For the First Time I Am in Despair for the West, as Well as Israel

[DogOnPorch]

What are you talking about?

You're the one claiming history is subjective. I'm on the opposite side...remember?

[DogOnPorch]

If some group's perspectives are not included, then it is not objective even at the start, in the data-gathering process. Aside from the obvious ones, like the tendency to consider wars and military campaigns the most important things to write down, and the obvious fact that during those wars, the losers don't get the same chance to make their contributions to history, there are other examples

Another good example today would be how to consider the native oral histories from people who did not have written languages until modern times. Euro-centric historians just assumed that oral histories are heresay and would not use them; but psychologists who study illiterate people tell us that someone who does not know how to read or write has much greater wrote memory abilities than literate people, who don't have the same need to remember because they can just refer to written notes. So, at least in recent centuries, oral histories appear to be much more accurate than previously expected, and often more accurate about historical events, including natural disasters, than many of the early written records of the time.

I can get any number of historical works by 'the losers'.

[cybercoma]

You're the one claiming history is subjective. I'm on the opposite side...remember?

You said I support some conspiracy theory. I don't. So I have no clue what you're talking about. What conspiracy theory do I support? I said history is interpretivist. I explained thoroughly how and why this is the case. Now you're saying I support a conspiracy theory, when I haven't supported anything other than the idea that history is interpreted.

[DogOnPorch]

You said I support some conspiracy theory. I don't. So I have no clue what you're talking about. What conspiracy theory do I support? I said history is interpretivist. I explained thoroughly how and why this is the case. Now you're saying I support a conspiracy theory, when I haven't supported anything other than the idea that history is interpreted.

If you support 'alternative histories' you're also supporting conspiracy theories.

[bush_cheney2004]

I can get any number of historical works by 'the losers'.

You were right the first time.....history is not subjective, but the historians are. That's why we dig up the bodies.

[cybercoma]

If you support 'alternative histories' you're also supporting conspiracy theories.

If you mean "alternative histories" as in the euphemism for conspiracy theories, then no. I don't support those. However, there are revisionist histories that are written with academic rigour and are quite valid. That's what I'm talking about.

[DogOnPorch]

If you mean "alternative histories" as in the euphemism for conspiracy theories, then no. I don't support those. However, there are revisionist histories that are written with academic rigour and are quite valid. That's what I'm talking about.

Still agenda driven. When's Benny Morris going to do his alternative view of the Battle of Leyte Gulf? He isn't? Why?

[DogOnPorch]

You were right the first time.....history is not subjective, but the historians are. That's why we dig up the bodies.

Yasser must be pretty ripe by now.

[cybercoma]

I don't think you understand what I'm saying. By agenda, I assume you mean taking a position. All historical writing takes a position and interprets meaning. If that's what you mean, then all history is agenda driven.

[DogOnPorch]

I don't think you understand what I'm saying. By agenda, I assume you mean taking a position. All historical writing takes a position and interprets meaning. If that's what you mean, then all history is agenda driven.

Historians are agenda driven. The so-called new historians aren't looking for alternative theories as to what hat Robert E. Lee wore at Antietam.

[cybercoma]

I don't think many people are going out reading primary documents to understand history. So we come to understand history through historians and they're all agenda driven. Hence my point that you continue to argue against, all history is interpretation of the past. Moreover, those interpretations change with contexts in which they are written. Historians today writing about Reconstruction are writing something very different than historians in the 1920s. Historians 80 years from now might even be writing something different again. But we don't go back to primary documents to learn the history for ourselves (the vast majority of us anyway). We learn it through movies and museums that take the historians work and interpret it themselves. So our connection to history is a connection to the interpretations of interpretations. We can never connect directly with what actually happened. In fact, there may be no connection to what actually happened, since the people at the time writing about the events were interpreting those events themselves. That means the primary documents themselves are also interpretations. You see how layers upon layers of subjectivity are built into history?

Edited November 26, 2012 by cybercoma

[DogOnPorch]

Here's real history.

http://cheapskateintellectual.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/oct2012-190.jpg

From this photo, you can learn a lot about the average Confederate soldier circa 1863. No Benny Morris needed for interpretation.

[jbg]

Yasser must be pretty ripe by now.

He always smelled pretty ripe.

[blueblood]

Just to give a concrete example:

The United States bombed Hiroshima. That's a fact. There's no disputing that this actually happened. But that event has a very different meaning to a Japanese person from that time, a Japanese person today, the American pilots that dropped the bomb at the time, the American executive that made the call, the average American not involved in the war, the engineers that built the bomb, the physicists that made the discoveries that led to the creation of the bomb, the Soviet government, each individual historian that writes about the event, every reader that reads the historian's intepretation of the facts of the event, us on this message board today, etc. etc. etc. The United States dropping the bomb on Hiroshima means something different, sometimes wildly different, to every one of those people/groups.

Also to note it took that kind of an ass whipping to get the Japanese and Germans to get their heads out of their ass. Unfortunately that may be what may have to happen over there. Heck the ottoman empire lasted a long time by keeping everyone's ass in line. That's the problem with treaties, they always tend to get broken. We should be fortunate the Americans whipped the USSR in economics. Europe today isn't pacified because all of a sudden people decided to play nice, Europe is pacified because the Germans got whipped and whipped good.

[DogOnPorch]

cybercoma: the average American not involved in the war

No such thing during WW2.

[jbg]

Also to note it took that kind of an ass whipping to get the Japanese and Germans to get their heads out of their ass. Unfortunately that may be what may have to happen over there. Heck the ottoman empire lasted a long time by keeping everyone's ass in line. That's the problem with treaties, they always tend to get broken. We should be fortunate the Americans whipped the USSR in economics. Europe today isn't pacified because all of a sudden people decided to play nice, Europe is pacified because the Germans got whipped and whipped good.

I'm glad you understand that.

Japan is now one of our closest allies. Not from playing nice with them either.

War is hell. There is no doubt about that. Children who just yesterday seemed to be playing in the tire swing on the front yard are off to fight, often in some distant land or venue. Everyone of any degree of sanity wishes that this were never needed, and that our beloved flesh and blood could go peacefully from playful childhood to productive, fruitful adulthood to wise old age.

Unfortunately, the way of the world is that nations and religious groups frequently do not like each other. There is always some group that doesn't want to engage in diplomacy or good-faith negotiation. It is the people that enjoy the cherished freedom relished by Americans and Canadians that do not wish to fight. Sometimes other people or groups make unreasonable demands that must be resisted. For example, in the U.S. south, peole demanded the right to keep other people enslaved, and were willing to forsake Congressional and electoral debate to that end. In more modern times, various groups, at different times calling themselves fascists, communists, or Islamists, believed that they had the right to limit the freedom of others, in behalf of some deranged or impractical dream of world paradise, on their terms, with them as rulers.

The civilized world has always tried to limit the bloodshed of war initially. During the Civil War, Union forces took no steps to occupy Virginia or North Carolina prior to their long-delayed secession from the Union. During World War II, much time was spent in both the European and Atlantic theatres on peripheral engagements with enemy troops, some at great cost of Allied life. How many Americans died at Guadalcanal, Midway, Iwo Jima and various African sites far removed from the main Axis powers?

Both the Civil War and WW II ended when the victors became serious about fighting. General Sherman's "March to the Sea", which devastated large swaths of Georgia, convinced the remaining Confederates that their cause was hopeless. The Dresden, Hiroshima and Nagasaki attacks, in my view, for the first time convinced the German and Japanese people, respectively, that their "leadership" was taking them one place; to the grave.

For war to end, the ultimate victors must prosecute it to the maximum extent possible. I am not advocating attacking supermarkets and skyscrapers deliberately. Those kinds of attacks accomplish little. If fanatics seek war, they should be given what they ask for. In spades. Attempts to daintily avoid civilian casualties and negotiate prematurely lead only to prolonged and greater grief.

Originally posted here (link)

[Guest Peeves]

No such thing during WW2.

I don't understand? Care to educate me as to your meaning please.

[DogOnPorch]

I don't understand? Care to educate me as to your meaning please.

During WW2, the US went for a national effort. That meant even Hollywood making movies was somehow connected to the War. Canada and other Commonwealth nations had similar total war strategies. Cyber was making WW2 sound a tad bit too much like one of today's 'wars' where most folks go around...lives unchanged...ignoring the fact the nation is in a conflict.

Edited November 27, 2012 by DogOnPorch

[GostHacked]

If you support 'alternative histories' you're also supporting conspiracy theories.

Well since you agree that historians are subjective, and *GASP* those are the ones writing history, you bit here is a non-starter.

[DogOnPorch]

Well since you agree that historians are subjective, and *GASP* those are the ones writing history, you bit here is a non-starter.

History is objective. Historians...and you and I...are subjective. This has never been one of my state secrets. But you can pretend if you wish.

[GostHacked]

History is objective. Historians...and you and I...are subjective. This has never been one of my state secrets. But you can pretend if you wish.

Great, now that we have established that, since much of this history is written by historians, how can you have any faith in what you are reading is true and unbiased? Even all your evidence to support a certain thing is also subjective based on the fact we both agree history is written by historians, therefore inherently biased and possibly wrong.

[DogOnPorch]

Great, now that we have established that, since much of this history is written by historians, how can you have any faith in what you are reading is true and unbiased? Even all your evidence to support a certain thing is also subjective based on the fact we both agree history is written by historians, therefore inherently biased and possibly wrong.

You rely too much on historians, for one. Now here is a photo...no historians involved. What does this tell you about WW2?

You get extra points if you can tell me the year it was taken by visual clues.

Edited November 27, 2012 by DogOnPorch

[GostHacked]

You rely too much on historians, for one.Now here is a photo...no historians involved. What does this tell you about WW2?

You get extra points if you can tell me the year it was taken by visual clues.

Another 'gotcha' tactic attempt. And your game is usually rigged. Thanks for playing anyways.

[GostHacked]

Seems like this belongs in this thread too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lixYEZ9M_dU

[DogOnPorch]

Another 'gotcha' tactic attempt. And your game is usually rigged. Thanks for playing anyways.

No it isn't. There is no 'trick' to that photo if you know your OWN historical facts. That B-17 is a G model. It's a late G model to boot. How do I know? The nose MG hanging down has a gun mount. The aircraft is silver rather than OD green & grey...meaning it was taken on or after Sept 1944. The mud tells me this aircraft ditched at an alternate airfield as all B-17 aerodromes were paved concrete. The barely visible nose stripe tells me it is possibly from the 303rd BG or the 305th BG. But it's hard to tell w/o seeing the B-17's tail/rudder.