"There Will Be No Going Back"
“We could still go back, all we have to do is…”
“There will be no going back.”
The Hunt For Red October
Nostalgia can be fun. It’s cool sometimes to look back and remember something fondly from our past, either as individuals or as a society. Reminiscing has its place.
I follow quite a few social media accounts that either post about history or prior cultural eras. It’s cool to see what people wore and some of the events of the time. Then there’s Super 70’s Sports on Twitter, which is both frickin’ hilarious and more or less accurate in describing the world between 1970-1990.
But where we get into trouble is when people say we should “go back” with more than a lighthearted tone.
There will be no going back.
Nostalgia at a certain point is rooted in dissatisfaction with the present. For some people, there’s no need to be nostalgic because now is the best years of their lives and the past represents a worse time. In that sense, nostalgia is a highly personalized thing. One kid loved high school, while another hated it.
It’s important to understand what it means when people say “go back.” What is “back”?
See my point? Nobody really can define what “back” means. In fact, they can’t even agree on whether “back” was good or bad, and why.
In my state there’s a couple that, for all intents and purposes, live in the Victorian era. Their clothes are all period-appropriate, and they use technology available at the time period. The wife in particular has received pushback for her traditional clothes, much to her bemusement.
Why? Some people interpret their lifestyle as a repudiation of the present times, a desire to “go back.”
Yet, the couple as I see it aren’t pretending the modern world doesn’t exist, nor are they living life as a form of protest. They simply like the clothes and aesthetics of the era. Perhaps they wish they lived back then, as Robert Howard wished he had been born during the Old West days. There’s nothing with being curious or identifying with a historical period’s clothing, art, etc.
But “going back” is an attempt to rewind the clock - or in the case of Superman, spin the earth backwards. It’s pretending as if things didn’t happen that did.
And that’s the real problem. It’s the desire for a time machine, not to visit or explore past but to avoid dealing with the present - except even then time progresses. They want a theme park where time has stopped permanently in a certain era.
And which era do you go back to, exactly? The stereotypical one is the 1950s. But then you have the critics who either say it was worse than now, or perhaps had its own problems we wouldn’t want.
Well, sure. But nobody would compare living in 1920s New York City with 1300s Europe during the Black Plague, or Germany during the Thirty Year’s War. Some times were demonstrably better than others. All had their challenges, but some challenges were worse.
The question is what was lost that we would like to regain?
Just to spoil the ending, you’re not going to get a consensus on that, ever.
This raises a rather nuanced point that those debating these topics miss. It’s not just a question of what timeframe to go back to, but who and what would you be?
Here we get to the great Rorschach Test that is the expression “going back.” When people hear that phrase they envision themselves in a specific time period under specific circumstances, and either yearn whimsically or shudder. When some talk fondly of the Middle Ages they aren’t thinking of being a serf or peasant, but a knight or some exciting adventuresome type. Or when they think of the excitement of a historical conflict, they dwell either on those who gained glory/fame or those whose lives were utterly destroyed. German writer Ernst Junger fought in World War I and wrote the compelling book Storm of Steel recounting his war experience in a gritted, masculine manner. It earned him money and notoriety. But others came back from the War to End All Wars with severed limbs or disfigured faces, if they came back at all. Ask them of the “old days,” they would reflect on them in totally different manners, but neither would be incorrect.
There’s no undoing what’s been done, and pretending it never occurred is a harmful form of cognitive dissonance, and just as damaging as the mindset people hold akin to the dog in the “this is fine” meme. Further, people want the good stuff from an era without the bad.
This is what I appreciate about art deco style, which came about in the 1920-30s. It drew inspiration from and celebrated the past, but it was fundamentally forward-looking and futuristic in its mood. After the fallout of World War I, it was an artistic way of “finding Serenity.”
There’s nothing wrong with disliking our current situation, whether it the societal, cultural, moral, legal, political, romantic, literary, musical, what have you.
But the question to ask is not “can we go back?” but to plot out a better future.
Among other things, it’s then you’ll find out who the future “let’s go back” nostalgists will be, for our present will some day be the past.