Canning Dock, Liverpool, Wikipedia.
Alan Turing
never forget
Historical Context
A Flourishing Economy
In 1912, Britain accounted for 30% of world exports, with 50% of employment in manufacturing and construction. It had the third highest average income per person and GDP was on an upward trend, leading to a focus on technological innovation.
"The expansion of trade is the surest way to create jobs and improve living standards for people around the world."
- Robert Zoellick
Social Standards
The main social standards were characterized by traditional gender roles, class distinctions, and conservative attitudes towards sexuality and morality.
"The woman who is always making a fuss about her rights is like a man who is always making a fuss about his rights: in both cases, they are usually in the wrong."
- George Bernard Shaw
"There are two nations; the rich and the poor."
- Benjamin Disraeli
"The unnatural and increasingly rapid growth of the feeble-minded and insane classes, coupled as it is with a steady restriction among all the thrifty, energetic and superior stocks constitutes a national and race danger which it is impossible to exaggerate."
- Winston Churchill
Homophobia
Society was quite conservative in its attitudes towards sexuality and morality. Premarital sex and homosexuality were considered taboo, and there were strict social norms around sexual behavior.
A page from the Sunday Express newspaper about ‘The Well of Loneliness’, August 19, 1928, Wikimedia Commons.