White History Month

White History Month, unlike Black History Month, is the month that never ends. From Patrick Henry’s “Give me liberty or give me death” to “manifest destiny” to America as “the great melting pot”, American history is not merely taught from a white point of view, it is taught as if blacks, Mexicans and Native Americans do not truly count as people.

White American slave owners, like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry, are held up as heroes of freedom. Meanwhile John Brown, who gave his life trying to free the slaves, is seen as what? A madman.

White racism is downplayed, so much so that whites say stuff like, “The Irish made it. What is wrong with blacks?” or sometimes even, “Jim Crow? What’s that?”

Lies are told about Native Americans and Africans so that the crimes committed against them by whites seem to be “not so bad”.

The achievements of whites, like the light bulb, are played up as wonders of invention while the achievements of people of colour – you know, like civilization, writing, iron, geometry, or like even clothing – are played down, taken for granted or just never get brought up for some reason. Egyptians, Middle Easterners and early man, meanwhile, become honorary whites for particular periods of history.

Consider:

• Vested interests: White Americans come from a violently racist past and still benefit from the racist set-up of society that comes out of that past.
• Point of view: Most writers and teachers of American history are white.
• Money: Way more money has been poured into researching, writing and teaching white history than black history.

Yet we are supposed to believe that the history we were taught at school is somehow Magically Unaffected by all that.

History as taught at school (as opposed to university) is such an utterly self-serving whitewash that it should, at best, be called White American Studies. Add English literature to that.

Yet white people still say stuff like, “Why is there a Black History Month but not a White History Month?”

That is called being blind to white privilege.

It is called being so used to how society favours whites that you do not even notice it and think of it as just “normal” and even “fair”.

So fair that any change from it, like Black History Month or affirmative action, is seen as unfair, even racist.

But there is more: a misunderstanding of ethnic or racial pride.

Most White Americans were taught to “not see race”, to be raceless. Unfortunately that failed to end racism. So for people of colour pride in one’s race becomes a necessary and even healthy self-defence.

But the sort of pride most whites have in their race is so unhealthy, false and narcissistic that it needs to put down others to seem good by comparison and to play down evils like slavery to maintain the idea of whites as Basically Good. Their broken self-image leads to broken history and round and round it goes, hurting everyone.

Even though West Africa is at the centre of the map coordinates we use, it is almost never shown at the centre of the map. Why is that?

See also:

• Why there should be a White History Month – in which I argue for its need because what is taught at American high school is, in effect, Caucasian Mythology
• How and why the American history they teach at high school gets whitewashed
• white privilege mindset
• race conscious
• Basically Good
• Black History Month
• American history books and racism
• The lies you were taught about Native Americans
• The history of black history
• History in Texas schoolbooks