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Comment by bufordtwain | Hacker News Reader

My mom was born in 1939 in France. She told me that she used to get an orange as her Christmas gift (nothing else). She would save her orange for a few days, looking forward to eating it. On the other hand her one brother would eat all of his immediately. I have an orange for lunch every day at work, partly because I like them but also to remind myself of this story and of how relatively good most of us have it these days.

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I had some stories from my grandfather (born in 1910) usually around Christmas time, where he'd ... I guess it was complaining - complain we were too spoiled as kids. "When I was your age, I got an orange for Christmas, and I was happy with it!". It really put a damper on things, and... I can't help it that I'm growing up 60+ years later in an era and world where we get oranges cheap at a grocery store. It's just 'normal' - not my fault if he didn't have that 60 years earlier. And yeah, we do have it great in many ways today (and... not so great in others).

I regularly ask my grandmother (born 1918) about the past and how she experienced this and that.

Overall I think she had a relatively simple, but comfortable life. She remembers getting electricity in the 1940s. Before that, they had plenty other ways to provide lighting and heat, so it didn't matter much. The family wasn't rich, but never lacked anything.

Later in her life things got more busy with more travel, vacations, especially after retiring in the 1970s.

She's still very busy with activities every day, but the last couple of years with the pandemic and restrictions was tough. Now that things are getting back to normal, she's really relieved. Even a simple thing like going to the hair-salon makes her day.

> not so great in others

I'm curious what you think is worse in the West now than it was a century ago.

Environmental devastation, at least in terms of footprint, is far worse, both in terms of space and noise. Water and processes are cleaner though. The weather is just fucked.

I was primarily thinking of environment when I wrote that comment, but I think there's probably some other things that are, in some ways, worse.

Physical health probably.

Seems like until 100 years ago it was a lot of work to get obese while today it kind of happens if you don't watch out.

It was a lot of work to not suffer long term effects of common infections too, or even second hand smoke. Or more directly, malnutrition and hunger.

Community

The glue for all communities is need. The less you need others, the less you need to compromise for others. It is a double edged sword though, on one hand you want the resiliency and security a tribe provides in order to make the gamble that can lead you to succeed, but on the other hand, individuals always have a goal of freedom and power for themselves so if they succeed they will no longer need the tribe (or at least as much), and hence there is no longer incentive to compromise for it.

The climate.

I am under the impression that smog and pollution were a big problem for urban areas.

Crime is significantly higher.

Deaths from alcoholism and drug addiction are vastly higher.

Is crime higher, or is it that crime is reported more?

> It's just 'normal' - not my fault if he didn't have that 60 years earlier.

I guess that's just societal progress, which is not only a good thing, but a great thing!

I read a while ago but can't find the source - the average person these days eats better than the King of France did a few hundred years ago... I think about that a lot

This was the case for my parents as well, and despite growing up in an age of abundance, there was still an orange in my stocking every Christmas morning. It's a nice tradition I think.

I remember reading a children's book about getting an orange for Christmas https://www.amazon.ca/Christmas-Orange-Don-Gilmor/dp/1550050...

We don't really have it good though, simply because the universe doesn't work like that. There's no such thing as a free lunch and you're paying a price for all this "goodness".

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