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talkpoliticsThe story goes that a college proffessor stood before a science class of undergraduates and finished a lecture by saying
"Ladies and gentlemen, in the next 20-30 years, you will discover that half of what I told you was incorrect. sadly, I am in no position to tell you which half that will be."
You may think that the advances of Scientific discovery make science unique, but it seems that a lot of what I learned at school has been incorrect. I was in primary school in the 1960s, and left school to go to work in '73.
Some of the teachers I had were fresh out of college, but some were older men and women who had served in the Armed Forces. they had actually lived through the Blitz on London, had been on bombing missions over Germany. they had seen post war news reels about the Nuremburg War Trails and the aftermath of the surrender of Japan. they, and the people fresh out of ollege, who had lived through the war years as children and younge teens, were all eager to make sure that we, the kids born in peacetime, realised that the peacful world that we grew up in had been hard fought for. It was up to us to make the sacrifices worth it, and to make the peace last.
Perhaps I took the message to heart more than most, for I seem to have been one of the few who took an active interest in social history, modern history and politics. I wonder what my old teachers would make of today's society if i met them in the street - but I digress.
There were certain statements that people my age have grown up 'learning' and accepting as fact.
they were told to us by adults, as well as our teachers, by people who were there at the time, even if they only read it on the news.
A lot of the 'facts' surrounding the Second World War have come up for re examination, and new findings and announcements have always upset certain people , I noticed. Even so it still got said. The post war generation, myself included listened to the spokespeople for CND and other organisations telling us that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were both purely civilian targets; that Japan was all but totally exausted by the end of the war, and that the Americans dropped the Bomb because it had to justify the expense of producing it somehow.
Somehaow, nothing seems to be able to catch up with a rumour, once you give it a head start.
it wasn't till I started going on the internet, at around the age of 45, that I began to learn the truth about such things. I learned that there were military installations of great significance at both those cities in Japan. And that although the Japanese were hoping for a peaceful settlement, the terms they wanted included keeping all the territory thay had gained. moreover, the alternative to dropping the bomb was either the US and UK invading Japan and suffering many more casualties as a result, along with a Japanese death toll, or maybe letting the russians do it for us and leaving them in charge of tokyo at the end of the war, like they were left in charge of East Germany. So, the descision to drop the Bomb or not was not so clear cut as some led me to believe.
Another piece of received wisdom I got was that Japan had committed many atrocities in the Second World War, against the Americans, who they attacked without warning at Pearl Harbour; against British and Australian POWs in their camps; against the peoples of South East Asia, especially Koreans, and the women that they enslaved to serve as prostitutes to the Japanese troops - known in Japan as ' comfort women'. Even now, the story went, the Japanese government has never apologised or made any reparations to any of these people. not even owned up to the japanese children of today about what had happened in the past.
Well, the atrocities did happen, it seems, but the bit about them never apologising - well, take a look at the link
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_war_apology_statements_issued_by_Japan#Apology_rebuffed
If you want to go through the list, it is all there.
The truth is out there. But how to get at it and deal with it when it arrives i something that should be taught at secondary school, I feel.
Perhaps the average ten year old is incapable of listening to two conflicting opinions- I don't know. But in the final years at secondary school, but I think that they ought to teach kids that 'My country, right or wrong', as the Frenchman Chauvin said, isn't a sensible option to take these days. Anti chavinism studies should be mandatory, producing better citizens and lesspolitical lobby fodder.
We do kids a disservice if we don't teach them the value of going to primary sources, of the techniques that proffessional historians use in interpreting documents and other peices of evidence. Of basic critical thinking skills.
It's been a long time since I left school, and maybe they do these days. But I look at the way conspiracy theories abound and I begin to wonder. How can we improve our children's chances of making sense of an increasingly complex world, I ask you?
At least I am glad of the internet, and the chance to meet in communities where the facts are discussed and you get to hear a wider range of opinions than the TV or newspapers offer. My warmest thanks to those on the internet who continue my education. Especially the person who sent me that link. _wanderer_, the username was.
"Ladies and gentlemen, in the next 20-30 years, you will discover that half of what I told you was incorrect. sadly, I am in no position to tell you which half that will be."
You may think that the advances of Scientific discovery make science unique, but it seems that a lot of what I learned at school has been incorrect. I was in primary school in the 1960s, and left school to go to work in '73.
Some of the teachers I had were fresh out of college, but some were older men and women who had served in the Armed Forces. they had actually lived through the Blitz on London, had been on bombing missions over Germany. they had seen post war news reels about the Nuremburg War Trails and the aftermath of the surrender of Japan. they, and the people fresh out of ollege, who had lived through the war years as children and younge teens, were all eager to make sure that we, the kids born in peacetime, realised that the peacful world that we grew up in had been hard fought for. It was up to us to make the sacrifices worth it, and to make the peace last.
Perhaps I took the message to heart more than most, for I seem to have been one of the few who took an active interest in social history, modern history and politics. I wonder what my old teachers would make of today's society if i met them in the street - but I digress.
There were certain statements that people my age have grown up 'learning' and accepting as fact.
they were told to us by adults, as well as our teachers, by people who were there at the time, even if they only read it on the news.
A lot of the 'facts' surrounding the Second World War have come up for re examination, and new findings and announcements have always upset certain people , I noticed. Even so it still got said. The post war generation, myself included listened to the spokespeople for CND and other organisations telling us that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were both purely civilian targets; that Japan was all but totally exausted by the end of the war, and that the Americans dropped the Bomb because it had to justify the expense of producing it somehow.
Somehaow, nothing seems to be able to catch up with a rumour, once you give it a head start.
it wasn't till I started going on the internet, at around the age of 45, that I began to learn the truth about such things. I learned that there were military installations of great significance at both those cities in Japan. And that although the Japanese were hoping for a peaceful settlement, the terms they wanted included keeping all the territory thay had gained. moreover, the alternative to dropping the bomb was either the US and UK invading Japan and suffering many more casualties as a result, along with a Japanese death toll, or maybe letting the russians do it for us and leaving them in charge of tokyo at the end of the war, like they were left in charge of East Germany. So, the descision to drop the Bomb or not was not so clear cut as some led me to believe.
Another piece of received wisdom I got was that Japan had committed many atrocities in the Second World War, against the Americans, who they attacked without warning at Pearl Harbour; against British and Australian POWs in their camps; against the peoples of South East Asia, especially Koreans, and the women that they enslaved to serve as prostitutes to the Japanese troops - known in Japan as ' comfort women'. Even now, the story went, the Japanese government has never apologised or made any reparations to any of these people. not even owned up to the japanese children of today about what had happened in the past.
Well, the atrocities did happen, it seems, but the bit about them never apologising - well, take a look at the link
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_war_apology_statements_issued_by_Japan#Apology_rebuffed
If you want to go through the list, it is all there.
The truth is out there. But how to get at it and deal with it when it arrives i something that should be taught at secondary school, I feel.
Perhaps the average ten year old is incapable of listening to two conflicting opinions- I don't know. But in the final years at secondary school, but I think that they ought to teach kids that 'My country, right or wrong', as the Frenchman Chauvin said, isn't a sensible option to take these days. Anti chavinism studies should be mandatory, producing better citizens and lesspolitical lobby fodder.
We do kids a disservice if we don't teach them the value of going to primary sources, of the techniques that proffessional historians use in interpreting documents and other peices of evidence. Of basic critical thinking skills.
It's been a long time since I left school, and maybe they do these days. But I look at the way conspiracy theories abound and I begin to wonder. How can we improve our children's chances of making sense of an increasingly complex world, I ask you?
At least I am glad of the internet, and the chance to meet in communities where the facts are discussed and you get to hear a wider range of opinions than the TV or newspapers offer. My warmest thanks to those on the internet who continue my education. Especially the person who sent me that link. _wanderer_, the username was.
(no subject)
Date: 8/8/10 22:00 (UTC)