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Rose-tinted views of the past in Ireland

JupiterKid

I’m member of a couple of FB groups that put up old photos of Dublin and other places in Ireland and they are interesting to see.

One thing I note from many of the comments from some of the members posting up is stuff like “how times were so much better back then”, “no crime”, “respect for authority” and how Dublin and Ireland have gone “to hell” in the past 20 years.

Why the selective nostalgia of a much poorer country where there was real hardship, the religious reigned supreme and abused countless vulnerable women and children?

Some posters on these sites even come out with casual racism and homophobia. Would these posters (mostly older people I note) prefer a return to those times?

Thoughts?

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Kilometres na gcopaleen

It's a weird one and a phenomenon I've noticed too on online groups. FWIW, in my experience, Dublin is safer, cheerier than it was in the 1990s when I first started wandering about it regularly. I still hear of break ins and muggings but especially the latter seem far less common than back then. It is strange seeing people saying how much better things were back in the day when my abiding impression of Dublin in the late '70s and the '80s was a poor city being destroyed by heroin addiction. Of course addiction and all concommitant problems still exist but they don't seem to define the city the way they used to so it seems strange that people are like "ah back in the day things were great." The amount of people who think that cops should be battering people is frightening too, everyone invokes Lugs Brannigan like he put the whole place to rights.

Franz Von Peppercorn

riffmongous wrote: »

They existed but we couldn't afford them!

Oh come on. I remember lots of kids coming back from Christmas break with these things.

Franz Von Peppercorn

Kilometres na gcopaleen wrote: »

It's a weird one and a phenomenon I've noticed too on online groups. FWIW, in my experience, Dublin is safer, cheerier than it was in the 1990s when I first started wandering about it regularly. I still hear of break ins and muggings but especially the latter seem far less common than back then. It is strange seeing people saying how much better things were back in the day when my abiding impression of Dublin in the late '70s and the '80s was a poor city being destroyed by heroin addiction. Of course addiction and all concommitant problems still exist but they don't seem to define the city the way they used to so it seems strange that people are like "ah back in the day things were great." The amount of people who think that cops should be battering people is frightening too, everyone invokes Lugs Brannigan like he put the whole place to rights.

Right.

There’s an underestimation of how poor it was in places. But also not everybody was poor. The south side existed. The we were all poor doesn’t seem right either.

FelaniaMump

Kilometres na gcopaleen wrote: »

It's a weird one and a phenomenon I've noticed too on online groups. FWIW, in my experience, Dublin is safer, cheerier than it was in the 1990s when I first started wandering about it regularly. I still hear of break ins and muggings but especially the latter seem far less common than back then. It is strange seeing people saying how much better things were back in the day when my abiding impression of Dublin in the late '70s and the '80s was a poor city being destroyed by heroin addiction. Of course addiction and all concommitant problems still exist but they don't seem to define the city the way they used to so it seems strange that people are like "ah back in the day things were great." The amount of people who think that cops should be battering people is frightening too, everyone invokes Lugs Brannigan like he put the whole place to rights.

Completely agree. Feels far safer in Dublin City Centre now than I ever remember it being.
I think people confuse the actual past with films and Maeve Binchy books. They talk about halcyon days that never actually existed. I wouldn't want to go back to any previous iteration of Ireland, for all the problems we may have now we had far worse ones in any previous time.

ELM327

Irish Guitarist wrote: »

I often see people younger than me reminiscing about things that are completely false. For instance lads in their twenties or thirties harking back to the good old days when they played outside instead of playing video games. If you're under the age of forty home computers and video game consoles have existed all your life.

I'm in my early thirties (just!) and we played football, tip the can, kerbs most nights, and the odd videogame thrown in.
We stayed out until we were called in (past dark sometimes) or for the simpsons new episode on sky1 at 6 on sundays.

It may have been false for you, but it certainly was a reality for me and others in my social circle of similar age.

valoren

And the photo's all appear to show the street's during good weather, during the summer etc. You'd think it was the Med!

I am sure, say, Cook Street in Cork City was just as ****ing miserable on a drizzly, December afternoon in 1948 as it is in 2018.

Kilometres na gcopaleen

One thing I will say is apparent from old photos, that city and town streets looked better, with less street furniture and if you go back far enough, litter just does not seem to have been that much of a problem. You had better, clearer vistas but that does not speak to how people's lives fared.

I also suspect at 60 or whatever age, the world was almost always better when you were 10 or 20, regardless of material circumstances.

CrankyHaus

One big change is that social problems that used to be restricted to Dublin and a few other places have gone nationwide. This has had a wrenching effect on rural areas where people have had less chance to adjust to the new circumstances. Meanwhile much of Dublin has improved, or at least not got much worse. I know the parts of the North Inner city that were rough and desolate in my youth are much improved and very vibrant, though still scaldy in parts.

I think the Irish Times MRBI study in 2004 was the first time it was recorded that widespread drug use and other issues previously considered Dublin only ("Hill16 is junkies only" as the country GAA gabs would chant) had gone national so the change in many rural areas probably happened from the 90s.

FelaniaMump

CrankyHaus wrote: »

One big change is that social problems that used to be restricted to Dublin and a few other places have gone nationwide. This has had a wrenching effect on rural areas where people have had less chance to adjust to the new circumstances. Meanwhile much of Dublin has improved, or at least not got much worse. I know the parts of the North Inner city that were rough and desolate in my youth are much improved and very vibrant, though still scaldy in parts.

I think the Irish Times MRBI study in 2004 was the first time it was recorded that widespread drug use and other issues previously considered Dublin only ("Hill16 is junkies only" as the country GAA gabs would chant) had gone national so the change in many rural areas probably happened from the 90s.

Great example of the point at hand: there were no problems that were exlcusive to Dublin! They were always nationwide, there were people taking drugs in Sligo and Castlebar and Tipperary and even in little villages. There was the perception that it was a Dublin only problem, and the perception has changed to understand that its everywhere: its only the perception that has changed.

murpho999

valoren wrote: »

And the photo's all appear to show the street's during good weather, during the summer etc. You'd think it was the Med!

I am sure, say, Cook Street in Cork City was just as ****ing miserable on a drizzly, December afternoon in 1948 as it is in 2018.

In the old days people knew not to spell plurals with apostrophes that everybody seems to do now!:D

murpho999

mariaalice wrote: »

There was different crime, also a lot of people were locked up unofficially, In the mid-twentieth century, Grangegorman Mental Hospital had patient population of approximately 2,000 people, staff also live in. Even in 1965 it had 1,628 patients.

There was an asylum/mental hospital in Galway with even more inmates/patients and when it was to be closed down there was protests locally about loosing the jobs because it was a big employer. imagine protesting to keep a mental hospital open because it was a big employer.

There was crime then.

It's people who commit crimes and people have not changed.

Sexual abuse was more rife then and unreported. Corruption was an issue too.

The only difference is drug related crime.

People got murdered, fought when drunk etc just like today.

Bobtheman

JupiterKid wrote: »

I’m member of a couple of FB groups that put up old photos of Dublin and other places in Ireland and they are interesting to see.

One thing I note from many of the comments from some of the members posting up is stuff like “how times were so much better back then”, “no crime”, “respect for authority” and how Dublin and Ireland have gone “to hell” in the past 20 years.

Why the selective nostalgia of a much poorer country where there was real hardship, the religious reigned supreme and abused countless vulnerable women and children?

Some posters on these sites even come out with casual racism and homophobia. Would these posters (mostly older people I note) prefer a return to those times?

Thoughts?

Ah jesus give it a rest. With your Liberal whining. People are entitled to recollect the past even through Rose tinted glasses. One thing we didn't have is nanny state liberalism and bloody face book
Don't kid yourself that your age group aren't racist too that's when your heads are out of yer arses
As for the poverty stuff Ireland was even in the 80s a lot richer than most of the World

FelaniaMump

Bobtheman wrote: »

Ah jesus give it a rest. With your Liberal whining. People are entitled to recollect the past even through Rose tinted glasses. One thing we didn't have is nanny state liberalism and bloody face book
Don't kid yourself that your age group aren't racist too that's when your heads are out of yer arses

And other people are allowed to point out that their recollections are less than accurate, or is your free speech only for some people?

murpho999

Bobtheman wrote: »

Ah jesus give it a rest. With your Liberal whining. People are entitled to recollect the past even through Rose tinted glasses. One thing we didn't have is nanny state liberalism and bloody face book
Don't kid yourself that your age group aren't racist too that's when your heads are out of yer arses
As for the poverty stuff Ireland was even in the 80s a lot richer than most of the World

What the hell is that?

[Deleted User]

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

Oh come on. I remember lots of kids coming back from Christmas break with these things.

We couldn't, not sure what else to tell you. I paid for my first console with my confirmation money

freshpopcorn

I would like to see what Ireland was back like then to be honest.
I'd be from outside Dublin so they'd be different issues/etc.
I'd mainly like to see were people happy/etc.

trixi001

Irish Guitarist wrote: »

I often see people younger than me reminiscing about things that are completely false. For instance lads in their twenties or thirties harking back to the good old days when they played outside instead of playing video games. If you're under the age of forty home computers and video game consoles have existed all your life.

They existed - but lots of homes didn't have them as they couldn't afford them

I'm 35 - we definitely didn't grow up with computer games.

One set of my cousins had them, my other 10 "sets" of cousins didn't.
When my cousins got the super Nintendo- we got their old Atari 2600 - this was probably in the early 90's - so I was about 9 years old.

gandalf

FFS I remember growing up in the 70's and 80's and it was a depressing hole. Things are much better now. Ireland is a much better country especially as we have finally got the jackboot of the church off our throats. It's not perfect but it is a far more tolerant country than it was.

I have some very conservative close family members who would be firmly in the "the country was better in the past" brigade but its purely because of the liberalisation of marriage, women getting control over their bodies and the decline of their beloved church in modern Ireland.

lawred2

Irish Guitarist wrote: »

I often see people younger than me reminiscing about things that are completely false. For instance lads in their twenties or thirties harking back to the good old days when they played outside instead of playing video games. If you're under the age of forty home computers and video game consoles have existed all your life.

I actually did play outside all day during summers

And I also played computer games

Fairly sure kids have always managed both

lawred2

EdgeCase wrote: »

There are people who reminisce about the great old days of Telecom Éireann when everything was all high tech and wonderful.

I read the history of it and they were diabolically bad in the 1970s and early 80s to the point that the telephone service in a lot of parts of the country was like something that belonged in a museum of 1920s technology.

It then installed a bunch of digital exchanges in the 80s and briefly was cutting edge until it didn't invest and got passed out by the world again and was a relatively laggard by the mid 90s.

If you wanted to make a call from Cork to Dublin, you'd nearly need to consider taking out a mortgage and there was basically no internet.

It was bog standard and grossly overpriced.

Likewise people going on about the old Irish Rail being nice. It was rough, really inconsistent, the trains were often clapped out bone shakers and it usually smelled like an old pub.

yup

remember taking a train back from Dublin after an AI final sometime mid nineties... not a single bit of unoccupied space

It just parked itself on the line somewhere in the midlands for about 2 hours

Think the engine gave in

lawred2

Bobtheman wrote: »

Ah jesus give it a rest. With your Liberal whining. People are entitled to recollect the past even through Rose tinted glasses. One thing we didn't have is nanny state liberalism and bloody face book
Don't kid yourself that your age group aren't racist too that's when your heads are out of yer arses
As for the poverty stuff Ireland was even in the 80s a lot richer than most of the World

a strangely aggressive response

Odhinn

Irish Guitarist wrote: »

I often see people younger than me reminiscing about things that are completely false. For instance lads in their twenties or thirties harking back to the good old days when they played outside instead of playing video games. If you're under the age of forty home computers and video game consoles have existed all your life.

And before them were the snooker & pool halls and video game arcades, where you could shelter from the suns rays all day. "outside" meant cider crazed youth time, down a lane or in a park.

mikemac2

Moore Street full of immigrants running their hair salons and phone repair shops. No Irish left, a bloody disgrace

Says Mary who emigrated to England decades ago

goose2005

Kilometres na gcopaleen wrote: »

It's a weird one and a phenomenon I've noticed too on online groups. FWIW, in my experience, Dublin is safer, cheerier than it was in the 1990s when I first started wandering about it regularly. I still hear of break ins and muggings but especially the latter seem far less common than back then. It is strange seeing people saying how much better things were back in the day when my abiding impression of Dublin in the late '70s and the '80s was a poor city being destroyed by heroin addiction. Of course addiction and all concommitant problems still exist but they don't seem to define the city the way they used to so it seems strange that people are like "ah back in the day things were great." The amount of people who think that cops should be battering people is frightening too, everyone invokes Lugs Brannigan like he put the whole place to rights.

the 80s/90's was also the golden age of joyriding and bank robberies

EdgeCase

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

Right.

There’s an underestimation of how poor it was in places. But also not everybody was poor. The south side existed. The we were all poor doesn’t seem right either.

I remember as a kid Dublin was completely smog bound. Everyone in the suburbs and city burnt coal and probably lots of badly adjusted oil boilers in use too. Your clothes would come in off the line with large 'smuts' (bits of unburnt soot and coal) on them.

As a kid I had constant really bad nose and throat problems that I now attribute to air pollution. I ended up with damage to my eardrum that required surgery later on. I never had any issues since I moved away from Dublin and since the smog died down. It was awful. If you haven't experienced it, you've no idea.

I also remember my mum being caught in 3 bank raids! She went into labour and lost a baby after one of them. Two of my aunts were followed and mugged at their doors, my neighbour was beaten up and we had issues with drug needles on our playing field in a fairly posh part of South Dublin.

There were also dogs roaming absolutely everywhere and dog muck all over the place.

I hate to say it but it was a total dump at one stage.

Dublin is tame compared to the 80s and 90s. It really wasn't one of its brightest eras.

CrankyHaus

FelaniaMump wrote: »

Great example of the point at hand: there were no problems that were exlcusive to Dublin! They were always nationwide, there were people taking drugs in Sligo and Castlebar and Tipperary and even in little villages. There was the perception that it was a Dublin only problem, and the perception has changed to understand that its everywhere: its only the perception that has changed.

You're wrong and you misunderstood my point. I said "widespread drug use" of the kind that was normalised in Dublin long before little villages, not the town oddball smoking a joint. I've seen the changes in a relative's village in the south-west. The place used to be as rural as you can get. Years ago the worst that could happen was the local alco's run ins with the Guards over poitin and my relatives would be scandalised over it. Since then lots of people have been moved in from Limerick City as part of its regeneration and you have stabbings in the village and major drug seizures in the countryside nearby, not to mention burglaries off the chain.

FelaniaMump

CrankyHaus wrote: »

You're wrong and you misunderstood my point. I said "widespread drug use" of the kind that was normalised in Dublin long before little villages, not the town oddball smoking a joint. I've seen the changes in a relative's village in the south-west. The place used to be as rural as you can get. Years ago the worst that could happen was the local alco's run ins with the Guards over poitin and my relatives would be scandalised over it. Since then lots of people have been moved in from Limerick City as part of its regeneration and you have stabbings in the village and major drug seizures in the countryside nearby, not to mention burglaries off the chain.

I didn't misunderstand your point, I disagreed with it, and you are further proving mine. You think that because you occasionally went to a village in the SW you know that the drug problem was exclusive to Dublin until the 90's?
Cop on! There were serious hard drugs all over the place well before then, you just dont know about it. Anecdotes are not data.

TheIrishGrover

Yeah. Nostalgia can be a dangerous thing. I mean, I hear people lamenting the 70's Ireland for God's sake. They forget the crippling poverty and unemployment. Unemployment rates that would be FAR higher if it were not for the staggering amounts of emigration.

People would emigrate to the UK and the US and basically would never be seen again because transport costs were SO high and, in many cases, they were there illegally.

Standard of living in general was very poor: Food was basic and hadn't changed much since the 40s. The economic climate showed no signs of improving and the whole world was deep in the middle of a cold war.

And as for the vaunted "respect for authority". There is a difference between respecting authority and kowtowing to the church and an overtly corrupt and self-serving government. People say "Oh, look at all the perverts and sex-crimes you have today. Didn't have that in my day". You did. But it wasn't reported because, however bad women have it today, it was so so SO much worse back then. But they had no voice because of said "authorities".

Perverts back then were the gay community: THEY were the ones who were assaulting young boys everywhere. Not the "authorities"

I'm sure, 40 years from now people will look upon the utopia that was 201X. Forgetting the rapid rise in racist, isolationist nationalism especially in the US and eastern Europe. The rampant homophobia in eastern Europe. The constant fear of terrorism and the hate-mongering that is both a symptom and cause of it. They will forget the boom and bust of the world economy. Will forget the people who bought houses only for them to be worthless a year later. They will forget that right now our economy is in the same place as it was at the height of the Celtic Tiger yet we have housing shortages and homelessness and always will have them.

They will point out the further merging of peoples and cultures but will forget people drownling in their thousands as they flee war-torn countries to countries that don't want them or can't handle them. They will forget the photo of a drowned baby laying face down on a popular pleasure beach.

They will laugh at the quaintness of emerging Social Media platforms but will ignore how they became a cesspool of hate and profiteering and agenda-driven misinformation.

They will point out how we were never so well off but will forget that we had to work harder and longer than ever before and use transport infrastructure that was not up to the task. Will forget people's 4 hour daily commute.

But, nostalgia is not new and will be here forever. Each generation looks back at the past with rose-tinted glasses and at the next generation as a bunch of lazy, entitled snowflakes (God I hate that term). It's just that now we are in an age where the average persons reminiscing can reach an extremely wide audience instantly and easily.

Irish Guitarist

riffmongous wrote: »

They existed but we couldn't afford them!

My father bought an Atari 2600 in around 1984. I doubt he paid that much for it because it had already been around since 1977. And I bought a Commodore 64 with my confirmation money in 1989. Things like the NES would have been difficult to get here but there were plenty of other consoles or computers that didn't cost a fortune.

EdgeCase

Remember when Twitter used to be nice and we all went out on lovely #Tweetups in pubs.