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A popular impression of the 70s is that they merely saw orgies move from the squalor of hippie pads to the luxury of the yuppie suburbs. A recent TV series, Swingtown, played off this by showing a suburban culture heavily tinged with this behavior. As with hippie orgies in the 60s, a lot more people seem to remember these events than were actually there. Granted, premarital sex was more prevalent and accepted than before, but, as in the 60s, it took the form of a series of monogamous relationships leading up to marriage much more than that of serial sex at orgies, whether on the floor or in a heated swimming pool.
In fact, looking at mail order catalogs, which reflected more of mainstream America than did Swingtown, it seemed that a secret Amish plot had taken over the lingerie industry, threatening to send the birthrate plummeting. (The birthrate did fall in the 70s, but not because of nightwear that doubled as birth control devices.)
Yet, overall sex was much more a part of the mainstream culture than ever before. Nothing better illustrated this than the growth of the pornography industry. While soft-core magazines, led by Playboy, had flourished in the 1950s and 60s, it was the legalization of hard-core pornography in Denmark in 1969 that led to legalization across the Western world followed by a boom in the industry. Compared to new magazines like Penthouse and Hustler, Playboy seemed mild and was progressively left behind by the competition.
While Women’s Liberation and the growth of the pornography industry both owed much of their success to the liberal climate created in the 1960s, many feminists actively opposed pornography, claiming it encouraged violence against women and children. Although there was no conclusive evidence either way on this issue, the battle lines were drawn, as women across the country demonstrated against pornography. This raised the difficult question of whether controlling or outlawing pornography would be a violation of First Amendment rights and set a precedent that would lead to stifling freedom of speech for themselves and other groups.
Oddly enough, pornography created an odd convergence of interests between feminists and a growing conservative movement in mainstream America. Pornography, the divorce rate, the embarrassing end to the Vietnam War, women’s liberation, drugs, uncontrollable teenagers, and a myriad of other changes rapidly transforming society caused growing alarm for millions of Americans. Besides pornography, parents were worried about the books their children were reading in schools.
The 70s: Dark Ages of fashion and design
Was it the Women’s Liberation Movement or just a really bad hangover from the drugs of the 60s that inspired the excess of bad taste and deranged judgment that passed for fashion in the 70s? Probably both. Women entering the workplace in greater numbers were faced with the dilemma of how to be taken seriously as good workers instead of being treated as sex objects in cute little mini-skirts, which largely describes the attitude of male workers in many companies until that time. The answer was the pantsuit, the female counterpart to the business suit. It was about as sexy as the unisex uniforms worn by Mao’s Red Guards. But it did send a message that a woman was there to work hard and be taken seriously as a human being. After a decade or so when women had gained more respect in the workplace, they could feel comfortable enough in their femininity to go beyond the unisex look.
There are various theories about the maxi-dresses of the 70s. One is that they were the result of overproduction of potato sacks from the 60s. Another is that they were designed to distract attention away from the wearers’ hair. The last is they also functioned as a supplementary birth control device.
But Women’s Liberation didn’t explain it all. Just as big record companies got control of rock music, squeezed out much of its creativity, and homogenized it into a more marketable product for mainstream consumers, they did the same for (or to) fashion. The basic approach seems to have been to take the psychedelic look and make it look respectable. Not a good idea, especially if you’re high.
So were women’s fashions really that bad in the 70s? Well yes and no. While it may have seemed the fashion industry was conspiring to put an end to sex forever, that was only true for the workplace, where sex isn’t usually a good idea anyway. So pantsuits and frumpy dresses and skirts probably did help protect women from sexual harassment and pave the way for more equality. And the comfort and utility of those clothes carried over to leisure activities away from the office.
However, as indicated before, sex was much more out in the open at this time, so women’s fashions for going out on the town were designed to be both attractive while also not advertising the woman as “easy.” The screenshots below from Swingtownpretty much illustrate this point, although the woman wearing the low-cut yellow dress played a character who might well have been described as “easy.”
So what excuse did men have for dressing the way they did? For one thing, the leisure suit, as it was called, found a comfortable middle ground between the grungy hippy look of the 60s and the more respectable look cleaned up yuppies needed for work in the 70s. As awful as it may have looked, it paved the way for Casual Fridays.
Also, many men did sympathize with the Women’s Liberation Movement, and adopted a somewhat unisex look in sympathy with it. By the same token, it helped free men from the more rigid gender roles in which they also felt trapped.
Along these lines, there were even matching his-and-her outfits...
Maybe it was something in the beer, but men still felt they had to be men. A popular song of the time by the (openly gay) group, Village People, even expressed/parodied the idea that “I want to be a macho man.”
Out of this developed a weird combination of flamboyant clothes (partly inspired by African American fashions) and an ultra-manly look of moustaches and shirts unbuttoned halfway down to reveal macho chests.
Batmen Even the Caped Crusader seems to have suffered a crisis of masculine identity in the 70s, so that villains with titles as innocuous as Penguin and Joker must have a field day in their criminal activities.
Bully magnets. That’s the only way to describe what these poor children forced to wear, inviting violence from even the girls in the class.
Unfortunately, bad taste didn’t stop at fashion. Homes were also infested with vomit-inducing artifacts (e.g., shag carpets and plaid furniture) that could easily convince an alien civilization to put us out of our misery as quickly as possible.
They even had inflatable furniture, its main saving grace being that once deflated, it took up less room in a landfill.
Living room curtains matched the plaid furniture in bad taste, coming in various pseudo-psychedelic patterns. The question was whether such drapes did more harm as part of America’s living rooms or good by hiding its contents from the outside world.
As if toilets, by definition, aren’t already the epitome of bad taste, the 70s covered these receptacles of waste in soft plastic, pink carpeting, and fake fur, turning them and the temples they inhabited (i.e., bathrooms) into cultural icons worthy of the decade that begat them.
Pet Rocks Possibly the most successful fad/scam of the 70s was, the brainchild of Californian, Gary Dahl, who realized, despite the recession, Americans had too much money and needed help in finding ways to waste it. Thus was born the Pet Rock. For only $3.95 (not adjusted for inflation) one could get a pebble from Rosarito Beach in Baja, California, along with a pet carrier (cardboard box with a handle and air holes) and a training manual so one could teach the rock simple commands such as “sit” and “stay” along with more advanced ones like “roll over” and “come”. Curiously, there were no feeding instructions. During the last half of 1975, Dahl (and imitators marketing cheap knock offs) made millions selling these lovely creatures. Sadly, after Christmas, everyone apparently had a rock and sales died.
Streaking Streaking is the act of running naked through a public venue to amuse, rather than shock, spectators. Although the first recorded incident took place on a bet in London in 1799, it reached its peak of popularity in spring of 1974 when thousands, if not millions, of streaks took place across the globe, especially on college campuses.”
The author, who was delivering pizzas on the University of Illinois campus in Champaign-Urbana, was in a particularly favored position to witness the rise and fall of this phenomenon over the course of less than a week. At first, there were isolated cases (or rumors) of individuals streaking short distances, such as between dorms. By Thursday, large groups of people were taking part in various activities, including naked couples on motorcycles, an entire fraternity doing calisthenics on their front lawn, and another group of fraternity brothers running with their house flag down the street. On Friday, a mass streak, involving an estimated 10,000 people, took place on the campus quad, the highlight being a naked sky diver landing in the crowd. By Saturday, everyone was dressed again. Warning: Since the 1970s, anyone convicted of streaking in the U.S. is labeled a “Sex offender.”
In the 70s, platform shoes were the latest attempt to make women look taller than they really were. However, some of these shoes seemed to be pushing women up to dangerous altitudes.
In fact, several models, including Naomi Campbell, AgynessDeynnfell, and two models in one runway show in China have fallen from their shoes. Campbell’s shoes had five-inch platforms and nine-inch heels.
With women growing so much taller, men had to keep up, so they also wore platform shoes.
As if cruelty to one’s feet wasn’t enough, how about trapping a live goldfish in the heel? Despite some doubts that real goldfish were used, apparently they were, at least in some cases.
America goes metric (and then goes back)
A map of all the countries on the globe still holding out in the battle against global metric tyranny (i.e., the U.S., Liberia, and Myanmar (Burma). Not that there haven’t been efforts. In 1866, Congress authorized the use of official use of Metric measures along side traditional English measures, and the U.S. was an original signer of the 1875 Treaty of the Meter. More recently, Congress passed the Metric Conversion Act of 1975 "to coordinate and plan the increasing use of the metric system in the United States". Metrication was not mandated however, and the U.S. Metric Board (USMB) lacked the power to enforce metrication. Despite public service announcements and road signs listing both miles and kilometers, the USMB had no real backing from Congress and was disbanded in 1982.
The Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 mandated use of the metric system by government agencies before mandating private use. Every year, each government agency must file a report on its annual progress toward metrication. The military generally uses the metric system since it often has to coordinate actions with other militaries. In 1998, the Mars Climate Orbiter was lost because, despite requirements that all sub-contractors use the metric system, Lockheed Martin provided thruster performance data to the team in pound force seconds instead of newton seconds. As a result, instead of orbiting at a height of 150 kilometers, it descended to 57 kilometers and burned up in the Martian atmosphere .
As the radical 60s of hippies transitioned into the liberal 70s of yuppies, producer Norman Lear decided it was finally time to address the social issues still dividing America, such as feminism and racism. The result was “All in the Family”, a sitcom centered around a bigoted, middle-aged, and conservative white man named Archie Bunker. Surround him with his stereotypical good-natured wife, his feminist daughter, and her liberal /radical husband, and watch the sparks fly.
Mike: "Why must you always call me Meathead?" Archie: "Oh, what the hell! Why does that bother you so much? I'll bet I wasn't the first one to call you Meathead." Mike: "You were the only one who called me Meathead. They never called me Meathead in school; they always called me Michael...what did they call you in school?" Archie: "Ah, different things." Mike: "Tell me, what did they call you in school?" Archie: "Well, I remember one winter during the Depression, we didn't have no money 'cause the Old Man lost his job....I wore out a shoe, one shoe. So, I couldn't go to school with only one shoe, see? But my mother, she found a boot. So, I had a shoe on one foot and a boot on the other. Shoe-boot. So, the kids called me "Shoe-Booty." Mike laughs. Archie: "They used to holler, "Tutti Fruity, here comes Shoe-Booty!” Archie: "And they kept callin' me that until they found out my name was Archibald. Then, they thought that was funny. And then I wished they'd go back to Shoe-Booty." Mike: "Kids all made fun of you, huh?" Archie: "Yeah, they all made fun, well, except one black kid by the name of Winston." Mike: "A black kid liked you?" Archie: "No, beat the hell outta me." Mike: "Why? ....There must've been a reason." Archie: "Well, he said that I said he was a n*****." Mike: "Did you?" Archie: "Sure." Mike: "Well then that's the reason!"
Archie: "What the hell reason is that?! That's what them people was called in them days then! I mean, everybody we knew called them people n*****s. That's all my Old Man called 'em. What the hell was I supposed to call 'em? I didn't know the diff--you call 'em a Wop? You couldn't call 'em a Wop because Wops is what we called the Dagos." Mike: "Did you ever think--did you ever think that possibly your father just might be wrong?" Archie: "Wrong? My Old Man? Don't be stupid. Let me tell you somethin' about him, he was never wrong about nothin'!" Mike: "Yes, he was, Arch." Archie: "Huh?!" Mike: "My Old Man used to call people the same things as your Old Man. But I knew he was wrong, so was your Old Man." Archie: "No, he wasn't!" Mike: "Yes he was, your father was wrong." Archie: "No!" Mike (yelling): "Your father was wrong!" Archie: "Don't tell me my father was wrong! Let me tell you somethin'! The father who made you--wrong? The father, the breadwinner of the house there? The man who goes out and busts his butt to keep a roof over your head and clothes on your back, you call your father wrong? Hey, hey, your father, your father, that's the man who comes home bringin' you candy. Your father's the first guy ever to throw a ball to you. And take you for walks in the park, holding you by the hand. My father held me by the hand...oh, he had a hand on him now, I tell you. He busted that hand once, and he busted it out on me, to teach me to do good. My father, he shoved me in closet for seven hours, to teach me to do good....'cause he loved me! He loved me. Let me tell you something, you're supposed to love your father...because your father loves you." Archie taps Mike on the shoutder. "Now, how can a man who loves you, tell you anything wrong?" Mike is silent. He begins to realize why Archie is the way he is and always will be. Archie staggers over to an empty space on the floor, lays down and passes out. Mike takes the awning and covers a sleeping Archie with it. Mike sits down on a crate and stares ahead, thinking. Mike: "Goodnight, Shoe-Booty."sparks fly.
Patty Hearst Patty HearstAKA Patricia Campbell Hearst Born: 20-Feb-1954 Birthplace: San Francisco, CA Gender: Female Race or Ethnicity: White Sexual orientation: Straight Occupation: Victim, Criminal, Actor Nationality: United States Executive summary: Kidnapped by SLA Father: Randolph Apperson Hearst Mother: Catherine Campbell (d. 30-Dec-1998) Boyfriend: Steven Weed (boyfriend at time of kidnap, ex-) Husband: Bernard Shaw (police officer, m. 1979, two daughters) Daughter: Gillian Catherine Shaw (b. 1981) Daughter: Lydia Marie Hearst-Shaw (b. 1984) High School: Sacred Heart Prep, Atherton, CA University: University of California at Berkeley Kidnapped Berkeley, CA (4-Feb-1974) Ransomed Tortured Raped Bank Robbery Hibernia Bank, San Francisco, CA (15-Apr-1974) Assault Mel's Sporting Goods, Inglewood, CA (16-May-1974) Robbery Mel's Sporting Goods, Inglewood, CA (16-May-1974) Unlawful Possession of a Firearm FBI's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives Took the Fifth Granted Immunity Pardoned (Jan-2001) Risk Factors: Smoking
Looking Ferocious after Vietnam: The fall of Saigon and the Mayaguez incident
On April 30, 1975 the Vietnam War finally ended. That was the day North Vietnamese forces took Saigon and put a final end to the regime in South Vietnam. For most Americans, the war had ended two years earlier with the Paris Accord that allowed the U.S. to pull out its troops “with honor” while leaving North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces still active in the South.
