Rating: 
Summary: Historical realities negate right-wing propaganda
Review: Every time early autumn rolls around, the American public is lambasted with a hysterical mantra spewing from the far right. This mantra comes in the form of a political philosophy (conservatism) that claims to be upholding 'family values.' Many politicians campaign on the platform of being 'pro-family' and promise to restore America to a nation of nuclear families consisting of a married heterosexual couple with children. They claim that 'evils' such as abortion, homosexuality, and divorce have disbanded the nuclear family of the '50s, and in order to reverse the nation's 'moral decline,' we all need to return to the days of the past where everything was just perfect. Fortunately, with this book, Stephanie Coontz has rained on the Republican parade. The pointed title explains it all -- we never actually were the perfect nation; the perfect family never existed. Coontz traces the American family from the early 1800s to the present day and concludes that every generation has had its fair share of troubles -- the 'Leave it to Beaver' family that we all dream about is just that -- a dream. We all get so caught up in remembering the good things about the past that we forget to remember the bad things, the things that made life miserable for families of the past: poverty, poor work conditions, extremely high teenage pregnancy and school dropout rates. Even some of today's problems were present in the families of the past. Divorce statistics do not actually reveal marital satisfaction; women of the past were more afraid to leave their husbands before modern feminism. Also, homosexuality has always existed. Dr. Alfred C. Kinsey's study of male sexuality in 1948 concluded that 10% of men are gay -- that figure has not fluctuated, despite conservative claims that there are 'too many gays today.' Recent studies even suggest that Kinsey's estimate is liberal; this would only indicate that the number of gays went down, not up. Abortion? Yep -- just like drug use, it still happens when it's illegal. Even though the abortion rate was lower when it was illegal, we shouldn't fool ourselves into thinking that it didn't occur. In summary, family life in the past wasn't everything that conservatives think it was. When they say that we should return to 'strong family values,' we can't look to the past -- the era of 'strong family [conservative] values' will probably never exist. Overall, this was an awesome book that reminded me why I'm an ardent Democrat. The book loses a star from me because of the writing; Coontz makes the reader confused in places where she crams many facts into small paragraphs without explaining what they mean. At the end of each chapter, I thoroughly understood what she was attempting to say, but I sometimes got a little lost along the way. I don't think that this caveat should be enough to deter anyone from reading the book, though. The book is still centered on an important political principle that many conservatives need to hear. Before making ridiculous claims about what they think the past was like, Republicans need to take time to review history and get their facts straight. The politics that Coontz concludes with couldn't be more accurate: Conservatism is all about 'the way we never were.' Liberalism is all about 'the way we really are.'
Rating: 
Summary: Had to put it down.
Review: I got about halfway through this book and I couldn't take it anymore. I agree with her analysis of private vs. public morality and family life. She also observed that the return to "family values" is indirectly targeted toward women. While I think she did a fairly good job tackling a very challenging topic, I had many problems with her organization. For example, she went into excrutiating detail to support her argument. She also came across as too academic, which is great for a student or teacher, but not for a casual reader. She rambled so much that at times I forgot her initial argument. Also, her time range was too great. I honestly don't think politicians are referring to the Victorian age when talking about "family values." She could have limited her argument to the 20th Century and it would have been just as effective, if not MORE effective. I had to skip parts because I got so sick of reading about irrelevant descriptions of Victorian life. This book would have been a lot more interesting if she had added a more qualitative, personalized element to her discussion. Overall, its not a bad book, it's just too much like a textbook.
Rating:
Summary: Had to put it down.
Review: I got about halfway through this book and I couldn't take it anymore. I agree with her analysis of private vs. public morality and family life. She also observed that the return to "family values" is indirectly targeted toward women. While I think she did a fairly good job tackling a very challenging topic, I had many problems with her organization. For example, she went into excrutiating detail to support her argument. She also came across as too academic, which is great for a student or teacher, but not for a casual reader. She rambled so much that at times I forgot her initial argument. Also, her time range was too great. I honestly don't think politicians are referring to the Victorian age when talking about "family values." She could have limited her argument to the 20th Century and it would have been just as effective, if not MORE effective. I had to skip parts because I got so sick of reading about irrelevant descriptions of Victorian life. This book would have been a lot more interesting if she had added a more qualitative, personalized element to her discussion. Overall, its not a bad book, it's just too much like a textbook.
Rating:
Summary: Done Well; Informative
Review: I read this book several years ago, and I enjoyed it quite a bit. The research was woven into the study excellently, and the discussion of how the families of the 50s helped create the families and culture we have now was facinating. If you're interested in American culture, esp. The Family, this is a book for you. The book does get a little slow at times, but if you stick with it, you'll be well rewarded
Rating: 
Summary: Much needed balance
Review: I was born in 1970, and my childhood memories are of sun-bathed days riding my bike and playing with my friends in the safe streets of rural England. Mummies and Daddies formed coherent units, there was a real sense of community, and life has been downhill from there. Right? Except that, as an adult, I know better. One couple across the road were staying in a miserable marriage in which affairs were used to express anger; another neighbour beat the living daylights out of his wife; two children from my school walked miles to the police station to report that they were being beaten and starved; paedophile rings were being dealt with; cases of incest, rape, and violent crime were not so unusual; and the fact is that I have no memory of these things because they were kept from me.
The argument that the past was better because one remembers it being so does not, I fear, hold water. Historians and sociologists fight a losing battle against nostalgia and the very human desire to return to a golden age when things were simpler, more wholesome, easier to deal with than the realities we face as adults. Books like Coontz's 'The Way We Never Were' are vital to understanding and facing the complexities of the world instead of retreating in fear to a world of projected simplicity and order that never really existed.
Rating:
Summary: Yes!
Review: I was powerfully inclined in this book's favor before I ever read it, because I already KNEW the Fifties weren't so great. How? Because I grew up in the 1950s, the child of a woman who left my father because he was drunk who beat her, was starting to beat me (when I was a baby), and could not hold a job. I also well recall my grandparents' devoutly religious friends calling her a bad woman and a bad mother for leaving her marriage. So needless to say I loved this book. It seems to me to be well researched and to point out a lot of things we have forgotten about the Fifties. There were lots of women like my mother, who went out to work to support themselves and their children, and it's nice to finally find a book that points out that we were there, too, along with all the picket fences and nuclear familites; that things were more complex than some people want to acknowledge, that families can be hell on earth for their members, that in spite of what another reviewer says, leaving a marriage can be a good moral choice and not a sign of depravity. Five stars, but allow for the fact that I am sort of biased here.
Rating:
Summary: Yes!
Review: I was powerfully inclined in this book's favor before I ever read it, because I already KNEW the Fifties weren't so great. How? Because I grew up in the 1950s, the child of a woman who left my father because he was drunk who beat her, was starting to beat me (when I was a baby), and could not hold a job. I also well recall my grandparents' devoutly religious friends calling her a bad woman and a bad mother for leaving her marriage. So needless to say I loved this book. It seems to me to be well researched and to point out a lot of things we have forgotten about the Fifties. There were lots of women like my mother, who went out to work to support themselves and their children, and it's nice to finally find a book that points out that we were there, too, along with all the picket fences and nuclear familites; that things were more complex than some people want to acknowledge, that families can be hell on earth for their members, that in spite of what another reviewer says, leaving a marriage can be a good moral choice and not a sign of depravity. Five stars, but allow for the fact that I am sort of biased here.
Rating:
Summary: Definite must-read
Review: I'm not surprised that some of the reactions to this book have been hostile and dismissive; people wish to hang onto their rosy view of the past, no matter how much proof is offered that it wasn't so rosy. Coontz isn't out to "destroy" the 1950s; she gives the era its due, in fact. All she is doing is pointing out that they weren't as golden as they seemed on the surface, and that things are much more complicated than "that era was great, this era is awful."
Rating:
Summary: Breathtaking! A must read for preachers, teachers, Americans
Review: I'm only 40 pages into the book (though I did cheat and read some in the middle), and I CAN'T RECOMMEND IT HIGHLY ENOUGH! An absolute must for anyone who is even a casual student of history, sociology, family life, or pop culture. A must for any pastor or counselor trying to understand the culture we are in today. An absolute must for any POLITICIAN touting a return to the values of the past. A glorified research paper, well . . .yes. A real page-turner. . . definitely! See the world in a new way, read this book!
Rating:
Summary: Not perfect, but a useful look at a misunderstood time.
Review: I, personally, found this to be an informative and useful book. While author Coontz's politically correct bias is obvious; it doesn't necessarily detract from the overall quality of the text. Despite the comments of a number of other reviewers, the 1950s were hardly a utopian time for families in the US. While many things that we find problems today were not as pervasive at the time -- violence, drug use, etc. -- they were present; and the seeds of this crop, which were to bear fruit in the '60s and '70s were sewn in the '50s. Far from being utopian, the '50s were in many ways a Huxleyan cesspit. Institutionalized racism, intense homophobia, enforced conformity. Any peace that existed during the '50s was merely a Pax Romana, achieved by suppressing diversity and creativity, built on the bodies of minorities, women, and children. Intellectuals and artists were persona non grata, and mundanity was the norm. Popular entertainment was a morass of blandness and mediocrity; the result of the Hayes Code, and oppression of writers and filmmakers who held unpopular political views. It was the decade of McCarthy's witch hunts. "Are you now, or have you ever been, a communist, homosexual, etc." Of Jim Crow laws and segregated facilities. Coontz is superb at capturing the contradictions inherent in the times; the trumpeting of peace and prosperity in an environment of increasing social upheaval and economic polarization. Of the beginning of massive government interference in the private lives of citizens; setting the stage for much worse to come. Of non-violent civil rights activities and protest meeting with violent backlash from the government and other mainstream groups. As Coontz illustrates quite well, teen pregnancy rates, rather than being much lower than now, were actually equivalent to the current rate (and have remained fairly consistent throughout American history). The main differences pointed out were that, rather than the open manner in which they are dealt with today. such things were hidden and denied. Most resulted in the "shotgun weddings" which were much more common at the time. Often, pregnant girls (particularly those of "good" or rich families) were sent off to stay with distant relatives before their "shame" was discovered. Their babies put up for adoption, or the pregnacies terminated by (expensive) clandestine abortionists. Schools, far from the pristine institutions of learning some try to claim, were rife with violence; as exemplified in Evan Hunter's novel "Blackboard Jungle". There were many complaints about the sorry state of the nations schools, the poor quality of eductation -- particularly in areas which were not predominantly middle- and upper-class white. Rather than demonizing the era, Coontz even tends to gloss over some of the worst parts. Child abuse, particularly sexual abuse, was considered a "family issue" and kept hidden. Children had no rights, no recourse, for dealing with abusive parents. No one who grew up in the '50s, particularly no one who wasn't an upper-middle-class WASP, could possibly see it as any sort of utopia. Most of the author's critiques of the time have been corroborated for me by the experiences of my parents and their friends.
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