The following is based on chapter 11 of James W. Loewen’s excellent book, “Lies My Teacher Told Me” (1995):
American history runs with blood and the important issues of life – but in high school it is made as dull as dishwater and filled with what schoolbook authors know to be lies. Why? Loewen says it is mostly because of teachers.
It is teachers –
- who mainly sit on schoolbook adoption committees;
- who are trusted by parents to teach their children history;
- who are seen by schoolbook publishers as their main customers.
History is made dull on purpose: dull history is way easier to teach. Names, dates and facts are easy to test for, especially at the state level. And if those facts are “safe”, or seem to have little bearing on the student’s life or are lies that avoid unpleasant truths, then it makes it easier for the teacher to control the class: because they avoid heated, open-ended questions, like about race relations, religion or divorce. But even dull high school history takes 55 hours a week to teach.
But there is more:
In the eyes of most teachers, parents, school boards and even the historians who take part the creation of schoolbooks, the aim of high school history is not to understand the nation’s past but to create citizens who respect authority and have pride in America.
Thus all those eagles and flags on the cover and words like “triumph” and “freedom” in the title. Thus the feel-good history built on lies and silence about the country’s ugly past. What 16-year-old could be proud of America, the thinking goes, if we told him the truth?
The books are not even thoroughly fact-checked – because truth has never been their selling point.
In America the ugly truth is saved for university history courses. But for eight out of ten Americans – and even six out of ten history teachers – high school history is as far as they ever go. And these people have the vote!
There are two main kinds of history books printed in America:
- those written for schoolchildren whose aim is to make them proud of their country
- those written for historians whose aim is to understand the past and make a name for the author as a historian.
Publishers are ideological whores: they will gladly print both kinds even though one shows up the lies of the other. Most publishing companies are owned by rich white people, but have little trouble with printing books that make rich white people look bad – so long as they turn a profit. They are far more interested in making money selling books than in pushing a particular message.
But publishers are to blame to a degree: there are plenty of school boards that want, say, more space given to blacks, and publishers could make money doing it, but they are not interested because that is not where the big money is.
See also:
- Other posts based in whole or in part on Loewen:
- History in Texas schoolbooks
- The white lens
My class was lucky, we took AP History and learned a lot of stuff that standard classes don’t teach, that made the class one of my favorite.
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Children indoctrination… What else is new?
This, at least to me:
But for eight out of ten Americans – and even six out of ten history teachers – high school history is as far as they ever go. And these people have the vote!
WTF? How is that possible? I mean, how can you teach a subject you didn’t study & graduate at university?
(Or am I missing something about American educational system and who can teach what?)
Here, you have to graduate from a specific university to teach schools subjects in both elementary and middle (high) school. For example, I am an archaeologist and I know plenty about history- but I am not allowed to teach history because history wasn’t my major.
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In America you do not have to be a history major to teach history in high school. History often gets pushed off onto football coaches.
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Abagond,
My history teacher was the football coach, but he was fierce both as a teacher and coach. Of course he had to teach the curriculum, but he pushed as much out as he could.
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Mira,
A Masters in Education is what is most required. For a long time in America, you only needed a High School diploma to teach Kindergarten through High School. Then teachers colleges became the way for teachers to expand their education in the late 19th century. The regular colleges and universities offered degrees in education. My Dad, even though a science major graduated with a permanent teachers certificate in 1939, because he had taken some education courses. This was in the state of Tennessee and each state has their own criteria. By the 60’s, advanced degrees were offered in Education and most school districts require a Masters to teach after a few years. Only some districts require that a teacher have a certain amount of hours or an undergraduate degree in the area they are teaching in High School.
I think this advanced degree in education is hindering a resource that could be useful, retired professionals in other fields. I had thought of doing this after retirement until I found out that with two years, I would have to complete a Master Degree in Education. I
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All countries present their version of history and usually the history of the victors. Swetisist history still rules in finnish academic circles because the swedes colonized the people living in the present day Finland for 600 years. Their version is of course that the swedes brpught everything here and the finns were just living in caves and tents before that. Which is bulldodoo.
At the same time swedes do not mention in any of their histories that there has been finnish population in present day Sweden at least since iron age above the Stockholm region. And of course, despite of that, finnish is still not an official minority language in Sweden but urdu is. Actually it was forbidden language at least up to the fifties.
US history is written by the winners and it has the same purpose as these do everywhere. Toe the official line and enforce its purpose to exist. And because US is a Good, its history is also a good one, in general terms. What ever fuck ups there might be, it is not because of the white establishment. Never was, never will be.
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I just so happened to have dusted off my copy of “Lies…” before seeing the Blogger feed. Reminds me of that fiasco in Texas with their proposed “version” of history and textbooks.
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Like Produce, I too took AP US History(APUSH) and had an excellent teacher. However, even in that class we tended to avoid the heavy stuff like genocide and racism. We touched on it for the sake of the course but we never had open cross-fire style discussions about it. Part of this had to do with the nature of the course. We were there to learn the material and test for college credit, not fine tune our knowledge of American atrocities and genocides. Knowing the type of people I went to school with, especially the AP students, it would have saved the teacher and more “conscious” students a lot of stress. Talking to Mr. G on the side/after class one could tell he was a man that had a clear understanding of the evil done in the name of America. However, for the sale of his sanity (and job) it was best if he kept things on the sterile side.
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I dont know why my Gravatar is not working
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So do it, Hathor. Why not? School’s fun, especially history.
Hell, if I were retired or independently wealthy, I’d be working on a second doctorate in history, right now.
Go get that masters, man!
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Their version is of course that the swedes brpught everything here and the finns were just living in caves and tents before that. Which is bulldodoo.
When, of course, everyone knows that they were in fact nomad hunter gatherers, living out under the stars at the time. 😀
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Hathor,
I actually know a way you could get a Masters in Ed. and teach at the same time, if you are interested.
My APUSH (TM Y) teacher was a hoot, but he had that “I’m old and can say whatever the f*ck I want” attitude, so he didn’t sugarcoat things. And our class was pretty diverse (more diverse than my high school itself, interestingly), so it worked out.
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Thad and Jasmine,
I’m tired, have health issues and still paying off student debt.
The most I could muster is a day job.
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The people in Texas are stuck for another ten years, before the text books will be reviewed again.
Hopefully there will be teachers like the biology teacher I had, who gave a survey on Darwin’s Theory of Evolution when it was illegal to teach it in Tennessee. On the state university level I think the law was ignored.
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Thank you all for info on teachers/education in the US. Yes, it’s definitely different here. (But I must admit I always liked the fact you can study two (or more?) things at the same time in the US. Say, computers and ancient Greek 😉 It’s impossible to do that here, even for two similar subjects, such as archaeology and anthropology. Some courses are the same, but generally, these are two different things and you can’t study them both at the same time).
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very good point about the history classes being pushed off on football coaches. now that i think of it, from about 9th grade through graduation, all my history teachers were football coaches as well. which is pretty telling about our education system. history is no longer the foundation for which we build our society, our morals, or our government off, it is just a bunch of quasi-important facts and names.
for the past 2 or so years i’ve been reading up on black history, slavery mainly, and it is AMAZING how little i knew about it.
that being said, i think the education system should get some flack about how shitty and diluted our history curriculum is. however, i don’t think the blame for ignorance regarding history and historical facts should rest on the education system. not only does the school system fail, but parents, churches and community organizations fail. the black community, for example (in the small southern Alabama town i was raised) should have been responsible for making sure i knew the type of mental enslavement we went through as well as physical. learning about Rosa Parks, MLK and the same 5 black people every February was my black history. and it’s sad. my parents should have been the facilitators of the most knowledge coming to me about this, of all people.
the education at schools should just be the basics. we as individuals and as communities should fill in the rest. is some white man from Elba, Alabama (a town of about 1,000 3 of which are non-white) going to be able to truly and suffieciently educate me on the power of Malcolm X or Marcus Garvey? is he or any male going to really be able to help me understand just how rape, childbirth, and child rearing effected black women during slavery? is some white woman from Nashville really going to be able to relay the struggle of Cesar Chavez and Gloria Anzaldua to Chican@s?
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Not to mention world history…
Anyway I agree with Sam that other countries are not totally innocent when it comes to distorting a few historical facts. However I think open debate at school is encouraged in most other democratic countries. I still remember, my history and social science classes were always the noisiest. They never ended when the bell rang.
On a side note, the amount of US patriotism and conformism practised already at a young age, such as parading in uniforms reminiscent of the military, juggling fake rifles, basically exhibiting martiality is unparalleled in the Western world. It seems that many American youths grow up learning big gestures of flexing muscles and making patriotic declarations always before critical thinking based on facts. It goes from standing up in school every morning greeting the flag with their hands on their hearts, to summer camps with (allegedly) a few brainwashing components, drill and boot camps for “disobedient” (or is it nonconformist?) teens, up to staggeringly aggressive gladiator games among 10 year olds. Images that are also happily exported to the “rest of the world”. However to many outsiders from other democracies it rather looks ostentatious and obscene.
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History, like everything, is hopelessly tied to profit. Don’t see a way of fixing that. My father never allowed me to only experience history through the lens of publishers. Certainly more can be done textbook wise, but really parents must take the time to educate themselves then their children. I took on many teachers, and they didn’t like it. Since so many kids don’t have parents who are able or willing, to give extra information, I have always been a staunch supporter of a mandatory class in Critical Thinking at the earliest age possible. Unfortunately, thinking critically isn’t taught, unless you’re lucky enough to be in a ‘gifted’ class or until college. One good thing about the internet, assuming access (which is deplorable on Reservations), allows kids to look up information on their own, very easily.
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History is white washed because white people just so happen to be the ones who have created the society and civilization that we currently live in. It is just a matter of fact that black people – by their achievements and contributions – haven’t made much history in the world. Blacks, by and large, haven’t invented life-changing technologies or processes, and they didn’t contribute much to any dynamic-shifting ideologies or philosophies.
History, at least at the high school level, isn’t about building the self-esteem of groups; its about teaching us how our current world came into being by learning about what happened in the past.
I’m only writing this because you’ve tried to force an issue that doesn’t need forcing. You’ve chosen to see history through a racial lens here, whereas I just see it as a study of the men (and some women) who have created our current state of affairs. They could very easily be looked at just as the *people* who made decisions and instigated progressive movements and wars, but you choose to make a big deal out of the fact that those people happen to be white. As if we should laud George Washington Carver just because he invented peanut butter.
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[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Assata Rae Escobar, skippcoon. skippcoon said: https://abagond.wordpress.com/2010/09/29/why-american-history-gets-whitewashed/ this is the bestest blog in the whole internets […]
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Chuck,
Well, I guess we better get rid of traffic lights, IBM, and modern refrigeration, for starters.
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@thad: yeah, funny thing is this: arab geographer Al Idrisi living in the court of the norman king of Sicily wrote about the North and Baltic and he mentions only two towns in the area covering the whole Baltic sea region. Both towns were in Finland. He actually did not even mention swedes, nor the danes nor the germans 😀 And this was 1100’s.
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Jasmin,
That is all fine and good, but we don’t sit around much in history classes discussing the invention of every single good that’s on the market or every business that has ever been started. Nor should we – since history should be concerned with discussing macro events.
Talking about the invention of refrigeration in a history class would merely be a self-servingly gratuitous endeavor with very little relevance to the arch of history.
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The whitewashing of ALL history, not just that of the U.S., is an outrage. Diminishing and/or completely eliminating ‘vanquished’ cultures and peoples from history does no service to anyone except those who have stricken others from texts and documents, and who feel the need to crow their self-appointed supremacy from the rooftops.
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“You’ve chosen to see history through a racial lens here, whereas I just see it as a study of the men (and some women) who have created our current state of affairs. They could very easily be looked at just as the *people* who made decisions and instigated progressive movements and wars, but you choose to make a big deal out of the fact that those people happen to be white. ”
Whiteness IS a racial lens. It is not objective. And considering that blacks and other POC weren’t considered equal or human until very recently (1960s’) do you really believe that history as you describe it is all there is? Do you really think that the dominant culture would tell the whole truth about subjugated cultures and peoples?
“and they didn’t contribute much to any dynamic-shifting ideologies or philosophies.”
As one example, civil rights was a progressive movement. Whites were a part of it, but it was marginalized groups had to do the bulk of the resistance because powerful people never give up their privileges without a fight. What would America look like if not for the efforts of non-whites? What would the world look like if not for indepedence movements in former colonies? How would we think of human rights today if not for blacks and other POC fighting and resisting?
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Llama & Jasmin
Do not engage it. *shakes head* It’s a migraine waiting to happen.
“…our current state of affairs”
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!
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@ Llama
Excellent reply. I also wanted to point out how were Blacks supposed to contribute when they were actively and willfully being held down. Dr. Daniel Hale Williams wrote about how Whites were actively trying to sabotage his research, even in light of the fact that it would be beneficial to all. It is somewhat like telling someone that they cannot work a computer, then berating and lambasting them when they do not write a brilliant program for it.
Ask the Black Wall Streeters if they had any ideas for revolutionizing America. They did. Financially…and were murdered and burned out for their efforts.
I just don’t understand that. How can you actively keep a people down for 400 years, then ask them why they haven’t contributed anything? Just wow. A great deal of whites think along these lines. What’s funny is that the majority of Black contributions happened when slavery ended..and even more when Jim Crow tactics were forced to be rescinded. Funny coincidence that.
*shrug*
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Moi,
I just wanted to confirm that this is the same dude who likes to talk out of both sides of his mouth. He can consider himself ignored.
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@Femi
Anyway I agree with Sam that other countries are not totally innocent when it comes to distorting a few historical facts.
What, you don’t believe that the Brazilians invented the airplane…?
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@Chuck
History is white washed because white people just so happen to be the ones who have created the society and civilization that we currently live in. It is just a matter of fact that black people – by their achievements and contributions – haven’t made much history in the world. Blacks, by and large, haven’t invented life-changing technologies or processes, and they didn’t contribute much to any dynamic-shifting ideologies or philosophies.
…
You’ve chosen to see history through a racial lens here, whereas I just see it as a study of the men (and some women) who have created our current state of affairs.
Do you realize how stupid you look here, Chuck?
You start off by claiming that black people have contributed nothing to civilization (which is an absolute and specific lie in so many ways that it’s not funny) and that white people invented civilization (which is a statement that would puzzle the Greeks, Egyptians and Babylonians, none of whom considered themselves to be white and all of whom considered out northern european forbearers to be a smelly and rather ignorant breed of barbarian, somewhere slighty above pond scum in the scale of human civilization). So you start out by SPECIFICALLY racializing history.
Then you flop right over on your back and whine about how other people see history through a racial lens.
Are you for real, Chuckie, or is that the ‘tussin talkning there? 😀
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No. Being white is being white. It is only racialized when you call attention to the pattern that those who have been at the forefront of making history just so happen to be white.
As for American history, the part that involved macro issues that involved racial tension and race relations, blacks are given their due. I learned a lot about slavery and Jim Crow and Civil Rights in my history classes. But anything before slavery, in terms of history, doesn’t really involve black people.
Although black people were on this continent at the time, they had very little input as to how this nation was formed. They didn’t have much to do with the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution (aside from being a bone of contention when cutting up state voting power came into play with the 3/5 Compromise), the National Bank, or the operations of the Supreme Court. I don’t take pride in pointing out that black people weren’t involved in the process – but that’s just how it was.
And we learn a lot about those things in school. At least I did. But when schools discuss the part where the table was set – pre 1800s – you say that history is “whitewashed”.
From my standpoint, the Reformation and the Renaissance and the Enlightenment etc were the impetus to the movements you’d like to talk about. Without those that I mentioned you wouldn’t even have anything to talk about because enough white people wouldn’t have come around to caring enough to end slavery – an institution that had persisted in so many other cultures for millenia.
I’m more than willing to give black people their due with respect to history; I just want to be correct and not overstate the case.
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whitepeoplehavealbinotraits:
I didn’t ask why black people haven’t contributed anything. I merely stated that they haven’t – for whatever reason. Those reasons we can discuss as supplementals to the real meat and potatoes of history; or we can discuss them in sociology or cultural studies classes. Those were real problems that black people faced; you all think that I’m trying to disregard the plight of black people in this country. Just because I state the truth – that black people *did not* have their food on the gas pedal during this civilization’s development – you think that I’m being a horrible person.
But a doctor *not* getting a patent through or a computer programmer *not* getting his software implemented is not history. Sad and unfortunate, yes, but not very historical in the sense that that person’s actions led to anything greater.
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“I’m more than willing to give black people their due with respect to history; I just want to be correct and not overstate the case.”
If that were true you would just say “oh yeah ancient egypt” and STFU. I think you should read or watch the National Geographic series Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond. It explains why white Europeans were able to develop superior technology and thus Subjugate the worlds indigenous populations by force.
p.s. (this isn’t something to be proud of)
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“I didn’t ask why black people haven’t contributed anything. I merely stated that they haven’t – for whatever reason.”
ahhhhhhhhh! what the hell!?!?!?!
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Although black people were on this continent at the time, they had very little input as to how this nation was formed…
I’m more than willing to give black people their due with respect to history; I just want to be correct and not overstate the case.
This is the biggest joke on this board. This right here.
*drops mic and leaves*
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that black people *did not* have their food on the gas pedal during this civilization’s development – you think that I’m being a horrible person.
Do you know why that was? Because they were the engine. They were the engine for this nations development. Cotton and tobacco was the fuel.
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@Chuck
I merely stated that they haven’t – for whatever reason.
I really don’t know what the reason for you to state that, Chuck, given that it’s patently a load of tripe.
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To all of the sane people in here: This does open up an interesting question of who gets to claim credit for individual successes that benefit the masses. I’m left-handed, and so are/were the current US president, da Vinci, Picasso, Mark Twain, Beethoven, Mozart, Oprah, and James Baldwin. I don’t think their successes say anything about me as an individual left-hander, though.
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rajan:
Way off. This argument isn’t mentioned in history books because that’s not how history played out. The Enlightenment mostly developed on European soil. In the aftermath of the Reformation and the Renaissance philosophers such as Descartes got the ball rolling. Later, Scotsmen John Locke and Adam Smith laid the philosophical groundwork that lent credence to the American Revolutionaries. Almost none of that philosophical headway was made by contact with Native Americans – most of whom didn’t have a written language.
You didn’t really connect this thought to your overarching point. But, for one, the rattlesnake was chopped into 8 segments which represented New England as a whole (with 4 colonies) plus 7 other colonies.
That symbol, created by Franklin in 1754, sought to compel the colonies to join together to fight *against* the French and Indians in the French and Indian War. The symbol had nothing to do with Native Americans being our philosophical Founding Fathers.
Funny that the French had their very own revolution not a decade after ours ended. Something tells me that the American Revolution wasn’t the only direct cause for the French Revolution (and French rebels did *not* have contact with Native Americans); rather, the confluence of similar liberal and progressive ideas with regards to human liberty and freedom set those wheels in motion. In other words, you’re either making that up, or you’re buying into the ‘noble savage’ myth.
Oh, I forgot to mention the Magna Carta from way back in the 13th century England. That was one of the first steps towards giving people other than nobles or kings rights.
Yes, they *guarded* it; they didn’t create it. Big difference.
Let’s start this way. How about you name some technologies or inventions that blacks have perpetuated? To offset it, name some wars that they have also started. History is a double-edged sword; the history makers have done good things and bad. The fact is that it has been white people who have done those things.
The major philosophies stem from the Greeks and Romans with the Judeo-Christian tradition occuring in there as well. The next major thrust forward was the Reformation, Renaissance, and Enlightenment which all influenced democracy and liberty. People of color had little impact on pushing those institutions through.
*I’m only writing this because you’ve tried to force an issue that doesn’t need forcing. You’ve chosen to see history through a racial lens here, whereas I just see it as a study of the men (and some women) who have created our current state of affairs. They could very easily be looked at just as the *people* who made decisions and instigated progressive movements and wars, but you choose to make a big deal out of the fact that those people happen to be white. As if we should laud George Washington Carver just because he invented peanut butter.*
Even if what you say is true, most “whitewashed” history doesn’t deal with mundane inventions. Thomas Edison is mentioned; he invented the light bulb and electricity. Alexander Graham Bell and Eli Whitney are mentioned because they invented products that shifted the dynamics of this country. And even though Carver is mentioned, his process wasn’t some civilization-altering event. Sorry. We can mention him trivially, but he wasn’t iconic in the historical sense – unless we invent academic fields whose sole purpose is to study those less-than-dynamic-shifting inventions put forth by minorities.
We’re talking about history classes right? Those classes have limited time constraints; teachers and curriculum have to discern between what is most important to learn. Learning about macro movements and interactions is much more instructive than hearing about processes or products that – while important and wonderful – didn’t have much top-down impact on the happenings of the world. If we started mentioning such categories of inventions we’d become bogged down with TMI.
You confuse my major points here. I’m not trying to belittle Carver or any other black inventor. Let their inventions speak for themselves. But we don’t go along teaching about who invented the WWW or who cracked the DNA code in history classes just because. If we taught about Carver’s inventions, how would we tie them in to major shifts in this nation’s history? Especially given that agriculture has been a dying industry in this nation since Carver’s time. If anything he was pissing in the wind. Farmers ended up becoming urban dwellers. The process by which they moved into cities is much more important to history than Carver’s inventions.
Yes, but we’re talking history class here, no? Save Carver and Mendel etc for science class.
I actually plan on naming my first child “George Washington Carver Ross”. Hopefully it’ll be a boy.
You’re flitting all over the place like a mosquito. Black people free ride on other people who do tip. They’re not so much doing me dirty as they are the rest of restaurant patrons. But go figure!
I have a master’s degree; they aren’t necessarily tickets to prosperity. Believe me.
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@ Jasmin,
Ha, yeah,I’ve been down that trail before. I think brown eyed people contributed the most to world history!!! And also people under six feet tall were quite instrumental in developing Civilization!
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OK, so you’re admitting that white europeans did develop superior technology and did use force and did basically develop the world as we come to know it? I never said the whole story of history was pretty or nice. I just said that white people were the faces of history.
You all place such importance on history and then look to history and get angry that black people aren’t much included in history. If you don’t like what you see then take to other academic activities, but don’t try to distort historical facts just to boost self esteem or create a false narrative.
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LMAO!
Places dusted off copy of “Lies…” back on the shelf…no need for further comment after those nicely-written responses.
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This is one of the reasons why I’m heading back to uni next year to study high school teaching (social science in particular). Kids learn facts and dates, but they never learn how to actually think.
Actually it’s quite interesting that teachers and academics are frequently seen as a stridently left-leaning group in society, but when it comes down to it, the system means that they almost inevitably end up reinforcing the dominant paradigm in their teaching.
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King, Jasmin:
Abagond made a post about why history is white washed. She made that observation that the people who reside in history all have a common trait.
Rajan:
You’re down for knowledge? Check out this piece by historian with the National Parks system debunking many of the contributions attributed to Carver. His great processional inventions were either unoriginal or nondemonstrable to a great degree.
http://www.network54.com/Forum/256246/thread/1088896552/last-1088896552/George+Washington+Carver-+The+Making+of+a+Myth
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@ Chuck,
Question: What school did/do you attened? Where do they teach you that white people are the “faces of history”, and that yeah, there were a few accomplishments made by other peoples here and there, but those accomplishments were trivial compared to those that were accomplished by people of European descent?
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“I think brown eyed people contributed the most to world history!!! And also people under six feet tall were quite instrumental in developing Civilization!”
LOL!
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Chuck, you’re hilarious! That site you provided a link to, is chalk full of a**holes making weird responses about Vikings, and natives in the north being white, “that is why the missionaries were able to convert them more easily”, according to one poster”. One poster even has the moniker of ‘c**nkiller! Another claims the article was posted originally on stormfront. The ‘Journal of Southern History”for which this article was originally published, was my first clue. Next!
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i had a good history teacher my sophmore year HS…i remember he worked hard to inform us of stuff…one thing he made sure we didn’t forget was that Gutenberg did NOT invent the printing press…he only PERFECTED it…the printing press originated in asia…he would mark us off if we said Gutenberg invented it and to this day when i encounter people who credit gutenberg w/ the printing press I WILL correct them and its all because of my 10th grade history teacher lol…
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The Brazilians? I suppose you’re referring to Santos Dumont. I think if he had emigrated to the US he would have had better chances to get proper credit, at least ideally speaking. But hang on, I almost forgot that the concept of the draw is widely unknown in the USA. It’s all about winners and losers, isn’t it? The fact he worked for the French didn’t help either. As usual…
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Hey, I think what we have here is a problem with communication! Chuck is a hilarious comedian, not a troll nor a white bonehead pretending to be a wise ass. Think about this one:
“OK, so you’re admitting that white europeans did develop superior technology and did use force and did basically develop the world as we come to know it? I never said the whole story of history was pretty or nice. I just said that white people were the faces of history.”
Now that is sharp and unmerciful comedy exposing the ignorance of some! Replace the word white europeans and white people with alien, and you can use the same joke again and again. It is hilarious!
Fantastic Chuck! Good job. I always knew that comedy is the best weapon to go after the white power boneheads. Your comedy proves that only too well. Well done!
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I haven’t read the entirety of all the comments, but just want to go back to the original post.
The issues you raise about history education are the same in Australia where I am originally from (I now live in South Africa). When I studied history at university I was shocked at what I hadn’t been told when I was studying history at school about my country’s past. At least I knew a fair bit of what had gone on due to my parent’s encouraging me to understand the whole story. In Australia the government is heavily involved in designing the curriculum. John Howard, a recent Prime Minister of Australia, described the truthful account of Australia’s history as the ‘black armband’ view of truth.
Interestingly at my university there were a lot of American exchange students who took a semester of Aboriginal history (I think to get a taste of the country’s history and culture, maybe it was even mandatory for them) which was taught in a very truthful way by Aboriginal Australians. It saddened me that they were learning more about Australia’s true history than a lot of Australian’s ever would, or even perhaps more than they would learn about their own country’s history.
The old adage is true, history is written by the victor.
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@chuckie: here are some tips for you for your next comedy act, feel free to use them in your jokes.
Hindu doctors were rebuilding noses and ears 2000 years ago, meaning they knew of plastic surgery. In the Veda texts they teach you the basics of the vaccine too, also some 2000 years ago. Funny stuff, huh?
They had fully functional batteries in Baghdad also 2000 years ago, These could be used in galvanizing process. Now that must be funny, considering how your buddies are there right now bringing the western democracy to that heathen hellhole.
Funny thing about that city, Baghdad, is also this: they had a hospital with one thousand doctors for free for all in 9th century. Isn’t that hilarious Chuck, concidering that you have never had such institution in the white USA? I mean, free medical care for anybody?? What a joke!
They also had fully functional post offices, banks with side branches as far as in China, water supply system, complete sewerage system and paper mill. And this was in 900’s when Chuckies heros were rowing boats and burning and looting coastal towns and monasteries and thinking if it is a good idea to take a bath once a week, a month or a once a year.
And Chuckies church of course recommended that nobody should take a bath since nudity is a great sin. In Baghdad and in many other places they naturally had public baths with gyms and swimming pools. But these were supposedly invented by a white european bodybuilding men in the 1970’s!! Right, Chuck?
Also some two millenia ago Herod the Great, you know, the guy from the Jesus stories, build a harbour at Cesarea Maritima which had none of the problems of our present day harbours concerning the silt and tidal water movements. Damn funny!
The Celts had a reaping machine in the first century AD which was, of course, invented by some other white europeans some 1700 years later. Now that is a good joke! They also had a textile of some sorts, called pilema by the romans, which could stop arrows etc. This was also said to be fairytale, untill the new white europeans invented kevlar few years ago. Now thats what I call a joke!!
White europeans also isolated aluminium as a metal in 1827 for the first time in human history, at least that is the joke here, but the chinese were using it as ornament metal for belts and such during the third century. The reason why this is so funny is because according to the white europeans that is not possible. And yet, they have found aluminium objects from the third century graves in China.
Mr Daguerre was not the guy who invented the principles of photography, nor it was mr Niepce two decades before him. Nor it was mr de la Roche in 1729. Nor it was roruscian Fabricius in 1536. The arabs knew everything about the process few hundred years before him. Hows that for a joke?!
At the height of the Vaticans power the greek philosphers were almost unknown in the west but studied widely in the Middle East. The Arabs also saved the text of those guys, or what was left of them. The christians had destroyed the library at the Alexandrian Serapeium, they destroyed the libraries in Athens and they burned the libraries of Pisistratus, Memphis, Bergamo and Jerusalem. Hunderd of thousands of acient books, science and litterature, was destroyed in the name of Holy Church. These acts were one of the major reasons the white Europe fell into the Dark Ages and are still today so dumb.
Without arabs we would not know that a greek guy called Democritus had an idea of atoms. And we could not know that he got it from a phoenician guy called Moschus, whose idea of atoms was much more closer of ours than Democrituses. Theres a joke for ya, Chuckiee!
Erathostehenes the Greek calculated the circumvent of our planet to be 24 700 miles, pretty close the our present figure of 24 902 miles. And he did so in the third century BC. At the same time up in the North, celts were busy killing each other and telling tall tales, germans were trying to figure out how to beat everybody, and romans had still not yet figured that the world belongs to them, and most of these guys believed that the earth was flat.
Scandinavians were no sure who they were and majority of Finland was the domain of the nomadic sami people. Slavic tribes were hiding in the wild and vast forests of central and eastern Europe. There were no russians yeat, since the birth of that ethnic group was few centuries ahead.
Now that is comedy isn’t it Chuck?
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sam:
you flit around trying to make the point that non-white peoples invented all of these things. that’s all well and good. give them their due, but just keep in mind that all of those areas of the world isolated themselves. the popular phrase concerning arabs is that they haven’t invented anything sinze zero.
its the same concept as the philosophical query: if a tree falls in the woods does anyone hear it?
regardless, the topic of history is also about ideas and the dialectical process of forming our modern civilization. the greeks and those who existed during the renaissance – all of those nasty conquistadors – on through to those who put forth novel ideas during the enlightenment have shaped our societies moreso than any groups you mentioned.
to talk about inventions that merely ended up stale and unused – even if they predated the western worlds very same invention of those products – doesn’t contribute much to the process of history.
one quick hit: you talk about free health care in baghdad in the 9th century…where the hell did it go then? could it be that other movements that took place in that part of the world made such a novel set-up virtually impossible to maintain? could it also be that state-run *anything* eventually collapses under its own weight? again, talking about free health care in baghdad in the year 800 – something that doesn’t exist – is akin to talking about the do-do bird. nice novel fact worth knowing for your weekly trivial pursuit game, but not worth knowing for its power to shape the course of history and the human experience.
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@ Chuck
LOL, everyone is making a genuine effort to educate you, but you just keep tossing back ignorant comments. So plastic surgery is “stale and unused” in today’s scociety?
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In the words of dave Chapelle “All this racism is killing me on the inside.”
That’s all I have add after reading some of the comments
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“OK, so you’re admitting that white europeans did develop superior technology and did use force and did basically develop the world as we come to know it.”
well. it depends on your definition of superior actually. I think you can argue that more technology was developed in China than Europe. And I think swords and firearms have done way more harm than good. But the main point your missing is that technology isn’t created by races. It’s created by individuals. I deserve no more credit for the invention of the printing press than Mike Tyson despite the fact that Guttenburg and I are both white.
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Actually Guttenburg was a bad example the Chinese invented movable type printing as well.
But that is a good example of whitewashing. Because in school we learned that it was Guttenburg who invented it.
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The Chinese invented toilet paper end of discussion Chuck you lose.
Fatality.
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One picture, one thousand words: http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/upload/2010/01/average_brain_size_for_the_thr/Rushton_Brain_Size_by_Race.jpg
A “racist” is often merely anyone winning an argument with a liberal.
I’m surprised Chuck hasn’t brought up the IQ differences.
Maybe that’s too much “crimethought” for this board.
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James Watson was right: http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/10/james-watson-tells-inconvenient-truth_296.php
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“The Chinese invented toilet paper end of discussion Chuck you lose. ”
You must think Chuck is a white supremacist. I can’t blame you, that is the caricature of anyone who holds non PC views on race.
But you would be wrong.
Chuck is an HBDer. HBDers generally acknowledge that NE Asians have higher IQs and larger brains than whites.
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@chuck: I was talking about the greeks also, not just arabs whom you seem to hate or lets say dislike. And a small hint: the greeks we talk about, you know, Aristoteles, Sofokles etc. They did not live during the renaissance. They lived roughly two thousand years before. Get it?? 😀
You ask where did the free healthcare went in Baghdad? Well, ask it youself. It does not exist in you own country either. Maybe it was the same kind of dumbasses like Nixon, Reagan and the Bush clan who destroyed that one too. You know, that kind of guys exist in other “races” too.
“could it also be that state-run *anything* eventually collapses under its own weight?”.
Well, not so, Chuck. It depends what the state thinks is worth while. In your country the government and idiots like yourself think that state should run military and devious banks rather than other things, no matter how much it is going to cost. Like few gazillion G’s in your case. It is a choice. US likes its military and sleazy bankers more than healthcare. You rather give up your money for new tanks and Lehman bros and shit like that, than wellbeing of your fellow man. That is how funny guys like you are.
Those nasty conquistadores did not invent a single thing. They killed a lots of people and enslaved millions, stole their countries and riches for a child on the Spanish crown and for themselves. But they did not invent anyhting. Ok, maybe they advanced the spanish inquisition. I’ll give you that much. But they did not invent even new tortures, They just copied them from the aztecs and others.
Inventions not used? You think plastic surgery is not used anymore? Vaccine is out of fashion? Nobody takes any photographs anymore? Damn, I did know that!! I had no idea that aluminiuma was not used anymore!
“its the same concept as the philosophical query: if a tree falls in the woods does anyone hear it?”.
No, but it did fall. Right? Get it? If you have not heard of something because your teatchers and buddies don’t know any of these, it does not mean they did not exist, that they were in use in some cases for centuries etc.
See, your white eurocentric world is very young, only some three, four hundred years old. Actually the hegemony of the west can be traced from 1800’s on. Before that the white european male did not rule the world with his superb inventions and war making abilities.
I understand that for a young guy like youself that seems to be like for evah, like you know, like a for a very many long time ago. But from the chinese perspective the domination of the west is just passing thing. They were the center of the world for much longer time than the west has been even counting from the romans and the chinese believe that tide is turning by now.
This may come as a shock for you, but the financial markets are already moving out. Dubai just recently passed London and New York, not to mention smaller european places, as The capital Capital of the world. Even the swiss banks are loosing out for the arab banks. That sucks doesn’t it? It is like 1500’s again, darn!
Manufacturing is already mostly in Asia. India has one billion citizens and China too. Those firggin muslims are breeding like rabbits. 1970 there only 50 million pakistanis, but now the population is 150 million! All that despite of floods, earthquackes, hungers, deseases and assorted catastrophes. What you gonna do? Go to war to retain the western hegemony?
Well, you are already doing it and let me tell you, buddy. You are not winning at all. And that is despite the fact that you are a white male, not european that is, but white american male.
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“HBDers generally acknowledge that NE Asians have higher IQs and larger brains than whites.”
what the F is that? 😀 that really shook my shoulders with a laugh storm! abagond, why not open a comedy club here. We seem to have some really good ones here!
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Oh, I see Chuck has deigned to grace us with his lovely presence. Just when you thought racism was going out with the younger generations.
Welcome, Chuck! You might learn something here… or not.
“You must think Chuck is a white supremacist.”
Nah, just a regular ol’ racist.
I don’t know what that James Watson link is supposed to go to but since he was an octoroon (plus!), I sure hope for his sake it wasn’t some “truth” about blacks.
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“You must think Chuck is a white supremacist. I can’t blame you,”
I can’t blame me either since he said…
“white Europeans did develop superior technology and did use force and did basically develop the world as we come to know it.”
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“what the F is that?”
It’s the truth, Mr. Snark. Look into it, between fits of laughter.
“I don’t know what that James Watson link is supposed to go to but since he was an octoroon (plus!), I sure hope for his sake it wasn’t some “truth” about blacks.”
What does Watson’s ancestry have to do with the facts underlying what he said? The Irish are far from the highest-IQ group in Europe, my being part Irish doesn’t mean I don’t acknowledge this fact.
Whatever the genetic basis for intelligence is, there’s no reason to think it is distributed precisely evenly across all people groups. The actual evidence, to date, indicates the opposite.
“I can’t blame me either since he said…
“white Europeans did develop superior technology and did use force and did basically develop the world as we come to know it.”
So? That is a historical fact and has nothing to do with intrinsic racial superiority. Stop being intentionally obtuse.
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And Chuckies church of course recommended that nobody should take a bath since nudity is a great sin.
This brings us to that great invention; soap! Who invented it? According to Answers.com, that great repository of knowledge! :
“1890’s german bum put steroids in soap but before then it was made with human penises”
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Who_invented_soap
its the same concept as the philosophical query: if a tree falls in the woods does anyone hear it?
How about this one; “What came first? the chicken or the egg”?
I’m surprised Chuck hasn’t brought up the IQ differences.
That’s next!
“The Chinese invented toilet paper end of discussion Chuck you lose. ”
I don’t even want to think about where we’d be without toilet paper and soap! On the historical continuum, these major inventions are some of the most important! Otherwise the world would be a funky place! There’s nothing worse than B.O.! Toothpaste and mouthwash are third and fourth place on the historical continuum! Thank god for whoever invented hygienic products!
A “racist” is often merely anyone winning an argument with a liberal.
Here’s an ad hominem for you; “A racist is a sack of sh*t in a cheap suit
<em.HBDers generally acknowledge that NE Asians have higher IQs and larger brains than whites.
An HBDer is also obsessed with black mens penises and testosterone levels. Makes for erotic reading actually when they start on this topic. I think most of them are closeted homosexuals. What straight man obsesses on other men’s penises? Only straight women and gay men do. Sorry for not being politically correct there!
James Watson is a negro if you go by the one drop rule!
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/article3022190.ece
He must have been dumber than the other two fellows he shared the Nobel prize with!
Why does the American history get whitewashed? So folks like ‘Chuck’ can go to blogs to provide comedic anecdotes, thereby providing relief when the debates get heated
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Puhlease (a fitting name, I must say — couldn’t thought of one better for you!),
“What does Watson’s ancestry have to do with the facts underlying what he said?”
For one, it refutes his arguments.
That is, if we assumed that he is intelligent. Which I have more than a few doubts on. Either way, 0 for Watson.
Why you keep presenting your opinions and those of like-minded people as “facts” is quite interesting. Well it was, until you said…
“The Irish are far from the highest-IQ group in Europe, my being part Irish doesn’t mean I don’t acknowledge this fact.”
The first step in overcoming your low IQ is acknowledging it. You’re halfway there.
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““What does Watson’s ancestry have to do with the facts underlying what he said?”
For one, it refutes his arguments. ”
No, it doesn’t. Maybe to someone incapable of thinking statistically.
Only perhaps the KKK thinks there is no such thing as smart black people, or that having a small amount of X group in your DNA makes you dumb. No HBDer thinks that, and it is not a consequence of what they say.
If you think that, you do not understand their arguments.
Ah dun buhlieve dat blacks iz mur athletic dan whites cuz mah cuzin billy bob runz fassster dan a jackwabbit!
^that’s the logic of your “refutation”, Natasha. No concept of group averages nor how they pertain to the individual. Sheesh.
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I’m wondering what people think of Basil Davidson, a British historian, who died just recently. Apart from writing books, he also made an 8 hour film in 1984 summing up some of the highlights in African history. I still remember the series from the eighties.
A synopsis :
http://dickinsg.intrasun.tcnj.edu/films/basil/videos.html
And a small excerpt
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rejan:
Good for you. But my personal attributes don’t change the facts of the discussion at hand. And your insults are fruitless and flaccid. I’m sure you’re familiar with the latter.
Jason Burns:
You’re implying that I’m taking credit for the achievements of past white people. Where have I taken such credit? You are too egotistical to see that I’m not making statements about individual black people. But the facts are that white people have invented more things and have “created” more history than people of other races and ethnicities. I mean, that would make perfect sense since we are living in a country that was founded on institutions that came from heavily white populated countries.
But if the discussion becomes something about the dearth of black people mentioned in history, then that gives me free reign to mention that the history and invention and civilization and philosophy and wars that occurred among whites were the most influential on today’s modern world.
And you’re right that races don’t invent things – individuals do. But it is quite obvious that white people got a head start on black people – for whatever reasons – and built upon that. Inventions and historical happenings don’t just pop up randomly; they stem from the intellectual investment of people that came before them.
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@ Chuck
toilet paper.
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sam:
Wait, so it ceased to exist and that had an impact on today’s world how? As someone mentioned below, the victors tell the story of history. They say that as if it’s a bad thing. Western civilization has “beaten” out other civilizations. Since history is a story about how we got to where we are today, there would be no point in discussing national health care as it existed in Baghdad 800 or in discussing other inventions that never made their way outside into the world.
I have beef with banks and the Federal Reserve system, don’t worry. But socialized health care becomes akin to no health care at all. Wait lists become huge and services and preventative care take a back seat to other more pressing matters.
You argue like a typical liberal. You miss the larger point and you keep focusing on “inventions” as if I said those were the only contributions worth mentioning. Because for every invention handed down by a black, Asian, or Arab person I could name one that was handed down by a white person. If we would get bogged down by such an endeavor, think about how that would play out in a high school history class. In history class, only the most relevant inventions are mentioned, and it is a waste of time mentioning every antecedent to that invention. Only those inventions that were most important to the arc of history get air time. That you see the non-mention of black inventions and inventors speaks to your inability to grasp the concept of history, and with enough hemming and hawing you alter the curriculum so as to teach things merely for the sake of self-esteem boosting. Instead, you could just understand that black people didn’t have the modes through which to transform history. This isn’t a knock on black personally, its just the truth. Why make something of it?
Western civilization begins with the Greeks and spans over 3000 years. The Greeks (who were somewhat influenced by the Egyptians who get plenty of air time in history classes) gave us many of the concepts of philosophy and mathematics that we have fine tuned to shape our modern world. So when you tell the story of history you have to eventually mention the Greeks and the Judeo-Christian tradition and the Middle Ages and Charlemagne and the Renaissance and Reformation and Enlightenment and the birth of Democracy. If you’d rather divert to other things that really had no long-term effect then your story wouldn’t be quite so effective.
News. America will remain a superpower; China will recede. There’s no way a country of 1.4 billion remains intact as its economic needs grow. Mix that with the whole coastal versus agrarian dynamic in that country; China in its present state won’t exist more than 50 years. America, though, is positioned well. First, we have access to two oceans. This is very important.
But should China turn the tide, they will be mentioned in history. In fact, they and India are mentioned a lot in contemporary history as is the black militant movement. Those are mentioned because they have had effects on our modern world and therefore deserve to be mentioned.
Again, you make the mistake of thinking that I’m making a value judgment by saying that whites tell history and whites occupy history. Its not a value judgment; its just the truth. If the financial markets shift to Dubai and the arc of history changes accordingly then fine. I’d like to think that if I were alive in the future when it changes I will give credit where its due. Either way, rest assured that any progress and development going forward owes much credit to the modern Western tradition. Ideas are centralized now – unlike at any time in the past – which is why Chinese inventions didn’t have an impact on the rest of the world.
That will probably happen; superpowers fight to retain their hegemony. That’s a rule of human nature and national sovereignty – something that no individual or group of individuals can change over the long run.
You expose yourself as the racist. You are the one taking solace in my failure – in the failure of white people. You hate this country and all that it stands for, yet you wish to take advantage of the things that it provides for you. Which is why you complain about the whitewashing of history in the first place.
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Herneith:
I don’t, but apparently you do.
Natasha W.:
He won the Nobel Prize – he’s kinda smart.
You are either stupid or being willfully obtuse. If Watson has black heritage that has nothing to do with his personal intelligence. The concept of HBD and innate racial IQ differences says that *when distributed across the races* white IQs tend to be, on average, higher than blacks’. In turn, Asian IQ is several points higher than whites.
An individual black person can still have a really high IQ, and an octoroon can still have a really high IQ. The one thing HBD would say is that the percentage of blacks with IQ 140+ is lower than that for whites.
So Watson’s black heritage doesn’t refute anything. If anything, the fact that he has black blood and is still intellectually honest enough to make such statements speaks to his authenticity.
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Chuck:
History should be about understanding the past. At the high school level it is not. Instead it is a whitewash, a white fantasy – the very storybook stuff you believe in. Like that the rise of the West comes from its ideas, political systems, philosophies, inventions and so on. Wake the fuck up. It comes from the barrel of a gun. It comes from the land and labour robbed from others – at gunpoint.
I do not judge a history book by how many black faces or white faces it has – I judge it by how truthful it is, how well it helps me to understand the present. High school history does NOT do that. It is a lie. It is about what white people want to their children to believe.
One of the best books I ever read about America was not about America – it was about Athens and how it got and used its power: the history of Thucydides. His world sounded like my world, the one I knew. Quite unlike the Hello Kitty Crap they taught at school – and that you, apparently, believe.
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Funny – the only person I see speaking from an unemotional/intellectual level is Chuck.
Everybody else is angry there’s a white boy disruptin’ the echo chamber up in here…why not try to refute his claims intellectually? Can anyone?
Can someone show the rest of the readers that a non-white contributed towards American History in a capacity that warrants mentioning in a condensed history course (that isn’t already covered in the typical history class)?
If there is, perhaps people don’t know, and by all means should be mentioned. If there is nothing to mention…perhaps this post is much ado about nothing???
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Anon:
The whole “non-white contributors to history” thing is Chuck’s derailment. It is not what the post is about. It is about why American high school history lies about the past. Read the post for yourself.
American history SHOULD be MORE like my post on Columbus:
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Where is Mira to point out that all these different faces of Chuck just don’t care?
It’s the ultimate derailing tactic. Get folks talking in circles and researching facts that go unread. It’s like a form of entertainment. Ignore this piece of ish. Speaking of which…
Toilet paper.
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@ anon.
I was actually hoping someone would chime in with some examples as well. I slept through my high school history classes and didn’t study history in college (art major)
Black inventors have been listed but apparently that’s not sufficient.
My problem with Chuck is the implication that any lack of significant historic contributions by blacks is due to some failing on their part, when in reality it was a failing on the part of whites for creating a system of racial subjugation under which blacks were not allowed to control their own destiny. Isn’t it a fact that surviving such an ordeal is of great historical significance in itself? Certainly it is as worthy of remembrance as say, going on a long sea voyage or fighting a war. What’s more dramatic, courageous and powerful than emerging from human bondage with a strong sense of determination, culture and destiny? All the while continuing to give of yourself to a society that has proven it doesn’t value your efforts.
We wouldn’t be the nation we are without Black Americans so saying that they had nothing to do with our history is a joke to me.
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@ Ankhesen
lol toilet paper!
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abagond –
I agree with some parts of the original post, definitely. Education is more about control; or “respecting authority” as you put it – history is just one sliver of the pie.
I suppose, if we were to take out the racial slant you provided… What incentive does any country have to provide the naked truth regarding history?
jason –
He doesn’t imply that, he acknowledged quite openly that history is a double-edged sword; great and terrible things occur. Plus, I’m sure the White/Black North/South ordeal is mentioned in every HS American history course. That is, it is remembered and significant to American history as a whole (and thus, covered material).
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“He doesn’t imply that, he acknowledged quite openly that history is a double-edged sword; great and terrible things occur”
Right. Basically that whites do great things and terrible stuff happened to blacks. But slavery and jim crow didn’t just happen to black Americans. They were not passive observers to the whole thing. To present it that way is whitewashing history.
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??????
Not really sure how you jumped there…
“History is a double-edged sword; the history makers have done good things and bad. The fact is that it has been white people who have done those things.”
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@chuck:
“You expose yourself as the racist. You are the one taking solace in my failure – in the failure of white people. You hate this country and all that it stands for, yet you wish to take advantage of the things that it provides for you. Which is why you complain about the whitewashing of history in the first place.”
Well, Chuck, sorry to dissapoint you, but I am a WHITE EUROPEAN. 😀 I know, it is a shocker for you. And just to clip your wings in the first place, I am not a french or anybody else you might think you saved in 1918 or 1945 from those evil nazis, who, by the way, were seeing the world pretty much like you. Which leads me to question, why on earth did the americans attack the nazis in the first place? I mean, they were promoting everything you are, sort of kindered spirits of youse.
I am a finn and we alone faced the wrath of Soviet empire twice and managed to survive as a nation unlike any other country with border along side USSR (check out the Winter war for starters). So we fought against the communist menace more than you and your whole familes put together and at no time a single white american or brittish came to our aid in our time of need. One black guy did though and actually fought in war. So you can save those “we bailed you out eat freedomfries” jibberish. 😀
In Europe we have a public healthcare in most countries and it is working mostly satisfactory BUT – TADAA! – we have private healthcare system working aside too! So we have both here! You can choose from them anyway you wish. 😀
Now that must be better than your system, where not even an insurance guarantees healthcare. Insurance companies in USA have people who can deny anything they wish if the company wants to make more money and pay less out. it has happened, it is happening and nobody cares. Only money does.
“Instead, you could just understand that black people didn’t have the modes through which to transform history. This isn’t a knock on black personally, its just the truth. Why make something of it?”
Well, Chuckie, I have to disagree on that too. See the blacks in Africa had goldmines and diamonds and silvermines and all kinds of trinkets that the white supreme being wanted. So the white supreme being went over there and stole all that. Africans also had slaves, so the white supreme being went over and showed his inventions on that too and commercialized the trade into truly global business. See, Chuck, the black DID change the history even trough these. 😀 They did not get any Nobels for these though…
“Western civilization begins with the Greeks and spans over 3000 years. The Greeks (who were somewhat influenced by the Egyptians who get plenty of air time in history classes) gave us many of the concepts of philosophy and mathematics that we have fine tuned to shape our modern world.”
Well, Chuck, those greeks did not want to be your white europeans at all. In fact they had a word for all us all, which according the legend, came from our languages. Those acient greeks with all their philosophies and sciences used to call the Northern white europeans Barbarians. 😀 Now, I assume you know the meaning and concept of that word.
“So when you tell the story of history you have to eventually mention the Greeks and the Judeo-Christian tradition and the Middle Ages and Charlemagne and the Renaissance and Reformation and Enlightenment and the birth of Democracy. If you’d rather divert to other things that really had no long-term effect then your story wouldn’t be quite so effective. ”
So called judeo-christian tradition is the biggest reason for the intellectual abyss we white europeans lived for centuries, say up to the Enlightment. It was the church who managed to destroy most of the intellectual heritage of the greeks and those before them. Actually, the christians tried their best to destroy all that knowledge for centuries. It was heresy to know anything. Knowledge was from that chap devil, you know.
And the reason for all this pogrom? The acient texts showed that there was nothing new in christianity philosphically. Some text even showed that Jesus was just a jewish guy, a teacher and a rabbi, perhaps a true contender for the crown of the jewish people, but just a man. Not a god, semi god or anything like that. Therefore the christians and their church did their best to destroy any trace of the wisdom of antiques. It was the arabs who saved most of what we know now. Ain’t that a bitch? 😀
Birth fo democracy, yeah. Did you know that they had a democracy of sorts in Iceland few centuries before USA? No? Well, we had it too. Every county had a meeting called Käräjät, where the spokespersons from each family met and discussed such trivial issues as war, laws and such. This was the practise for centuries among the finnish tribes. That is, before the christianity came with its concept of freedom and enlightment: kings and taxes, subjacation, slavery, control, heresy, burnings at stakes, torture for ones beliefs, witchcraft, sin and satan and all those other wonderful judeo-christian traditions. These latter ones did not exist before the christianity up here north among us white europeans.
“News. America will remain a superpower; China will recede. There’s no way a country of 1.4 billion remains intact as its economic needs grow. Mix that with the whole coastal versus agrarian dynamic in that country; China in its present state won’t exist more than 50 years. America, though, is positioned well. First, we have access to two oceans. This is very important.”
I assume that saying America you mean USA? Well, I got news for you Chuckie. Your whole nation has no money at all. It is all borrowed 😀 You understand? You have no money, period. Your government stands only because those frigging chinese are lending money for it. Your economy is in much worse condition than the famously chaotic russian one. That should make you think twice about history, Chuck :-D.
If the China, as the major money lender, would call in its loans tomorrow, USA would stop to exist. There would no money for any troops, for any state or government salaries. Not a single cop, official, soldier, nurse, doctor, teatcher, pilot, air controller would get his salary. Now you can only imagine where that might lead into. I seriously doubt USA could survive that.
The only thing, the only thing at the moment, that keeps US as a super power, is your nuclear arsenal. That is all you guys really have. Period. And ok, effienct agriculture, for now.
The problem with your view of history Chuck is that it is what is called eurocentric. Like you can see the flaws in afriocentric or sinocentric history, yours is also flawed. First thing you must understand is the historical fact that the story of the white victory was written afterwards, it was invented as a cohesive story. For example, Charlemange was a nobody from the arab and chinese perspective. I doubt if anybody had even heard of him in Indian states.
1500’s the chinese saw the whole Europe as the lands end, the most furthest shit hole of the world. It was full of plague, wars and very dirty and uncivilized people. There was nothing the chinese needed from Europe. They could sell to those stinking crazies some stuff, but they did not need them nor there was anything the europeans could give to the chinese. That was how the chinese had looked europeans for centuries.
That changed only in 1800’s. And why? Because the white supreme being wanted to make really big money from the opium trade 😀 Did you know that, Chuckie? Yeah, the international drug trade begun earnest with the brittish opium traders. The thing would be similar like the colombian cartels would show up into your shores to sell drugs by tons of it and make billions with it. But, wait a minute, they are allready doing it!! Darn! 😀
USA is a very young nation and country. Very young. It has been around only couple centuries plus. That is very short time in history. I, for instance, live in a city that officially founded in 1500’s. There is a city in Finland that existed at least in 1100’s. And Finland has never been urban society untill last few decades. This kind of knowledge gives one a different perspective. Nobody can say that USA will endure say next two centuries. At this moment it is up to your creditors.
Understand what I am trying to say? History is not a victory lap for the USA, no by a mile. I know that american history as it is presented to you tries to tell you that. It tries to convince you that somehow there is a white line of heritage from the acient egyptians to you guys. Well, there is none. You are not the princes of Egypt. Or anything else. That is why this post is talking about white washing the history in american schools etc.
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@anon: how about the whole system of government stolen from the iroquois?
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Now, sam…
THAT’S called delivering a fatality. Way to represent, LMAO.
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Great post Sam. but seriously your scaring me stop it. 😉
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@jason&ankhesen: 😀
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@ LOL, Puhlease, or whoever,
“No, it doesn’t.”
Yes, it does. “X is Y. I am X. I am not Y.” is not a valid argument.
Which is why he recanted the statement.
Maybe you should take some logic lesson reviews.
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Chuck,
“He won the Nobel Prize – he’s kinda smart.”
Kinda being the operative word here.
And, sorry, I’m not really impressed by all that. You can be a genius in one area and fail in every other — happens all the time. But maybe I just have high standards.
“You are either stupid or being willfully obtuse.”
Ummm… excuse me?
Mr. “Ad hominems are for weaklings” — Hypocrisy at its finest.
Well, at least you can’t claim “rationality” anymore, so much for that ruse, huh?
“If Watson has black heritage that has nothing to do with his personal intelligence.”
Now, that’s a stupid statement. See above comment.
“The concept of HBD and innate racial IQ differences says that…”
Who on earth was talking about “HBD”? Not I. I was discussing Watson’s statements. So far as I know HBD =/= Watson. So your whole comment is irrelevant.
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“Funny – the only person I see speaking from an unemotional/intellectual level is Chuck.”
LOL, Chuck, I see you got all three commenters from your blog to defend you here?
ROTFL.
And uh, no, Chuck is not “unemotional/intellectual”. See his flagrant use of ad hominems and insults that he always claims to be “above”. It’s quite clear he is very invested in looking “right” in this debate and that he is personally invested in the idea of whiteness. He’ll admit this himself.
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“he is personally invested in the idea of whiteness.”
Noooo, it’s just a coincidence that he’s white AND trying to shove white superiority down our throats. If POC could just stop taking it personally and see the FACTS they would see the truth!!!
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You know I was just wondering about that myself. And what about the mighty all knowing Professor Thaddeus? (Please, Please Please note that was not an invitation!!!)
Could it be that both unconsciously really empathize with what Chuck and his pals have to say?
I don’t want any of my comments here to seen as a derailment so I would like to commend Sam for the much needed history lesson he has brought to this discussion. And also acknowledge information supplied by Femi and JasOnburns which I will use for other postings. Guys great stuff this was very informative!!!
This “Eurocentric world-view “bug”” is akin to getting a cold in its early stages: You stay in denial while the symptoms develop. A little while later they are so undeniable streaming down your face. That it becomes impossible, just plain foolish and idiotic to deny its existence. So you simply accept and come to terms with it.
Or of course you can continue in denial and non-acceptance. A popular choice for some…
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Kwamla,
“Could it be that both unconsciously really empathize with what Chuck and his pals have to say?”
Doubtful. Very doubtful.
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@Natasha
What would be your explanation for their absence in this latter part of the discussion?
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Thad was here:
and here:
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Mira stays out of discussions like this, I think. Most commenters do, seeing as they are futile.
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@Sam
Props.
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sam –
Your comments wrt the economic condition of the US are quite known already.
What’s up with saying Africans changed history via trade goods (diamond, gold, and silver)? The rest of you don’t find that offensive to a degree?
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This book should be required reading in every sociology class: http://books.google.com/books?id=rPNFXBnwuNoC&lpg=PA176&ots=7KRjcWm5I3&dq=jensen%20black%20white%20iq%20regression&pg=PA176#v=onepage&q&f=false
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@anon: Well, if you deny that africans had an impact on the history, I can only say that I do not know what history you talk about. The history of the Moon?
For starters you might think the few million blacks in the US. They, of course, shaped the whole economy of the whole South by working as slaves and they, of course, were one of the major causes for the US civil war, so I think they had some impact on US history on that account alone. Blacks, that is the guys from Africa, you know, have done much more than that to the whole american culture. But I guess that is not history, is it? 😀
And if we really go down the history and think about did africans have any impact to the history of this planet, well, lets just say this: humanbeings came from Africa. That is really embarassing for the supreme white man, who came from there too 😀
It just pointed out the US economy for Chuck, because he seemed to belive that USA is somehow outside of the forces that shape the history of the mankind. Like I said, the chinese could end it all next week, if they wished to do so, simply by calling back their loans. Add to that the capital the japanese and arabs have poured in to the USA and which could be withdrawn at any time, you have a one nation which is really standing on eggs. And that is American history too, right now.
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*applause*
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*slow clap* for Sam ! Whos with me? LOL
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Do American History Teachers Value Feelings Over Knowledge?…
trackback >>The Moral Liberal: Defending the Judeo-Christian ethic, limited government, and the American constitution>>…
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Chuck seems to have taken a powder.
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@Puhlease:
I think this book should be required reading for American high school kids since many are not learning much in regards to their history.
It was an immeasurable help to me as it helped with memorizing dates. It was also fun reading it. Here’s a favourite”:
“There was an old man form Boston Mass
Whose b*lls were made of brass
He banged them together to play Stormy Weather
And Lightening shot out of his a**.
A bit tame, but it proved a good source of memory enhancing exercises! Imagine memorizing thousands of filthy limericks! Since they didn’t/don’t teach historical context in most high schools, memoriazing dates is all! Anything which can help should make you grateful, Puhlease indeed!
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Here’s a better history book:
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sam:
so then you’re another self-loathing white person. good job!
nice derailment. btw, the U.S. *did* save europe from the scourge of nazism you freak.
You’ve accepted the meat of communism so it doesn’t much matter. The only thing you’ve resisted is physical occupation. Plus, I’d love to see how your country fares once multiculturalism takes hold. As of now you have a mostly Finnish society. Allow Muslims to get a greater foothold in that country, and then come back and talk to me. Since you know nothing about melting pots you should probably refrain from discussing the matter. It is much more difficult to run socialist-style national policies when the ethnic and racial demographic isn’t homogenous. Too much *natural* group tension.
Plus you don’t even realize that you’re shooting your own argument in the foot. You are citing *white* European nations as being the only ones that have actually succeeded in bringing universal health care to their countries. White countries have done that which you find so important.
And they did what with those natural resources? Again, the topic of discussion is why is history whitewashed? It is whitewashed because largely “white cultures” have done profound things with the earth’s resources; and most importantly the things they have done have mostly shaped our civilization as we know it today.
You can wiggle around and shift goal posts all day long by bringing up red herrings about health care etc, but you’re missing the point.
You’ve exposed yourself as yet another America hater – just like Abagond. And this economy is worse that the *Soviet* one (you incorrectly said “russian”)? By what metric? The American poor have had more wealth – in absolute terms – than the Soviet middle class. The Soviet system was horrible which is why it lasted 70 years and has all but died in only the most totalitarian/backwardized regimes. Get real.
Operative word: “if”. Hint: they won’t. Hint: they can’t.
So how would you characterize those respective societies today? I mean, because we live in the 2010s – not the 1500s. We’re studying history in school from the perspective of how things are in this current time – not how they were perceived by people of the 16th century. As I’ve said, you merely want non-white civilizations to be mentioned gratuitously in order to boost esteem and take away from white civilization’s success. The truth is that most of the movements and interactions of non-white societies turned into dead ends. They came of nothing. Asians, blacks, Arabs may have created amazing things in their time, but if they didn’t translate into change and action that directly affected our modern state then they are trivial and relatively unimportant.
Which speaks to my point that it is you leftist racialists who make this argument up. None of my teachers ever mentioned that history’s makers were white. We knew they were, but that was never an issue worth mentioning. History was created by people – no color. You and yours make this a racial/ethnic argument.
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From Chuck’s own blog:
Oh No:
“Chuck, you should have mentioned your little tiff here: https://abagond.wordpress.com/2010/09/29/why-american-history-gets-whitewashed/
There are so many fragile liberal minds that need crushing. One man can’t do it all.”
Chuck:
“are you puhleese? those fools are about as stupid as they come. they’re so stupid they don’t realize they’re stupid. i don’t know why i waste my time.
and they got all riled up *before* i even said anything about HBD;…:
Source:
http://glpiggy.wordpress.com/2010/10/13/on-women-in-the-locker-room/
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Chuck said:
“You can wiggle around and shift goal posts all day long by bringing up red herrings about health care etc, but you’re missing the point.”
And you are missing the point of the post, derailing the argument into your own pet topics.
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@ chuckie: heres a tip for you: USSR collapsed 20 years ago. So there is no more Soviet Union. I think your history books really need a small overhaul. 😀 Get real, you know!
“You’ve accepted the meat of communism so it doesn’t much matter. The only thing you’ve resisted is physical occupation.”
Finland has never been a communist state, country or anything near of it, you illiterate poor soul :-D! My granfathers and uncles fough in two wars, one was wounded three times for making it sure Finland did not become communist state. Nor I am a communist or socialist by any definition. So save your breath, ignoramus.
“btw, the U.S. *did* save europe from the scourge of nazism you freak.”
It was the USSR actually who did it, you bonehead. Commies won the nazis. 😀 That must really burn your arse! You guys almost came in too late for the parties which is why half of the Europe, excluding tiny Finland who got no help from the west at all, fell under the soviet occupation. And wasn’t it you guys who accepted that? Oh yes, you did! 😀 See, this is also what is white washed in your history books!
And just to show you how little you actually know about the history of the WW2, Finland threw out the germans from Lapland too in our third war in six years. Not a single american soldier was around for that one too. Now hows that, you peacenick??
“And this economy is worse that the *Soviet* one (you incorrectly said “russian”)? By what metric? The American poor have had more wealth – in absolute terms – than the Soviet middle class.”
Well, you really do not have economy to speak of, you moron. Your state does have no money at all, get it? It is all loaned. All those dollars that you have are loaned from the arabs, chinese and japanese. That must really piss you off :-D. And I meant RUSSIAN economy, not soviet you dumbbell (this is revealing too, you seem to be totally not aware that USSR is no more :-D).
Ok, lets talk about the SOVIET UNION versus USA today. You guys have 27 million adults in your country who can not read. Everybody in USSR learned how to read and write. You have millions of people who live on the streets. They do not have that much posessions, do they moron? 😀 The poor in USA have no possibility for a health care nor do some few million working class people who don’t have the money to pay for insurance. In SOVIET UNION everybody had a health care for free! Hows that you supreme white male?? 😀 Soviet Union was a terrible place but for the majority it was much better materially than USA today is for the american poor. That is also historical fact, which is also one reason to call your history white washed. 😀
And you show your ignorance on the history when you say soviet middle class. There was none. They were officially all workers, see? 😀 Comrades, remember?
“you’re another self-loathing white person”
No I am not. I’m very proud man and I really don’t loath myself. As for retards like you, you get my loathing for free. See I’m so strong and self confident that I see no man as a threat. I fear no one. It becomes from experience. I’ve been around and met all kinds people all over the world and lo behold, I can survive out there! You know, in the real world with the real people. So I am not affraid any race, person, nation, religion etc. Not even poor saps like you. I have no need. 😀
See, fear promotes hate and aggression, just like in you. You are so scared that you try to hang on anything you can and this leads to these really dumb thoughts that you have. You should get out more often and meet some nice people. Try some ping pong instead of wallowing on those hate sites on the Net!
“We’re studying history in school from the perspective of how things are in this current time – not how they were perceived by people of the 16th century.”
And there in is the problem: you guys really do not understand history at all, do you? See, if one can not learn from the history, one is doomed to repeat it. So, I would recommed that you would study how chinese people perceived the world in 1500’s if not because the chinese still see it pretty much the same way. For them China is in the center of the world. That is today, my ignorant friend :-D.
And also, if you dismiss the past, you have no idea how we are here today, which comes very clear from your text. You have no idea how the world we live in came about. You have a nice fairy tale version of it. You believe in it. But that is not history, dear child. That is the white washed history. 😀
” if they didn’t translate into change and action that directly affected our modern state then they are trivial and relatively unimportant.”
Which is why you are so ignorant and read the white washed history that has all kinds of flaws in it. You have ni idea how these other cultures affected yours. Well, I guess that is normal since you don’t know anything from the past. For starters you could start to study the history of ideas, you know, philosophy and such. You could learn something about your culture which is not that original at all when you looked at it little bit closer.
“History was created by people – no color. You and yours make this a racial/ethnic argument.”
Indeed it was, which is why I am wondering why you babble about the white supremacy in the first place? 😀 And it is you who make it about the race, not me, you ingnoramus.
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Sam has touched on most of the points I wanted to bring up, but the myth that the U.S. “saved” Europe really needs to be answered twice.
Yes, indeed, the U.S. was an integral part of the TEAM that saved Europe in WWII. Without its money and economic aid, the Soviet Union and Britain would have never held out.
By the time American troops got into the fighting in Europe, however, the German military had shot its bolt in Russia. The Battles of Kursk and Stalingrad had occurred before one U.S. soldier ever set foot in Italy and the German resources that were tied down by the fighting in Western Europe were hardly significant until 1944.
Even then, as D-Day was being launched, the Russians launched their own Operation Bagration, which would push the Germans right out of Russia and back into Poland. It took the U.S. and the British 3 months to pack up the Normandy front, destroying about 20 German divisions in the process – divisions which were mostly second rate, at that. And the Brits and Americans fluffed their one great encirclement at Falaise.
Meanwhile, the Soviets gobbled up close to 70 German first-rate divisions and only stopped at the gates of Warsaw because they had outrun their supply lines.
Without a doubt, the people who most fought and bled to save Europe from the Nazis were the Russians. Only an ignoramous would believe otherwise.
But here’s the real kicker: the U.S. COULD make a decent claim that they were the ones who saved east Asia from JAPANESE occupation.
Why is it we never hear anything along those lines from American patriots? Could it be because the U.S. “saved” Asia, only to hand it straight back to its European colonial overlords?
Not much to brag about in terms of saving democracy there, is there?
And finally, Sam is right: for an American to whine about Finnish cowardice in the face of the Soviet threat requires ignorance that beggars the imagination. The Finns handed the Soviets their collective ass on a platter not once, not twice, but THREE times (and managed to look very cool soing it, too), and this with an army that was basically equipped with popguns. I won’t even mentioned the comparative casualty rates (anyone interested can look them up in Wikipedia), but basically for every ten Soviet soldiers killed, one Finn pinched his thumb in an ammo box.
Blustering American right wing a$$holes can only dream of being one day as tough as the Finns.
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Sam, didn’t you know that all naysayers are ‘liberals or left wing? That is the clarion call of these so-called right wing people. When in doubt. scream LIBERAL! That is how you can tell they are losing an argument! They attack people’s supposed political leanings instead of the argument itself.
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Of course if Britain and the US hadn’t launched the campaign on the Western Front, Western Europe would have probably come under Soviet (i.e. Stalin’s) domination along with the East. In my opinion, the Soviet Communists in the early to mid-20th century were every bit as brutal as the Nazis despite their ideological dissimilarities. That said, the Russian people did indeed fight with incredible perseverence during the war.
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@herneith: 😀
@thad: yeah, I’ve been wondering that too: why all these later day viking saints do not take the credit for liberation of Asia? Weird…
Also, I wonder how many of these newly born vikings know that the original viking men used to curl their pretty blond hair and beards, dress up nicely in purple and red tunics and once they made the contact with the arabs in the Caspian region, used to wear mascara also?
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Apparently, some do.
Once again….
“Has Stormfront become a dangerous nest of degenerate effeminacy and anti-Christian values”?
http://christwire.org/2010/09/has-stormfront-org-become-a-dangerous-nest-of-degeneracy-effeminacy-and-anti-christian-values/
Read it and ROFL. 😀
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FG makes a good point. Sam is sitting here talking out of both sides of his mouth – extolling Communists on one hand but then displaying pride in his countries’ ability to withstand their scourge. Either way, Soviets murdered many more millions of people than did the Nazis. America had a hand in not only preventing the spread of Nazism but also the spread of Communist – both of which were leftist ideologies.
don’t foist your faux pas on me; you’re the one that said “russian” economy when you were talking about the behavior of the “soviet” economy. i corrected *you* you finnish freak.
i hate to break it to you: finland is inconsequential in the realm of geopolitics. nobody has wanted to occupy or at least bad enough to fight to any great lengths to do so. it offers no strategic advantage since it is off dangling up above the rest of europe. no country has to go through finland to obtain resources or trade routes. so don’t act like finland was able to survive on its own accord as if that is something worth bragging about. finland never met much of a threat because nobody cares about finland.
OK comrade, let me put this into perspective for you. First, the Soviet Union had a 99.7% literacy rate in the 1980s. The U.S. has a 99.0% literacy rate today. The latter is quite a bit better considering that children aren’t forced to read by the barrel of a gun. Second, what did all of that reading in USSR go towards creating? That’s right, nothing! Because of the severely handicapped economy – because of communism – Soviets couldn’t create real value even if they had good educations. So while the Soviets were truly capable of creating a handful of amazingly talented individuals in whichever realm they felt was important i.e. chess, athletics, ballet, music, etc they were unable to replicate such success for the rest of their citizens. Because of a relatively freer economy, Americans are able to choose what they want to do for a living. So we end up with a much higher number of people able to translate their talents and abilities into something economically prosperous.
As for the homeless, it is another great liberal myth that homeless people in this country just fell through the cracks. No, one has to *work* in order to become homeless. You must willfully abdicate the vast number of opportunities that Americans are given in order to succeed and prosper in this country.
As for your assertion that Soviet quality of life was somehow better than anything Americans experienced, I urge you to browse this article:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1079/is_v85/ai_3912991/pg_10/
High alcoholism, high infant mortality, low life expectancy. The Soviets – even if they had nominal free health care – were a country is social disarray. Which is why it no longer exists.
I was perfectly content to study history as history. The important events and inventions in our lives without any emphasis on color. But Abagond wrote a post about “whitewashing history” and you brought up all of these dead-end inventions to show that black people and Asians have created things. But that really just side-steps the point. I or nobody I knew was going around trying to pound our white chests to show that only white people have made history- it was you and the others who have provided a dialectical jumping off point.
Again, why is history not told from a Finnish perspective? Because Finland was tucked into a tiny nook way off in the corner of the world. Continental Europe and America have contributed the most and been involved in more of the process of history and been involved in more of the creation of the nations, wars, and achievements of this world than people of other races. When blacks, arabs, or asians contribute in any meaningful way they are mentioned. Martin Luther King Jr. is mentioned in American history books. I think Sam here is angry that he was “forced” to learn about American history. He resents that because he thinks that implies that America is stronger than his country. Well, it is. But he shouldn’t take it personally. Finland is a fine country that I hope to visit someday; it will just never be a world superpower that bends the rest of the world’s agenda to its whim.
As for the precarious finances of the United States. Stories of our demise are greatly exaggerated. Yes, we’ve racked up quite a large debt, but those that have borrowed money are being held by their short and curlies just as we are by them. It is a symbiotic relationship, and they (the Chinese) are much more contingent on us than we are on them. For all of the money we owe, there is a tremendous amount of assets and wealth residing within this country’s borders. All of that money wasn’t borrowed for naught; we have at least something to show for it. And the relatively laissez-faire economic attitude has allowed for massive wealth creation here – which is why we’re still further ahead of most large Western countries in that regard.
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Chuck said:
“I was perfectly content to study history as history. The important events and inventions in our lives without any emphasis on color. But Abagond wrote a post about “whitewashing history” and you brought up all of these dead-end inventions to show that black people and Asians have created things. But that really just side-steps the point. I or nobody I knew was going around trying to pound our white chests to show that only white people have made history- it was you and the others who have provided a dialectical jumping off point.”
You are so full of it. First you derail and then you blame it on others. You were the one who brought race and white chest-pounding into this, no one else. My post was about why lies are told about American history in high school. You made it about race and derailed it into the White Inventor Argument.
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Enough of Chuck’s derailment. From this point on I am deleting all comments that are not on the topic of the post.
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Which both?
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Um…well since it hasnt been explicitly stated the word “whitewashed” isnt always used to denote a something racial. Much like whitewashing a fence or wall white-washing history is concealing all the negatives/dissent (the dirty) from history(the fence) and only focusing on the positives(painting the fence a uniform color, white). For instance downplaying genocide, slavery, imperialism, the Negatives of Manifest Destiny ect. and playing up the success of American Capitalism (omitting the fact that without slavery, MD, and Native American genocide America as we know it wouldn’t exist).
This isnt the most articulate explanation of the phrase “white-washed” but you all get the point.
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@ Y
You are right. The original meaning is – to gloss over, conceal, suppress. I would also add – distort, manipulate, mislead.
Whitewashing is often practised by people whose ideology is very close or virtually identical to a past ideology which was proven inhumane, despicable, destructive, impractical or factually erroneous. It can also be the past ideology of a former enemy they fought against.
In order to differentiate or distance themselves from suspicion of doing the same wrong, they distort the proven and documented facts. They put a new misleading spin on past facts to make their own similar twisted ideology seem benign or at least somewhat acceptable. They attempt to give at least the (deceitful) impression that they deserve the benefit of the doubt.
The efficiency of whitewashing is usually the stronger, the less educated/informed or critically thinking the target audience is. The lowest common denominator comes to mind. Whitewashers use manipulation techniques based on known phobias of their target audience.
An example is the pit bull owner whose dog attacked a little child in the park. Then there’s a public outcry that there were too many past cases like that with pit bulls and that restrictive laws need to be passed. The pit bull owners will make any effort to make the public believe (through manipulated statistics, known prejudice etc) that most of the past cases were actually caused by rottweilers, and that pit bulls are docile.
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@ abagond: 😀 I wondered how long you can stand that moron. You got some great mental stamina, I tell you!
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I help keep him in shape. 😀
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@ Femi
Exactly. Too bad there are entities present that wish to change the meaning of white-washing into a racially charged term and use their distorted definition to project their own racial baggage.
SMH.
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Abagond
LOL beautiful and on point wording, it painted such a hilarious and ironic image. That has a good chance of making my top 5 laughs this week. This Chuck guy seems to be looking for an outlet for his denial that isn’t an echo chamber.
I really hope that blockquote tag works >.>
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LOL! Abagond, why not do a post on “White chest pounding” ? It’d be interesting to see a post on this rarer breed of racist that’s been showing up here lately…
How to spot a White-Chest-Pounder:
– inability to engage the ideas of the original post
– cutting and pasting white chest pounding rants from St*rmfront etc
– invites buddies to visit website X to pound chests together
– creates chest-pounding sock puppets
– often resorts to White Inventor argument
– suffers from poor self-esteem
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“You must think Chuck is a white supremacist. I can’t blame you, that is the caricature of anyone who holds non PC views on race.
But you would be wrong.
Chuck is an HBDer. HBDers generally acknowledge that NE Asians have higher IQs and larger brains than whites.”
Chuck’s HBD (Human Biodiversity) belief is just the latest “compromise” along the descent of racist arguments. It’s completely vacuous intellectually, of course, but probably is a harbinger of the concessions that Stormfront will have to make in the coming years.
HBD is completely laughable, but it’s the only place that honest racists have to go.
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@ aeigfc
LMAO!!!! I hope Abagond does it.
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Human biodiversity, as King puts it, is simply a post-modern face for good old-fashioned racism.
The most renowned human geneticist, Luigi Cavalli-Sforza (whose arguments HBD proponents often warp) has given conclusive arguments which pretty much put the HBD cargument flat out in the grave.
The nut of the matter is this: HBD proponents make a strawman argument: they claim that anti-racists are, in fact, saying that all human beings are biologically identical and that there is no biological patterning to the human species. Then, when they can prove that there is indeed biological patterning, they have supposedly disproven the anti-racist hypothesis.
QED.
The fact of the matter is, as C-S shows, while there is indeed human biopatterning, these patterns do not nicely correspond to discrete, stable subspecies that could be labled “races”. There are, indeed, human lineages and breeding groups on the planet, but in evolutionary terms these are quite temporary (none of them is older than a few thousand years, at best) and are incredibly small – C-S estimates somewhere between 200,000-500,000 of these on the planet.
So even if one were to squint REAL HARD, hold one’s nose and claim that these breeding groups/lineages are, indeed, effectively races, the terms “Caucasian”, “Asian” and “Negroid” (or what have you) have absolutely no meaning on the genetic level.
(Yes, Abagond, I know I owe you an article on C-S. Hopefully, I’ll get it out soon.)
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Thad I have always felt this way but I never knew the scientific reasonings behind it. thanks for the info!
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Thad said:
“(Yes, Abagond, I know I owe you an article on C-S. Hopefully, I’ll get it out soon.)”
I look forward to it.
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“So even if one were to squint REAL HARD, hold one’s nose and claim that these breeding groups/lineages are, indeed, effectively races, the terms “Caucasian”, “Asian” and “Negroid” (or what have you) have absolutely no meaning on the genetic level.”
And once you do move to the genetic level, you find that a “race” (such as “Negros/Africans) is not a single genetic race at all. Instead we look more like this:
Full article here:
http://scienceblogs.com/geneticfuture/2009/04/massive_study_of_african_genet.php
We’re all over the place genetically! But how different are Africans from one another? Genetics researcher Stephan Schuster conducted a survey that sequenced the genome of five people native to the region of southern Africa, including anti-apartheid activist Archbishop Desmond Tutu. The other four subjects were Bushmen, one named Gubi who had his entire genome sequenced.
“Gubi is the first person from an African minority population to be fully sequenced, and comparing him to the other three men from the region shows as much genetic separation as you’d expect to find between European and Asian peoples. Says Schuster: “This is despite the fact that they sometimes live within walking distance of one another”
So, basically between Bushmen and Bantu, you can find more genetic variation that you can find between say… Han Chinese and Frenchmen. YET, HBT numskulls try to treat “Black people” as one massive genetic race, who is somehow genetically disadvantaged.
BTW article here:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/2010/02/18/genomes-of-desmond-tutu-bushmen-show-africas-huge-genetic-diversity/
But how can this be, seeing that Black people don’t even share the same relative genetics?? If genetics is the great driver of intelligence or social complexity, then there should be more variation among Blacks than between other races, since there is far richer genetic diversity/variation between Black peoples.
– HBD is basically a theory for stupid people who wish to draw conclusions from other more intelligent people’s research, that the researchers themselves do not draw. It’s a catchall for gullible internet dummies who think they’ve finally stumbled upon someone who can explain a way for them to be superior (which most dummies are desperate to be)
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It’s a catchall for gullible internet dummies who think they’ve finally stumbled upon someone who can explain a way for them to be superior (which most dummies are desperate to be)
Thank you!
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Nice articles, King! Thans for posting them!
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Abagond,
I noticed in your post that you felt that school districts were leaving the teaching of “real” history to those who went onto the university level. I am of course paraphrasing a great deal. Much of the discussion in the comments has revolved around history taught at the secondary level as well. I would like to offer up my own anecdotal experience.
I have attended undergrad at both a private liberal art college and a state university. It’s been my experience that unless a university student specifically seeks out one of the topic courses in history, they come away knowing about as much as they learned in highschool. The classes in history often needed to fulfill one’s general ed requirements are very generic in terms of materials presented. The professors that teach these seminar style courses even at the very expensive private liberal arts college were adjunct professors who were holdovers from other departments in the humanities section.
A textbook from one of these classes on 19th century U.S. history actually had only one chapter devoted to slavery and the African American experience in America. YES, the chapter was intended to cover both subjects! It was the shortest chapter in the book. Based on the “info” in this text, one would honestly think that blacks were bought to this country via a protracted boat ride, worked in the fields, then were emancipated by the wonderful great Abe Lincoln and all of the grand people in the north…and that’s all folks! This was a text which I paid over $150 for (the high price of university texts is quite another subject which I could discuss at length using very colorful language , lol) and the class was considered upper division. For many majors this class and it’s counterpart (20th century U.S. history) would be the sole requirements in that area for their degree to be awarded.
Keeping the above in mind, I would say, no wonder America has many -supposedly educated included- who are in fact clueless. Great post & blog!
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Have you tried http://www.wallbuilders.org? you’ll find out that American history isn’t ‘whitewashed’ at all–he even talks about Benjamin Banneker. Even wikipedia doesn’t think he did anything–He was a person who wrote an Almanac and found the 77th parallel which Washington DC is on today
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Late to the party, but I find it hillarious that Chuck seems to think that Kemet was populated by a bunch of white people.
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Also west Africa was using brass,Iron other materials way before Europeans. The only great Europeans are the Romans and the Greek. What were the Germans were doing or the English eating their own people for food. I wish my son father was Roman or Greek well both instead of German,Austerian well Nordic type.
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love this blog, referenced it in my blog thebottomlineistruth.blogspot.com
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If you rebel against your elders, you always attempt to wipe out any signs of their ever existing. Look at every theme of overthrowing the “old establishment” aka elder, in every Hollywood movie. Do you see them retaining any signs that the old establishment existed????? Apart from the odd mounting a severed head on a stick? (Sound familiar)
Discussing this issue with the average white person is like asking a rapist why he raped you and expecting a decent conversation!!! If the victim is calm, it would put the rapist off because of his guilt introducing fear of retribution, if he were to admit he committed the crime. If the victim is angry that only makes the rapist’s job of denial easier.
Point is, only a truth seeking heart in a white person would be able to engage in the topic of whitewash of history.
Most of US don’t have a truth-seeking heart in this current era.
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This is an interesting post. I’m now learning that what we learned in school has been white washed. The definition of white washed that I have learned is defined as try to clear someone or their name by deliberately conceling their mistakes. Well there are lots of reason why we as school children were fed misinformation there were many agendas at play. I learned that the information put in school text books is a panel teachers that decides what goes in the text books.So alot of information has been omitted. Their are lots of culturally biased class room instructors that are not comfortable discussing things like race.So certain information can’t present accurate information correctly. Christopher Columbus is presented as a hero. When I later learn he is a murderer of indigenous people in such of person greed. All that business at Thanksgiving is a lie as well. The pilgrims and indians having a friendly feast. I then learn the pilgrims murdered the indians. This is my understanding of whitewashing. I intend to purchase the book Lies My Teacher Told Me.I like Napolian Bonaparte quote. “History is a set of lies agreed upon”.
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Christopher Columbus was presented as a hero and explorer, when he was nothing but a murderer of indigenous people in search of personal greed. The mythological tale about the first Thanksgiving is a lie as well. The pilgrims were the real savages slaughtering the indians. History is a set of lies agreed upon.
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The Bible is even being presented as European. Check out this “once in a lifetime” event occurring on the History Channel. http://theamericanjesus.net/?p=8974
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Regarding the statement in the post
Well, it looks like some teachers are turning this on its head:
Colorado students walk out to protest conservative ‘censorship’ of AP history
(http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/09/colorado-students-walk-out-to-protest-conservative-censorship-of-ap-history/)
It seems social media has helped mobilize (mostly white) students to back their teachers on this one.
Does anyone know what is currently being covered by the US History AP exam (or have a link that discusses it)?
According to the article, the fear of conservative educators is
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(http://youtu.be/64NrhxeZ518)
What is meant by “positive aspects of U.S. history and its heritage”? (wording from the narrator)
Do People agree that teaching materials should “promote citizenship, patriotism … (and) respect for authority” and not “encourage or condone civil disorder, social strife or disregard of the law.”
(http://www.allmediany.com/news/32696-denver-students-accuse-school-board-of-censoring-us-history)
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Distortion is deliberately made by politicians and media channels to get the support of the people who were once ill treated and ignored. But, when we look back, the Blacks were leading a life of abject poverty and oppression by tribal leaders before they were brought as slaves to America. Even today look at the economic and social conditions of the Blacks in their own African countries. They live in squalor and filth. Video images of these people show their beastly living
They don’t have even proper clothing and they live in huts and holes. But slaves brought to America could even become president like Obama. Now hundreds of thousands of emigrants are waiting near the Mexican border to enter America. How lucky Obama’s ancestors could freely enter America on slave ships.
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@ Abraham Yeshuratnam
“…Blacks were leading a life of abject poverty and oppression by tribal leaders before they were brought as slaves to America.”
If ignorance is bliss, you are floating on a very high cloud right now. LOL!
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@ Abraham Yeshuratnam
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Didn’t Obama’s father enter the US on a student visa as a university student? How is that an example of slaves, or their descendants becoming POTUS? How is that an example of slaves freely entering the US?
I have read that his mother likely has an ante-bellum slave ancestor (and hence Obama himself), but it is also possible that we have already had a white president who did too. Neither indicates anything.
This guy is a mere troll spouting forth pure nonsense.
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@Abraham Yeshuratnam
Distortion is deliberately made by
politicians and media channelsme to get the support of the people whowere once ill treated and ignoredare ignorant.^ Fixed that for ya.
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@Abraham Yeshuratnam: “Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”-Martin Luther King Jr.
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@ Abraham Yeshuratnum: “Better to remain silent and be thought the fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.”—Abraham Lincoln
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