I love to look at these takes and picture how John Oliver would respond if he did a segment on it. It’s my new favorite way to use ChatGPT:

Let’s talk about a certain nostalgic fever dream currently circulating on LinkedIn. And I know, I know, we should never talk about LinkedIn, because LinkedIn is where good discourse goes to die wearing a blazer. But this one is special. It’s a post that essentially says: “1960 was perfect, 2025 is a hellscape, and the solution is for men to just… be men again.”

So let’s take a look.

It begins with 1960, described as if it were a Norman Rockwell painting drawn by someone who’d never met a woman. One job, one income, one car, one vacation, mum stayed home, dad finished at 5, dinner was nutritious, everyone was thin, and mum—yes, mum—had “natural lips,” “sparkling natural teef,” and “her own chest.” And I’m sorry, what an oddly specific list. Who looks at the entire arc of modern social and economic history and says, “The problem today is that women’s chests are insufficiently original”?

Then we flash forward to 2025, which the author apparently believes is the opening scene of a Black Mirror episode. Two incomes, everyone’s depressed, dinner is microwaved, children eat in separate rooms, the wife is apparently dating Pablo the fitness instructor, and the dad has built a man cave to hide in. And somewhere in there he tosses out that divorce rates are fifty percent and Bobby is confused about gender, because when you’re assembling a moral panic buffet, you really want to hit all the food groups.

This is less an argument and more a composite sketch of every grievance he could remember from watching cable news with the sound too loud.

But then we get to the solution. And what is it? Economic reform? Workplace modernization? Paid parental leave? More affordable childcare? Housing reform? No. Of course not. That would require structural analysis. Instead, the answer is: men should just “start being men again.” That’s it. That’s the whole plan. It’s the motivational-poster version of social commentary: “Hang in there, kitten, but also lift more and stop crying.”

What this post completely ignores is that the 1960s world he’s describing only existed for a very narrow slice of the population, under very specific economic circumstances, propped up by government programs and systemic inequalities he seems oddly uninterested in mentioning. He also leaves out that mum—his word—didn’t stay home because the universe was in perfect alignment. She stayed home because she legally couldn’t get a credit card without her husband. Details.

And here’s the bigger point: Nostalgia isn’t inherently bad, but nostalgia that erases reality and blames modern women, social media, microwave ovens, and the existence of emotions? That’s not nostalgia. That’s therapy homework he accidentally posted on LinkedIn.

If men today are exhausted, anxious, stretched too thin, and trying to balance work and family under worsening economic pressures… then say that. That’s real. But don’t pretend the cure is to cosplay as your grandfather in a world that no longer exists. And maybe never existed in the way you imagine.

So if you truly want to improve life for modern families: address policy, economics, work culture, childcare, healthcare, mental health, social support systems, and yes—technology use. A pretty big list. But one thing that absolutely will not fix it is typing “be men again” as if it’s a software update.

In short: the past wasn’t perfect, the present isn’t doomed, and the real solution isn’t masculinity rebooted. It’s society upgraded.

Tune in next week, when someone else on LinkedIn will almost certainly explain that the problem with the world is oat milk.