But was American society affected by the Cold War, or was America just trying to make their society better to show it off to the other countries? Basically, did America's way of life and economy during the cold war improve because they wanted it to show it off or was it a necessity? The Cold War did affect the American's way of life. America was a young nation and it was just beginning to develop into a dominant country. It first really just established itself as a world power during the two world wars. Therefore, the cold war was a time in which Americans were trying to get a name for themselves by showing how great, life in their country was. Shows like Leave It to Beaver and Father Knows Best portrayed the stereotypical American families. Even though everyone knows that there is no such thing as a perfect family, people still enjoyed watching these types of shows. Commercials, or shows like I Love Lucy, showing the stereotypical woman or housewife in the kitchen were another way of showing things off. It is really very difficult to always own the latest models of things coming out. So a woman in a kitchen with all the new appliances is really unlikely. This was another way of showing off to other countries how life was or wasn't. However, the show I Love Lucy, mainly showed how much freedom a woman had when her husband wasn't home. Lucy constantly did foolish things that weren't exactly the ways women were supposed to have been behaving. Once again, the United States was portraying how great life was in America compared to other countries. The majority of the television shows during the 1950s showed no poverty, death, ethnic mixing, or racial tension. It just presented the "perfect world." Juxtaposed, it could be argued that the Cold War didn't help shape the American society. American life could have just formed like how it was supposed to happen; like human nature. When the men all came back from World War II, many women lost their jobs and weren't as active as they were during the time of WWII.
