LogFAQs > #954225963

Zero_Destroyer posted...

Ideally, yes, history teaching reforms should be done in mind with the idea of full accuracy. However, "full accuracy" is eventually going to be subjective, because even good faith actors will ask if certain things are necessary. Some of the Lincoln quotes are good examples. Is it necessary to teach those to reveal leaders will act more pragmatically and that they shouldn't be deified because they held bigoted beliefs? Probably, but I can see how an opposing viewpoint would say it's too reductionist and takes too much away from what was materially accomplished by Lincoln.

For the US being fundamentally racist, I think it's a core component, but not the only one. A history framed solely through slavery and its effects is, well, a framing device used to emphasize how slavery affected things in the states.

The Texas GOP doesn't want this taught, but it isn't because they feel it's reductionist, it's because they want a very glossy version of history where the struggle for Civil Rights ends in the 1960s with a clean victory. I think that aiming towards the framing of the US as fundamentally racist in an environment that is very much like the 1970s and 1980s in terms of massive conservative pushback is a positive thing even if it isn't the whole story.

So I'd agree if we only framed the US as fundamentally racist it could become reductionist or even potentially false in portions, but I don't think classrooms had the sole intent of just teaching the 1619 Project and no other framing of U.S. history. Ideally, you'd take elements from it that focus on events often not taught in classrooms that are entirely accurate and use those, but the Texas GOP has effectively banned this.

If somebody argues for a good goal for bad reasons, that doesn't change it being a good goal.

US history is largely a story of progress away from racism. That doesn't mean the racism didn't happen but I think a lot of people expect some of these "teachings with a focus on racism" to be a series of sentences like "Columbus discovered america, but he was a monster to the native americans, and that's why he was a racist shit bag, and that's why america sucks... The founding fathers enshrined in their document that all men were created equal which was a bold idea at the time, but many of them own slaves, so that's why their racist shitbags, and that's why america sucks... Lincoln fought for an end of slavery, but he had many racist quotes, and so he's a racist shit bag, and that's why america sucks... "

And honestly I understand people afraid that is what is going to be taught, many of people pushing this "america is fundamentally racist, we are defined by racism" seem very invested in dunking on america and not particularly invested in historical truth.

Would you agree that there are elements of the 1619 project that aren't concerned primarily with historical accuracy but with contextualizing American history as meaning a certain thing? Like elements of the movement that would rather a person think of America as largely racist and thus largely bad than necessarily get historical details right?

I think republicans jump to wrong conclusions and get defensive about history, but the underlying sentiment of "we should teach history, we shouldn't teach people to hate america" is one I agree with. A history class is about talking about the details of what really happened, not telling people specifically how to judge those things.

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