The 1950s wasn't the dark ages. People in positions of power had already been through the horror of gas attacks in the First World War, which is about the closest equivalent. The Nazis had experimented with biological weapons, and this was reasonably widespread knowledge at the time.
So if your point is that it was a simpler, more ignorant time, I don't think that works.
What we all have to face is that, when allowed to operate in secret, this is what governments have done and will continue to do. Often with "good" intentions.
If there's something we need to evolve, it's the oversight of our institutions, or indeed abolishing some of them.
The 1950s wasn't the dark ages. People in positions of power had already been through the horror of gas attacks in the First World War, which is about the closest equivalent. The Nazis had experimented with biological weapons, and this was reasonably widespread knowledge at the time.
So if your point is that it was a simpler, more ignorant time, I don't think that works.
What we all have to face is that, when allowed to operate in secret, this is what governments have done and will continue to do. Often with "good" intentions.
If there's something we need to evolve, it's the oversight of our institutions, or indeed abolishing some of them.