Poll of the Day > Best era in American history

(+) Yeah! (+)

I think most people would say any era before the Civil Rights Era because according to some, that's when America lost its way.

When the internet emerged for me is one of the best eras.

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70s and 90s both seem really great. I chose the 70s just because then I could experience both

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Late 90s were the high point of American society. It's been all downhill ever since

If I had to pick one of those, 90's.

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1990s.

Not as much war, not as racist as it had been before, had a president that smoked cigars and gets his dick sucked by college interns.

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faramir77 posted...

Not as much war

Kuwait, Panama, Yugoslavia, Somalia... The US military wasn't exactly twiddling its thumbs.

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Depends on who you are.

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Probably depends on what your background is.
For me, Id say anytime prior to 1492

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That moment when those wall streeters jumped out windows

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What an amazing shock that a site populated almost entirely by children of the 1990s would vote for the 1990s. Truly, this is an astounding and unexpected result.
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ParanoidObsessive posted...

What an amazing shock that a site populated almost entirely by children of the 1990s would vote for the 1990s. Truly, this is an astounding and unexpected result.

I considered this but I've also heard older folks talk about how great everything was in the mid to late 90s

The 80s seem like they would've been fun though

G) Probably any time before Columbus reached those islands to the southeast.

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1770s

My era.

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Blighboy posted...

That moment when those wall streeters jumped out windows

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ParanoidObsessive posted...

What an amazing shock that a site populated almost entirely by children of the 1990s would vote for the 1990s. Truly, this is an astounding and unexpected result.

40s and 50s: white supremacist hellhole
60s: hippies, racism starting to be acknowledged
70s: women are now considered people
80s: death of liberalism, rise of trickle down Reaganomics bullshit
90s: I did not have sexual relations with that woman
00s: Jesus Christ don't get me started
10s: started okay but then your parents got Facebook and elected a YouTube comment section as president

Pick one.

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faramir77 posted...

80s: death of liberalism, rise of trickle down Reaganomics bullshit

Reaganonics didn't really start impacting shit until after the 80s though. Every older person I've talked to that lived through the 80s talks about fun it was. As a metal fan, it seems like it would've been fun for metal fans at least lol

The 80's were great sure, if you were straight and white, and even better as a man.

IronBornCorps posted...

The 80's were great sure, if you were straight and white, and even better as a man.

Which is hilarious because one of the biggest fashion styles of the 80s for men was to look completely androgynous.

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Those choices seem more like decades and not really "eras".

IronBornCorps posted...

The 80's were great sure, if you were straight and white, and even better as a man.

I feel like it's tough to judge it that way. It's not really fair to look at life back then through a 2021 social media addicted, outraged lens

I voted idk. As a white passing male life was good in all aspects of American life even today despite all the cries about sjws.

Yeah, I voted 90s while trying to detach from nostalgia. Historically, I'd consider every decade in American history pretty terrible. Only went 90s because things were becoming a tiny bit more progressive, except...not at all XD. Clinton was basically a moderate Republican. 2000s could also be a contender, but the bigger wars kind of screw it.

Honestly surprised there have been 0 60s votes. Once again, a lot of total crap in that decade, but there truly was an opening of perspective in society and music at large (in the USA).

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Pre-invasion from Europe, probably, so like... 1480s or earlier? Other than that, I guess it's today, but that says less about how great today is and more about how godawful it's been in the past. From the poll, maybe either the 60s or 90s. Still a ton of bullshit going on then, but... eh... I'll give a vote to 60s just because Fa said no one has voted for that yet.

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Gaawa_chan posted...

Pre-invasion from Europe, probably, so like... 1480s or earlier? Other than that, I guess it's today, but that says less about how great today is and more about how godawful it's been in the past.

Yeah it was good times back then. Ya know, dying of diseases that would be easily treatable now as well periods of famine. Women dying during childbirth. Children dying of things that would be easily treatable now. Barbaric warfare and massive amounts of unchecked rape

faramir77 posted...
80s: death of liberalism

A lot of kick ass movies came out in the 80's too. Enjoy the 80's and then move on to the 90's. Everything sounds great about that choice!

For me, it's a tie between 1980s and 1990s. After that, technology became too advanced, controlling, confusing, and inconvenient. People also became more evil. From here on, it's only going to get worse.

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The great era we could create.

OhhhJa posted...

Yeah it was good times back then. Ya know, dying of diseases that would be easily treatable now as well periods of famine. Women dying during childbirth. Children dying of things that would be easily treatable now. Barbaric warfare and massive amounts of unchecked rape

those were the good old days

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*shrugs*

My personal favorite so far has been the '90s.

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OhhhJa posted...

Late 90s were the high point of American society. It's been all downhill ever since

So The Matrix had it right.

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80s had the best music

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OhhhJa posted...

I feel like it's tough to judge it that way. It's not really fair to look at life back then through a 2021 social media addicted, outraged lens

When a lot of your friends and people you love start dying from some new disease called AIDS, you know the 80s are a shitty decade to be gay. That's not looking back on it through a "social media addicted, outraged lens".

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Criminalt posted...

When a lot of your friends and people you love start dying from some new disease called AIDS, you know the 80s are a shitty decade to be gay. That's not looking back on it through a "social media addicted, outraged lens".

Wasn't the issue with AIDs more of a promiscuity and lack of basic safe sex practices thing more than sexual preference? After all if a couple only sleeps with each other and they both know the other person has been tested and they have a trustworthy character then it's almost impossible for any issues like that to come up regardless of if they're straight or gay.

Imagine not being a 90s kid

Reigning_King posted...

Wasn't the issue with AIDs more of a promiscuity and lack of basic safe sex practices thing more than sexual preference? After all if a couple only sleeps with each other and they both know the other person has been tested and they have a trustworthy character then it's almost impossible for any issues like that to come up regardless of if they're straight or gay.

It was more rampant in the gay community in the 80s, but I think it was inaccurately portrayed as a virus only gay people contracted when that was pretty far from the truth. I remember, even as a kid in the 90s, it being kind of a social stigma for the gay community

OhhhJa posted...

Yeah it was good times back then. Ya know, dying of diseases that would be easily treatable now as well periods of famine. Women dying during childbirth. Children dying of things that would be easily treatable now. Barbaric warfare and massive amounts of unchecked rape

Yea cause none of that happened afterwards

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Reigning_King posted...

Wasn't the issue with AIDs more of a promiscuity and lack of basic safe sex practices thing more than sexual preference?

It took a while for the mechanism of transmission to be properly understood, there was a lot of confusion and misinformation, and even by the middle of the decade there still remained uncertainty and fear about whether or not it was even safe to shake hands with someone who's gay. Gay men were treated as likely carriers of a deadly disease simply on account of their sexual preference, because their sexual preference was deemed to be their "lifestyle". It was as much about perceptions of the disease and of those whom it affected as it was about its health impact.

And when people around you, who are close to you, start dying, it makes for years of shitty memories and all the hindsighted lectures about the importance of monogamy don't change that.

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ParanoidObsessive posted...

What an amazing shock that a site populated almost entirely by children of the 1990s would vote for the 1990s. Truly, this is an astounding and unexpected result.

Thats what Arv chose

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Criminalt posted...

It took a while for the mechanism of transmission to be properly understood, there was a lot of confusion and misinformation, and even by the middle of the decade there still remained uncertainty and fear about whether or not it was even safe to shake hands with someone who's gay. Gay men were treated as likely carriers of a deadly disease simply on account of their sexual preference, because their sexual preference was deemed to be their "lifestyle". It was as much about perceptions of the disease and of those whom it affected as it was about its health impact.

Ah. I will admit I didn't think of it like that at all. I suppose the saying "hindsight is 20-20" is appropriate here but if I do sit and think about it I suppose I had heard things about the paranoia people had. While I wasn't alive to see that play out for myself I've seen plenty of examples of how irrational fear that can twist people here in this era so it checks out.

bshwalker posted...

Yea cause none of that happened afterwards

It takes a great deal of ignorance to compare quality of life in a first world country in 2021 to quality of life in the 1400s and walk away thinking, "ah yeah, it was so much better back then." I guess that's easy to do when you didn't live in the 1400s, but cmon

OhhhJa posted...

Yeah it was good times back then. Ya know, dying of diseases that would be easily treatable now as well periods of famine. Women dying during childbirth. Children dying of things that would be easily treatable now. Barbaric warfare and massive amounts of unchecked rape

Pandemics were not as common in pre-Columbian USA because civilization in the western hemisphere was not organized the same way it was in the east (lower population densities + large distances between civilizations = slower spread, and they also did not have chickens/cows/pigs, so the western hemisphere had fewer infectious diseases- syphilis is the most famous one). Modern medicine aside (as it is definitely a large point in favor of the modern era being best), it's ridiculous that you think the modern era is somehow significantly better in terms of war/rape, particularly when it comes to the Americas (the history of post-Columbus Americas is just a non-stop onslaught of genocide and war, be it on this soil or shipping our folks out to butcher people overseas), and particularly when it comes to the indigenous peoples, who even today have some of the worst statistics in terms of being victims of violence in the country in great part owing to a Supreme Court ruling that made it impossible for tribes to prosecute non-tribe members who committed crimes against them *googles* Oliphant v. Suquamish Indian Tribe (1978).

But to be honest, I was not thinking in those terms; my chosen metric was that indigenous Americans utilized resources more sustainably, and as we teeter on the cusp of irreversible climate damage and a non-stop barrage of global superbug pandemics, it seems a bit silly to act as though this is some sort of inarguable truth that the modern day was better than the pre-Columbus Americas. After that time, the western hemisphere's history can be summarized thusly: genocide -> colonialism -> non-sustainable industrialization -> climate change + global pandemics with highly resilient superbugs + unending waves of multi-nation wars and economic crashes.

None of that leads to long-term stability/sustainability, and I do tend to prioritize that over modern conveniences, though that's definitely a YMMV thing. It's really not a matter of any era being particularly great. While they all have their ups and downs, you're basically trying to pick out which is the "least shit."

You also completely ignored the part where I said that it's basically either pre-columbian era... OR today. Any spot between those two points means that you're compromising both of the best aspects those two points offer- sustainability and fewer pandemics vs modern medicine and conveniences.

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Gaawa_chan posted...

Modern medicine aside (as it is definitely a large point in favor of the modern era being best)

You make lots of good points but I think this point can't be minimized. It is the single most important factor in terms of quality of life. Modern medicine has saved countless lives of people that would've never survived birth or infancy as well as people with conditions or diseases that are easily treatable now that were a death sentence then. Hell, I possibly may not have survived as a baby back then because I had jaundice

OhhhJa posted...

You make lots of good points but I think this point can't be minimized. It is the single most important factor in terms of quality of life. Modern medicine has saved countless lives of people that would've never survived birth or infancy as well as people with conditions or diseases that are easily treatable now that were a death sentence then. Hell, I possibly may not have survived as a baby back then because I had jaundice

I think it's a fair and reasonable position to choose the modern era for the existence of modern medicine.

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OhhhJa posted...

It takes a great deal of ignorance to compare quality of life in a first world country in 2021 to quality of life in the 1400s and walk away thinking, "ah yeah, it was so much better back then." I guess that's easy to do when you didn't live in the 1400s, but cmon

My post is implying that prior to 1492, things were better for the indigenous people of the Americas than after. All the advances made after that date, didnt benefit them and only minimally benefits them now. It wasnt much better in the 1400s for some people than it is now, thats true. But for others, 500 years of what theyve gotten is not better than what they had prior to colonization by a group that tried to exterminate them.

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