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In the June 1969 issue of Civil War History — Volume 5, Number 2, pages 116-132 — a renowned Southern historian attacked the legacy of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.
"No single war figure stands in greater need of reevaluation than Lee," wrote Thomas L. Connelly, the late University of South Carolina professor. "One ponders whether the South may not have fared better had it possessed no Robert E. Lee."
Connelly's essay was among the first academic musket shots fired on Lee's standing as an outmatched but not outwitted military genius presiding over a Lost Cause — a reputation celebrated in fawning biographies and monuments like the one removed Friday in New Orleans.
Was General Lee overrated? Get your armchair historian on...
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The Truth About Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee: He Wasn’t Very Good at His Job
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Grelb's Reminder:
Eighty percent of all people consider themselves to be above
average drivers.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Monday June 12 2017, @12:56AM (9 children)
Jr high history, supposed to get to modern day. Never hit the Civil War. High School history, supposed to get to modern day. Never hit the Civil war. College history, supposed to get to modern day, never got to the Civil War.
3 shots, never got the Civil War, WW1, WW2, cold war, Vietnam. But I sure as shit know in 1492 Columbus sailed the Ocean Blue.
/ for me, history class was a huge waste of time
// Drake crossed the southern tip of South America around 1580 or so
/// Tell me again how knowing this is useful.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Monday June 12 2017, @01:02AM (5 children)
The history books wouldn't tell you shit anyway, unless you get good ones at the college level. The folks who know history at the battle-by-battle level with at least a basic understanding of statistics are professionals or hobbyist autists.
Unfortunately, for the past 10 or so years colleges here have been teaching that all the bad things that happened in history were caused by straight White men and if it weren't for White influence Africa would have fusion reactors and flying cars.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by jmorris on Monday June 12 2017, @01:11AM (4 children)
Actually I'd argue that general histories focus far too much on wars, battles and generals. Military historians should study those things. Everyone else should be taught the issues that brought on the war, who won and what changes came about as a result. And most history should be like that, less focused on Great Men and the implication that we are all playing some Cosmic game of Civilization where the States and the Great Leaders guide everything and focus more on the social, political, religious and geographic and technological stories and how they influenced each other.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @03:33AM (1 child)
I'm not sure. That sounds awfully like political correctness to me. Did your account get hacked?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday June 12 2017, @12:04PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @05:19AM
James Burke [google.com] should have been writing those History books.
Howard Zinn [google.com] is another guy who -did- write History books--and didn't just repeat the White-people-are-awesome myths.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday June 12 2017, @12:44PM
The current SJW crop of academic historians hates that. Not solely because they're men although that probably helps. Your paragraph is pretty much mainstream university historian thought.
Originally the great man style came from good old Plutarch who used it as a convenient compare and contrast topic, and trying to teach little kids on the theory that its easier to get kids to remember at least a little about some dude than about vast themes of changing conditions or whatever. Also its kind of a residual shared common astrological history so your average idiot knew what it meant to cross the rubicon like Julius Caesar so you can bring history alive via analogy. Also "great man theory" was supposed to be inspirational back before being anti-white and anti-male became part of the religious doctrine of the progressive.
As with most things the greek moderation strategy is best. You're ignorant if you don't know about Admiral Nelson, but you're also ignorant if all you know is a bunch of dead dudes names and battle locations. You're wrong if you've only read Plutarch AND you're wrong if you've only read the good (aka non-great man theory) parts of Gibbon.
Admittedly another aspect is keeping the money rolling. You can't make money in 2017 as an academic off great man theory reading of Plutarch because everything that can be said about those great men was said already over the last 2000 years, but a treatise on the hand waving importance of the trade in silk or whatever is the kind of thing you can make money off in 2017. So naturally the academic faculty is disinterested in replacing themselves with a nice translation from the classic languages department so they rant about how awful it is and how important alternatives to the great man theory are.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday June 12 2017, @06:13AM (1 child)
Has no one ever informed you that it was YOUR FAULT that you never studied recent American history?
For my part, we, as a class, never really studied WWII. I, personally, devoted uncounted hours to studying Hitler, the Third Reich, the officers, and the Holocaust, BEFORE I graduated from high school. I devoted far less time to the study of WWI, but I did study it, on my own. I have even figured out why WWII was almost inevitable after the "peace" of WWI.
Bear in mind that I grew up decades before the internet became ubiquitous, and that I had to pilfer a half dozen libraries to find all of my study material on the subjects. Because I wanted to know, I either walked, ran, or rode a bicycle to those various libraries, many many times, to satisfy my curiosity.
It is not to late, for you. Hit Google, or any other search engine. Many books are free to download, many more are available for purchase, cheaply, on the internet. If you know little or nothing about WWII, it is because you don't care to learn. The materials are available.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Monday June 12 2017, @12:25PM
For example, one of the most educational Second World War moments was when I looked at who were the Chancellors of Germany before Hitler and saw how the two before were vicious bastards. One had been working to undermine the Treaty of Versailles since the early to mid 1920s in Germany's outlawed military general staff, including alleged assassinations and other black ops, the other had dissolved the Free State of Prussia, removing by far the largest obstacle to Hitler's totalitarian reign. The kicker was that neither were Nazis! They were selfishly pursuing ultimate power over Germany as well, but were out-maneuvered by Hitler who had populist backing they couldn't match.
It was enlightening to see what sort of thing we should be looking for in warning signs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @01:34PM
We did get to the Civil War but no further, history class just started over again and again. I read ahead in High School to see how far the books went and not only did they tend to end nearly a decade before the year I was taking the class but I also realized that we never even got 2/3rds of the way through the book.