Rewriting History

NEARLY EVERYONE, at one point or another, mysteriously transforms into an expert historian. The most common venues for this seem to be at family dinners, group gatherings, or bars and grills during converstaions in which the subject turns to politics. Political disagreements tend to be the root cause of these miraculous transformations, in which people with less than ideal high school educations spontaneously possess the historical knowledge of Ivy League faculty members. We all tend to be interested in history, but mostly only to prove a point, to feed the ego by winning a heated political argument. And so be it. History breeds cliches, which, like most cliches, contain more than a modicum of truth. History does not repeat itself, but it rhymes. Patterns in human behavior emerge. People and nations who do not learn the lessons and mistakes of history are doomed, or at least inclined, to make the same mistakes which have been made repeatedly before, such as building walls to keep people out (walls don't work unless manned. Why, then, build a wall at all?), or starting wars without proper preparation and motive. History is a powerful and potentially dangerous tool. George Orwell said that whoever imposes his or her version of history upon large numbers of people or nations has the chance to gain power and keep it, and to thus greatly control the historical events of the future. This is why history must be researched, written, and taught in a highly professional, critical manner, and an agreed upon body of facts established, to ensure that malevolent interests don't gain access to and control of the discipline and abuse it for their own malign inerests. Tragically, alarmingly, disastrously, that is precisly what is occuring in American society now. History is being abused. We the people are being subjected to a toxic brew of false history, for nefarious purposes. The ancient Egyptians erased from the records any events unacceptable to pharoah. The communists in Russia and the NAZIs in Germany concocted and promulgated entirely false accounts of their own country's past, versions of history which glorified the fatherland, and made it seem as if their respective political movements possessed the only solutions to their nation's current problems. Now, here we are, in our beloved America, doing likewise. At least, about forty two percent of us are. Trump leads the charge in historical misinformation, and his MAGA minions are right behind him,following suit. Its more blatant than ever, for Trump history does not bother to reach far back in time as many false narratives do, but rather, tends to confine itself to the recent past. The obvious problem for the purveyors of these false narratives is that it makes an easier job of countering and correcting the lies - if only people are willing to accept the truth. And now for some facts. Ukraine did not start the current war in Ukraine. Russia did. Trump did not win the presidential election of 2020. Biden did. The insurrection of January 6, 2021 was soley the responsibility of Donald Trump, with the direct assistance of thosuands of his followers, and the indirect assistance of millions more. It was not a hoax perpetrated by some fictional "deep state", nor the result of a nefarious liberal plot. Trumpism gives us the most glaring examples of historical lies, but a fundamental truth must be recognized. It is this; Public school American history textbooks tend to be written not from an objective, honest point of view, but from a desire and intent of making the United States and its hsitoryseem more noble and positive than it actually is. In truth, American history is not pretty. In fact, it is quite ugly. Traditionally, however, we as a culture have tended to be unable to accept this reality, unable to teach the truth to our children. Public schools have traditionally tends to promote patriotism more than honest, accurate American history. This is called "hagiography". Some more facts: The United States was founded upon violence, genocide, slavery, and greed, not Christian values. Every square inch of the country was stolen from previous civilizations. There are, of course, many more examples. The fact that this dubious approach has been challenged and changed to a large extent in recent years is an encouraging sign, but also a primary source of the widespread disatisfaction of public education among conservatives, who generally, to fuel and validate their hyper patriotism, prefer hagiogrphy to historical reality. Goethe said that "patriotism corrupts history". Indeed it does. Whatever price in pride we pay for accepting the truth, in historical studies or anywhere else, is surely far less than that which we pay for embracing falsehood, historical or otherise.