Shorter Mark Steyn (and with apologies to Jameson):
Though I clearly know absolutely nothing about the state of history education, I feel pretty certain that if my son continues to learn about Rosa Parks, he’ll eventually find a career suppressing free speech, blowing up ancient monuments, stoning promiscuous women, and harassing ethnic and sexual minorities.
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17 comments
November 26, 2008 at 6:22 pm
Prof B
OT, but there’s an interesting discussion on the H-Diplo list with a post by David Kaiser defending the German tradition in history and lamenting the continuing dearth of “real” historical opportunities due to the dirty farking hippies and their social history nonsense. “Interesting” in the “I can’t believe someone’s still engaged in this debate” kind of way.
November 26, 2008 at 7:40 pm
TCG
The “Great John Howard” said Steyn, in his bit of wingnuttery.
Is Howard almost as close to as great as Bush or as great as Bush? I am not sure how Steyn would answer.
November 26, 2008 at 8:05 pm
Ahistoricality
Normally I really regret clicking through to the Corner, but this time I’m really glad I did. I had an epiphany: these people really are conservatives. I know that sounds simple, but you know, if the Corner existed in the early 1800s, they’d be complaining about how the curriculum was all rabble-rousers like Washington and Jefferson, and the glories of the English tradition were being laid aside.
The beat goes on!
November 26, 2008 at 10:32 pm
davenoon
Exactly, TCG — my first reaction was of course to wonder why anyone but compulsive scab-pickers would care what John Howard’s view of history is…
November 27, 2008 at 9:05 am
jmsdonaldson
On our way back from a short vacation yesterday, my wife and I were trying to find a radio station in Jefferson City, Missouri (four Christian stations, bunch of stations with Republican talk radio and no NPR) and accidentally got Sean Hannity’s show just in time to hear him say that nothing happened in African-American history between Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington and the 1960s. It had been quite a while since I yelled at the radio like an old man.
November 27, 2008 at 11:08 am
Daniel De Groot
This kind of thing is why John Cole retracted his hopes for reaching peak wingnut immediately after considering the possibility.
He had hoped that the election of Obama would portend a decline in right wing insanity as they would reflect upon their collective failure to assist the Republican party by adding ever more cowbell.
Instead, I think what has happened is they feel the freedom that comes with a lack of having anything more to lose. There is no congressional majority nor Presidency to protect, nor any reasonable hope to regain them in 2010 or 2012. The minimal constraints of trying to seem respectable for electoral expediency are gone. It’s all id now baby. To paraphrase Jack Handy, if you are already falling to your doom, you may as well pretend to swim for the amusement of onlookers.
November 28, 2008 at 6:06 am
ajay
“I feel pretty certain that if my son continues to learn about Rosa Parks, he’ll eventually find a career suppressing free speech, blowing up ancient monuments, stoning promiscuous women, and harassing ethnic and sexual minorities.”
The apple, as they say, does not fall far from the tree.
November 28, 2008 at 4:43 pm
Doctor Science
The most boggling thing in that casserole of boggle is that Steyn doesn’t think kids are taught about Rosa Parks as part of a moral, heroic narrative. Far from being a history that’s all about the warts and that rejects narrative, Parks is brought in to star in as heroic an American narrative as Steyn could ask for.
November 28, 2008 at 9:21 pm
Charlieford
You can make a career out of stoning promiscuous women? Is that what they mean when they call someone a “stoner”?
November 28, 2008 at 9:22 pm
Charlieford
And someone needs to turn Hannity on to W. C. Handy. Or into. That would work, too.
November 29, 2008 at 3:39 pm
student
It’s ironic that David Kaiser, of all people, should be trying to revive the German historiographical tradition, the “scientific investigation of the past.” Some readers here may know Kaiser as the purveyor of nonsensical Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories, “history as it essentially wasn’t” I suppose. For a devastating review of his recent book, published by Harvard University Press, see
http://www.washingtondecoded.com/site/2008/03/road-to-nowhere.html
November 29, 2008 at 4:33 pm
Walt
I looked for that discussion on h-diplo, but I couldn’t find it. I found what I presume was Kaiser’s original post, but that’s it. (I have no idea what the “German historiographical tradition” is, or why dirty hippies hate it, which is why I went looking.)
November 29, 2008 at 6:27 pm
Ahistoricality
Walt,
The “German historiographical tradition” is also referred to as Rankean: “History as it was” is often indicated by the use of the German term “wie es eigentlich gewesen” (show what actually happened)”
It’s mostly invoked now as a slap at “theory” and its disturbing, distorting effects (as some see it).
November 29, 2008 at 8:51 pm
yeah
Dude, Steyn is not subtle but he’s more subtle than your summary. Dumb, dumb, dumb post.
November 29, 2008 at 9:04 pm
Hemlock
I’ve been lending my father readings from my comps list. He says that works by historians in the academy make him depressed. Makes me ponder the past.
Which post is dumb, Dave Noon’s???
November 29, 2008 at 9:09 pm
Hemlock
The books I lent him were synthesis texts, most of which you can find at a local book retailer. No actual “academy” texts (speaking of Creation, CC, etc.).
November 30, 2008 at 3:32 pm
Charlieford
“He says that works by historians in the academy make him depressed.” Remind him to be grateful he didn’t have to live it.