> This whole newsletter is a white guy advocating for a 1950s world. But with flock cameras.

It reads uncomfortably close to an anti-intellectual discourse so popular in the far-right.

Something fascinating that you may not know: traditional architecture is one of those things that is simultaneously:

a) Genuinely widely preferred, with many articles on this, ranging from aesthetic preferences through to scientific studies of how eyes move and what causes fatigue. There is genuine value to architecture before modern architecture -- and...

b) A stalking horse for right-wing thinking.

It's really interesting how this happens and it mirrors other right-wing techniques. A common way to get people into right-wing thinking is to find something that is genuinely unpopular or that people have concerns about, yet which has constrained discourse. Examples: lower incomes. You then talk about the good old days, and reframe it: lower incomes becomes, 'people taking your income, agh those immigrants'. Architecture becomes, '1940 and before were better, oh and everyone was white then'. You get the idea.

Another popular one on social media is the Greek and classical world, especially its comparative lack in modern education compared to, say, 1900. That's an easy intro to colonialism and racism, disguised in the neutral or even interesting format of ancient history.

Once you recognise this, you see it everywhere.

But don't let this fool you re older architecture having genuine value. We just have to avoid saying people have no taste, or referring to their preferences as 'pabulum'. That is condescending, makes normal people feel unheard, and then when someone does hear them on the innocuous subject of architecture, they pay attention to what else that person says.

Casual racism paired with elitist arrogance? Who knew HN could get so bad.

Do better.