Why can't we teach history as it happened ?

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I can't stand some of the propaganda and stuff that present itself in history because I've seen through it and realised things are not as they were made out to be like certain figures in history were not all good and were not all bad. We sometimes humanise Alexander ''The Great'' while demonising Genghis Khan even though both were brutal conquerors.
I also remember seeing a video about why Communism isn't as hated as Nazism because there is ignorance around the subject and some teachers are ''left-leaning'' towards it. Its probably also because communist Russia fought against the Nazis alongside the democratic and capitalist countries in World War Two and its been taught that it was a war of ''good vs evil'' whereas the wars in Korea and Vietnam are seen as ''Not good wars''. The only other ''good war'' was probably against Saddam Hussein after he invaded Kuwait.

Last edited by chris1989 on 06 Jun 2022, 1:06 pm, edited 2 times in total.

If children were taught the truth about history, graduation would involve mass uprisings and violent revolution.

Wars are never straight forward. There are a lot of unknowns and a multiple view points on what is happening. Take the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Nobody has a sure knowledge of WHY Russia invaded except for Putin and his true reasons are likely to die with him.

In school, we were taught the lie that the signers of the Declaration of Independence founded America as a Christian nation in which everyone had the same rights and there was liberty and justice for all.

In the public libraries, I found out the truth -- accounts that told of roughly two-thirds of the Founding Fathers being slave-owners; that women were not allowed to vote, run businesses outside the home, or own real estate in their own names; that each state had the sovereign right to declare that any person who was not a white, Protestant, Anglo-Saxon male was not considered a 'Man'; that non-whites were not even considered people; and that the "Indians" of the North American continent could be freely raped, murdered, imprisoned, and otherwise driven from the land to make way for white settlers and plantation owners.

Children are taught that the American Colonial Era was a happy fun time for everybody all around, when the truth is very much the opposite.

I think you have a fair point here and it is certainly one acknowledged by historians today. Take the Romans for example. This has to be one of the biggest one sided pieces of history ever. Will we ever know exactly what went on? I honestly feel so much of the past is simply made up. We also need teachers willing to explore facts with young people and be impartial rather than accepting. I’m hoping the curriculum changes in U.K. I know there are attempts to decolonise the curriculum for a start and not teach the white, male, one sided views the post above said they were taught.

I thought that was one of the worst wars, not so much in numbers of casualties but in sheer BS



https://www.democracynow.org/2018/12/5/ ... _a_massive


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_War_syndrome

You don't still believe the thing about the babies in incubators, do you?

I don't really know about that. Please tell me

In the lead-up to the Gulf War there were claims made about the Iraqi military stealing incubators from hospitals and throwing the Kuwati infants occupying them on the ground.

No such incidents ever occurred, the claims were fabricated.

My history class taught us to do our own research and to question to motivations of every source rather than just teaching us that "this happened and then this happened..."

I prefer this approach. You can't just teach history as a collection of facts because all of history, both ancient and modern is made up of people writing who wanted to make s**t up to make their enemies look bad and aggrandize themselves while justifying their actions.

If you don't trust the government's version of history but you want the government to teach your version of history as a fixed narrative then you're still trusting the government.

I used to hear that people who don't learn history are doomed to repeat it. Well here's a news flash: humans repeat history anyway, because humans are violent, intolerant and warlike by nature.

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." -- George Santayana (1863-1952)

"I've got news for Mr. Santayana: we're doomed to repeat the past no matter what.  That's what it is to be alive." -- Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007)

I know what you mean. What I find ironic is that people who are strongly against these very things go on rants about how the founding fathers intended all people to be created equal & have equal rights. I often get polls in my email asking about what I think the founding fathers intended in regards to racism & sexism & such & if I answer that they did not intend equality nor equal rights, people would probably assume that I must be against that. Just because I believe that the founding fathers did not support true equality & equal rights, does NOT automatically mean that I do not support equality & equal rights. Insisting that the founding fathers supported equality & accusing everyone who disagrees of being racist & sexist & such is causing people who don't believe that about the founding fathers but who also support the ideals of equality & equal rights to feel alienated from their side. Some things were different back then & it ultimately does not matter what the founding fathers intended. What's important is what we think about times today & what ideals we currently support & what we are doing about it. Arguing about what the founding fathers intended or not is distracting people from focusing on the way things currently are today.

The way things currently are today is that teaching history as it happened is demonized as "Critical Race Theory" by the political Right, which is making every effort to suppress teaching truth to children, and instead teaching their "white-washed" version of history in which women and minorities were happy being subjugated and controlled by their white male masters.