Back Wards

Reverse?
The road leads forward—into the future, into adventure.
“Backward” was invented for nostalgics. Or historians.
Or did evolution ever downshift, pause, and glance backward? I couldn’t say—I’ve never met evolution. 
And yet, the idea feels like a strange variant.

Still, the call to “go back” does serve important functions. For someone standing too close to the edge of the road—or the cliff—a sharp, life-extending “Back up!!!” is surely welcome. And those of us a little older often find ourselves drifting in thought—and in stories—back to our youth. “Things were better back then!” The eternal companion on the journey of longing for the past.

Spoiler alert: They weren’t better.
They just dress up as the better life—the fair politics, the full rights, the truly good existence.
And our memory synapses have their own sense of humour and irony: they sugarcoat the good bits and simply redact the rest.

Yet this endless longing for the “good old days” keeps resurfacing—especially in politics and society. 
Suddenly, family life in the 1950s and ’60s is being sold as a desirable luxury package.
But what was family life actually like?

In the wake of the post-war economic boom, unemployment was hardly an issue. In the household, the man was solely responsible for income. The woman was expected to be a housewife and mother—working in a job outside the home was barely accepted. 
And the children? They were meant to show respect and obedience. Then the day at least had some structure.

The 1950s are often remembered as an era of prosperity and cultural uplift. But behind that shiny curtain lie darker truths: human rights and individual freedoms were tightly restricted. In the U.S., racial segregation was in full swing—and gave the Ku Klux Klan new momentum.
Women had little or no access to higher education or the freedom to choose a career. “Happy at home” was the slogan.

This is just one example of how the backward movement seeks to erase today’s progress—replacing it with a romanticised “golden age.”
It’s astonishing how quickly some people are willing to give up their rights—without receiving anything truly valuable or life-affirming in return.

“Chickens campaigning for cage farming!”—the perfect slogan for outdated political legislation.

I’ve never liked reverse gear.
Why go back to a time I already know? I lived through it. Survived it.
But the achievements of the past seventy years—in politics, society, and the economy—paint a far more appealing picture of life today.

And what about forward?
Simple. That’s the call to adventure. Into the unknown—but shapeable—present. 
Maybe even into tomorrow.

How adventurous and fantastic is that?

Let’s go!