"The Yankee Conspiracy": How to waste my time

[Steve]

Friday night, my supervisor relieved me at my security post. Terry is an unrepentant redneck, self-proclaimed "poor Southern white boy", and the Civil War ended up being touched upon as we talked before I left for home (probably due to my current reading, Noah Andre Trudeau's "Southern Storm: Sherman's March to the Sea").

Whoo boy, was that a mistake.

You see, according to my good buddy Terry, the entire historiography (not that he called it that) of the American Civil War is false. The victors wrote the history books, and so of course they made it a story of a noble Yankee crusade to stop slavery instead of what it truly was: a war by Yankee hypocrites, business interests, and politicians to subjugate the South, which seceded over tariffs. He brought up the difference in wages between what we got and a security guard in the great Yankee bastion of New York City (didn't respond when I tried to bring up different costs of living). He insists the Union was an all-white army while the Confederates had Cubans and Mexicans and Blacks fighting in the gray, reinforcing the "Yankee hypocrite" argument.

I've written down summaries of the various secession ordinances to show him tonight, but I'm venting here because I'm pretty sure this is going to be a waste of time. How do you debate someone who believes in an active conspiracy that destroys historical evidence and even commits murder to prevent alternative historical views from being widespread? Any evidence that opposes them is automatically suspect as a result of the conspiracy. Alexander Stephens' cornerstone speech? A Yankee invention. Descriptions of mistreatment of slaves? Yankee invention.

For the record, I think he's a bit put-off on the subject of debating me because of his estimation of my "smartness", which frankly is "Smarter than I am". As in, he believes I'm far smarter than he is, mostly due to having seen my reading material. Because it's a rule that if you see someone reading, they're probably smart; if you see them reading "smart stuff", then they must be really smart.

This whole subject makes me despair because it shows just how poor historical education is. Sure, we're taught history in school... but we're not taught how history works. We're not taught sufficiently how historians debate and argue and explore history, the role of primary sources and peer review, etc. History's just there in a book, which we're to take at face value, and which in turn gives conspiracy-mongering a foothold since some people won't like what's written in the book.

[Simon_Jester]

You sure you should be debating the boss (granted not YOUR boss, but still A boss)?

How old is this guy? Granted history instruction in the US hasn't been uniformly stellar since, well, ever. But I get the sense that it's actually gotten a bit worse in the last ten years...

[fgalkin]

A) Don't debate your boss. It's a bad idea that may cost you your job.
B) If you do decide to debate your boss, show him copies of the Confederate Constitution and the States' Articles of Secession. If he dismisses those as Yankee fabrications, ask them how does he know what the Confederacy stood for if it's very founding documents were false. There may also be actual copies with the original signatures and what not, but I'm at work and can't look it up right now.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Mr Bean]

Here's a good one, get a copy of Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee by Captain Robert E. Lee, His Son and ask him to explain why Robert E Lee, greatest hero of the south would support the northern account of history. Or Fighting for the Confederacy: The Personal Recollections of General Edward Porter Alexander another Confederate general. Both books are based on the hand written accounts of the men involved and not just one paper but hundreds dozens of which were published in southern newspapers of which he can purse at his leisure in various civil war record depositories in the south.

In essence ask him why the leadership of the south would collude with the north to change history and how in the 1800s they manage to get to and replace the literal millions of letters of correspondence home from officers and soldiers as a truly staggering amount of mail on both sides was sent from both sides and we have a ton of it preserved in various colleges and museums in the states.

If he insists it's all a trick then stop right there as nothing you could do will convince him even up to and including raising Jefferson Davis and having him present a signed copy of The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government (Written by Davis himself)

[Steve]

Bah! The Lee and Davis books are marked Library Use Only by OCLS, can't check them out. Bah I say!

And what I really wanted to bring up in the threat is the issue of history education. Just like with science education, too much of it is set up as facts being dictated instead of processes being explained. This allows all sorts of pseudo-science and pseudo-history to get a foothold in minds, because there's no understanding of how those fields work and people can sound authoritative even when their work is junk. "My word against their's" is asserted, and thus it becomes a test of popularity and one's prejudices.

And, of course, the fact that history is universally considered "boring". Maybe I should become a history teacher after all.

[Skywalker_T-65]

I don't find history boring...

That being said, I can completely agree on that. A lot of history/science just isn't really expanded on anymore. People take what there is as the gospel truth, or else think it is completely wrong. There is very little middle ground for people who like investigating the history and actually learning it. It also tends to get annoying when the teachers don't know what their talking about. For example, my modern warfare (yes that is a class here) teacher called IED's, 'Improved Explosive Devices'. That may seem minor, but it gets annoying when they get the little things wrong (the guy was in Afghanistan and still got it wrong!). And I can't tell you how many other times I've been tempted to correct my teachers...I am a big history buff, and it rankles me like nothing else when I know my history better than the teachers.

I'm just hoping when I get to college this fall it gets better...oh God I hope it gets better...

[Simon_Jester]

It is quite hard to find enough people to teach history right. They have to know history. They have to know it well- i.e., a level of content knowledge that lets them breeze through any reasonable test of their knowledge, because they have to be able to explain and analogize. They have to be able to engage students- this is seriously difficult. They have to do all those things, on what is, frankly, not a very impressive salary; there are a lot of historically literate people who wouldn't take that job.

Bleh.

A) Don't debate your boss. It's a bad idea that may cost you your job.

He's debating the boss of the business he's a security guard for. His boss is someone else entirely. This is still, however, not a good idea. A bad idea, rather. Even a very bad idea.

[Fenreer]

Give up, Steve. You can't win against Southern Apologists. Their truth is the one they decide upon, and everything else is a lie and anyone speaking those lies is an enemy.

[Steve]

It is quite hard to find enough people to teach history right. They have to know history. They have to know it well- i.e., a level of content knowledge that lets them breeze through any reasonable test of their knowledge, because they have to be able to explain and analogize. They have to be able to engage students- this is seriously difficult. They have to do all those things, on what is, frankly, not a very impressive salary; there are a lot of historically literate people who wouldn't take that job.

Bleh.

A) Don't debate your boss. It's a bad idea that may cost you your job.

He's debating the boss of the business he's a security guard for. His boss is someone else entirely. This is still, however, not a good idea. A bad idea, rather. Even a very bad idea.

Uh, no. He's my supervisor with the security company. That said, he's really good-natured about it. And given our manpower problems and his imminent operation (artery cathetar to his heart via the femoral) I'm not too worried about getting canned over historical dispute.

Honestly, to me, the bigger issue is that things like this happen because of how badly these subjects are taught in school. It becomes easy to believe in powerful groups manipulating the telling of history to benefit their interests when history is presented as rote fact to be memorized. It's not just rote facts; it's about understanding how people were, how they thought, how individuals believed, how events flowed and were determined by the motives and decisions and prejudices of nations and leaders. History is always in flux as new theories and sources and discoveries mold it.

But, eh. I perhaps wax too poetic, and as a professional historian Thanas is probably better suited to griping about these issues. Oh well.

[madd0ct0r]

don't debate him. you get him to dig his heels in you'll get nowhere.

talk with him about it though. like you said, all good natured.

[CaptHawkeye]

Honestly, to me, the bigger issue is that things like this happen because of how badly these subjects are taught in school. It becomes easy to believe in powerful groups manipulating the telling of history to benefit their interests when history is presented as rote fact to be memorized. It's not just rote facts; it's about understanding how people were, how they thought, how individuals believed, how events flowed and were determined by the motives and decisions and prejudices of nations and leaders. History is always in flux as new theories and sources and discoveries mold it.

But, eh. I perhaps wax too poetic, and as a professional historian Thanas is probably better suited to griping about these issues. Oh well.

Anybody who teaches history with an agenda isn't really interested in teaching history, they're teaching propaganda. They're trying to sell you a doctrine of thinking, and it's usually wrong. If propaganda is what the audience wants, then their is nothing you can do about stopping it. Again they're not actually interested in learning about real history, they just want to feel empowered or motivated.

You're absolutely right that really learning about history comes from taking the time to understand it, which is what separates the really knowledgeable and professional historians from the fakers and liars. *cough*David Irving*cough*

History is a science like any other. If it's treated impartially and objectively it will bestow some real knowledge about how the world works. If it's seen as little more than a tool, then it's open to same kind of perversion that bred things like the Eugenics Movement.

[Iracundus]

The problem is that certain people are much more apt to seize on conspiracies as a means of explaining things, especially as a means of justifying why their side lost. It happened in Weimar Germany and obviously with these Confederacy apologists. I think psychologically people prefer an explanation that involves a scapegoat to be the target of hate, and in which there is personal malevolence and malice towards their own side. It justifies their own importance or plays up the aspect of being a noble victim. People want to believe that things happened for a reason, even if it was an evil reason.

In contrast, explanations that involve more impersonal forces, or even just the workings of chance, might come off as cold and mechanistic. It doesn't give an easy target of hate or revenge, and it can make the world seem that much more dangerous if bad things happen for no reason.

Trying to argue with such people is pointless because they are not using rational means of hypothesis then that being backed up or refuted by evidence to reason. They have almost reversed things and formed a conclusion first and then cherry pick the evidence that matches their thinking, and just discarding anything else that disagrees with them. No amount of evidence will ever be sufficient as disproof because they have already set themselves up as sole arbiter of what is valid evidence. They may have also set up scenarios where there is a convenient fall back explanation that serves to discredit any and everything: "Oh all that is because the documents were forged, edited, or destroyed." Can they prove it? Often no, but they also often fail to understand the issue of burden of proof resting with those making the positive claim, such as there being a conspiracy. They may try to bounce the question back and ask you to disprove them first, which is the fallacy of demanding negative proof. There are an infinite number of things which can never be conclusively disproven.

It doesn't have to be history alone. You can see this same line of flawed reasoning with such things as for example, those people that refuse to believe Bin Laden was actually killed. They have already concluded there is conspiracy at work and that gives a fallback excuse of everything being forged. No video, no picture, not even the actual body would ever be sufficient because they can always claim it is just a forgery by the conspiracy.

[Akhlut]

http://www.amazon.com/Lies-My-Teacher-T ... 0684818868

Bam, get this book. And give/lend it to him. Or, at least, read through it and condense the points down for him, especially those surrounding the Civil War.

The book, on the whole, does a stellar job showing how the US history education system is fundamentally broken and how it can be changed. It does also have a few primary historical documents (primarily, a couple pictures of lynch mobs and their victims), but, on the whole, it describes how the US history education system is flawed and the way to get around it, which also includes, for a few portions, simply saying "we're not sure between several alternative narratives which may or may not be correct."

It also has a full chapter on the US Civil War and includes a lot of information on how it started out as the Slave Power seceding over fears of abolition, and the Union initially getting involved to preserve the integrity of the US before turning into a crusade against slavery.

There's also a chapter on Reconstruction, and another on the US Civil Rights Movement. It really is a great book on historiography and helps to right a lot of wrongs induced by the US educational system for history.

[Steve]

Read it, Aklhut, and the followup on bad historical markers. And he'd never accept it. "Yankee propaganda".

That's the conspiracy theorist for you.

[Simon_Jester]

If you can hand him documents that were literally signed by Jeff Davis and he won't believe them, you really are wasting your time.