NFL
By: Greg Rector
Erasing history has been a hot topic over the last few years. A vocal element has campaigned for what can and cannot be taught in schools. The same group of people behind this will also say those teaching kids in 2022 the true history of this nation from its inception through to the end of the Civil War and its darker periods of time where Jim Crow laws were enacted would make their little Johnny or Susie traumatized, or feeling guilty for the sins of their forefathers. What a load of garbage. We’ve seen the monuments to the “heroes” of the Confederacy taken down in various towns and cities, and now the U.S. Army has announced name changes to bases that had been named for Confederate generals for far too long. The United States Military Academy at West Point will also see the removal of all Confederate symbols from the academy. These same people have made a theory taught at law schools for the most part into their favorite boogeyman as how their kids are being indoctrinated by teachers. Sorry folks, that’s an outright lie. The basis for “Critical Race Theory” is to challenge all mainstream and alternative views of racism and racial justice from all sides be they liberal, conservative, or progressive. It’s an ACADEMIC reference to critical thinking, critical theory, and scholarly criticism, it does not as many claims assert criticize or blame specific people. On that basis, alone little Johnny and Susie won’t be taught “CRT” in grade four. Don’t let Florida Gov. DeSantis and others tell you otherwise. We saw the ugliness of Charlottesville, Virginia when the tiki-torch parade of racists and supremacists led to the horrible death of Heather Heyer all over the possible removal of symbols celebrating the Confederacy. In no other nation on earth has the losing side been allowed to drive the narratives surrounding the causes of what became the darkest period in our history, the United States Civil War 1861-1865.
How We Got Here
“Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” That is a line all of us have heard in school. I get that about 85% of us were asleep or busy texting these days in history class. The subject of history is boring and all those lines we ourselves have uttered or heard from classmates for a very long time. The illiteracy rate in terms of U.S. history over the names and dates is astoundingly high. 45 men have been Presidents of the United States and so few can name more than a handful. Yet many of those same people can recite chapter and verse the myth known as the “Lost Cause” for people who make claims about the Confederacy and its glory etc. The Confederacy was mythologized starting on April 14th, 1865 when John Wilkes Booth assassinated the 16th President of the United States Abraham Lincoln. The mythology has been going strong ever since. Just look no further than the propaganda machine that is Hollywood. From Birth of a nation, Gone With The Wind, and the most painfully long, and so poorly acted Gods and Generals, the mythology of the cause of the Confederacy has been a constant, in film and in books. Try as I might there’s only one other campaign I can find from the losing side in a conflict taking hold the way the “Lost Cause” myth has. From 1919 to 1945 in Germany. That campaign only ended when the leader of that movement Adolph Hitler and his Nazis were defeated in the Second World War. I get reading about history is boring. So how about a little history lesson on YouTube instead? Just search for “Checkmate Lincolnites” and enjoy. The series is funny as well as historically accurate. The Myth of the Lost Cause was a constructed historical narrative on the causes of the Civil War. It argued that despite the Confederacy losing the Civil War, their cause was a heroic and just one, based on defending one’s homeland, state’s rights, and the constitutional right to secession.
Slavery Happened
The Original Sin. Oh my, I am forever traumatized now. How can I ever get past the guilt? I am a white male whose ancestors may have enslaved human beings. How can I go on living knowing this? I was taught that since a slave ship arrived on Virginia’s shore in 1619 that slavery was a part of the colonies, and after the birth of the nation from 1776 until 1865 it was a reality in the United States of America. Did that knowledge scar me for life? Not at all. I learned from that how damn awful it was to enslave human beings, To treat everyone with the same respect regardless of race, creed, or color, and because that was easy to do later on I could add regardless of gender and sexual identity. You see I wasn’t inundated with the mythology surrounding the real history of slavery. Have I scarred anyone with this knowledge? If so I’m so sorry about your sensitivities being affected. No lawsuits though because I am simply exercising free speech and haven’t slandered anyone. The Civil War was won by the Union and as part of that, there were new Constitutional Amendments (13th 14th, and 15th), to enshrine rights that freedom applied to all not just white male property owners as at the beginning of the nation. The efforts to “whitewash” even that from history books and classrooms is a disgrace to what the nation is supposed to stand for. Yes, ladies I also know full well the nation has never truly enshrined your rights either.
The Mythology
When my daughter was in grade 8 she came home one day and was telling me about “The War of Northern Aggression” a phrase I knew all too well being in Arkansas. To say I was ENRAGED was putting it mildly, to learn a large part of the myth of the “Lost Cause” was being taught to my child. Remember the fears of “indoctrination” those against the truth have for their kids? I didn’t want my child to believe any of those falsehoods. The next morning Daddy went and had a little visit with the school’s principal and the teacher involved. They were facing me in my United States Marine Corps uniform. An angry Marine is not a fun person to deal with. I was not the only parent who was angered either, I was joined by six other parents that morning. Instead of teaching the real history what ended up happening is that for two decades schools in Arkansas didn’t teach anything about the Civil War. The teacher involved “retired” after that year. Was it something I said that made him retire? I hope so. This was the manifestation of generations of teaching that was allowed to fester all throughout far too many parts of the United States. My wife’s family all had the mythology of the “Lost Cause” down to a tee. Chapter and verse, thankfully though they all realized it was based on LIES. Just as the grievances that Hitler and his cronies had after Germany’s defeat in World War One took hold and led to them being able to come to power and cause so much suffering around the globe.“Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” Until the truth is truly the standard in all 50 states, in every school district this will be a never-ending struggle.
The Struggle
Where this really matters is at the local level. In so many school districts those WE elect to school boards can at their whim alter what is or isn’t being taught to our children. Do you want to end this from happening? Then no matter where you live there’s only one answer. Get involved. Make sure you know where these candidates stand on basic history. Far too many good people are allowing a failure to learn from history to occur. It may even take more of us to run against these people. These same folks who scream freedom of speech are banning books as well. The only other group to do this type of thing with success again was the Nazis in Germany. There’s a line from the Declaration of Independence I use often “We hold these truths to be self-evident” sadly our history’s real truths have been under assault since before and after 1865. Only “We The People” can put a stop to it.
