Quote:You are on the mark on a great many these things I was trying to explain this the other day to someone on here. Students may leave school believing in evolution, ect. but they believe and not understand. They parrot the opinions of their teachers but cannot explain how any of it works or why they believe what they do. 

 

In history, that mindset becomes even more troublesome because rarely are things cut and dry, there is nuance. It's sad to me when you meet young people who think almost everyone in the south owned slaves and that slavery is an American institution. In reality, very few people actually owned any slaves, and the UK/USA were on the leading edge of ending slavery. Many places on earth still have the institution but it isn't really talked about. Even more rarely discussed is the slavery in the Middle East. That was on a much larger scale, lasted longer, and the conditions were far far worse, but somehow people think slavery is an American problem when really the USA was a huge part in fixing it.

 

Very much so.  In fact, the story of slavery is told and expressed much like the TV movie series Roots.  While some of it might be accurate, what most people don't realize is that slaves were actually treated relatively good by their owners.  Slave owners actually encouraged families and breeding.  Without trying to minimize the inhumanity of the situation, slaves were considered to be like livestock.  A rancher doesn't abuse his cattle, he takes care of them.

 

Now I am by no means condoning slavery.  As I stated, it was a very inhumane practice, but at the time it was also an accepted practice.

 

Getting back to the story in the OP, the display of a Confederate Flag in a HISTORY class is not "unsafe" or "offensive", especially when a Union Flag was also displayed.  It could actually be a "teaching moment" if some student was "offended" by it.  Instead, students are indoctrinated to believe that it is a "hate symbol".

 

I wonder if the display of a swastika is "offensive" in a WWII History class.

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