Welcome to the tedious, exhausting, yet sometimes rewarding world of cross-referencing.

History is going to always be inaccurate. Like it was stated in one of my favorite fantasy novels. "Turn over any historian and you'll find a storyteller." People as a whole tend to not be able to tell an account of events without adding some "gravy" to it as I have heard it called. Peoples bias and tendencies to embellish will always distort history.

The important thing with history is to understand that the bias is there and to take things with a grain of salt. People tend to too often take things as Gospel and as such treat it as unalterable. Which sorry history will always be prone to various changes from the minute to the massive.

Overall though (and to keep it on topic) history I think is getting better and better about limiting bias. Not saying that the levels have gone down but anymore there is so much information out there that you can get a better understanding of what is going on and get a better idea for what the actual facts are.

History will never be entirely factual or entirely accurate (since we are working off of the writings and statements in the past and none of us having personally lived through it) however it is getting better about it being possible to find out what is being glossed over.

history we learn in school is totally biased. completely from america's point of view. basically true just really biased

:sarcasm:History is marred by red tape and falsehoods that the governments only want us to know. Sure there are some facts there, but the underlying issues are covered up so that we do not know the whole truth. One sided, biased opinions from the writers imaginations fill the books that teach our children. :sarcasm:

Alright!!

I want to thank everyone once again for their input - it really helped me out. Sorry I wasn't around to talk more but I needed to hear all the other opinions first before putting my own in.

Just because the polls closed doesn't mean the thread is so feel free to continue if you like. ^.^

As for my view on history...well..

I've actually been doing a lot of research on the subject lately - my main focus being on World War 2 as it's one of the best documented and wide reaching out of the recent world events. So far I've come to the conclusion that history is fairly biased. While I haven't yet seen one government sanctioned version in any country that flat out lies I have seen a lot of personal or cultural OPINION in the released texts. It's hard to record something and not add in a word or two about how you feel as well.

Part of the bias appearance comes from the fact that historians are forced to choose which events are important and which are not. This is even more complicated when those writing the books don't have the full story to begin with.

I may have mentioned this before but a teacher I spoke to once told me that she didn't even realize that during world war 2 the Americans had internment camps for the Japanese. She had never been told about the experiments done on soldiers of the U.S. by their own government. It's not that the information wasn't there - but it wasn't presented by the historians who came before her. Either they didn't think it important or were trying to cover it up and forget about it.

If those who teach us history are biased then the history we learn will naturally have that bias as well. And when we as the teachers pick and choose what is important to learn as well we make the bias even worse. The end result is that like the telephone game many of us played as children - the message gets distorted the further down the line we get.

This is why it is important to constantly review our information and cut the bias away as soon as we find it. It will never be perfect - but it can be as accurate and fair as possible.

*crickets in background*

(kay, I'll be quiet now... -.- )

N/A

I've come to the conclusion that history is half truth and half lies and government cover-up.

Well, I can't verify much about the German version of World War 2 but I do know they place a distinct emphasis on the fact that not all Germans supported Hitler. In fact there were many who outright opposed him ( and died).
Even now we're learning just how many people tried to kill him.
Even loyal Nazi's thought he was nuts.

What I find a little irksome is the details of Hitlers early life. According to many American texts he was overly coddled by his mother, belligerent to his teachers, and eventually ran away from home despite being well cared for.

A little digging later and we find out the reasons for these actions.

Adolf and his half- brother ( yes, he had a brother ) were routinely abused by their father who would beat them and their mother with little or no provocation. Not to mention his father was a drunk -( and possibly Jewish) and that he also slept around with other women with no regard for his wife.

It was his brother, who ran away from home. Adolf stayed until after his father died when he was still young ( around 13 I believe ) . Later he decided to go to Vienna. After his mother died of cancer ( while enduring a painful treatment by a Jewish doctor. ) and he was rejected by a prominent art school ( headed by Jewish leaders ) he became a vagrant selling postcards of his paintings to survive and became disgusted by what he saw there.
( Jewish run prostitution of German women )

Does this mean that all Jews were evil? Heck no. There were just as many productive members of society as not and I'm sure he ran into an equal amount of Catholic, Protestant, Aethist, etc. neer-do-wells. But when you're in a helpless situation most people need someone to blame. And so he got tunnel vision after too many bad experiences.

We are never taught this in America but it does have a place in the history books - because it gives background information on why he did what he did. In fact, his childhood was not too far from the norm in Germany as it suffered in the depression. This is why so many people could identify with him. Contrary to belief in America, Hitler didn't start the ball rolling on anti-semetism or white supremacy.

In fact, both of these had been found in Western countries the world over. Even in America there was prejudice against the Jews - however not to the extent that it would become in Nazi Germany. And Australia had a state implemented program that involved 'breeding out the black' in half - caste Aboriginal children by legally taking them from their parents and forcing them to marry or work for whites with the knowledge that their children would be paler complected - and thus more acceptable in Australian society. under the guise of 'helping' the native people by literally turning their descendants white.

Oh yeah, and they were still doing it up until around the 60's when the man in charge retired from the position.

so in essence. Yes, it happened in Germany.
It could just as easily have happened in America.

And I asked a history teacher recently at college and he admitted that we in America still tend to teach that our country was a knight in shining armor - ready to save the world.

@ Clarise: You have a very good point there when you spoke about the American Civil War. Written records and art are really all we have to go on for much of the world's history, so I give historians kudos for sifting through it all. And much of that is most definately biased.

Speaking of the American Civil War, I actually have a little anecdote that I find funny, but not in a ha-ha sort of way. I"m a native of South Carolina, and when we learned about the Civil War, we were taught (especially in the later grades when we were old enough to understand tariffs) that slavery was not the main reason that South Carolina seceded from the Union. Slavery was in fact part of the reason, but it was not the biggest reason, it was part-n-parcel with a slew of economic reasons. I once wrote about this in a journal on DeviantArt, and I specifically mentioned Sherman's March to the Sea.

I got really interesting responses from some of my friends. My roommate had barely even heard of Sherman's March to the Sea when I mentioned it to her once. I remember Sherman because after sixth grade, every time I learned about the American Civil War, he was mentioned because he left a swath of destruction through the states of South Carolina and Georgia. It's reported that the soldiers took particular delight in destroying South Carolina since it was the state that started it all.

History isn't just written by the winners, it's also taught by people who will overlook one thing while focusing on another. I have no idea what I wasn't taught when I learned about Sherman and the tariffs, but I at least know what some of my friends had missed.

Unfortunately I do.

This is not to say the evidence is not there. If you dig really really hard you can find most of the facts covering a modern event - last 100 years or so. My problem is that the people who write our textbooks - whether due to time or content restraints or just flat out bias are not giving our students the whole story. Why is it that from state to state the history of our country changes? Let alone from nation to nation.

There are things I never dreamed were true that I'm now finding out actually happened. I had to learn these things myself - the government wouldn't tell us.

For example, what government is going to willingly admit to terror bombing a civilian city - especially in front of a populace that believes their country is 'right' and 'just'?

Well, the US admitted it. Then promptly made sure it wasn't in the history books our children would be reading. Yes, the information is there. But the real bias comes in when people gloss over certain facts in favor of others. The historians may be able to see both sides of an event but the people out on the street very rarely get that chance. They either believe what the government tells them is true or don't care to look into the subject further - each being equally harmful.

And furthermore, how is the average joe supposed to know how valid his source is?

I'm reading through a book right now titled 1001 things everyone should know about World War 2. The back cover and inner flap tout it as a definitive and complete reference for all the major events in the war. It's only if one reads the foreword by the author that he states that his work will by it's nature be biased and is mainly the opinion of what's important by one man.

This is true of most historical literature. So how are we to know when it's fact, opinion, or some mesh of the two? Most people are not going to bother sifting through facts in order to get the real truth. It's time consuming, boring, and rarely rewarding. ( unless you're really into history)

That's in part why I did this poll. To find out just how many people believe what they are taught in grade school, high school, and college and why they feel the way they do.

I don't think all history is biased - just what we're taught as fact by the public education system.