Previous generations of parents until the most recent one taught their children the same set of ideals, essentially consisting of, “the world is what you make of it,” “the world isn’t perfect,” and “the world will not bend over backwards for you.”
These lessons are not oversimplifying life, nor are they overcomplicating it. These set realistic expectations of the world and that it’s simply not perfect, and that’s fine.
The problem with the latest generation of parents – the so-called “helicopter parents” – is that they taught their kids that the world would be perfect by the time it was handed to them. Those kids grew up and now we’re the most anxious country in the world.
It’s hard to completely blame them, since they were spoonfed an agenda that was simply not grounded in reality, by fault of the parents, media, and institutions who went along with such a completely ridiculous idea. However, there is a time to grow up and, after a certain point, only you yourself perpetuate your own misery.
Despite this, there’s plenty to change about the world for the better. Some principles are incredibly misguided and misinformed, but it doesn’t make everyone evil. Short-sighted, one-note, or naïve, maybe, but not evil.
But there’s one thing you cannot change. This isn’t to say we can’t change this now because we haven’t found the technology or done the research yet, or that we need to convince the population to agree with us; it’s to say that we are literally, by virtue of this topic itself, unable to change it.
You can’t change history.
History is meant to be objective. To say you can change history is to say you can change the past, and that’s something we certainly don’t have the technology for yet.
Objective history means we all agree about the past and can move on from it. We can base our new ideas, morals, and expectations from a basis which we all see as constant.
We can choose to teach certain types of history; willfully choosing to ignore or magnify certain parts of history over others is disingenuous. We can also discover new pieces of history that might drastically change stories and long-held beliefs. To deliberately not entertain findings that might explain parts of history is intentionally insincere.
But the latest episode from the profoundly wise New York City Councilmembers are not caught in either conundrum. According to one, they are concerned with “correcting” history.
The mantra that many on the left are trying to change history eventually got too unpalatable for people to remain objective, so the left changed the words and they’re trying to sneak back into the club after being kicked out.
How exactly is “correcting” history any fundamentally different than “changing” it? Even if a new piece of evidence is found that does, in fact, alter what history tells us, it’s not “changing” history. We cannot take it upon ourselves to deliberately try to change history. We can look for clues, we can present evidence, but actively working to “correct” history unequivocally summons an ulterior motive.
The problem with New York City’s attempts at “correcting” history is that their form of “correction” is removing statues of historical figures, who are considered – within just the last few years – so morally reprehensible, that we’re better off removing statues and monuments altogether. The “corrections” they’re trying to make aren’t based on new findings; the Council just simply does not like the statues.
Some figures have done undeniably evil or immoral things. Even in those circumstances, we disagree with removing statues or monuments because it sets a horrible, illogical precedent that easily leaves the door wide open for abuse. Suffice it to say, many people throughout the course of history who were deemed completely morally bankrupt at the time did not receive accolades, so this is less of a problem than some make it out to be. However, we still firmly believe in the problem the precedent sets.
When you remove or “correct” pieces of history, even in light of someone who, even in their day and age, was a “bad person,” you’re now leaving the rest of our standards for maintaining history up to moral interpretation, something that has always been driven by hyper current ethical codes and mores of the time.
In the current age of moral relativism and subjectivism, especially in a Godless society, human emotion and comfort is the main point of magnetism for our collective moral compass. While most people would be considered generally “good” people, our views of right and wrong are, in fact, completely at will of current trends, platitudes, and leaders.
In the days of the early republic, slavery was viewed by some as moral and just. We couldn’t imagine that today. (The slave trade still goes on in certain parts of the world, but don’t tell the NYC Council that).
In the days of Prohibition, consuming alcohol was deemed immoral and something from which no good could be derived. In today’s day and age, turn to your left, now turn to your right, none of you are sober.
Even in the 1970s, women could not apply for a credit card without their husbands’ permission. This was viewed as perfectly acceptable at the time.
And the last few years over which we have started to view figures such as George Washington as completely immoral and evil based on a topic considered acceptable at the time have gone by very quickly. What happens in the next few years? Are we wrong? Are we more right? Do we feel better about ourselves?
Tell us why we should view the current era as the epitome of all moral progress? Are we really that perfect? Is this really it? Should we go home because we’ve stopped progressing and learning?
One New York City resident said he’d rather see a statue that “reflects loving everyone or something like that,” instead of one of Christopher Columbus.
Not only could this philosopher bring it upon himself to list a more impassioned example, other than “something like that,” he fails to see that history is not here to make us comfortable. In fact, if history makes you uncomfortable, that’s usually a good thing, since it means actual change has occurred, hopefully for the better.
This man also seems to think that no one has ever loved anyone else in the history of ever, but we’ll let it slide. After all, the most loving people are the ones who constantly shout about how loving they are. It’s almost like saying “I’m the most innocent person in this prison lineup.” It’s understood why we suspect this person is guilty, correct?
But let’s humor him. Let’s replace the statue of Christopher Columbus with someone “who loves everyone,” and then see if they’re still worthy of a statue in five years, let alone five hundred.
Herein lies the hubris some on the left currently suffer: it is believed that through our progressive society, that we have achieved all that we can and that we are at the utmost peak of moralism our society has ever achieved, as if that exact same concept wasn’t considered by hundreds of other factions, populations, and societies before ours.
The other problem with those on the uber-left is that they think looking at history through the lens of today makes them look and feel like saints. Of course it’s easy to do that. We can look back at those who burned witches and say “good thing we don’t do that today, we’re really good people based on that one archaic example.” How about we address the ways we, presently, come up short each and every day, instead of cherry-picking the low-hanging moral fruit and grandstanding on the graves of people from centuries past? It’s a selfish and narcissistic viewpoint that will not allow us to truly progress as a society.
If we only ask ourselves easy questions, we’ll always look like geniuses.
Here’s the message: history is brutal. It’s an ever-collecting series of human success and failure. It’s not yours to change, or even “correct” in many circumstances. It’s there for us to learn from, to mirror those who are inspiring and to learn from those who made mistakes.
Although, since this is also up to personal interpretation, it seems people like those on the NYC Council don’t believe that we are capable of making those discernments ourselves.
Even their cop-out of putting disclaimer plaques is an insult to our intelligence. Perhaps if we teach kids accurate history, they can identify these figures and understand their shortcomings on their own without a piece of marble covered in urine and marijuana residue to do their thinking for them.
Furthermore, if we remove these statues and monuments, solely for the comfort of today’s battle-ready keyboard warriors and urban soldiers, who’s to say the next generation will endorse or even commit the atrocities of those whose statues we removed today?
You removed the statues, therefore, no one can learn from history.
And those who do not learn their history will be doomed to repeat it.
