To find this fb poem awful.

[Mov1ngOn]

Several friends are sharing this and I feel really uncomfortable with it. Any thoughts?

[georgetteheyersbonnet]

Just as an illustration, my grandparents (all working class, born in the 1920s/30s so exactly that wartime/1950s generation begin fetishised in the poem):

grandma 1. depression, attachment problems with her children, false teeth from an early age, diabetes resulting from poor diet, persistent anger and psychological problems relating to husband's affairs and money problems, miscarriages and emotional issues from early bereavement of her own parents
grandfather 1. died from 2 alcoholism-related cancers, lung disease and liver failure, had depression, many affairs in the 1950s and was alcoholic most of his life

grandma 2. grew up in horrendous tenement poverty, COPD from smoking, type 2 diabetes, horrendous diet, lost all teeth aged 24, mobility problems from weight, smoking and lack of exercise; agoraphobia, OCD, anxiety and panic attacks
grandpa 2. grew up in dire poverty as one of 13 children, depression, anger, smoking-related health problems, poor diet, heart problems from poor diet and lack of exercise, emotionally crippled and couldn't relate to his own children

Sounds great as a model for life! Where do I sign up for this 1950s nostalgia lark?

[Buckinbronco]

I'd post that ^*

[Buckinbronco]

Ha ha ha. Life is SO MUCH better now then in the crap old days when everyone was poor and bored

[NoTractorsAtTheTable]

Anything written in Comic Sans is automatically dreadful, no matter the content.

[georgetteheyersbonnet]

You could always post something cheerful below that poem about the massive health and social care burden we are facing as current taxpayers as a result of current pensioners' lifestyle-related health problems - type 2 diabetes and heart disease from poor diets and lack of exercise, COPD from smoking, high numbers of lifestyle-related cancers from sunburn, diet, smoking and alcohol, as well as all those other serious health problems caused by the lack of workplace 'elf and safety in the good old days, such as mesothelioma. Though that might burst the delusional nostalgia bubble

All this rubbish about home cooked meals, ha ha! All my grandparents' generation that I knew of (now in their 80s and 90s) had spectacularly bad diets, were all addicted to processed foods and sugar (my grandparents basically existed on Spam, meat paste sandwiches, processed suet pies, Blue Riband biscuits and Mr Kipling fondant fancies as far as I could tell - not a sniff of a home-cooked meal in sight). They all had type 2 diabetes and heart and lung problems from smoking, all were overweight, all had false teeth as there teeth had all dropped out early in life through decay, and had a load of other health problems from a lifetime of poor diet, chain-smoking, the legacy of childhood illnesses pre-vaccination and so on. And they all, uniformly, had forms of depression and other mental health problems from alcohol addiction to OCD.

People in this country have a serious case of delusion about the lifestyle of past generations. A few years of being on powdered egg rations in the war doesn't compensate for the horrendously unhealthy diet and lifestyle of most of the rest of the twentieth century. And our current crises in funding the NHS are largely down to the needs of a huge bulge of existing and incoming pensioners with complex health problems, a lot of which result from poor diet and lifestyle choices.

[Mov1ngOn]

In particular"the wife was content with her lot" riled me.

As if the problems now are wife's discontent.

[Mov1ngOn]

I wasn't saying that! I'm mainly a sahm myself and love that I've got the choice.


I was reacting to the thought that if we just went back to when women were forced to stay home they would all be happy.

Far too simplistic, as above if that solved everything what about domestic violence, marital rape, etc.

[Chuckading]

canyouforgiveher I understand that and agree with you, it's having choice. I choose to be at home and am happy, but if I wasn't happy I could easily shove the kids in daycare and go back to work, our grandmothers didn't have this choice. I also agree not all women in any era were happy to be told what they had to do! What I didn't like was op stating she felt it awful that women could be happy not working! Maybe I took it too literal, but just because one woman isn't happy in the home, doesn't mean another isn't!

[Spangletangle]

I do find it quite offensive actually.

Various relatives of mine had eating disorders, and mental health problems in the mid last century. They just 'suffered with their nerves'. Mother's little helper anyone?

My own mother was very much not happy with her lot, until the 80s when she got a job and left my father.

[mumoseven]

I do like corned beef though. Remember in the early 80s when you couldn't get it because of the Falklands war?
-misses point-

[emilybrontescorset]

It's a load of crap.

[AliceScarlett]

Urgh yanbu, horrible that is.

[mrsfuzzy]

fbollocksexit.

[ChihuahuaChick]

Maybe I could get my dad to write one about his childhood in 40s/50s...
"My dad was a violent alcoholic, my mother could barely cope, dad spent mum's money on booze, so we were permanently broke".

[Canyouforgiveher]

I'm a stay at home mum who doesn't work and I love that I'm able to be, I wouldn't change it for anything!

yes but you probably wouldn't love that if you had no choice about it- if you had to give up your job when you married (not when you had children) simply because you were married which is what happened to many women in the 1950s (including my mother in 1958).

[Chuckading]

Ok fine the poem is bollocks but....

It seems awful to just think women were happier not working

I'm a stay at home mum who doesn't work and I love that I'm able to be, I wouldn't change it for anything!

[EveryoneElsie]

You're not overthinking it. If people repost shit without understanding it then they shouldnt expect to get a pat on the back for it.

[ManonCrempog]

I love the fact that there is a poem which starts with "I remember the corned beef of my childhood"

[LunaJuna]

Tell her that if she really wants to be a 1950,s housewife and live in the past, she shouldn't get distracted from her house chores to be on Fb

[Toddzoid]

As if women were so happy and contented with that life . I hate the way people look back at the past with rose tinted specs. That entire poem misses out the parts where kids were getting whipped by teachers, wives were beaten and raped and it was accepted, married women weren't really allowed a life outside of the family home, abortion was illegal, homosexuality was illegal, if a woman was raped it was her own fault for being a slag etc etc. We think it's a man's world now, back then women didn't even have the slightest look in. We were their lowly baby makers and maids.

The 'good old days' eh

[LunaJuna]

Why would a woman post this kind of crap on fb???
Women can be a SAHM if it's a pragmatic choice for their families, but they don't need to post things suggesting the patriarchalism is the model for society!! This is awful!!!!!

[kiwimumof2boys]

Oh to go back to those time, times when sexism and racism was rife
and it was legal to beat your wife

Children may have seemed 'seldom unhappy'
But were largely ignored
Too scared to speak up about anything
For fear of being beaten by the jug cord

Women may not have been happy 'with their lot'
Valium addiction, alcohism and depression stats
Show their happiness to most meant not one jot

[wannabehippyandcrazycatlover]

There was a Facebook post not so long ago about how women should be a domestic goddess and be a whore in the bedroom (I'm Paraphrasing) and always please your man- and that if this was old fashioned then they don't care.

I laughed at the post because it was ridiculous but the comments made me seethe. It's this kind of attitude that puts women's rights back decades and should be challenged EVERY TIME.

[ipswichwitch]

I wouldn't say my gran was contented with her lot. She was in the forces in WW2, but the second the war was over she was told in no uncertain terms by her father, that she was to come home to her factory job until they managed to marry her off to a distant cousin. She had no choice in the matter, even though it was the last thing she wanted. She was that miserable and trapped, she began drinking and became violent and abusive to her DC and husband. Happy times eh

I find people that post this type of shite on FB have fuck all idea of the reality of being a 30's/40's/50's housewife. Bet they never surveyed any before they wrote that, cos they certainly wouldn't be claiming they were all contented if they had.

[NickiFury]

So what if there was a thread a few months ago ? I don't live on MN so missed it. I imagine quite a few others did too.