My mother lived her entire life in the 1957 mindset of that article (although on a more lower-middle class level, with no hope college.) And it killed her — literally, she committed suicide, tormented by the devils of a “woman’s place.”

Although I attended high school in the 1960s, it was in a back water that still enforced a 1950s moral code (and double-standard). Unreliable birth control, no legal abortion, so pregnant girls sent away, or forced to marry as teenagers (at 14, for one of my A student friends.)

Freshman and Sophomore year in college, yup, we had a dorm mother, curfew, no “boys” in our rooms: sex was necessarily furtive.

But despite all that, the so-called sexual revolution finally kicked in even in backwaters (or we took matters in our own hands) and I like the majority of women of my generation began to live sexual and more feminist lives (often while fighting for each step now taken for granted.)

Between my mother’s example, and my stepmother’s also limited life, I was scared straight of a patriarchal marriage. And for good or ill, marriage in general.

My relationships are egalitarian, or I walk, because I know the nightmare of the reverse. Anyone fomenting for a Way Back Machine to the horrible ’50s is either a selfish prick, or didn’t live that life first hand.

As for the increasing infantilization of college kids, I think that’s tied to just how expensive college is any more. In the 1960s, California residents could go to the UC for free and in other states a student could earn enough from a summer or part-time job to pay in-state tuition and room and board at a state college. Now, parents have to cough up huge amounts of money and co-sign enormous loans to to get their kid a degree. If a student changes majors or fails a course, and needs to stay an extra semester or two, that’s thousands of more dollars down the drain. Parents have an investment to safegaurd now.

If anyone was foolish enough to come on campus to publicly call for a return to the ’50’s era college life, most students would mock and tease them mercilessly. If s(he) persists, it will be followed with a campus protest.

exholt, I’ve noticed a trend at my University towards the infantilizing of students. Most notably, the school sent home letters to parents last year urging them to discourage their (adult) children from participating in an all day all campus drunkathon (”Unofficial” St. Patrick’s Day). Furthermore, it’s almost impossible to be considered independent of your parents for college, unless you’re married, have a kid, or 24. That means, most importantly, that if your parents refuse to even fill out the application for financial aid, you’re screwed and the school won’t do anything, as i found out the hard way.

The sending of the letter home is troubling….sounds like they are returning to the practices of the 1950’s era where parents and even prep schools were allowed to see your collegiate report cards at the end of each semester.

The financial aid thing, though, is implemented because the colleges and the federal financial aid feel that the parents/child should pay a portion of their educational expenses if they are deemed financially able. They probably want to make sure that if the parents are middle or upper/upper-class, that the parents don’t attempt to avoid paying their share.

I knew a straight-A student in a similar fix in my frosh year where his wealthy parents did fill out the forms….but he was found ineligible and those parents told him they were not going to pay for it despite being able to afford to splurge on multi-million dollar vacation homes and luxury items. He ended up having to balance a 30 hr workweek, taking out heavy loans, and taking class overloads so he could attempt to graduate early. How he managed to do all that, maintain straight-As, and remain respectful towards his parents is unfathomable to me.*

In my case, I was quite fortunate and lucky to receive a substantial college scholarship that along with working summer and odd jobs during the school year, meant my parents did not have to pay a cent of my tuition at Oberlin. There was no way my family could have afforded the high price tag otherwise.

* In my familial culture, wealthy parents who refuse to invest in children with great academic potential because they desire to spend the money on luxuries for themselves are looked upon disdainfully as “uncultured” and avaricious.

Anyway, there were some women in that group who had majored in astronomy, and told how they had had to either: 1) lab partner with a boy who could be out observing at night, and hope that he made detailed enough notes, or 2) break curfew and then somehow figure out a way back into the girls’ dorm. No academic exemptions were allowed to the rigid rule that women must be in lockdown at night.

This was at a pretty liberal institution, that has been co-ed since its 1860s founding. (Carleton College, in Northfield, MN)

Most people I’ve talked to, even current college students, still think of college students as children and that they need more “supervision.” I find the idea appalling, as we’re adults, damnit.

One concern about the essay, however, was how the author seems to normalize 1950’s undergraduate life as a series of social events attended mostly by upper/upper-middle class undergraduates punctuated with some academics. That was far removed from the experiences of some high school teachers and classmates’ mothers who attended comparably elite colleges. In addition to having to endure this sexual morality double-standard, they also had to balance academics and work to finance what their scholarships did not cover along with dealing with snobbery from their wealthier more socially “elite” classmates.

I particularily like the psuedo-progressive guy who was only mouthing these arguments to get under a girl’s shirt.