landing Is A Good One

I think the Kennedy era officially ended there. At that point, Johnson did what he said he would to continue the legacy, and when that was done, it officially became the Nixon era.

I think i might use that as the end of the 60's as well.

[bettyellen]

5. Something about everyone staring at their phones- life is different post smart phone.

[roamer65]

9. I think the 1960's ended in December, 1972.

With conclusion of the Paris Peace Accords...ending our involvement in the Vietnam War.

[misanthrope]

11. That's a good one!

Noted.

[Igel]

15. You and many others.

Most put the '50s ending with JFK's assassination. When I was a kid the last baby boomer year was '59. It's been moved consistently, and for a while people tried to make it coincide with cultural trends.

People tend to put the '60s ending not with the Manson trial but connect it more with the anti-war movement or hippies. Often 1968 or '72 are listed as the end of the '60s.

Reagan's election is usually when the '80s started. Some have tried to say AIDS, but that's for a particular subculture, and for years after AIDS was first identified researchers were still getting their bearings. (It's far easier now to identify what was going on then than it was in even 1985, and far easier these days to prove that everybody knew what was necessary then by picking and choosing quotes and facts than it was, again, in 1985. I could do the same thing with the fall of the USSR, and show that it was obviously common knowledge in 1980 that the Soviet Union was going to collapse in a decade ... except that those opinions would be outliers, conjectures deemed unfounded at the time, and often quotes taken out of context.)

The '80s ended with Clinton's election, or thereabouts. '90s probably before Clinton left office--it wasn't the recession, it was the NASDAQ and stock market crashes that killed the tech and financial boom. There's an argument that the '00s began in 9/01, though. I'm not sure we have to account for every second.

But that's looking at social trends. Technologically things line up differently. Same economically. They influence each other, but I suspect 2012 will be a big year because of the changes that smart phones are creating.

[muriel_volestrangler]

16. You might date the change to the 2007/8 financial crash

which precipitated Obama's election (he being the obviously more competent candidate for dealing with it), but is also more notable around the world, with international changes in economies, trade, and banking (eg Greece), and which produced many changes in government around the world (you might also say it had a longer term effect on things like Brexit). It also marked the end of the neocon era, when they could get elected by saying "but will you be safe?".

I'd also mark the end of the 1930s with Hitler's invasion of Poland.

[cally]

17. The passage of the ACA

and the tremendous backlash. First new entitlement and the focus on the roll of government in our lives. Right terrified that their propaganda machine and billionaires did not get what they wanted despite winning Congress and outspending.