My philosophy on trying to edit, delete or replace history to fit the current beliefs.

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Julius Otieno
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My philosophy on trying to edit, delete or replace history to fit the current beliefs.

Post by Julius Otieno »

Society is in a perpetual progression, for whatever is deemed to be the norm changes from time to time. In the 1800s’ it required guts for one to say that women are equal to men, today one has to reach the pinnacle of audacity to say that they are not.

In so progressing, societal values & moral standards also change. This leads to the conundrum of: what should we do with the past that does not conform to our present values?
“Reformists” are agitating for & to some extent, they already are erasing the past & arranging the present as they deem fit. This is evident in all spheres of life where man’s achievement can be measured.

In literature, calls have been made to re-write or “put into context” books that “reformists” deem racist, misogynistic, or in any way or form perpetuate inequality & prejudice. Herman Melville’s Moby Dick is to be re-titled Moby Dickless, Little Women will be re-titled Little but Legal Women & Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird's “racist” passages are to be expunged.

“Reformists” have found fault in many thinkers like Karl Marx & Adam Smith not because what they said was objectively faulty but because some aspects of their work do not conform to modern values. Their solution is to burn the aforementioned thinker’s books and discredit all their works.

What “reformists” seek is similar to what Marxists sought albeit the “reformists” method is more subtle and within the existing framework of government. Marxists sought sweeping erasure of history and that is what is being done now.

Re-writing history will not undo what already happened. In fact, it gives ideologues like David Irving a chance to use history to give a selective & tendentious account of what happened to further their political aims in the present.

It is prudent to maintain racist, misogynistic & all books that do not conform to our present values in their original form and come up with compelling arguments to peel such thought in the books & unmask them.

It is prudent to maintain statues as they are and write a book, commentary, or explanation as regards to what the historical subject did so as to discover the truth about the past and present an accurate description of it as possible.
Many people toppling statues in fact have no idea of what the historical subject represented. If I decide to put on a shirt with a swastika today purely for aesthetic purposes I will be labeled a hater of Jews. Why? Because people have been programmed to believe a swastika represents hate not knowing it was used before the Nazis came to power.
Further, do they know what National Socialism was and what it stood for? Better to beat me up than read William Shirer’s The rise and fall of the Third Reich because it will strain their faculties.

We don’t destroy patriarchy, misogyny, hate, or prejudice by toppling statues, burning houses, and whatnot. No. We can only do so by preserving the symbols of hate and the literature thereto and coming up with compelling arguments to prove the contrary.

We can’t legislate human emotions. You can’t change someone’s view of you by making it mandatory that he/she tolerates or loves you. No. You can only do so by listening to his view and deconstructing it; showing him the flaw in his argument. From argument & discussion rather than censorship arises understanding.
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LuckyR
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Re: My philosophy on trying to edit, delete or replace history to fit the current beliefs.

Post by LuckyR »

Ah yes, the old bait and switch.

Starts off reasonable then switches from chastizing book-rewriters (who most agree are a ridiculous tiny splinter group) to those who are offended by the glorification on government property of confederate generals and slave traders (which includes whole races of people).

No one decries current unfairness more than those who expect to benefit from continued past unfairness.
"As usual... it depends."
Steve3007
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Re: My philosophy on trying to edit, delete or replace history to fit the current beliefs.

Post by Steve3007 »

I'm generally opposed to processes which destroy information about the past. That includes destroying information about how people talked, wrote and thought, even if (or perhaps especially if) they talked, wrote and thought in ways that most of us don't today. But the problem comes in distinguishing or conflating the presentation of information with the promotion of a value. These two things are often confused in several contexts. For example, in some countries, laws against "promotion of homosexuality" are used against any material which simply states the facts of the existence of homosexuality. Another, broader example: people frequently conflate a description of the reasons why a crime has been committed with an endorsement or excuse for the actions of the criminal.

So, when it comes to things like the removal of statues of people who did things in the past that we consider morally unacceptable, one question to ask is: what was and is the purpose of that statue? Is it simply to inform people that the person in question lived and that he often sat on a horse?
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Re: My philosophy on trying to edit, delete or replace history to fit the current beliefs.

Post by Steve3007 »

Julius Otieno wrote:We don’t destroy patriarchy, misogyny, hate, or prejudice by toppling statues, burning houses, and whatnot. No. We can only do so by preserving the symbols of hate and the literature thereto and coming up with compelling arguments to prove the contrary.
What are your thoughts on the idea of preserving these things but placing them in a different context in an effort to emphasize their role as records of the actions of the past while not necessarily aggrandizing them? Isn't the placement of a statue in, for example, a public square in a country's capital meant at least partly as a statement of values? Some people suggest moving some statues to museums - environments whose purpose is primarily to display information about the past rather than endorse or condemn aspects of it.
AverageBozo
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Re: My philosophy on trying to edit, delete or replace history to fit the current beliefs.

Post by AverageBozo »

Julius Otieno wrote: May 20th, 2021, 5:21 am
It is prudent to maintain statues as they are and write a book, commentary, or explanation as regards to what the historical subject did so as to discover the truth about the past and present an accurate description of it as possible.
Many people toppling statues in fact have no idea of what the historical subject represented. If I decide to put on a shirt with a swastika today purely for aesthetic purposes I will be labeled a hater of Jews. Why? Because people have been programmed to believe a swastika represents hate not knowing it was used before the Nazis came to power.
Further, do they know what National Socialism was and what it stood for? Better to beat me up than read William Shirer’s The rise and fall of the Third Reich because it will strain their faculties.
Statues depict who are heroes are. The fact that a public figure was idolized in years past doesn’t guarantee any justification for current prominence. The statues are anathema now because they depict figures who are not our heroes, even if they once were.

Any prior use of the swastika was coopted by the Nazis and used to symbolize Naziism, and its values and methodologies. What a thing formerly represented can be replaced.

No one has re-written the history of the statues. No one has re-written the history of the swastika. However, we live in the present.
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Pattern-chaser
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Re: My philosophy on trying to edit, delete or replace history to fit the current beliefs.

Post by Pattern-chaser »

LuckyR wrote: May 21st, 2021, 2:26 am Starts off reasonable then switches from chastizing book-rewriters (who most agree are a ridiculous tiny splinter group) to those who are offended by the glorification on government property of confederate generals and slave traders (which includes whole races of people).
Yes, this is my take on it. We should not try to rewrite or change history; that's just silly. Pointless too. And book re-writers are a good example of this. On the other hand, there was a recent (UK) example where (some of) the people of Bristol took down a statue of a slave-trader. Yes, the slave trade took place, it was real, and wrong, but to glorify it is unacceptable, and this glorification should be undone, IMO. Why should the black people of Bristol have to walk every day past a statue of a man who enslaved their ancestors? That is unreasonable too.

Statues are erected to commemorate people from history who we admire. It is inappropriate today for us to glorify the memory of slave-traders. The statues should be taken down and moved to museums, with explanatory notes about the slave trade. It would be wrong to forget it, just as it is wrong to glorify it.
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