What was progressive in one era can become politically backward in another

Evidence

I have highlighted the similarities between the early U.S. penitentiary—with its aspirations toward individual rehabilitation—and the repressive supermaxes of our era as a reminder of the mutability of history. What was once regarded as progressive and even revolutionary represents today the marriage of technological superiority and political backwardness. No one—not even the most ardent defenders of the supermax—would try to argue today that absolute segregation, including sensory deprivation, is restorative and healing. The prevailing justification for the supermax is that the horrors it creates are the perfect complement for the horrifying personalities deemed the worst of the worst by the prison system. In other words, there is no pretense that rights are respected, there is no concern for the individual, there is no sense that men and women incarcerated in super maxes deserve anything approaching respect and comfort. — Davis, Angela Y, Are Prisons Obsolete, 130

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Ideologies change when subordinate elements of old ideology become primary; Traditional social structures and orders can disintegrate over time; A sub-proletariat can become the conservative bastion of a monarch against bourgeois revolution (+2 more)

Related

• A sub-proletariat can become the conservative bastion of a monarch against bourgeois revolution (similarity 0.88)
• The penitentiary was framed as a progressive reform of its era. (similarity 0.81)
• Italian party convergence under Depretis erased substantive Left-Right differences until socialism (similarity 0.81)
• A legacy stops shaping politics once newer routines become cheaper (similarity 0.79)
• Institutions once deemed inevitable became unthinkable through political struggle (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Ideologies change when subordinate elements of old ideology become primary #expands (0.70)
• Traditional social structures and orders can disintegrate over time #qualifies (0.55)