The Society is very good at presenting incomplete histories as those that are complete. That is, they adapt the evidence to fit their dogma, not the other way around. "This is the worst time in history" is only true if you look at bits and pieces of evidence, and not at the picture in toto.
Sure, life was great a hundred or so years ago, as long as you were white, well-off, male and straight. Any aberration from that societal "standard" and things weren't so hot.
Visible minority? Ghettoized, few if any civil rights, victimized and subject to perptual verbal slurs.
Female? Second class citizen with limited civil rights and a 20% chance of dying in childbirth or from childbirth related causes.
Gay? Prison or worse.
And all this was considered "normal."