Rice University logo
 
Top blue bar image The Other Group
A group blog for students in HIST 159
 

Last Thoughts on Kennedy: Do we need legends?

December 14th, 2011 by lft2

Through the Legendary American class course have been repeatedly faced with the issue of whether or not legendary Americans should be endorsed and taught in schools.  Arguments for the perpetuation of legends have been set forth by everyone from Furstenberg to The Simpsons, but I believe that their effect is more harmful than beneficial to our society.  The legends, as we know them, distort the past and thereby prevent us from clearly viewing the future, as is evident in the sensationalized legend-making process that has partially obscured John F Kennedy.

 

The negative effects of legend-making are clear in the example of JFK.  For most American children, he is presented angelically, as a visionary ripped away from the nation.  As I child growing up in Texas I remember becoming physically angry over the injustice of assassinating someone so young and so wholesomely pure. Because Kennedy was a ‘legend,’ I assumed he deserved the adoration, and imagined him in my mind as a flawless martyr.  This type of mindset, which Loewen insists is a common side effect of the ‘legends’ system, instills a black-and-white world view—those who are good enough and those who simple aren’t—that is extremely dangerous in the morally complex world of reality.  Legend-making, like all elitist methods of viewing history, is also fallaciously exclusive, and presents students with an extremely narrow perspective of the past.  Lies My Teacher Told Me references studies that reveal that history is the least favorite subject of most minority students, and who can blame them?  When the supposed moral high point of a class is a wealthy white man with only a lukewarm tolerance of the Civil Rights movement, we know we have erred.  Instead, history should be more based on the lives of the average person.  We should take society as a whole, and view vast trends with a specific examples to illustrate various points along the spectrum of life experience.

 

More relevant to Kennedy than these issues, however, is the problem of why we insist on legend-making in spite of the consequences.  I argue that legend-making is maintained because it has become, rather than a format for teaching history, an outlet for sensationalism.  American culture is fascinated by the sensational, and constantly seeks entertainment from the seediest rock stars, most inaccessibly evangelical, and most absurd celebrities.  The tendency was evident even hundreds of years ago, but has been made worse by the increasing speed and demand of modern media.  It’s effect is clear in the children’s book I studied: only briefly does Sutcliffe acknowledge JFK’s weakness as a president, while the headline-grabbing tale of his saving a fellow soldier by swimming for miles with a lifejacket between his teeth gets multiple pages of coverage.  The tone of the book suggests that the rhetoric might have been even more skewed if not for the emerging PC culture that would have condemned it.  Sensationalism accounts for why Kennedy’s legend has survived—a tragically young death, a rise to the most powerful position in the nation, a picture-perfect family, numerous covert affairs, including a rumored one with Marilyn Monroe, one of the most sensational American figures of all time.  In light of the headlines, the facts of Kennedy’s presidency are lost.  We forget his failings as a negotiator in the Cuban Missile Crisis, his miscalculations in the Bay of Pigs, and his questionable morality within his personal relationships.  With the current model, students cannot hope to learn political information, and instead are subjected to a class about a cardboard saint who provides no guidance as to how to run a country beyond the preschool mantras we’ve heard since infancy.  When we base our history on the sensationalism of legends, textbooks become no better than sensationalist magazines, looking to over-emphasize episodes of interest to the point of misrepresentation.

 

The legend-making based on sensationalism has been such a difficult trend to dispel because sensation is so entertaining a values.  It is also easier to moralize and inflate towards either the good or the bad side of the spectrum.  Some separation needs to occur, however.  History must cease to be the place we turn to for morality tales and must start to become a place where facts can be debated and challenged, but on a factual basis.  Ture, having a legendary figure to spew out civic texts may “bring the community together,” as Lisa Simpson observed, but it should not.  History should not be the place where we hear about Kennedy’s ‘pure’ love for his family—it should be where we address his mistakes—and many existed—and take a dynamic role in preventing them for future generations.  Morality tales can be told from any fictionalized source or from simple utilitarian logic, but history should be un-airbrushed fact.  Legends may conceivably have had their place in the early years of the United States, binding together the rebels that formed it and their disparate descendants, but now that the country has a foundation, would it not be better to fully transfer the commonality that creates consent to the morals of the nation?  In such a conglomerate nation, I would be far happier inviting a russian immigrant to sample my culture with declarations of freedom of worship and speech than I would be holding up the face of a man he may never have hear of and who may have been responsible for the deaths of many in his country.  An truthfully, the American public is in no need of more nationalism.  I think most citizens are blinded by their national pride, which is greatly affected by legends.  Perhaps my time living internationally has given me an altered, slightly socialist view, but if this nationalism could be redirected towards a more global appreciation for humanity we might be able to do something productive with our time on earth.  Instead, we perpetuate an elitist, excluding system of history in an increasingly elitist, excluding country; the legends must go.

 

Works Cited

Furstenberg, François. In the Name of the Father: Washington’s Legacy, Slavery, and the Making of a Nation. New York: Penguin, 2006. Print.

Loewen, James W. Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong. New York: New, 1995. Print.

Sutcliffe, Jane. John F, Kennedy. Print.

 

Posted in Laura | 1 Comment »

The Public Eye: JFK’s Myth and Memory

December 14th, 2011 by jrh5

President John F. Kennedy was a man in the spotlight of the American public. He started his campaign that way, taking advantage of both his youth and the emergence of television and winning over the hearts of the people. As he won hearts, he also won votes, and in 1960 he just slid into office, beating Nixon by a perfectly styled hair. Once President, he and his family remained in the public eye, becoming popular in much the same way movie stars of the time were. They influenced even fashion and the arts, and eventually the family in the White House came to be known to America as Camelot. They were the seemingly perfect balance of politician and celebrity.

But not all was perfect in the Kennedy family—John suffered from two endocrine diseases, was often on medication, and had at least one extramarital affair. None of this, though, was discovered until after his death. And with his death came a whole new set of questions. The official story became that he was killed by “The Lone Gunman”, Lee Harvey Oswald, who was then killed by another man working alone, Jack Ruby. But the abundance of facts available about Kennedy’s assassination has lead to hundreds of questions and conspiracies about his killers, their technique, and their motives, despite all official reports meant to explain what happened that day.

John F. Kennedy’s very public life and death, and the discoveries and conspiracies that came to be after his death, prove that no matter how much information we think we have, we can never really know the truth about a famous person, much less a “Legendary American”.

Camelot presented to the American people the image of a perfect family life in the White House. John F. Kennedy had his gorgeous wife and kids by his side through his campaign and Presidency, supporting him and then becoming famous in their own way.  Jackie Kennedy had two beautiful children, a boy and a girl, and had a handsome, rich, and successful husband. She was seen as an icon around the country, creating new fashion trends and signaling new trends in the arts and thus creating interest in the general public.

But not all was what it seemed. Camelot was crumbling on the inside. J.F.K. was suffering from both Addison’s disease and hypothyroidism, and depending on three doctors (one of which was known for his controversial treatments) to help with his pain and other symptoms. Jackie lost her new born son just a few months before her husband died, the second she lost. And the medication that John was on made him especially… virile, as doctors at the time put it. So, as is often corroborated, it was later discovered that he engaged in extramarital affairs with several famous women.

Despite the presence that the family exuded to the public, and all that America knew about the family, with the constant media presence they allowed in their lives, no one actually knew what was happening in their lives. No one knew the pain they were experiencing until after they died, and we still don’t entirely know the extent to which the disease and medication affected Kennedy in regards to his political life and decisions.

Nowhere is this lack of insight into this seemingly transparent life more evident than in regards to Kennedy’s death. Due to the publicity of his death, with the Zapruder film catching it in its entirety and every television and radio station mourning his death in the weeks following the assassination. Then when doubt came into the picture, once Lee Harvey Oswald was killed as well, the Warren commission’s investigation was supposed to end all questions with a thorough explanation on what happened that day. And yet the commission had so much differing information about the characters involved that day and so many conflicting depictions of the event that their explanation could not cover every single thing that happened that day. So only more questions were raised, especially considering the connections that each of the people in the case—Kennedy and his brother, Robert, had been rooting out mob bosses, and Oswald supposedly had mob connections, there were suspicions that Kennedy was the target of Cuban exiles after his failed Bay of Pigs invasion, even Lyndon B. Johnson and the Secret Service were considered possible backers of the assassination.

Several more commissions looked into the assassination and came to approximately the same conclusions that the Warren Commission had, until finally the records were sealed for the next thirty years.

So despite all the publicity, how much information the public was given about the assassination— 60,000 documents involving the assassination were gathered and unsealed from 1992 to 1998 by the Assassination Records Review Board so that the public could draw their own conclusions— we still don’t know for sure what went down on that fateful day in November 1963.

Even in the age of television and celebrities constantly in the public eye, we still can’t separate myth from fact when it comes to public figures. Even in death they remain a mystery to the public at large, never to be known fully by the millions that thought they loved them. No matter how much people think they share with the public, a person (because that’s all a celebrity is, behind all those cameras) still has a private self, one they don’t want to share with the world, and that private self may never come to light.

We can never truly know what another person’s life is like, never truly establish what is a part of their legend as opposed to their history. Public figures reveal this better than anyone else, and the Kennedy family and legacy is a prime example. Myth will always blur the lines of truth.

Posted in Jessica | 1 Comment »

Rubric Problem

December 14th, 2011 by lft2

I just wanted to preface my final post by saying that the rubric supposedly attached in through the link on the class blog will not open correctly for me–all I can see is pages of numbers and letters.  So, if my addressing of the questions is a bit off from what you intended us to discuss, that’s why.

Posted in Laura | 1 Comment »

JFK: Past and Present

December 14th, 2011 by pjy1

When studying legendary Americans, sometimes the famous legends tell more of the audience than of the subject itself. It speaks of the audience’s thoughts and values at the time. And looking at how the legend is portrayed over time can yield valuable information on how those views change over time as well. Such is the case of John F. Kennedy. From his time in office to the present, the criteria Americans have judged him by for his role in the Cold War has shifted from actions to result. And while the views of 1960 America may seem intolerant for questioning the concept of a Catholic President, historical context shows that it was more tolerant than its own past.  And the America today still seems to promote religious tolerance with Kennedy being used in civic texts like children’s books to promote equal rights regardless of religion. From these two trends, it is shown that the standards of judging past political figures have shifted to include results and also that there’s a rising religious tolerance throughout American history.

One conclusion that can be drawn from Kennedy’s image during the Cold War leader is this: In times of danger or crises concerning the nation, the American people will look for a leader to unite them. Kennedy’s crisis was the Cold War. The nation feared the spread of Communism, the antithesis of the American ideal. Furthermore, the worst case scenario was thought to be obliteration of the country in nuclear war. Even if the American were to win in that war, Kennedy remarked that fruits of victory would be like “ashes in the mouth” (Smith, 272). Kennedy received a lot of support from the American people whenever he confronted the Communist threat. For example, his approval ratings went up to around 74% after the dealings of the Cuban Missile Crises (Smith, 269). As far as the American public knew, he managed to stare down Khrushchev into submitting. But it didn’t matter if his plans were successful or not so long he was fighting Communism. For example, the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba ended up in disaster; yet Kennedy’s approval ratings rose to his highest of all times at 83% after the American public found out (to which Kennedy later remarked, “I hope I don’t have to keep doing stupid things….to remain popular”) (Tuzzleman). What we can draw from this analysis is that the American people under crises seek a leader to unite them and if he successfully does so, his results are less important than his actions. But the opposite is also true! In the Civil Rights movement in September of 1963, Kennedy’s approval rating sunk to the lowest of his term of 56% (Presidential). The protesters and the violence demonstrated disunity within the country, something Kennedy was to have remedied and so his approval ratings dropped for not fulfilling his “role”.

Now that the Cold War is over and Kennedy is gone, Kennedy’s role as of uniting the people is not as needed. Today, his acts of “doing something” is not enough and so results now play a bigger role in judging his image. This is exemplified with Kennedy being well remembered for his role in peacefully ending the Cuban Missile Crisis along with the signing of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. But with more focus on results today, events like the Bay of Pigs has also lost support and is now regarded as a disaster and is ironically seen as a symbol of US fallibility (Weiner). Some might contest that the real reason why there is more focus on the results today is not the importance of unity back then but rather that time allowed society to observe results more carefully. Hindsight is 20/20 and more time before events allow for more thorough analysis. It could be possible that Americans did care for results but couldn’t clearly interpret them at the time. However, even a brief glimpse of Kennedy’s Bay of Pigs result would show America’s defeat with 100 out of 1500 killed and many captured (Weiner). There would be little reason for the event to boost Kennedy’s popularity at that time other than the fact he was acting against Communism. In addition to reversing the view of the past, the views may be exaggerated as well. Many quotes still exist today expressing the fear of nuclear war at the time. Defense Secretary Robert McNamara observed “I thought I might never see a Saturday night again.” A Soviet Chief of Operations commented “Nuclear catastrophe….was counted down by minutes.” (Smith, 265) However, a survey of the American people shows that there was little fear of a nuclear war even during the Cuban missile crises! During the weeks after Kennedy’s address only 12% of the poll stated the Cuban situation changed their daily life and only 4% of the population engaged in any safety activity. Furthermore, thoughts of death decreased by 8% and overall happiness increased 5% from the spring. (Smith, 272) It seems that over time, the American people have exaggerated the fear of nuclear war in the ‘60s. But why? It might be that exaggerating the dangers of the past would increase its perceived difference with the present, thus increasing the perceived result of Kennedy. Of course, there are other possibilities of why the fears were exaggerated. The public could possibly not have known of the gravity of the situation during the Cuban Missile Crisis and only have known the true danger they were in after the polls were taken. But it is unlikely that this is the case. The polls were taken after Kennedy’s public announcement of the missiles on October 22, 1962.

Another point of interest of Kennedy’s legacy is that his religion, Catholicism, broke a tradition of Protestant presidents. Kennedy Catholicism shows an increased religious tolerance among Americans in historical context along with a respect for intellectual achievements and wealth. During the 60’s there was some concern over a Catholic becoming President. One issue was the possibility of the head of state becoming a subordinate of the Catholic state and Pope. It could possibly dictate the policy from education to abortion (Burns, 248). In a survey of 1956, over 20% of the polls stated that they wouldn’t vote for a Catholic President even if he were well qualified. However, the objections of the 1960s to a Catholic President were less than its predecessors in the 1920s. In the 1920s, the Catholics were still primarily immigrants and thus had little entry into politics. The last Catholic presidential candidate was Al Smith of 1928. So what was the difference between Kennedy and Al?  Al was a provincial New York candidate and mostly relied on the local vote. But Kennedy had crossed all boundaries of his immigrant past, save for religion. He had wealth, Harvard education and intellectual achievements. Furthermore, the Catholics made social advances in the realm of politics between the 1920’s and 1960s. “By 1958, Catholics had been elected governor or United States senator in states where catholic voters were a minority, including California, Ohio Pennsylvania and even Minnesota.” (Burns, 252-253)  When Kennedy won 61% of the vote in the West Virginia Primary against Hubert Humphrey, it was clear that Kennedy had overcome any anti-Catholic sentiment at the time to claim the Democratic nomination (Burner, 49). What this shows is that the Americans in the ‘60s had enough religious tolerance to nominate and elect a Catholic President. It also reveals that Americans are concerned with other image factors other than religion such as education and wealth, reasons of why the image of Kennedy was more appealing than that of Al Smith.  Some might point out that it may be too hasty to draw that conclusion because Al Smith and Kennedy ran at different times. And it is possible that had Al Smith ran in an environment similar to that of1960 America, he probably would have faced less opposition concerning his religion. However, it is highly unlikely that the nation as a whole in any time period would have preferred the “provincial, salty, wisecracking New Yorker” over the” wealthy, Brahmin accented” Kennedy (Burns, 252).

Today, Kennedy being a Catholic is used as an example of the freedom of religion America. Civic texts like a children’s book states that Kennedy stood up for his rights to be President.” Nobody asked me if I was a Catholic when I joined the United States Navy,” it quotes from Kennedy (Sutcliffe, 24). It shows that Americans still treasure the idea of religious tolerance enough that they will use Kennedy as a way to imprint tolerance on the young minds of American futures.

Some of Kennedy’s legacies are of his Cold War events and his Catholicism. However, by looking at how these legacies are viewed over time, we may learn more about the American people. In terms of the Cold War, action against the spread of Communism drew approval of the Americans in the ‘60s because they sought unity and fighting against Communism was something many could unite under. But in the present, Kennedy’s accomplishments have been exaggerated or even reversed. This is an effect caused by current Americans now judging the past based on results rather than the act of simply acting. His religion was met with oppositions from some Americans but it was less in magnitude compared to the ‘20s and shows an increase in religious tolerance since then. The fact that his election as a Catholic is part of civic texts shows that Americans still appreciate religious tolerance and want to maintain it by teaching it to future generations.

 

WORKS CITED

  • Burner, David. John F, Kennedy and a New Generation. Boston: Little Brown, 1988. 47-49. Print.
  • Burns, James. John Kennedy A Political Profile. New York: Harcourt, Brace &Company, 236-252. Print
  • “Presidential Approval Ratings.” Gallup. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Dec 2011. <http://www.gallup.com/poll/116677/presidential-approval-ratings-gallup-historical-statistics-trends.aspx>
  • Smith, Tom. Public Quarterly. 67. Oxford University Press, 2004. 265-275. Web. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/3521635?seq=1>
  • Sutcliffe, Jane. John F, Kennedy. 24. Print.
  • Tuzzleman, Alex. “From the Archive: In the Carribean Storm.” History Today. N.p., 2011. Web. 6 Dec 2011. <http://www.historytoday.com/alex-von-tunzelmann/archive-caribbean-storm>.
  • Weiner, Jared. “Bay of Pigs.” Exploring the Culture of Little Havana. N.p., 14 Oct. 1998. Web. 25 Nov. 2011. <http://www.education.miami.edu/ep/littlehavana/Monuments/Virgin1/The_Virgin_Mary/Bay_of_Pigs/bay_of_pigs.html>.

Posted in Peter | 1 Comment »

Response to Last Week’s Presentations

November 30th, 2011 by lft2

Last week Dr McDaniel suggested that we write a short response about the groups that present before we do, so I will briefly be doing that along in addition to my regular post this week.  I thought that both groups did well, which in a way makes it harder to learn anything about what we should or shouldn’t do.  Both kept fairly focused on the essential questions of the course, as I think is necessary, and both successfully incorporated the data specific to their historical figures with more general, philosophical, issues.  If I were to find a fault that we could learn from, I would say that the first group especially dealt with lengthy pauses in the discussion, and although is isn’t really something we can prepare for we should be wary of letting the conversation lapse, and we should be ready to jump in with another topic if it does.

Posted in Laura | No Comments »

JFK Reading Questions

November 26th, 2011 by lft2

Here are our questions for Wednesday:

  1. Compare the Kennedy children’s book to Weems’ biography.  Does the modern text appear more balanced?  How so or not so?  If the current text is more balanced, does it suggest that we don’t need Legendary Americans or civiv texts anymore?
  2. In a recent Times article, Kennedy was ranked 11th in the list of best presidents even though the article acknowledged that he dealt mainly in rhetoric and passed “very little in the way of funding or legislation.” With this in mind, assess the roles of sensation and achievement in the lives of Legendary Americans.  How does this relate to Kennedy’s scandalous personal life, assassination, etc?
  3. What does the shifting data expressed in the polls reveal about how the public felt about different events in Kennedy’s presidency?  Do you think polls are useful/truthful as a source?

Posted in Laura | 3 Comments »

JFK Online Readings

November 26th, 2011 by lft2

Hey everybody!  Here are the online readings for you to look at in preparation for our JFK discussion on Wednesday:

  1. ANB entry: http://www.anb.org/articles/07/07-00152.html?a=1&f=John%20F%20Kennedy&g=m&n=John%20F%20Kennedy&ia=-at&ib=-bib&d=10&ss=1&q=2
  2. Polls excerpt: http://www.jstor.org/pss/3521635, pages 269-275
  3. Kennedy vs. Romney: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/why-mitt-romneys-mormon-question-doesnt-matter-as-much-in-2012/2011/10/10/gIQAvgIeaL_blog.html
  4. Polls image: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/data/popularity.php?pres=35&sort=time&direct=ASC
  5. Interpretation of Polls: http://jfklancernews.blogspot.com/2009/02/look-at-jfks-popularity-polls-by-debra.htmlReading questions to follow.

Posted in Laura | 3 Comments »

A Good President

November 23rd, 2011 by jrh5

Prompt 1: What makes a good president? Roosevelt is frequently listed in the top 5 of all presidents. Explain what makes Teddy a good president, keeping in mind the attacks against him in some of these readings.

Teddy Roosevelt strikes me as less of a “good President” than just a man who was loved by the nation and had good intentions. There’s a striking parallel between him and John F. Kennedy, in this sense. John F. Kennedy had all these grand ideas about how to make the nation a better place, but he really never got any legislation through. Similarly, Roosevelt had great ideas for conservation or fighting big business, but, as discussed in the “Bully Boy” excerpt, nothing worked out as planned. And both of these men are now seen as “great” Presidents, often making top 10 in the lists of greatest Presidents, despite this.

They were also both great presences in the public eye, with “dynamic personality” (Bully Boy). Teddy was known for his trademark glasses and grin, and it was Kennedy’s charisma that got him into office. The nation loved them.

With how little either of these men really got done towards their goals, and, for Roosevelt, considering his ideas of race, I wouldn’t peg either of these men as “good” Presidents. I think the public just remembers them as such because they look back and only remember the public personas. They remember what the men had intended to get done, rather than what actually happened, and they remember that they were good men. And in this case, they’re both misremembered.

The public memory of them has gone through heroification, like Laura talked about in her post last week, to the point we no longer hear about things like Roosevelt’s racism.

A truly “good” President should be one that solves problems by getting good legislation through, and leads the nation to a better place than where it was when he first got into office. But because the President is just one man, rather than, like Congress, a group seen as one that is much more difficult to see in terms of individuals, the nation’s like or dislike of the man becomes much more personal, and likely to be based on reasons other than whether or not he is a legitimately good leader.

Posted in Jessica | No Comments »

Finishing up with Kennedy

November 16th, 2011 by lft2

Just to clarify, I don’t think there is much more to say about the group projects.  At least on my part, I have turned in the resources and am currently working on wording the questions so that they will be most effective in sparking discussion in class.  I could give an update on the points I want to cover, but I feel like this would be an exact repetition of what I posted last week and Jessica posted today, so I will avoid that.  From my perspective, I am happy with how prepared we are (which I think was evident when we met up yesterday and had little to talk about), and I think if everything goes according to plan we will have a very thought provoking and successful discussion.

Posted in Laura | No Comments »

Pros and Cons of Heroification–Prompt 1

November 16th, 2011 by lft2

According to Lies My Teacher Told Me (which I think is a fantastic, fascinating book that I read excerpts of in high school philosophy), heroification is a pervading problem in American schools that leads to several negative consequences for students.  For example, the excerpt suggests that the blemish-free portrayal results in “pious, perfect creatures without conflicts, pain, credibility, or human interest.” (p. 9)  This contributes to statistics I remember reading elsewhere in the book, which reveal that history is the least-enjoyed academic subject especially amongst students who are not white males, as the majority of historical heroes are.  The worshipful portrayal also leads to unrealistic standards for role models in the eyes of children.

As may have been evident in class, I have been on the fence throughout the semester regarding the value or lack thereof of the idealized legendary American, but this excerpt solidified my opinion.  Loewen perfectly argued why heroification is a negative influence on learning, and I found that all of his points rang true with me.  I had no idea that Helen Keller was such an extreme socialist, as the 20 page biography I read of her “held her up” as the “blind and deaf girl who overcame her physical handicaps” (pg 10) and little else.  Similarly, I was shocked to learn about Woodrow Wilson’s extremely racist and un-democratic politics, as I had always been told that he was one of the ‘nice’ presidents–wanting to be lenient on Germany after WWI, trying to ensure the peace with the League of Nations, etc.  Not only did these revelations make Keller and Wilson more interesting to me, but they made me feel more engaged, as the omitted details referenced ongoing problems and conflicts in our country that needed and still need to be addressed, rather than portraying America as a stagnant result of years of gradual bureaucratic progression.  I also agree with Loewen that current textbooks’s glossed-over content results in “intellectual immaturity” among students. (p. 25)  I feel this myself, as I am usually disappointed and saddened when I hear of some negative aspect of an American Hero that I learned about as a child.  Why, though, when it is clearly unrealistic to expect perfection from anybody?  I feel that the unrealistic expectations taught by history have also bled into my personal life, as I tend to expect too much from authority figures such as my parents.  Loewen’s assertion that we have been given a “Disney version of history” seems very accurate. (p. 25)

As far as solutions are concerned, I think the answer is simple: textbooks and teachers should be more forthcoming about the faults of historical figures.  Just as I don’t believe religion is necessary to having morals, we do not need history to give us ideal figures.  We can use fairy tales and utilitarian, logical ethics for that.

Posted in Laura | No Comments »

« Older Entries