Pajama Game - History Lecture : Mr Kent

1950s - WWII
2 emotions - Darkest period, happiest period
Hope/Despair
America during WWII
 America was previously a country of isolation
          - Resilience
          - Belief that they can solve their own problems
America ends up fighting Germany
       - Germany declared this war

Their victory was a tainted moral victory for US  
           Compromised victory because they aligned with communist Russia.
                - The US fired bombed cities
                - The US lost their moral compass through use of nuclear bombs and propaganda

Despair - had a sense of hope for African Americans
- WWII raised that blacks were needed by the americans. They spilt their blood with white people
- They dealt with tyranny abroad and at home

Women were in charge of themselves to a new degree - Propaganda embraced the equality of women
1945 - country town between despair and hope
Months after war victory, a new fear of communism .
This fear of communism starts to erode their hope.
Hope for blacks and women stop followed by a sense that their hope was misguided.
- Cloud of fear of communism and fear of the nuclear war (fear was even bigger because of their lack of technology and communications unlike our world now)
Nuclear war was the big downer for the 1950s


Labour unions - protect the rights of the workers
- became politicised
- collective bargaining (communism)

Moguls of industry had political power and had a fear of communism which was logical.
Russians declared "their objective for the whole world to be communist"
- US were agitated by work unions

Industries at that time had gone from producing domestic products to war machines back to domestic products.
Women's rights in the 1950s were the women saying "You owe us" to the men for taking over their role during the war.
- became angry that they had been expected to go back to their previous role
- their access to money had changed
- women decided how to spend money
- issues of domestic violence was highest in the 50s
- voters - politicians started listening to women

Despair
1. Men won't change - the patriarcal idea of men's control was under threat
2. some women gave in, some fought, some fled (divorce)

They actually fought the war to preserves what it meant to be american (this social unfairness comes with this)
Communism - men and women were equal

Despair that so little is changing and the change is taking so long.

Blacks weren't treated equally after fighting with whites

1945- everything seemed happy but deep down there was despair