There were never any "good old days" just some fond memories segregated from the horrors of the time by selective memory. Studies show that people living intellectually starved lives as many rural people did in the past experience a much larger drop in IQ compared to those that stayed intellectually engaged.
To me this explains a lot about the plague of religion and conservatism that will destroy our society from within if it's not addressed responsibly soon.

I always hated going to church and catholic school and everything about the blind following the blind. Books written by fallible men, everyone fighting over who's right. It makes no sense. If religion is so great, why isn't it all inclusive and teaching folks to hate others? It's Illogical. Even as a child,, I knew that much..

I certainly listen to mostly 60's music and have great affection for the area I was raised in but as regards my religious teaching at Sunday school ?. No way

Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.

There may be such appeal for some people, but this writer always had an uneasy relationship with religion. While there is undoubtedly some fine music written because of religion, there is never any nostalgia in it for me.

The thing that makes the past so comforting is that we know how it turns out.

We are a pack/herd animal. We survive better in groups than individually. Groups work better when everyone is thinking along similar lines in regards to ethos/morality/behaviour for the good of all.

That is something that religion did it used that need to be the same to unite people.
I think that people miss that commonality. We have very little of that today, between different philosophies on life and the wide range of issues to disagree over.
Get a group of atheist together and there will be a host of issues that they do not agree on.
Get a group of any other group be it based on faith, interests, etc. I am thinking here of the Geekventions I go to ie Comic Con and all of the differences within that group the gate keepers of fandom, the original trilogy vs new movies of Star Wars so even in these tiny groups there are differences.

Religion said don't think just follow what we say and all will be good so it was safe and comforting. Everyone was thinking the same and doing the same.

Nostalgia would be a part of it as it was the comfort of being a child and going to a gathering where everyone was the same. Getting dressed up (I had a special pair of white gloves I wore on a Sunday to go to church) The social engagement the confirmation that you were okay and doing the right thing. These are all comforting memories. Stepping away from religion makes you doubt those memories but they are still good memories that you can keep while ditching the religious rubbish that went with them.

I don’t get the mindset here. I can’t stand listening to the same music I listened to last week much less 50 years ago and nostalgia for what? Ignorance and discrimination? Pre computers, pre safety standards, pre Information Age? The good old days weren’t so good except for privileged white males and exist only in your imagination just like god does.

Yes, I agree, it's nostalgia in large part, why so many people still are anchored to religion. It's not that it makes sense to them, but that they were taught at a young age, religion is what makes a person good, and they can't shake that lesson, since it was ingrained in them. It takes actually reading the "sacred texts" and trying to make any sense of it at all that makes a person actually think whether it's all BS or if there's something there to revere.

I think people tend to get worn out in having to constantly adapt to a changing world. The past which one has already (mostly) adapted to can seem pretty attractive, but it is impossible to turn the clock backwards. Nostalgia does often make a person long for a time they are already familiar with.

I do not think people are religious due to nostalgia. However, I do think religion exploits nostalgic longings to try to make religion seem more attractive. The idea of going back to the familiar instead of havign to constantly adjust to change is a pipe dream, but it is used to (falsely) sell religion as a way to make one's life easier and happier. It's an attractive fantasy. But religion is all about selling fantasy.

You almost have it right, but not. Religion is still popular because most people can't Think for themselves, period!

I listen to oldies music because I consider most of todays music noise pollution.

The only way we can time travel in reverse is through that nostalgia. Listening to 50 year old songs over and over is a part of this. I apply this to my life and the world at large but not so much with religion. As humans we are like this because we find some purpose in our past. It is very hard to remember what Tommy did in the future and you have no memories there until it arrives. People around me fall for the religious line because it is the only way they know to see dead relatives again. What about Ben Franklin? Will any of us know him or his group of friends in heaven? Maybe they are the ones living across the tracks. Another side of town.

It’s the brainwashing as well. Nostalgia too. A big part of abandoning it for me was the way it influenced people’s attitudes about dying and what ways of that are considered to be ‘appropriate’ because of what some book that was created by morbid brains ‘dictated’. As far as I’m concerned, end of life circumstances are extremely personal in nature, and the person in that predicament, especially if they are suffering from a debilitating illness should be left alone to decide how to proceed with the best possible solution for themselves.

If you really look at it, the good old days were never that good. But time heals all wounds.

Can be so. It depends on what you were indoctrinated with as a child, I was given science and nature from an early age, and they still call up nostalgia for me. Yet I also got religious education as well, but that did not take, and thoughts of the early religious teachings now, only fill me with mild revulsion. If your childhood was ideal perhaps you can maintain nostalgia for all you were given, but if there were also bad parts, then when you try to put those bad parts into the past you leave behind, then perhaps some part of what you learned has to go with them.

We listen to the same songs for several reasons, but the main one is the music. For the past 20 years or more is average, below average, or just plain sucks. If Taylor Swift were around in the 70s or 80s she would have never come close to a record deal, and she is today's superstar. In a survey taken 4 or 5 years ago of people ages 18 to 70 something, ranking their favorite bands, all but one (Nirvana) were from the 70s and 80s, with a smattering from the 60s. Bad or boring music is just that, no matter the genre or era.

Religion does not merely appeal to the imagination of people it fully exploits it in the production of images that generate fear, a fear that has no basis in reality. It is the product of an overactive imagination, the promise of an illusory heavenly state of affairs is the consolation prize for adherence to a divisive sadomasochistic doctrine. It would seem that many people suffer from an unbridled overactive imagination which finds an outlet in religion.

Familiarity can often breed contempt or longings that bring about unconscious memories of past familiarity!!!

We are all creatures of habit wether we realize it or not!!!

Too too many memories are ingrained though route and habit!!!

Cable companies show the same shows over and over again because they found that people prefer to watch a show that they have seen before because they know what they going to get from the experience. With a show that they haven't seen before they don't know what they will get from it. I think this also explains why some people prefer to listen to old and familiar music instead of new music that they have to figure out. This isn't 100% true for everyone but it explains a lot.

I read an article a while back that found a study that revealed that people generally prefer the kind of food that they were fed as kids. They develop a taste for other foods later on but will usually prefer the kind of food that they grew up with. I think this is true for many things. What people grow up with forms the foundation of their interests throughout life.

I don't listen to the same music over and over, and neither did my late wife, who was 15 years older than me. She loved listening to modern singers, like Bruno Mars and Adele, etc., just as much as oldies, and really liked alternative and indie bands of today, same as me. But what really irritates the hell out of me, as a music and karaoke snob, is all the singers I see at karaoke, of all ages, but most noticeably and more commonly, the older people, is how many of them sing the same damned boring, stupid songs all the time there, every week, which gets really boring when you go to the same shows every week, and can usually predict exactly which songs they will sing, within an array of the same five songs or less. You can't tell me that these people only know five songs that they could sing as well as any other. I can't understand how they can't get bored with themselves or their repetition, but they don't seem to care and they sure don't care about boring the audiences at the shows. I just refuse to condone and approve their selfish boorishness, so when they sing, I duly ignore them, and then give them the perfunctory pity clap when they finish, no matter how well they sing. Because, whether they recognize it or not, this ain't American Idol, and they aren't singing it perfect, nor do they get any better at the songs with the repetition...

Steven Van Zandt, legendary guitarist in Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band, has weighed in on why today's music is lackluster. For one thing, he points out that new technology has allowed any bumpkin in his basement to produce an album. That in itself is not the problem. The problem is that basement boy skips the years of playing small venues, getting up in front of live audiences and learning his chops, and finding out works and what doesn't. Also, Van Zandt points out that the music has shifted genres. From 1965 to 1994, rock and roll dominated. From '95 on, pop has been ascendant. [I will add that pop music (especially techno and house) lends itself to soulless, contrived, basement production. And the reason that big venue, live pop is usually accompanied by elaborate stage design, over-the-top lighting, lots of costume change, and dozens of dancers is that the music on its own, stripped of the extraneous frills, does not stand up. IMHO.]