Korman: Nostalgia gilds the good old days

Former U.S. diplomat and U.N. ambassador George Ball once said, “Nostalgia is a seductive liar.” At the time, he was referring to the outdated foreign policy of containment employed during the Vietnam War.

Today, he’d consider America a deceitful prostitute. Nostalgia permeates society from every conceivable angle, from politics to popular culture to Halloween garb — don’t act like you weren’t proud of your Nickelodeon “Global GUTS” contestant costume idea.

In a study published last year by the Association for Psychological Science, researchers asked participants to reminisce about positive events in their lives and then write about them. In the end, the study found that bringing back these memories resulted in overall positive feelings, higher self-esteem and an “increase in the feeling of being loved and protected by others.”

Nostalgia hasn’t always been held in such high regard. As late as the 20th century, nostalgia was considered a genuine psychiatric disorder linked to anxiety and depression. Before that, it was regarded as a flat-out disease. In the 19th century, nostalgia was even attributed to demons inhabiting the middle brain. But now, even artificially induced nostalgia makes people giddy.

While longingly reflecting on the past provides a comforting link between our past and present selves, it also tempts us to idealize the past and overlook the progress society has made since then.

For lack of a more contentious target, consider this example involving Glenn Beck of Fox News.

On his Oct. 15 show, Beck played a series of clips which included the famous 1979 “Mean Joe Green” Coca-Cola commercial and various clips of ’50s-era nuclear families eating TV dinners and apparently watching “Leave it to Beaver.” Beck is also the founder of the 9/12 Project, which encourages Americans to remember their fervent patriotism the day after the Sept. 11 attacks while quietly brushing off how fearful and vulnerable they felt.

Following the montage, Beck said, “If a politician told you, right now, that we could go back to those simpler times when people were together, you’d do it in a heartbeat, wouldn’t you?”

Of course, those simpler, more unified times also included racial segregation and the Cold War.

Society has progressed a great deal since the periods to which Beck alludes. Not only would I rather eat a Hot Pocket than a Salisbury steak TV dinner, but I’d watch the 50 plus episodes of “Law & Order” on Hulu.com before I’d watch one black-and-white episode of “Leave it to Beaver.”

Beck’s view illustrates what Fred Davis, in his 1979 book “Yearning for Yesterday: A Sociology of Nostalgia” calls “first order” or “simple” nostalgia — that is, the belief that things were better before than they are now.

In 2002, former U.S. Senator Trent Lott, R-Miss., was forced to resign because of a remark that reiterated his support for Strom Thurmond’s 1948 presidential campaign, which featured a devout anti-civil rights platform. While Lott might not have consciously intended to endorse segregation, his comments and Beck’s illustrate a potential pitfall of simple nostalgia.

In his 1991 book, “The True and Only Heaven,” noted historian and social critic Christopher Lausch wrote, “Nostalgia does not entail the exercise of memory at all, since the past it idealizes stands outside time, frozen in unchanging perfection.” In other words, we tend to romanticize the past, regardless of what has happened since.

This tendency has perpetuated a culture in which we proudly tout our support for Pluto’s reinstatement status as a planet and wear Converse All Stars despite their dismal ankle support.

Last weekend, I saw “Where the Wild Things Are,” Spike Jonze’s cinematic interpretation of Maurice Sendak’s 1963 classic children’s book. I was fond of the story as a child, and deep down, I hoped it would — however briefly — restore my starry-eyed youthful sense of wonder, prompting sentimental flashbacks to the days when I didn’t have responsibilities, regularly saw my family and didn’t have to pay for the food I ate.

Unfortunately, as is the case with many adaptations, it failed to capture the essence of the original. I left feeling disappointed and ashamed that my nostalgia had been exploited for monetary gain. Ball might argue that I had been “seduced.”

Remember when we were too young to be nostalgic about anything? Everything was so fresh and exciting. We had nothing to compare our experiences to and nothing about which to be cynical. Life was so simple back then.

Ah, the good old days.

E-mail Ben at bek25@pitt.edu.