What are some indications of the "postwar pessimism" of the 1920s? Why did liberal values such as progress and democracy fall under attack at this time?

Indications of postwar pessimism includes;

1) The "lost generation" term used to describe pessimism of U. S. and European thinkers after the war

2) Postwar poetry and fiction reflected disillusionment with western culture

3) Scholars--Oswald Spengler, Arnold Toynbee--lamented decline of the west

4) Religious thought reflected uncertainty and pessimism

5) Karl Barth attacked liberal Christian theology embracing idea of progress

6) Older concepts of original sin and human depravity revived

7) Attacks on the ideal of progress

8) Science tarnished by the technological horrors of World War I

9) Most western societies granted suffrage to all men and women

10) Many intellectuals disillusioned with democracy

11) Conservatives decried "the rule of inferiors"

Why did liberal values such as progress and democracy fall under attack at this time?

1) In Russia, a dictatorship of the proletariat (working class) emerged

2) War communism, a policy in Russia that gave all private property to the government and created a communist society during the civil war, opposing the liberal value of progress.