"George Will on 1619" Topic

link

from that right-wing rag the WaPo

"1773 Boston Tea party" …British provocation"?

Did I miss something?

Well, the threat of a John company monopoly in the NA colonies was pretty provocative, yes.

42, Will was listing a light sampling of rebellious actions in the colonies which predated Lord Dunmore's proclamation. It makes Will only the most recent of many people to point out that the 1619 Project's premise requires time to flow backward, and American slaveholders to be responding to a British threat which wouldn't exist for decades.

Even Goebbels generally got sequence right, but this seems to be beyond the capabilities of the present New York Times and the 1619 people.

Do we have anyone here willing to argue the pro-1619 Project viewpoint?

There have been several on previous threads.

doc, for someone who says they haven't read any of the 1619 project and recommends that no one else does it does seem to have gotten under your skin.

Ive read George Will for a long time. He is pithy, entertaining but like posters on here love to point out about several of the 1619 authors, he isn't an historian.

He is mistaken about slavery not being an issue in the war of independence, it was an issue for some. There were thousands of facets to that war, not just the official, singular story that got handed down to us. Aren't you the one that likes to repeat that the Civil War's Southern motives were complicated?

Ideas don't just occur when they are set down, sometimes it's their absence that proves their very existence. Didn't Crispus Attucks get drawn white for the newspapers because there was concern no one would care about a black's death?

Worries over emancipation were swirling around the South for quite a while and even if no official documents said that, I don't believe no one worried over it. It's truer to say that most whites didn't really care that much at the time and there weren't any blacks with the status to express their concerns.

No one is going to find the value of the 1619 project by dusting it for any trace of inaccuracy of opinion. We will all have to accept that the thrust of the works are to open up unexplored points of view and hitherto unrepresented voices.

Instead, the work will either catch fire or it wont and no one will be able to stop it. When Paine's Common Sense came out, did it matter that it was riddled with exaggeration and fabrications? Was the value of that publication it's accuracy? Were the British able to stop it from being read and firing up revolutionary fervor by pointing out that a lot of it wasn't true?

In any case, it wont matter if you disapprove or I approve because you cant stop an idea and the truth will out.

Au pas, do you have anything to back up the claim that slavery was a factor in the revolution? I'd love to read a reputable source that claims it was.

"Ideas don't just occur when they are set down, sometimes it's their absence that proves their very existence."

Using this logic I could say that the colonists won the battle of Monmouth because they were assisted by Aliens in flying saucers. Since there are no records that say there were aliens there, 'their absence that proves their very existence.'

"Worries over emancipation were swirling around the South for quite a while and even if no official documents said that, I don't believe no one worried over it."

Do you have any unofficial documents, letters, diary entries, or debates that support this? From my reading emancipation as a political consideration didn't exist at the time. The South's attitude about slavery, expansion of it, and emancipation really didn't harden until decades later. After all, there were black troops that assisted in the defense of New Orleans in 1814 and no one raised any concerns that I'm aware of. Yet when blacks tried to enlist in the Confederate army in New Orleans in 1861, only 47 years later they were turned away.

"The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history." Orwell

Charge, yes, of course it is complicated, it always is. This is at least partly correct:

Worries over emancipation were swirling around the South for quite a while and even if no official documents said that, I don't believe no one worried over it. It's truer to say that most whites didn't really care that much at the time and there weren't any blacks with the status to express their concerns.

Jefferson's analysis of the evil of slavery, and Washington's efforts to free his slaves, certainly show "worries" about it -- but not from a desire to cling to the institution! Pretty hard to argue that TJ and GW are unrepresentative of the Virginia aristocracy of the time.

"Do we have anyone here willing to argue the pro-1619 Project viewpoint?"

Probably not. People who actually pay attention to history don't generally get along well with projects which start lying in their introductions, and people who don't pay attention to history don't have a lot to contribute on historical topics.

Why don't you give it a try, Bill? It should go nicely with your proposal to eliminate straight white male rules writers.

???? I must have missed that one! That would be ME!

Well, I for one see the 1619 project as an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of the Revolution and, by extension, of our nation. That is, I do not credit the authors with good faith concerns about truth. But not everyone sees it that way.

History is ALWAYS a battleground, but the stakes are a bit higher than usual in this particular fight.

"The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history." Orwell

Yes, people post this with alarming frequency around these parts. I suppose it is amusing as a platitude but it needs to be further examined, veracity tested and asked whether it applies here.

Anything that cant withstand to be challenged or tested isn't worth very much. If debate around narratives cant take place, that makes me wonder if there isn't a fear that they are fragile.

Also, we have to be certain that the history as we understand it is accurate, truthful, complete and fair from it's inception. Otherwise it would hard to argue that forgetting what's inchoate or flawed is a huge loss.

Why are we assuming that Prof. Hannah-Jones has the power to obliterate? A new point of view should be welcome. I am not impressed that mostly conservatives have banged the table about a single fact, that may not actually be a fact, instead of discussing all the other ideas brought up in the articles. It makes me suspicious that this claimed error is a justification for no one to have to read any of it at all. Is every book we read iron tight in terms of accuracy, do we chuck it on the fire if it isn't?

doc, I like GW and TJ but GW was a total racist at the time of the revolution. Sure he had an 11th hour revelation but he freaked out about emancipation during the war itself. Some might say he flipped his wig.

Well, I for one see the 1619 project as an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of the Revolution and, by extension, of our nation. That is, I do not credit the authors with good faith concerns about truth. But not everyone sees it that way.

History is ALWAYS a battleground, but the stakes are a bit higher than usual in this particular fight.

I find this troubling. It sounds like you dont believe in full disclosure, robust debate and complete truth. Are you suggesting that history is merely propaganda and anyone can change what people think if they are persuasive enough?

Who cares what she's trying to do? It's the ideas that matter. I thought you hadn't read any of it? Why are the stakes high? What am I missing?

Au pas, again I ask if you have any documentation to back up the statements you've made.

Criticism of the 1619 Project

Five historians wrote to The New York Times Magazine to ask the creators of its 1619 Project to issue corrections, including for Hannah-Jones's assertions on the American Revolution and on Lincoln. The correction request was signed by Victoria Bynum of Texas State University, James M. McPherson and Sean Wilentz of Princeton University, James Oakes of the City University of New York, and Gordon S. Wood of Brown University.[64] Historian Leslie M. Harris, who was consulted for the Project, wrote in Politico that she had warned that the idea that the American Revolution was fought to protect slavery was inaccurate, and that the Times made avoidable mistakes.[41]

George Will is correct and I am most certainly on the side of McPherson here. But this is not history as most of us understand it here. It is social, editorial comment. The writers have some interesting points of view, many of which I disagree with. They have a right to their perspective. And if it is taught in schools, it is important to teach it as such.

Was Palin correct that Lexington and Concord are in New Hampshire? Was Trump correct that Washington's troops secured airports? Not historians. Commentators and free to speak as they want.

The Times made a mess of this in many ways and they deserve the pounding they have gotten. But I think the big problem was that it was assumed to be academic history, but lacked the citations needed to underpin its assumptions.

Charge wrote:

It sounds like you dont believe in full disclosure, robust debate and complete truth. Are you suggesting that history is merely propaganda and anyone can change what people think if they are persuasive enough?

I believe absolutely in those things, which is why I am robostly critiquing views I believe to be in error.

No, history is not MERELY propaganda, but it IS often used in propaganda. And OF COURSE anyone can change what people think if they are persuasive enough! That is what "persuasive" MEANS!!

Btw, Tort, you are misremembering Palin's rremarks. Here's the Yahoo news story:

Sarah Palin is a divisive figure. But no matter where you stand with the former Alaska governor's politics, this recent video of her speaking about Paul Revere's historic ride is sure to raise a few eyebrows.

In the video, which was taken at Boston's Old North Church, Palin gives a bizarre version of Revere's 1775 ride. Addressing an unknown person, Palin remarks:

He who warned the British that they weren't going to be taking away our arms by ringing those bells and, um, making sure as he's riding his horse through town to send those warning shots and bells that, uh, we were going to be secure and we were going to be free.

A couple of things are wrong with that interpretation, but one central main point seemed to be lost on Palin: Revere wasn't warning the British about anything. Indeed, he was warning the Americans about an impending British attack--as his celebrated historical catchphrase "The British are coming!" made abundantly clear.

But Palin can take some small consolation in knowing she's not alone among high-profile leaders affiliated with the tea-party wing of the conservative movement in misremembering a key development in colonial American history--even as the movement prides itself on serving as the guardian of the American Revolution's founding principle of liberty. Last month, Michele Bachmann--Palin's likeliest rival for the tea party vote should they both elect to run for president in 2012--told a crowd in New Hampshire that they came from the state where the first "shot heard round" helped set off the American Revolution in Lexington and Concord. Lexington and Concord, of course, are in the neighboring state of Massachusetts.

Doc adds: Palin's statement was awkwardly phrased but clear enough that she was warning about British coming to seize weapons. And of course Reverse didn't say "the British are coming", either, but "the regulars are out", so the Yahoo story is as wrong.

And the New Hampshire reference was not hers at all. She also did not say she could see Russia from her house; that was Tina Fey. Sometimes propaganda becomes history!

Yes, people post this with alarming frequency around these parts

Tells me all I need to know.

I find this troubling. It sounds like you don't believe in full disclosure, robust debate and complete truth.

More unfounded assumptions and faulty binary transitional logic.

Cardinal:"The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history." Orwell

Au pas: Yes, people post this with alarming frequency around these parts

Tells me all I need to know.

After reading your posts, I believe this about you. However, if you're unmovable on the topic, why concern yourself with what anyone else thinks?

I find this troubling. It sounds like you don't believe in full disclosure, robust debate and complete truth.

Cardinal: More unfounded assumptions and faulty binary transitional logic.

No, it's very well founded. doc said he hasn't read the articles, doesn't plan to, doesn't want anyone else to, thinks the authors are operating in bad faith, are in error and dont have the necessary credentials to expound on the topic, and yet still believes the essays represent an existential threat.

I got it right.

And doc, maybe both sides of the revolutionary history are propaganda. What I meant was you seem to think whomever gets there first with their version of the propaganda…wins.

I got it right.

Are you going to hold your breath and stamp your feet now?

I've read the original article carefully twice as well as the book. It's extremely problematic particularly if it's taught in early elementary school as bona fide history. College could be a different story with a counter view for balance. As much as you would like it to be so, it's not history.

And doc, maybe both sides of the revolutionary history are propaganda. What I meant was you seem to think whomever gets there first with their version of the propaganda…wins.

Nice try

Charge, I enjoy engaging with you, but your habit of imputing to me thoughts I do not have can be annoying: "What I meant was you seem to think whomever gets there first with their version of the propaganda…wins." No, the only thing you can fairly assume about what I think is what I actually SAY -- though I welcome your questions, especially if I am unclear.

No, it's very well founded. doc said he hasn't read the articles, doesn't plan to, doesn't want anyone else to, thinks the authors are operating in bad faith, are in error and dont have the necessary credentials to expound on the topic, and yet still believes the essays represent an existential threat.

Well, I haven't read 1619 because it is behind their paywall, but I am relying on the reviews and critiques of scholars I respect, Gordon Wood being a prime example.

Charge gets it mostly right, except why WOULDN'T a bad idea represent a threat? Whether it is existential is open to debate, but if the intent is to undermine the legitimacy of our Founding then yes, existential.

I do not want to censor the 1619 stuff; I want everyone to reject and ignore it. Because that is what we do with bad ideas.

The problem remains. Plan 1619 fron Outer Space is NOT history. They have no business pushing shite like this in schools.

Agreed.

Doc, I want everyone to make up their own minds on it, as is their right. The intent of the authors is to be included in the framing of the period, bringing their own ideas. First amendment, go for it. I do not have to accept it, but I do find some of it interesting. But I reject it because of the lack of scholarship to support the presumptions. if there is no evidence, you can pass it off as opinion, like cable news, but not as history.

As for Palin, I was incorrect. But no comment on her Revere remarks. I would like to see a citizenship test administered to some of our recent leaders.

I'd like to see a citizenship test as a requirement to vote, period. The same one we give to naturalized citizens would do.

But politicians do not WANT citizens. "They'll turn us into beggars cause they're easier to please."

I thought the only test for native born Americans was a valid proof of U.S. birth and,therefore, citizenship. Admittedly, Race and gender were once criteria, but that has been amended. As for voter "Tests", that acquired quite a bad reputation in the South during Jim Crow when it was used for much the same purpose as you are seeking here; limitation of the franchise targeted at people you disagree with.

I somehow imagine that the es of the rural backwaters would magically pass the test, while urban minorities would somehow fail.

As for the relative education and civic knowledge of voters in the 18th and 19th century, as well as the 20 th century vs today I have two thoughts: 1. Vastly more citizens have been exposed to the functions of government and are involved in exercising their citizenship through voting than ever before. 2. Quite apart from the imagined powers of politicians to somehow mislead the citizenry, I think there has always been a good supply of conspiracists and magical thinkers in our history, as it is today with Quanon, January 6th rioters, backwoods militia /survivalists, anti-vaxxers, and assorted religious fanatics. Don't give them a citizenship test, but a test of their mental connection to reality might be in order.

The problem remains. Plan 1619 fron Outer Space is NOT history. They have no business pushing shite like this in schools.

There's different types of history. This is social history or viewpoint history. It may or may not belong in schools. Which schools does it need to be excluded from and why?

If we are worried about a glossy, patriotic US history in schools replaced with a grittier one that faces its shortcomings we arent really worried about history so much as ideology.

I do not want to censor the 1619 stuff; I want everyone to reject and ignore it. Because that is what we do with bad ideas.

Has this ever worked? Examples? Aren't crusty conservatives who condemn it just making it more popular with the kids?

If we want to be a community, we have to have some things in common. Our memories, our history, are central to that. As opposed to only having in common being recipients of the latest government largess.

All citizens of the US have that citizenship in common. We have always, as groups, seen our history and destiny differently. There are points we agree on, but many, many aspects of our character and history we have ALWAYS disagreed upon. Seeking some watered down, false, propagandized, view of our past and present is not what a democracy is supposed to do. It is supposed to adjudicate the differing views in a peaceable manner, it is not doing well at that task in the present day.

Almost every time we get to a point like this is during a great societal change that is seen by some as realigning the economic and political powers in our nation to their detriment. It was so prior to the civil war with the slavery- bound South. It was so in the late 19th. Century change from farm to factory, from rural to urban during the Industrial Revolution. There was much strife over the increased role of government during and after the Depression and New Deal. We are now in the second industrial Revolution and a great cultural shift that is generational.

The reason it is so stressful is the political structure needs reform. For the last 20 years we have often had a minority government representing a decided minority of the US citizens and voters. They have enacted laws trying to resist the change that many other Western nations are implementing. They will lose. They probably know they will lose. They will do anything, believe anything, to preserve what they see as the demise of many of their most ardent beliefs. Facts are ignored and fantasies acted upon as if true and real. They will lose.

PS- as PdC has argued, the 1619 effort has some things wrong, but it's refocused view on our past consensus on history raises many worthwhile questions and addresses the past fictions that were too willingly accepted by many historians. It serves to cause a needed reflection on that common history that largely ignored the contributions of many people to our nation's success. The Rev. Weems- style history of our Founders, the Lost Cause fiction, and , more recently, the ravings of Quanon, Tuckerist history, and Stop the Steal mob are far, far worse factual ‘history' than anything found in 1619.

Repiqueone +1 In addition we are in great danger as fantasies replace truth. Different points of view may be argued legitimately as long as the basic facts are acknowledged. However, what we have seen in the last few years is a blatant denial of facts and truth in exchange for fantasy and belief. This is dangerous.

They will lose.

"The battle is not done."

Doc, they lose or we all lose. One must trust that, in the end, the majority will see that authoritarian, sectarian, and anti- intellectual and anti- scientific leadership will bring the whole enterprise to an end.

Your penchant for bad poetry now introduces a quote from Babcock! You never roam far from your turf do you? Add McCray to your sources and your position now looks as much religious as historical on many of these issues. In any case, you seem to yearn for an imposed "correct" history that conservative, white, Christian citizens can supply for everyone else.

Pique, you got just one thing right: you lose or we all lose.

authoritarian, sectarian, and anti- intellectual and anti- scientific leadership

LOL, yes, we are easily led!

And it is a great hymn. How many of YOUR poems do millions of people sing a century later?

Well, if I follow Babcock's example no one will sing my poems until well after my death, So I'll (We'll) never know.

Though I admit I have written no hymns, so the chances are none is the answer. I feel no loss to myself or the world in that regard. You'll let me know when McCray's histories are being sung? That could revolutionize history writing! "McPherson Sings the Civil War" could be a real treat! I hear he has a fine baritone voice.

PS Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

It's McClay, not McCray. And do you consider HAMILTON history? or 1776, the musical? You might profitably read Bill's essay on memory, posted at the link with that name.

or here: link

"The agenda of late modernity has turned into a steady assault on the claims of memory, grounded in the conviction that the past has nothing to teach the present, and that wherever the past is inharmonious with the desiderata of the present moment, it can and must undergo a thorough erasure and reconstruction. Living as we do in the age of ultimate moral truth, we are obliged to take command of the past as well as the present, in order to forge a future of pure justice and pure equity. We cannot permit our souls to be made impure by the existence of bad examples in our world. They must be removed from our sight. All statues erected to imperfect heroes of the past must come down immediately."

"Remembering rightly is harder than ever in our morally panicked, militantly secular, and increasingly post-Christian world. The phenomenon we call "wokeness" is a monomaniacal preoccupation with the detection and punishment of moral fault, past and present, which does not permit forgiving or forgetting, does not tolerate the foibles and inconsistencies and blindnesses to which all of us are prone. It also, like all such domineering moralisms, soon becomes a vehicle for the cynical and remorseless manipulation of conscience by people interested only in power."

The American past has always undergone erasure and reconstruction, the Lost Cause narrative being the most obvious example. The agenda of late modernity has included professional academic efforts to help complete and restore the truth, undo the fog of political manipulation that has befuddled us. I am NOT talking about 1619, or shallow PC histories ghost written by right wing tv news hosts.

There is no clear monolithic state of "Wokeness". Turned into a political label, it loses its original positive connotations about truth and awareness.

Now we cannot say it except as defined by those who do not even subscribe to it and we have completely forgotten that it arose to confront the assault on memory regarding race. And some of its proponents seemed to have skipped academic research in favor of political expedience, or used it to excuse mindless assaults on property.

The last sentence you include is chilling It could as easily be referring to the far right as to the left. The chilling part is that the righteous writer may not realize it.

+1 Tort! The righteous seldom recognize that much of their condemnation is a reflection in a mirror of unwarranted and exaggerated fear of change. Once you have a fixed mental universe, then change is always a threat. Once change reveals some ideas to be untrue, that fear can be magnified to irrational beliefs and violent acts. Both extremes can experience this, but the righteous right is certainly setting all records for the last several years. Thankfully they are a minority of our population, but they either are blind to that fact, or see themselves as the chosen few and discount their lack of numbers as requiring even more irrational actions.

The strongest evidence of this is the replacement of policy and governance with moral crusades, belief in many imaginary threats, and a torches and pitchfork mentality. It will pass, but not without some damage.

BTW in the US, change has generally flowed for the last 100 years from West to East and from urban centers to rural. Lines of resistance have been created at their antipodes.

We few, we precious few, we band of brothers . . .

Hmmmm…Hank Cinq was an agent of change with his longbowmen and the power it gave to skilled common men. It was the French fighting change that you would back! That is evident in this Shakespeare history.

In his time, your heroes were trying to close theaters as irreligious, secular, dens of iniquity supported by city folk. Some things and people never change.

What fools these mortals be!!

Two points of order, Mr Speaker:

1) "We few, we happy few…"

2) Archers were first employed in significant numbers in English forces by Edward 1. Decisively by his son Edward III. Whether either could be said to be men of the people is another discussion.
Nor indeed, Henry V despite "a touch of Harry in the night," when characters, events and dialogue might possibly have been altered for dramatic purposes (see 1. above)

I hope that helps.

Uhhh, we were't discussing men of the people but change and those that augment it and those that resist.

Shakespeare's histories were very political in their support for the Plantagenets and the Crown. He really threw Richard III under the bus( or the parking lot as recent digs have shown.). He knew where his scone was buttered.

By the way, the portrayal of the common man in his plays was one of the cornerstones of the English commoner's perception of his place in society. The fact that Harry went out among his troops in disguise to judge his army's temper on the night before battle is masterful. The media always have a role in defining national character, but they find it difficult to sell attitudes that aren't already there in a culture or body politic. The English commoner as the solid core of the nation has deep roots.