We took a family vacation in the early 90s and drove from East Texas all the way to Nashville. At the time, it felt like we stopped at every Civil War battlefield (twice) along the way. Seeing the meadows and rolling hills with cannons and other historical relics was a powerful sight. Imagining the sounds and smells of gunfire, the bravery and fear of the battles is a humbling moment. I recall a story about a Union guard talking to a Confederate soldier from a Tennessee unit who had been captured and noticing the young man’s ill-fitted clothes and general state of shoddy equipment. He (paraphrasing) asked, “Why are you fighting? You don’t appear to have a major stake in this war.” The young man replied, “Because you’re here.” A few years ago I took an interest in researching my family ancestry and found cousins from Tennessee who served in the CSA. They were mountain folk who didn’t have slaves, a plantation, or much of anything else to their name, but I can imagine them giving the Union soldier the same reasoning for taking up arms.
While the current age we live in likes to take American history and ‘Disneyfy’ it into simplistic caricatures of a good/evil binary, the complexities and nuance remains, especially for the War of Northern Aggression. The current charge that history is not being fully taught is correct, but for different reasons than the detractors point out. All they want is history taught in a manner to ensure those who have been deemed the personification of evil stay that way. This isn’t relegated to only American history, but Western Civilization overall. This is how society has arrived to the asinine conclusions that only Europeans conquered and enslaved other peoples throughout world history. It doesn’t acknowledge the reality that human nature hasn’t aged – that all of humanity contains the ability for committing depravities against their fellow man, while also being able to show empathy and compassion at other times.
True. Slavery began in Africe where chieftains sold their own people or captured people from other tribes to Arab slave traders. Can you kmagine someone dressed like George Washington trying to chase down and catch Kunta Kinti in Africa? Not likely. But instead of other Black Africans and Arab slave traders being held accountable, only the White Bread Caucasians are the demons.
I think perhaps a sizable fraction of the American people are beyond caring how everyone got here hundreds of years ago. I think what we are interested in is whether the Bill of Rights is still the law of the land. If it’s not then lots of us will want to reconsider our options.
Just how much more evidence do you require that the law has become whatever the Dims declare it to be? And I mean that in a de facto sense as opposed to hypothetical. The Bill of Rights means nothing.
I’m afraid you’re right Tom. But most Americans are still going through the process of discovering their real status as serfs. When they realize this we’ll find out if there is a cohort that doesn’t want that fate. Then we’ll see what follows. Maybe nothing. But I can still hope.