The HITS Theory of History

 The HITS Theory of history

 

Throughout recorded history the HITS theory of teaching history to children has predominated.  This theory teaches we did no wrong regardless of what that wrong might be.  It also teaches that if by some chance we did do some wrong- well it was the other guy’s fault and well deserved.  And besides that, we were only protecting ourselves from some self-described catastrophe.

Prior to the Civil War (so named by the victors, who do not just get the spoils of victory but also get to name the conflict), those of us who had to rationalize the immoral practice of one human being owning another named slavery the white man’s burden protecting black folk from a life of poverty and ignorance.  Too bad we didn’t give those black people a shot at proving them wrong and freeing them from the life of poverty and ignorance as an enslaved people.

We brought many Chinese to our shores to build railroads.  Once we didn’t need their skills anymore we stopped allowing Chinese to come to our country.

During WWII we placed Japanese-American citizens in concentration camps to protect ourselves from the perfidy we knew they were plotting.  We didn’t do that to Germans who we were also fighting.  Could the fact that the Germans looked more like us be a reason they were allowed to roam free. 

We allowed millions of Jews to be baked in Nazi ovens because they didn’t worship like most of us so we couldn’t allow them to emigrate to America and save their lives.  And besides, we all knew how Jews really were and maybe Hitler wasn’t all that wrong by the way he characterized them.

Women by means of law and tradition are still treated as the personal possession of the males in their lives.  Even in the U.S. there are laws that place women in a secondary condition as opposed to males.  And tradition is a whole other story.

Teaching children about these wrongs is considered wrong because we all know the United States is the land of the free and home of the brave and is a county whose history is peppered with good deeds and exceptionalism.  This scenario is also totally true.  The United States is home to more immigrants than any other country on earth.  The proud lady in the New York harbor has much of which to be proud.

Knowing all sides of our history is important.  As a single human being, my hope for being a better person lies in my knowing what I have done wrong and how I can be better tomorrow.  So, it is true of our nation.  When we limit what people can achieve because they worship a different god or the same god in a different way or worship no god at all is just stupid.  Limiting people because their skin tone is different or their faces skew differently is also very stupid.  When we limit the talents people bring to our country because of these differences, it is not only immoral, it is stupid.  Why deprive our attempts to problem solve by not utilizing every single talent we have?  Because we embrace stupidity by these behaviors. Oh, the HITS theory of history?   Head in the Sand- we do it all the time and no one complains