American History: Lies Your Other Teachers Told You [Friday, November 14, 2014]

[professor-lyman.livejournal.com]

Josh had written a quote up on the board again:

History, despite its wrenching pain,
Cannot be unlived, and if faced
With courage, need not be lived again.--Maya Angelou

"One of the most pervasive themes in our history is the domination of black America by white America. Issues of black-white relations destroyed the Whig Party to collapse, prompted the Republican Party to form, and had the Democrats position themselves as the "white man's party" for almost a century," Josh began. "Senators mounted the longest filibuster in history--more than 534 hours--to oppose the Civil Rights Act in 1964. And that's not even mentioning the Civil War that split the country in half and killed 620,000 Americans--which is about the same amount as every other war we've ever got involved in combined. It still affects the way we look our world--no one can convince me that the rise of the right wing extremist Tea Party isn't a direct result of Barack Obama being a black man. And the most infuriating part is that the history books, for the most part, refuse to address it."

He ran his hand through his hair. "The Civil War was about tariffs. Thomas Jefferson, who owned slaves, really loved freedom. The Civil Rights Act fixed everything magically forever, assuming you even get to the '60s in your class. And that, dear students, is a load of crap. We--and here I mainly mean 'white guys who approve history books'-- just don't like looking ourselves in the face about this."

He took a sip from his coffee. "We'll get into specifics about this next week, but why do you think we don't talk about race except in a 'oh, that was in the 1800s' sort of way?"

Comments

Listen to the lecture

[professor-lyman.livejournal.com]

People are dicks, yes?

Re: Listen to the lecture

[spin_kick_snap]

The problem with race relations in America was not a topic that one should enjoy discussing. After all, it was a deeply fraught conversation, looking at centuries of ugly and painful behavior that too often led to violence and death.

So, of course, Kathy wasn't grinning at the opportunity to discuss it. That would be horribly inappropriate. If anything, it was a thoughtful grimace as she considered which somber and salient points to bring up.

Really. That amount of lip-twitching was normal for grimaces.

Re: Listen to the lecture

[kenselvren.livejournal.com]

And as usual, Jalian was almost completely lost by the topic. "Six hundred twenty thousand?" she took a moment to boggle. She'd been to the mainland enough to realize there were a lot more people in this world than in the one she had come from, but it still felt like an almost unimaginable number in this context."

Re: Listen to the lecture

[professor-lyman.livejournal.com]

Josh nodded. "Two percent of the population of the country at the time," he said. "In today's numbers, that would have been more than 6 million deaths."