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  • January 14, 2016 at 12:09 am
    B Woodman

    Going back to the 1780s? When a MAN took care of his family against hostiles – Tories, Brits, Indians, and thieves. And the WOMAN supported him fully, or died. No in-between, no metros, no FemiNazis, no hipsters, no latte soy sippin’. At least that’s how I’m reading this.

    • January 14, 2016 at 12:15 am
      formwiz

      The 1780s weren’t fun.

      The MAN took care of his family against hostiles – Tories, Brits, Indians, and thieves with only a single-shot firearm, so the odds against him were lousy.

      Most people died by age 40. The Industrial Revolution was still a gleam in the eye of James Watt, so the only power in most cases was muscle power. No antibiotics. Many people married at least twice – women died almost as often as kids and half of all kids died before they were 5.

      No in-between, no metros, no FemiNazis, no hipsters, no latte soy sippin’

      Who do you think were the nobles and the landed gentry? Some made something of themselves, but many were wastrels.

      As I say, I’ll take 1950 any day.

      • January 14, 2016 at 8:37 am
        DavidT

        One small correction about the average age. If you made it past toddler stage you were likely to make it into your 60s at least. What brought the average down was a high infant mortality rate.

      • January 14, 2016 at 8:46 am
        Cliff H

        What brought the average down was not infant mortality, although that was significant – it was the frequency of women dying during pregnancy and childbirth due to poor or non-existent medical care and/or unhygenic doctors or midwives assisting in childbirth.

        Things may not have been as bad in America as in the old world, but in “The Wealth of Nations” (1775) Adam Smith comments on the 50% or greater child mortality rate among peasants and how this required the wife to produce a never ending stream of children in order to assist in the farm work. This physical strain also commonly resulted in early death for the woman either from fatigue or during childbirth.

        Then there was the problem of the local nobility coming around and drafting your teen-age boys into the service of the King’s latest war. All in all not an era I would particularly like to return to.

      • January 14, 2016 at 11:25 am
        Alan

        Try not to forget: lower-middle class today, even our technically “poor”, have lives better than kings, as late as High Renaissance and even later, with their palaces and hordes of servants, could have dreamed of. Perspective!

      • January 14, 2016 at 8:11 pm
        MasterDiver

        Try this for an example: The palace of Versailles did not have ONE SINGLE toilet/privy. During the grand parties in the Hall of Mirrors, the nobility relieved themselves in the stairwells. No wonder perfume was such a hot commodity.

    • January 14, 2016 at 12:26 am
      interventor

      Plenty of water power. George Washington prospered, first as miller, then as brewer, and, finally, as the largest distiller of fine spirits in the nation.

      • January 14, 2016 at 6:00 pm
        H_B

        Washington had to borrow money to travel to Philadelphia after being elected President. No one would loan him money for his second term, and he died in great debt.

        A great man (he quit), but prosper he did not.

  • January 14, 2016 at 12:10 am
    formwiz

    An American woman in 1950 was sitting on top of the world, wealthy, adored by her man, happy, secure, with kids to love and raise.

    The feminists were unhappy because they were Commie hacks.

    We could do one whole Hell of a lot worse than 1950. Women, most of all.

    • January 14, 2016 at 9:44 am
      rooftop voter

      Amen formwiz.

      Men would be a hell of a lot better off as well. Though you wouldn’t get rich quick, you would have steady work and build towards it.

      People don’t want to take the middle part of the journey anymore.

      • January 14, 2016 at 12:19 pm

        You’ve got that right. In the 1950’s you worked, you took care of your family and you lived your life. I know we’re looking back through rose colored glasses, but today’s living in constant debt, an out of control government, race riots (protests).

        One thing we have in common with the 1950’s is Russia is again a huge threat. Our government just pretends it isn’t so.

  • January 14, 2016 at 12:28 am
    Wuwei_meteor

    Change your own tires, beyotch. To be honest, nothing that American men felt about American women remains the same after the tariff for seeing one naked was revealed to be 2/3 of everything you can earn until she finds someone else to victimize…

    • January 14, 2016 at 8:43 am
      Otto Didact

      That’s only if you live in an alimony (and palimony) state. Course that’s one reason to do your damnedest to find one you figure you have a decent chance of being able to live with till one of you dies. Been with mine for going on FORTY-FOUR YEARS now. But that ain’t saying I don’t have to take a teeny “vacation” now and again. Just me and my dog in a tent in a nice quiet national/state park campsite. She goes to spend a week with her sister 3 hours drive away for the same reason. It works.

    • January 14, 2016 at 1:32 pm
      Insomniac

      Preach it, brother. There’s a reason men are increasingly saying f*ck it and going their own way.

  • January 14, 2016 at 12:31 am

    As Zed and Sam both know, and as Chris is saying here, you can’t go back to the past.

    But back to the future? Maybe…if we can save one. Right now, sad to say, my bet is against it.

  • January 14, 2016 at 12:42 am
    Chris Muir

    This is a comment from NotYetinaCamp-for some reason,wordpress doesn’t like him.

    Mendacity reigned. He spoke of fantasy only believable by the true believers and those dimmed and following as true the words of the Main Stream captive Press. Progressive word changes and manipulations filled the SOTU provided by the writers for the TOTUS.
    My first post was eaten by the alien living in his body, or was that in the internet. So this is a 3rd post. It is but a shadow of the post as Obama is a shadow of an honorable man.
    People like him do believe that they can say whatever they want in order to manipulate the inferior creatures. Communism and Islam encourage such lying and taqyyra to benefir the cause. Bearnaise would be proud.

    I still say that we could use Hand and Franz from old SNL to pound and pump up that girly man into what he deserves to be.

    Islam is still the enemy of all that is not Islam. They must be removed from civilized society and lands. It appears that the Syrian refugee was vetted beforehand as we did not see a spontaneous rape in the “first lady’s” booth on live coverage by a rapeugee.

    We are in an asymmetric war. SOTU was part of that war.

    • January 14, 2016 at 2:43 am
      NotYetInACamp

      TY. I have a few people who like me.

      I think that it is a combination of living beyond land internet connection and the interaction between reaching out by a signal amplifier to reach a weak net connection that works intermittently. The past did not have any of these connections. So back to the future.
      But a future in which equality means empowerment.
      A good woman is impossible to beat. It should be the same for both.
      Alas. Few know what should be possible for a lifetime.
      Neither sex should get a free ride. Responsibility improves life for both.
      1950 would be better if these were the only choices:
      http://moonbattery.com/graphics/womens-rights.jpg

      We have been on the verge of such incredibly good human development, and we keep on getting pulled back. Sometimes by people who want a future than no civilized people should permit. It makes one wonder who is designing the possible futures. Go for the responsible and good. Not the submitted and evil.
      There is so much better possible. We are that good that we should create the better. But we must always recognize and deal with the evil that people are able to do. That, so we can have the better be what is created.

  • January 14, 2016 at 1:04 am

    “…did not see a spontaneous rape in the “first lady’s” booth…”

    Even muz scum have some standards. Little boy butts are one thing, but crossing species boundaries must be a sharia nono.

    • January 14, 2016 at 6:57 am
      Bill G

      “crossing species boundaries must be a sharia nono”
      Incorrect. Search ‘koran’ + ‘intercourse with sheep’
      And a rude old joke has it that an arab saying is “Women for progeny, boys for pleasure, sheep for ecstasy”.

      • January 14, 2016 at 11:10 am

        Point taken. And yet the comparison with sheep and asses is still not favorable for the Moo. It is a species unto itself.

  • January 14, 2016 at 1:53 am
    Joseph Belk

    Sharia prohibits crossing species boundaries?

    Uh, tell that to the surviving jennies (I do mean female Asses, literally) in Iraq, Syria, any Muslim land…

    • January 14, 2016 at 12:34 pm
      Malatrope

      Just remember, the Koran says that Allah insists that you cannot eat the goat after having sex with it.

      • January 14, 2016 at 2:41 pm
        Pete in NC

        But you can sell it to someone in the next town to eat.

  • January 14, 2016 at 3:26 am

    I remember the 1950s. I was born in 1955, and I remember a good piece of that last half decade. I remember the rest of the time since then, and when it started to go to shit, and why. The future must return to the past, or there will be no more of us.

  • January 14, 2016 at 7:06 am
    Bill G

    Back to the Future, indeed. Back, to things that never should have been discarded; things like honesty, common courtesy, common sense, respect for others…”I may disagree with what you say, but I shall defend to the death your right to say it”.
    As NotYetInACamp says, “There is so much better possible.” We are on the verge of incredible things, scientific and technological advances should be bringing a better life to everyone. And yet too many individuals wanting personal power foment violence to be able to rule others.
    I fear for the future of those who follow us.

  • January 14, 2016 at 7:56 am
    eon

    Most of science fiction’s futures truly suck.

    The progressives’ ideal falls somewhere between the movies “Soylent Green” and “Logan’s Run”- either they’re the only ones who eat, with “furniture girls” in their rooms, or they’re the only ones, period, and nobody lives to be older than them. BTW, both were based on novels, SG by Harry Harrison, a hardcore liberal/left type, LR by William Nolan and George C. Johnson, both pretty much “small l” libertarians. I’m guessing most progressives have never read either one, or they wouldn’t think such futures were so cool, even for the “ruling class”.

    “Star Wars” is how the progressives see themselves, as romantic rebels struggling against an evil Empire, i.e. Western civilization, with mystical powers in their corner. (It was originally supposedly set in the 25th Century AD, not “a long time ago…”, etc.) Their paradigm allows them to go all “Triumph of the Will” on everybody else with a clear conscience, as if they needed the excuse.

    The “Hunger Games” is another progressive ideal, and the one I think most are shooting for. They’re the Capitol Party, living in high-tech luxury and coming on like Max Quordlepleen ( or maybe H.R. Pufnstuf), everybody else are medieval peasants who get to be killed in baroque ways in gladiatorial games to amuse their betters. With armed stormtroopers to keep the peasants in line. (They never ask what happens if the stormtroopers decide to make a “change in management”.)

    Even “Star Trek” isn’t all that Utopian. Look up the Maquis sometime on the ST Wikia. Their “benevolent” Federation settles them in the butt-end of nowhere (mainly to get them out of the way due to their “disruptive” political views in a fundamentally Fabian Socialist state), then cedes said BEON to a neighboring and nasty full-on police state, and expects them to get out of the way, sending its war fleet to do them over when they say, “Now, wait just a damn minute, here”.

    The UFP’s message is “Become Enlightened Like Us- Or Else”. And since its military subsumes its police, and they are forbidden to make war on anybody else (see “Organians”), they spend most of their time keeping the proles in line. A government that can’t occupy itself with bothering other governments tends to become oppressive toward its own subjects, mainly because people who go into government are the sort who think they are better than everyone else, and are incapable of minding their own business.

    So before you go “back to the future”, be careful about exactly what sort of “future” everybody else has in mind.

    And don’t forget to look under the rug. And look that “gift horse” in the mouth.

    You never know what might be hiding, in either place.

    clear ether

    eon

    • January 14, 2016 at 11:14 am
      H_B

      More reasons why I love “Doc” Smith’s Lensman.

      • January 14, 2016 at 8:18 pm
        MasterDiver

        We could use a Roderick Kinnison right now. Witherspoon has been in office too damn long, and should have been impeached the day he was inaugurated!

        QX

    • January 14, 2016 at 11:36 am

      You forgot Firefly.

    • January 14, 2016 at 11:40 am
      Alan

      Depends on where you get your science fiction. For the last few decades, the major publishing houses have convinced themselves that dark visions make better ‘literature’ and are what the field deserves. Contrast with the mostly “human wave” stories from Baen’s authors, and a growing number of independents – stories where, even if things are difficult (for dramatic tension purposes), the people are mostly folks you can respect.

    • January 14, 2016 at 12:37 pm
      Malatrope

      It is hard to beat Heinlein’s view of politics.

      • January 14, 2016 at 4:31 pm
        Bunkerbuilder

        Love RAH since 3rd grade, His economics at Best were childish, at worst silly.

        His uncritical belief in Jeffersonian republics was and is silly, (Jefferson’s and Jackson’s anti-National banking fetish held back the USA achieving a more stable business environment for nearly 100 years….

        Progressive/commies want to weaken any social structure that can or could act as source of resistance to the Uber State total conception to cremation Urn lifecycle. No strong social groups like freemasonry, no churches, but the Eco-State one, no families, clans, or tribes except as levers of State policy such as imaginary ethic groups such as “Hispanic.”
        No marriage shall be formed with out the permission of the state or allowed to continue without ongoing constent.

      • January 14, 2016 at 7:28 pm
        H_B

        His politics actually changed quite a bit over the course of his career. I would presume so, but have you read both Starship Troopers and The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress? With emphasis on the high school lessons in personal responsibility from the former and de la Paz’s explanation of “rational anarchy” in the latter?

        Over the years, I’ve thought quite a bit about Paz’s suggestion of a legislative body that only exists to repeal laws.

      • January 14, 2016 at 8:19 pm
        MasterDiver

        Or L. Neil Smith’s

  • January 14, 2016 at 8:23 am
    GWB

    Though there are plenty of examples of problems and bad ideas if you go backward in time, it’s only the progressive mindset – that change equals good and growth – that thinks the future is always better.

    The key isn’t just in things like chivalric ideals. It goes to a more fundamental issue – moral citizens. Amoral and immoral citizens cannot live in a free republic. Period.
    Morals are how we govern ourselves. Progressives throw them out because they don’t want to be governed by ideas set down by some god. Hedonism prevails as they ironically set themselves up to be their own gods.

    However, man cannot live unrestrained. To live among others, he must be governed. This means he must govern himself, or others must govern him.
    The progressives have stripped away our self-governance by breaking down and destroying our morals. They have indoctrinated our country into believing that God is dead and they don’t have to follow His rules any more.
    But, you must retrain a man. So, they preach absolute hedonism in sexuality, but insist on “affirmative consent” laws and codes that allow retroactive charges of regret rape. They insist on being allowed to say or show any vulgar thing or act – while denying everyone else the right to use “offensive” words.

    The only way to return our freedom is to restrain ourselves. This can only come with the recovery of morality and humility (the acknowledgement that God is god, and I am not).
    Until then, expect the progressives to continue to make it very difficult for men to be men and for women to be women.

    A great divorce is coming. It can be amicable, or it can be bloody. But the time for peaceful separation is coming to an end – rapidly. If it turns bloody, all of Western Civilization will likely fall (with the possible exception of Oceania).

    Lan astaslem.
    Molon labe.
    Give me freedom or give me death.

    • January 14, 2016 at 4:51 pm
      Doo-Dah, Doo-Dah

      “… man cannot live unrestrained. To live among others, he must be governed. This means he must govern himself, or others must govern him. ”

      Excellent summary.

      Thank you.

      • January 14, 2016 at 5:50 pm
        John Greer

        A wonderful synopsis of Hobbs’ Leviathan.
        Too bad the poor man was so verbose it would kill him to be so succinct.

    • January 14, 2016 at 9:09 pm
      interventor

      Oceania is a sparsely populated area. Exists because of the US and the Pacific fleet. China has plans for Australia, mentioned in their military plans.

  • January 14, 2016 at 9:07 am
    Cliff H

    Since we’re discussing science fiction, a short excerpt, if Chris will indulge me:

    Young girls are attending a lecture –

    “But Momma Maria,” a girl near the back called out. She stood up, tall and not yet fully developed as the woman she would one day become.
    “My name is Caroline, Carrie. My mother has six children and even though she loves my dad she really doesn’t want more. Neither of them are passionate youths any more, but she still wants to keep him happy. What should a girl do if she doesn’t want to get pregnant?”
    Maria considered this for a moment.
    “Carrie, modern medicine has given us many miracle drugs that when properly used are wonderful things. When abused they can be Hell.
    “There are times in every woman’s life when she either should not or does not want to risk pregnancy. Girls the age of all of you here, for one thing, and women older than forty when the stress of pregnancy may be extremely hazardous to both mother and baby. There are economic and other pressures all through life that may also occur. At those times it is entirely appropriate to use effective contraceptives.
    “Keep in mind, girls, that nature has created in you this paradox of wanting children and yet fearing pregnancy. In every potential relationship it is the woman who must consider if she wants to risk investing 9 months of pregnancy, the difficulty and pain of childbirth, and 16 to 18 years raising this particular man’s child. Since Nature also decided that men are expendable they do not have this problem. A man is only pregnant if he WANTS to be pregnant, and he can still walk away at any time, or might even die.
    “This is the natural order of things and the price we pay for our children is what makes us care so much about them. Thomas Paine wrote, ‘What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives everything its value…’ and nature has seen to it that we pay dearly for our children.

  • January 14, 2016 at 11:01 am
    Spin Drift

    We look to the past for our future? Me, only in the sense that I see 1984 coming if we don’t get off our asses and mold a new future based on personal responsibility. That’s it.

    Remember all politics are local. When the government has finally gotten to (read that as F’d over) enough citizens (Obamacare anyone?) maybe some will move to right the ship. It’s to too easy to settle (we’re hoping for a fertile spring) for the other guy to do something. Well you’re the other guy now. The wolves are at your door. It won’t get better until you/we demand better.

    Trump has seized being the lightning rod for the disgruntled man. Unfortunately I think he will be a less than stellar benevolent dictator and bend to the crony capitalists for future citizen fleecing. This would be a bad thing as the outcome of that will be a big lurch left and the despotic end game just gets moved 4 years out.

    It’s time to right the ship, personal responsibility, no government dependence, belief that you are an imperfect being and need to acknowledge a greater divinity are the bed rock of what this country was made from. That is what going back means.

    Spin
    Molon Labe
    Right the Ship
    TrusTed

  • January 14, 2016 at 11:32 am
    Arkelk

    The only real problem I see with going back to the 1950s (and early 1960s) was the legal and institutional racism. We had been making general progress getting away from that until the last seven years. If we could go back to the 1950s/early 1960s’ hope and spirit of technical progress and general morality but without the racism, we would be well off indeed.

    • January 14, 2016 at 12:25 pm

      I pray that is entirely possible. There are some changes that were for the good of mankind and the removal of institutionalized racism was one of them. I believe the points made concerning we must follow a moral code adhere to that and better emphasize the changes we need to make.

      Without a moral compass to guide us, we wind up with what we have now. Basically following the Satanic guideline “Do what thou wilt”.

      • January 14, 2016 at 1:11 pm
        steveb919

        Welfare is institutionalized racism if I’ve ever seen it. Keep them under control at all cost.

  • January 14, 2016 at 11:54 am
    Lonestarwhacko

    Basic point is this……American women aren’t worth the risk. More and more young men understand that now. Modern marriage is an economic trap. But there’s a way to avoid that! MGTOW!

    Before some feminist starts whining about the children…….well…….we don’t want a woman to hold them as hostages. Yes, white men are to blame for everything, right? Well, we aren’t going to be the whipping boy any longer.

    Feminists expect us b to protect them, irregardless of what they do to us. Bad idea.

  • January 14, 2016 at 11:58 am

    We sure as hell shouldn’t look to sci-fic for a blueprint; as noted in the examples those imaginations were limited to a time-bending alien-populated version of the elite/prole shithole we’re in right now. And we shouldn’t expect much more from people whose only claim to fame is a vivid imagination/prescience and the ability to write that down entertainingly. But virtually every one is perfectly willing to envision limitless possibilities of other-worldliness, with the exception of the One that is real, regardless of their inability or unwillingness to ponder and/or accept it.

    And that of course is what is missing from our present. The belief that there is something greater to guide our thoughts, activities, and planning. So to me, back to the future means looking at what was good and bad and what worked and what didn’t in both the 1780’s and the 1950’s, and attempting to apply those lessons and principles to the modern world to salvage and/or create a worthwhile future to go “back” to.

    I hear B. Franklin’s words in my head quite a lot these days, and blend it into the sage wisdom from an uneducated mill co-worker whose simplistic three words mean and apply so much to what we have done to ourselves at this juncture…Ben, in answer to the question “what have we got, a monarchy or a republic?” as he left the Constitutional Convention of 1787 answered “a republic, if you can keep it.” And it is painfully obvious that we have not. The mill worker would say, when someone would abuse or take for granted opportunities and advances in work and life “Cain’t stand prosperity…” And it is painfully obvious that we could not. Can we use all of the above to regain our republic and true prosperity? I don’t know.

    But BTW, as to us heading to 1984? Well, we sure have been trying to make the literary version real, and in many ways we have. But talk about going back to the past, the real 1984? Mid-Reagan; yeah I’d take that…but of course that was a renewed chance at a republic, and we couldn’t keep it, because we just didn’t recognize it, or maybe because we just cain’t stand prosperity.

  • January 14, 2016 at 6:07 pm
    Gus Bailey

    Sorry Chris, that one went over my head. Either the commenters are right and Zed wants a return to either the 1850s or 1750s; OR, Zed doesn’t believe that modern American men are MAN enough to handle the 1950s. I’m suspecting the latter. Please advise.

    • January 14, 2016 at 7:27 pm
      Chris Muir

      yes on the 1st part.

    • January 14, 2016 at 7:39 pm
      H_B

      Since the rest of the comments have been about SF, I’ll mention Lucifer’s Hammer by Niven and Pournelle. The story, after much buildup and character establishment, is about a comet directly colliding with the Earth. Civilization immediately collapses. The rest of the story is about putting civilization back together. One of the first casualties of the catastrophe: feminism. When it was easy and there was plenty of wealth, it sounded like a winning ideology. After things go bad, women immediately start cozying up to the most capable man they can find.

      Scratch a man, find a savage. Scratch a feminist, find a housewife.

      As to “going backwards”, I don’t think it would be a bad thing if people spontaneously adopted the mindsets of the skeptical, rationalist, “Age of Enlightenment” in the late 1700s.

      • January 14, 2016 at 8:27 pm
        Lonestarwhacko

        I think it will depend on just how feral the feminist is. No sane man will feed and shelter a mentally ill whack job. If we see those types of hard times, I reckon problems will be taken out and dealt with.

      • January 14, 2016 at 9:01 pm
        MasterDiver

        Earlier, I referred to L.Neil Smith. In his “Probability Broach” series, he posits a society based on Individual Property Rights, tempered with the principle that no one has the right to INITIATE aggression against another. Imagine the tough, individualism and drive of the early 19th century, combined with the technology and entrepreneurial spirit of the 20th, without the drag of smothering government regulation and taxation.
        If an individual tries to initiate violence (or theft, rape, assault, B&E, etc) the target (note I did NOT say “victim”) has every right to respond with up to and including deadly force to protect himself, his family, and his property. Additionally, if the perp is fortunate enough to survive, he must make restitution to the person he attacked. Courts only exist to enforce this practice by adjudicating the suit, and determining the restitution to be made. Once restitution is made, he is square and the matter is settled. If he can’t make good, his name is plastered all over the private and public media branding him as a malefactor. If anyone wants to do business with him, they have been warned. There are no prisons, no permanent criminal class. Crime is just too dangerous to be a successful lifestyle.

        The bottom line is that no-one has the right to force his beliefs, desires, or concepts on anyone else. He can try to convince them, by debate, argument, logic, or persuasion, but they must willingly agree, not be forced. Basically, everything is contractual, with all parties unanimously agreeing to the terms. This includes governments, which puts a major crimp in political power.
        Read the books, especially the first in the series. Anarchy CAN be a stable form of government.

  • January 14, 2016 at 7:29 pm
    Pamela

    If you’re going to hit the re-set button, watch out for the bump/crash/boom that comes with it.
    I can hear it now “Honey, we’re running out of mammoth, you want to get Ogg and the others, and run that small one down over there. I need to get the spiders out of the cave. Again.”

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