The_1950's

While the 1950’s were a time of prosperity post the war it was also a time of change and conformity. The Cold War brought upon many accusations and insecurity. People soon realized that a new era was to become after this high pressure search for communists. The 1950’s became a time of conformity in which families were the center of life. Couples married young, moved to suburbs, and lived in a new society of consumerism. The 1950’s included traditional gender roles and conformity and yet a rebellious youth culture. This time also included the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement. The 1950’s was a time of conformity and contradictions that led to rebellious 1960’s. Life began to take on a whole new look. Television was created, and embraced by almost every family who could afford it. The television became the center of every families life. Not only did everyone run home excited to watch it, but everyone also embraced the shows as a display of what life should ideally be. Shows like “I Love Lucy,” and “Father Knows Best” showed a “typical” family life. The man wore a suit and carried a briefcase every morning to work and the woman was a full time housewife, always tending to the children and husband. These shows became the ideal way of life and anyone who did not live this way felt as if their family was strange or had something wrong with it. These shows, and television all in itself made people conform to what they saw and what the new “large corporations” exactly wanted. Women saw the new house cleaning products or stoves and believed that they truly needed these things. People began to become exactly what the television showed, or at least they tried. Furthermore, television and the culture in itself created a new type of gender role. The 1950’s became a time in which traditional style roles became very popular. After so many problems during the war and during McCarthy, people only wanted to conform to a traditional type of family life. Influenced by television and culture people began to take on new roles. Just like on television, women and men took on separate roles. The man was the head of the household and was expected to go to work, come home, watch television, and eat. While the woman was expected to stay home, watch the children, clean the house, tend to the husband, and cook. Then the children were expected to be obedient and perfect in school. The problem was that no family could be perfect and no family was the ideal traditional family. Not only this, but also this gender separation was unfair. If a family had a problem or was not like the family shown on television, they would be scared to be seen by their neighbors. Nobody wanted to be different. Nobody was supposed to have problems. Mothers were always beautiful, and even cleaned the house in high heels. Fathers were strong and manly. Men never showed emotion other than anger and slight happiness. Children all followed the rules. They never had sexual relations and had very good manners. This caused many women, men, and teens to become frustrated with their society. They could not stand the fake smiles, happiness. Gender roles took on one of the biggest changes after WWII and then also after the 1950’s.