28 NEWSWEEK.COM MARCH 13, 20 20
tHey call tHe 1950s tHe gOlden age OF televisiOn. pisH.
This is the Golden Age of Television. And movies. And music. And
books. And probably just about every other cultural vector you
can think of. This is the Golden Age of Culture. Better creative
output. Better performers. But you have all that because of us.
Before the 1970s, culture in the U.S. was tightly controlled and
highly commercialized. The big music labels determined what
you heard, the big publishers what you read, the big studios what
you saw. The control was both informal and formal, from radio
stations refusing to play “Negro” music and black artists to cen-
sorship of movies, albums and television programs. In 1952, the
National Association of Broadcasters established the Television
Code, which among other things prohibited profanity, sex, real-
istic violence, irreverence about God and religion, or the negative
portrayal of law enforcement or family life.
We boomers don’t like rules. Especially dumb ones. We broke
down the soft barriers between genres, mixing rock and folk
and blues and classical. We showed sex in movies—real sex, not
just heavy breathing and passionate stares. And most of all, we
refused to take anything as sacrosanct or untouchable. We cre-
atedNational Lampoon(1970) andSaturday Night Livein 1975.
Hill Street Blues(1981) broke the police procedural mold with
its intertwined storylines, multi-episode arcs and mix of per-
sonal and workplace stories—devices still used today. We poked
and pushed at that censorship envelope until it finally broke.The Television Code ended in 1983,
although music is still censored on
TV and on the radio (the “radio edit”
of CeeLo Green’s songF**K Youhas
the lyrics as “Forget You), along with
movie content rating codes. Because
of us and the abetting technologies
of digitalization and the internet,
we now have the most exciting and
vibrant cultural environment ever.
It’s worth noting that it’s not just
entertainment where we have more
choice. In 1970, a typical grocery store
had 6,000 items. Today, a regular gro-
cery store has about 40,000 items, and
a Walmart supercenter has 120,000.
Amazon had over half a billion prod-
ucts for sale in 2017 and was adding a
million products a day. In every catego-
ry—electronics, airlines, hotels, clothes,
furniture, you name it—the number of
available items is growing at what feels
like an exponential rate. All that choice
can feel like a burden—until, of course,
you don’t have it.Culture