How will the Covid 19 panic effect the way we think? Will it be something like our thinking following WWII?
Let's have a look.
When WWII ended, surviving soldiers heaved a collective sigh of relief and grabbed the first ship home. They were determined to make love, not war.
At home, the politicians had to think swiftly. How were they going to accommodate all these men who risked all to defend their way of life?
Even though they made sure the returned soldiers were separated from their weapons before coming home, these guys needed jobs, homes and a lifestyle that had been worth fighting for. No longer would they be content with catching a freight car to look for work in rural wheat fields.
Money needed to be made available for social programs. This initiative would eventually create a brand new middle class.
British songbird Vera Lynne's White Cliffs of Dover, Lili Marlene and The Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square were now replaced by tunes like Roly Poly, Penny Candy, and How Much is that Doggy in the Window (Bark, Bark).
It all portrayed a domestic wonderland complete with loving spouses, happy children and pets. Slick new cars and vine-covered cottages were all part of the picture imagined under stress in the trenches.
A guy in the US named Mickey Spillane launched a successful writing career. His hero was a private dick named Mike Hammer, who was quick on the trigger of his twin heaters. His actions were those of a survivor straight out of the trenches of WWII. The books I recall reading were Vengeance is Mine and I, the Jury. Obviously, Hammer was intolerant of legal procedures that dragged on and on.
There was work for everyone. Much of it was employment transferred from manufacturing war planes and tanks to a newly-awakened automotive parts industry. It was hoped that Rosie the Riveter would choose to get married and give up her spot in the production line to some veteran looking for his share of the national economy.
Investment capital was used to make sure there was work for everyone who wanted it. Doing otherwise might have proved troublesome, even dangerous.
Then, of course, there was the problem of how to fit into civilian life all that new battlefield technology launched by both sides in the need to win the war.
A lot of it was to be re-deployed to a domestic environment. For example, the torsion bar suspension used to make Nazi Tiger Tanks float like oversize Cadillacs was among the first to be adapted to domestic automobiles. Chrysler was the first to install it in their luxury sedans.
Surplus Jeeps and tracked Bren Gun carriers were proposed as farm implements, but were found to be not quite right for the job.
The manufacturers made sure that much improved versions suitable for farming, were made quickly available to the farmers.
While V2 rockets were adaptable to the US space program, radar was adopted by highway patrol cops. Synthetic oil, that enabled Nazi panzers to be started in a frosty Soviet winter, now lubricates our auto engines so efficiently that often they outlast the rest of the car.
People who very recently were unsure they would survive now saw their way clear to achieve what they wanted to do with their lives. And why not? Clearly they had earned it.
The social consciousness was positive and the sky was the limit. The Hollywood musicals illustrated the mood very well.
It is seriously doubtful that a pandemic like our super-hyped Covid could do the same thing for today's screwed-up world.
