Lies they told you in history class

Grey_Wolf_Leader

New member
Feb 13, 2011
28
0
0
In response to all of the accusations of "Propaganda":
How exactly is this propaganda? It tells the facts of the founding of America and the American Revolution.

The song and the video make it evidently clear that the Americans treated themselves as subjects to the King of England, and thus were British citizens. That is a real fact.

It also points out that the true reason the colonists rebelled because they were not being taxed fairly. And they got rid of the concept of a king because of it. They didn't have a voice in the British government and they realized it.

The lyrics and imagery of the colonists emphasized the point that they felt robbed with the King's unfair taxes. And the British just blew them off by justifying that they could do it because their own taxes were higher. That's what the king meant when he said, "I don't care". The fact he was taxing people who couldn't object to it legally to him didn't bother him. Need I remind you of how Europeans viewed their American cousins at the time? Pretty much the same way city people view a Hill Billy today.

But the Americans had become independent in spirit just like the show portrays. They had come to understand that they had the right and responsibility to actively participate in government, and they would not just let somebody else (the King) do all of the running of government for them. They would defer to a higher power only when he recognized them as independent agents.

The American Revolution was much more about a clash of cultures than actual taxation.

It was between the European Way, where one was expected to follow the King [or whoever else was in authority] without question, whereas in America, taking care of one's self and actively participating in a democratic, republican government had developed a culture of both respect for authority and yet questioning independent thought over the men in charge.
 

orangeban

New member
Nov 27, 2009
1,442
0
0
mabrookes said:
immortalfrieza said:
Dimitriov said:
immortalfrieza said:
Glass Joe the Champ said:
So guys, what kind of lies, if any, did you learn in your history class?
That history class is important or even slightly relevant to anyone besides historians and people that work in museums. Basically, that history class has any justification for it's existence whatsoever is the lie.

As a fun exercise let's assume you aren't in fact trolling. Please defend your statement.

I ask you to defend it because, as the existence of History classes implies, you seem to be making a claim that goes against what the majority of people believe. You may be right, if so please explain how. Or more likely you were taught History poorly and don't understand the true, and very important, reasons for studying the past: in which case you have my sympathy as that is not entirely your fault.
I'll try to defend it, but it'll be hard to do so without history buffs everywhere coming out of the woodwork to tell me that I'm full of it. I should first clarify that I enjoy learning about history, I watch the history channel all the time and spent much of my youth reading about Dinosaurs, lost civilizations, and so on for my own entertainment. I just see history classes as an incredibly bad waste of time to the vast majority of people.

I'll go more in depth as to why I think history class is pointless:

To start with, how many people do you know or even think is likely to get any sort of job (the entire point of school BTW) that even slightly involves history? How many of them already have? Compared to the entire planet's workforce a pretty miniscule amount I'll bet. Of that small amount, how many of those people do you think learned anything of actual worth to their professions in grade school, most of that comes from college and simple independent research.

A common defense of history class is the phrase "those who do not learn from the mistakes history are doomed to repeat it." However, this phrase fails to take into account that most people, for example, are not going to find themselves in situations to which knowing when the French Revolution happened and why is going to be in any way relevant. That particular case is very unlikely even if you live in France. If they insist on making people go through history classes the very least they could do is teach subjects that are relevant to modern society, not things that are anywhere from decades to millenia old.

History classes are, in my opinion, just another one of the largely useless subjects and classes that are taught in basic school, and that should be phased out in favor of ones that are, and the money saved from doing so be put towards allowing everyone to get a college education without having to pay through the a!^ for it.
You failed at the very beginning which makes the rest of the post somewhat pointless. The point of school is not just to get a job (I can't imagine how bad the world would be if we reach that point), it is to learn life skills in general - from that then we should have equipped the child to be able to study further, go into work or just improve the world in some way by contributing (which does not have to be a job, a concept you obviously do not understand).

As for the subject, history requires more of a mix of writing, comprehension and critical though/analysis skills than any other subject (because of its application, I would suggest more than any English course). Even if the child never remembers any of the history, the skills learnt (assuming they bother to actually try) are extremely valuable, and wouldn't be possible without the unique potential of learning history.
I may as well pop in and say that here in Scotland (note: different from England, that's important) history is less about learning history, it's more about learning analysis skills. 60% of the test are Enquiry Skills e.g. Questions about quotes e.g. Questions that generally require no knowledge of history. The bits that do require a knowledge of history are mainly to test your abilities to organise your knowledge. So it does provide skills, and (for me at least) gives us a fun way to learn these skills.

To the post at hand though: Nah, we actually got a pretty un-biased view. One module was called: Alexander the Great, Hero or Villain? and the school was happy to admit that Britain did cock up the treaty of Versailles a bit, leading to the Second World War.
 

orangeban

New member
Nov 27, 2009
1,442
0
0
Grey_Wolf_Leader said:
In response to all of the accusations of "Propaganda":
How exactly is this propaganda? It tells the facts of the founding of America and the American Revolution.

The song and the video make it evidently clear that the Americans treated themselves as subjects to the King of England, and thus were British citizens. That is a real fact.

It also points out that the true reason the colonists rebelled because they were not being taxed fairly. And they got rid of the concept of a king because of it. They didn't have a voice in the British government and they realized it.

The lyrics and imagery of the colonists emphasized the point that they felt robbed with the King's unfair taxes. And the British just blew them off by justifying that they could do it because their own taxes were higher. That's what the king meant when he said, "I don't care". The fact he was taxing people who couldn't object to it legally to him didn't bother him. Need I remind you of how Europeans viewed their American cousins at the time? Pretty much the same way city people view a Hill Billy today.

But the Americans had become independent in spirit just like the show portrays. They had come to understand that they had the right and responsibility to actively participate in government, and they would not just let somebody else (the King) do all of the running of government for them. They would defer to a higher power only when he recognized them as independent agents.

The American Revolution was much more about a clash of cultures than actual taxation.

It was between the European Way, where one was expected to follow the King [or whoever else was in authority] without question, whereas in America, taking care of one's self and actively participating in a democratic, republican government had developed a culture of both respect for authority and yet questioning independent thought over the men in charge.
Poppy cock, you did not follow the monarch blindly in Britain, we had a Parliament for a long, long time. And the video is clearly anti-Britain, it portrays the monarchy as greedy fat bastards, and Britain as an evil freedom-quashing dictator (only partly true)
 

C. Cain

New member
Oct 3, 2011
267
0
0
Brown_Coat117 said:
C. Cain said:
Brown_Coat117 said:
Well they really didn't explain the why just that it happend. So like I said not a lie per say
And noone questioned it? I mean it's kind of a big deal. Also, technically it is a lie, a lie by omission. oO
Well obviously I questioned because I took that time to know.

The thing about schools is that they have to start teaching from somewhere. Yes I would have liked if they would have mentioned the embargo on Japan. How do you explain the embargo on Japan when you don't explain their own brutal empire building, how they went from detaining German prisoners in WW1 to Nazi allies pre-WW2 and on and on, and how do you cram all that information into a limited time with many student who learn differently and at a different pace. I don't view it as a lie omission because because not covering the embargo didn't really change any of the fact that they taught about the attack or the result (US entering WW2.)
Yes, you questioned it. It's just that people in my class (me included) usually asked why these kind of attacks happened to begin with. At least those who cared. Just name dropping the Embargo might have been sufficient?

Anyway I can see your point.
 

Ironic Pirate

New member
May 21, 2009
5,544
0
0
Glass Joe the Champ said:
Hey guys, I'm taking a US History Class right in high school and recently our teacher showed us this video from School House Rock (a series of educational videos for kids).

t[/youtube]

We then had to write an essay on why this video is stupidly inaccurate. (For example, I talked about how Euro-American relations were a lot more complicated than "America is awesome and England is full of dicks")

This is hardly the first time in class we've had to unlearn what is essentially propaganda we were taught as kids. It got me wondering if other schools/states/countries have the same kind of biases in the classroom.

So guys, what kind of lies, if any, did you learn in your history class?
A children's cartoon in the form of a song contained inaccuracies and over-simplifications? It's almost as if it's target demographic is known for not handling nuances very well.

I think lies is a bit strong. History is complicated, little kids are dumb. Teachers paint a picture with broad strokes, and much of the purpose of later education is to expand their existing knowledge.
 

C2Ultima

Future sovereign of Oz
Nov 6, 2010
506
0
0
That Pearl Harbor was a completely out of no-where attack by the Japanese for no reason whatsoever.

The U.S Government actually provoked Japan into it because we wanted to join the war to help Great Britain.
 

thevillageidiot13

New member
Sep 9, 2009
295
0
0
Brown_Coat117 said:
C. Cain said:
Brown_Coat117 said:
Well they really didn't explain the why just that it happend. So like I said not a lie per say
And noone questioned it? I mean it's kind of a big deal. Also, technically it is a lie, a lie by omission. oO
Well obviously I questioned because I took that time to know.

The thing about schools is that they have to start teaching from somewhere. Yes I would have liked if they would have mentioned the embargo on Japan. How do you explain the embargo on Japan when you don't explain their own brutal empire building, how they went from detaining German prisoners in WW1 to Nazi allies pre-WW2 and on and on, and how do you cram all that information into a limited time with many student who learn differently and at a different pace. I don't view it as a lie omission because because not covering the embargo didn't really change any of the fact that they taught about the attack or the result (US entering WW2.)
Well, it's a huge deal. From the moment it happened, the Americans treated it as an unprovoked act of aggression. People learned to *hate* the Japanese, because propagandists essentially left out the "embargo" stuff and focused more on the "Japanese attacked U.S. Naval Base," and the clear image the American people were left with was a barbaric, uncivilized, evil Japan that attacked bystander nations for no reason.

That's why the mass imprisonment (with no trial of any sort, I might add) of 120,000 Japanese-Americans (approximately half of them children) for a good 4 - 5 years went over so smoothly: because the American people were taught that the attack was unjustified, and, in turn, learned to hate Japanese and Japanese-American individuals with a passion.

I would argue that, by leaving out the fact that Americans (in a way) provoked the attack, the history fails to do the Japanese side of the story any form of justice. You could argue that the Japanese attack was a disproportionate retribution to a comparatively minor decision, compromising and satisfy both sides in a way. But omitting the embargo from your taught history isn't going to win you any points for being unbiased.

Also, people really, really tend to forget that it was a military base, not a civilian population. If you sign up for the Navy and don't acknowledge at least a SLIGHT possibility of getting killed during your time in the armed forces, then... I don't know what to tell you. The U.S. Navy isn't your private cruise liner with a complementary buffet. It's a war machine. They train you to fight and die for your country's government. You're no longer a civilian -- you're now fair game for other armies and navies from around the World.

The Japanese government didn't drop an atom bomb on a civilian city. They attacked a military base, and it's not the fault of the Japanese that the American Navy was so unprepared defensively, despite getting some intelligence reports that Pearl Harbor was a possible target. Was it tragic? Yes. But, frankly, the Americans were in a position to be better-prepared, and they weren't, and their navy paid the price for it.

Then again, many historians understand that history is little more than a long chain-reaction of grievous offenses and attempted retributions, and which side you're biased towards depends on where you start telling the history, as you said.
 

Treblaine

New member
Jul 25, 2008
8,682
0
0
C. Cain said:
Treblaine said:
(...)

The importance of artillery is so underplayed in the Curriculum, it only ever covers briefly how expensive, and dangerous they were yet at such shortage, it makes them seem like a red-herring. In fact it was the move to large-calibre, fast firing gun with high-explosive warheads that were finally able to break the trench system as high explosives (unlike the ealier black-powder warheads) really could blast barbed wire and anti-tank defences to pieces so that tanks and people could go right over them.

(...)

it was also important that the solders advance across a broad front. What happened earlier in the war was supposedly "logical" they would focus on cutting one hole in the barbed wire, but then as an entire platoon tried to get through this one bottleneck the machine guns would cut them to pieces in this one gap. To defeat the trench defences you must deploy overwhelming force across a broad front in perfectly combined forces.

(...)

But advancing over a wide front, with the ENTIRE barbed-wire defences destroyed then the machine guns then had to sweep too wide an area, and they were being shot at from too many different angles.

(...)
I always thought shrapnel was used to cut wire barriers, not HE. Oh well, live and learn.
Ah, the classic "sharapnel" shell was quite a rube-goldberg device. (PS: the term "shrapnel" is now applied to all objects thrown out from an explosion, in actuality it was a very particular type of shell)

It was a cylinder packed with lead/iron balls with a one end a wedge and black powder, basically the cartridge was supposed to detonate over head, the black powder ram the wedge into the cluster of balls and launch them out. This was avery effective weapons as to spite the balls travelling at rather low velocity heading straight down they were most likely to hit the top of the head where a fractured skull was EXTREMELY lethal back then. Hence the move to steel helmets, because they could treat shallow wounds to the torso and legs fairly well. But the brain, very slim chances.

So, high mass of relatively low velocity "pellets" and low-pressure explosion.

Anyway, these black-powder propelled sharapnel cases are utterly useless against barbed wire, they just shook them around a bit, they were little more effective than tossing fireworks at them. The problem is black powder as an explosive lacks "Brisance". That's a French term which when referring to explosives means "ability to shatter and tear" which is independent of the SIZE of the warhead, it depends on the chemical composition of the explosive, it basically means how high is the overpressure.



Steel barbed wire is TOUGH, you need to have a warhead of HIGH EXPLOSIVES like TNT or Dynamite to really rip the wire to shreds this was expensive and dangerous to manufacture. This lead to shortages in them middle of the war.

But this is where the UK Curriculum again tried to pull the wool over the eyes of an entire generation.

They would cherry pick circumstances from two different stages of the war and make no distinction between high-explosive warheads and black-powder "low explosive" warheads. They would first say:
-artillery was useless against barbed wire (early in the war, with low-explosive warheads) and against trench defences in general
-artillery was in short supply and dangerous to manufacture (middle of the war)

Leaving the impression that artillery was a futile waste of time, the idea is planed that it is a toy for out-of-touch generals (always depicted as miles behind the front line) and even the impression that they loved their (phallic) big guns more than they appreciated the lives of their soldiers.

One thing they hide completely is how trench warfare was ACTUALLY FINALLY BROKEN with concentrated use of artillery using high-explosive warheads, they literally would chew any fixed defences to pieces, trenches would be literally buried under the onslaught. But the Curriculum COMPLETELY COVERS THIS UP!!! It completely fails to demonstrate how by 1918 the Germans HAD broken out bt had been forced to fall back and an imminent counter attack by the Allies was inevitable. That is why the war ended.

I remember asking my History teacher why World War 2 was not fought like the First World War - considering by the end of WWI all the technology was there at the beginning of WWII. He was at a complete loss and stuttered out some bollocks about blitzkrieg, but the truth is the END of the First World War was fought very much like the START of the 2nd World War!

In WWII there were various attempts to create deep trench defences but they were all wreaked by concentrated and coordinated artillery and to a lesser extend air-strikes. Artillery is seen as such a first-world-war technology, the impression is left that it was obsolete even then, the truth is that it was pivotal with a few small and subtle advancements. But you can only appreciate these differences by actually getting STUCK INTO artillery technology. But the uk curriculum seemed to have a phobia of looking at detail military weapons or tactics which I think it totally futile: to cover the history of war while insisting on ignorance of pivotal tactics. Pah. Either teach it all or don't.

The problem being to a layman who refuses to look at the nitty-gritty of weapons technology, then it artillery was useless in the beginning then they will assume it will be useless later in the war.
 

Treblaine

New member
Jul 25, 2008
8,682
0
0
C. Cain said:
Treblaine said:
C. Cain said:
flatten_the_skyline said:
The told us that Napoleon kicked pretty much ass in the beginning. He was FRENCH, dude! ;-)
He was Corsican. That barely qualifies as French ;)
And Hitler was Austrian (yet led Germany in WWII).

Stalin was from Georgia (yet led mostly Russian people in WWII).

There are so many examples from history of leaders leading people from a completely different place from where they were born and grew up. The point is people can feel they belong to countries for many and various reasons and factors, surely being made emperor of France makes Napoleon a French Citizen?

Surely Arnold Schwarzenegger is an American after making so many American Action movies (even though he still has that outrageous Austrian accent).
I was jesting, my friend. As I said, nationality is tricky. Also: I already addressed the whole German/Austrian thing a few posts back.
What I do is if I am corrected on an (obvious) point is I edit the original post to the reply just so I don't get a load of people correcting me on the same point.
 

C. Cain

New member
Oct 3, 2011
267
0
0
Treblaine said:
C. Cain said:
Treblaine said:
C. Cain said:
flatten_the_skyline said:
The told us that Napoleon kicked pretty much ass in the beginning. He was FRENCH, dude! ;-)
He was Corsican. That barely qualifies as French ;)
And Hitler was Austrian (yet led Germany in WWII).

Stalin was from Georgia (yet led mostly Russian people in WWII).

There are so many examples from history of leaders leading people from a completely different place from where they were born and grew up. The point is people can feel they belong to countries for many and various reasons and factors, surely being made emperor of France makes Napoleon a French Citizen?

Surely Arnold Schwarzenegger is an American after making so many American Action movies (even though he still has that outrageous Austrian accent).
I was jesting, my friend. As I said, nationality is tricky. Also: I already addressed the whole German/Austrian thing a few posts back.
What I do is if I am corrected on an (obvious) point is I edit the original post to the reply just so I don't get a load of people correcting me on the same point.
If people wish to correct me on a side remark that was meant as a joke, then they can go right ahead. I'm not going to edit my joke because people don't bother to read the thread or figure out that I wasn't serious to begin with.
 

MrJKapowey

New member
Oct 31, 2010
1,669
0
0
Actually, we're very good that here in my Grammar school (England). Our History teacher even took 20 mins from our GCSE Coursework (officially sanctioned) source analysis lesson (1/10) to explain what Traditionalist/Revisionist historians are, and why he is Revisionist with regard to the subject. (WW1, and why it was not a joke (e.g. Haig wasn't an idiot))
 

Brown_Coat117

New member
Oct 22, 2010
112
0
0
[quote="thevillageidiot13" post="18.316033.12847907
Then again, many historians understand that history is little more than a long chain-reaction of grievous offenses and attempted retributions, and which side you're biased towards depends on where you start the history, as you said.[/quote]

Very true. Once again using the embargo as an example you could say that the embargo provoked the attack, while the embargo itself was the result of Japanese aggression in China which included an attack on a US warship and embassy, and millitary operations that resulted in the murder and rape of many Chinese and even British civilians.
 

got_ginger

New member
Jun 27, 2011
7
0
0
i know there are a lot, but in england they are now being undone by two tv shows; horrible histories(based on the well made childrens books) so good even me as a adult find them educational and funny. the second is occasionally QI, which as the name (short for quite interesting) emplies, deals with undoing common educational understandings and educating the truth in a comicial manor(and it has stephen fry, therefore awesome). check them out
 

Treblaine

New member
Jul 25, 2008
8,682
0
0
thevillageidiot13 said:
Brown_Coat117 said:
C. Cain said:
Brown_Coat117 said:
Well they really didn't explain the why just that it happend. So like I said not a lie per say
And noone questioned it? I mean it's kind of a big deal. Also, technically it is a lie, a lie by omission. oO
Well obviously I questioned because I took that time to know.

The thing about schools is that they have to start teaching from somewhere. Yes I would have liked if they would have mentioned the embargo on Japan. How do you explain the embargo on Japan when you don't explain their own brutal empire building, how they went from detaining German prisoners in WW1 to Nazi allies pre-WW2 and on and on, and how do you cram all that information into a limited time with many student who learn differently and at a different pace. I don't view it as a lie omission because because not covering the embargo didn't really change any of the fact that they taught about the attack or the result (US entering WW2.)
Well, it's a huge deal. From the moment it happened, the Americans treated it as an unprovoked act of aggression. People learned to *hate* the Japanese, because propagandists essentially left out the "embargo" stuff and focused more on the "Japanese attacked U.S. Naval Base," and the clear image the American people were left with was a barbaric, uncivilized, evil Japan that attacked bystander nations for no reason.

That's why the mass imprisonment (with no trial of any sort, I might add) of 120,000 Japanese-Americans (approximately half of them children) for a good 4 - 5 years went over so smoothly: because the American people were taught that the attack was unjustified, and, in turn, learned to hate Japanese and Japanese-American individuals with a passion.

I would argue that, by leaving out the fact that Americans (in a way) provoked the attack, the history fails to do the Japanese side of the story any form of justice. You could argue that the Japanese attack was a disproportionate retribution to a comparatively minor decision, compromising and satisfy both sides in a way. But omitting the embargo from your taught history isn't going to win you any points for being unbiased.

Also, people really, really tend to forget that it was a military base, not a civilian population. If you sign up for the Navy and don't acknowledge at least a SLIGHT possibility of getting killed during your time in the armed forces, then... I don't know what to tell you. The U.S. Navy isn't your private cruise liner with a complementary buffet. It's a war machine. They train you to fight and die for your country's government.

Then again, many historians understand that history is little more than a long chain-reaction of grievous offenses and attempted retributions, and which side you're biased towards depends on where you start the history, as you said.
On the other hand, put yourself in the shoes of John Q. Public circa 1941.

Do they think they cover such boring details as trade embargo and Japan's overseas interests? No, it's a trivial matter to them - or at least they think it is trivial - so when the news comes to them: "American Naval base attacked, Three Thousand Americans dead" you understandably flip your ever loving shit.

So when FDR makes his speech to congress (and in effect, all of America) he doesn't mention the embargo even in a trivialising way. Who knows, maybe FDR had good reason for doing this. He did not want to give his new enemy the privilege of any kind of righteous attack and didn't want to leave the impression that attacking naval bases would be a good way for dealing with embargos for two reasons:
(1) it might make future efforts at getting embargos too politically frought as they'd say "this will bring another pearl harbor on us!"
(2) he didn't want to leave America's enemies the impression that such an attack would even be interpereted as such. If Japan was trying to manipulate America to remove the embargo by a sneak attack

Shortly after Pearl Harbor, US forces were overrun in the Philippines and those who were taken alive were monstrously mistreated. Only a handful survived in a pathetic shape from years of abuse, the Japanese Army REALLY WERE monstrous to their captives. The worst cases of human experimentation were committed by the Japanese Chemical Weapons division on captured POWs and any foreign civilians they could grab.

I couldn't even read about all that happened with Unit 731

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731

It gave me nightmares and I'm not the sort to get nightmares over nothing, I'm the sort who like horror movies. But this. Uuuuhhh.

Japanese internment is a tricky issue, and Americans even in the immediate post-war era certainly feel very guilty for it, however it was known to the government that Japan did have a very effective spying network on the West Coast of the United States while German Espionage in America was almost non-existent. It was a secret as they had broken's Japan's cypher for spy communication, but they couldn't just announce this discovery or they would just change the cypher and the advantage would be lost.

Then there is the contrast between the war in europe. There, America was clearly able to say that they were fighting against Nazism, Hitler's Germany. Many German citizens had fled from (or been forced out of) Germany with the new regime, and it was a new and scary regime not like Germany before. But how could the Americans say "no, we're not fighting all of Japan, just, err, the part that... no"

The thing was Japan was united in its war with America, it was not some new crazy regime, it's the same establishment as since generations ago. The issue was of loyalty, if a relative turns up from Japan would you report them to the police? The German Spy ring was broken by visiting German relatives and being reported, the FBI were worried the same was not happening here.
 

chaosyoshimage

New member
Apr 1, 2011
1,440
0
0
Chased said:
I heard that Nikola Tesla wanted to desperately work with Edison so Edison agreed and made Tesla do all of his gardening work. At least Tesla had David Bowie play him in The Prestige, beat that Edison!
Another reason I need to see The Prestige...

tthor said:
this. I'm not so sure i would say he stole from Tesla, but Tesla was sure by FAR much more intelligent and and a better inventor than Edison could ever dream of. Tesla was genius and revolutionary, so much so that many people wrote of his ideas as being crazy. I mean, damn, he powered a field of 100 lightbulbs from 27 miles away with wireless electricity, and even made working designs for a charged particle beam weapon. Many of his ideas we are only just now beginning to realize. I am AMAZED that we don't fucking talk about this genius ever!
Tesla: The original mad scientist. Yeah, he was way ahead of his time.
 

Sean951

New member
Mar 30, 2011
650
0
0
Tiger Sora said:
rayen020 said:
Completely skips the war of 1812. America tried to invade Canada, were pushed back by an army much smaller. And we burned the White House. I can see why they wouldn't want to teach that since they need to tell every child America is #1 and never loses. But the past is taught so mistakes arn't made again.
Let's be fair, it was a very silly war. The Orders of Counsel had been repealed, and neither side was willing to do anything because the U.S. declared war at roughly the same time and they didn't know how the other was reacting. The U.S. military that was beaten in Washington wasn't exactly a trained force, they were a militia that was lucky to be able to march in a line. The actual Army and Navy became rather impressive by the wars end.

C2Ultima said:
That Pearl Harbor was a completely out of no-where attack by the Japanese for no reason whatsoever.

The U.S Government actually provoked Japan into it because we wanted to join the war to help Great Britain.
I don't think FDR was really trying to get Japan to attack the U.S. He was actually against [http://www.theamericancause.org/patwhydidjapan.htm] the oil embargo (not the greatest source, but I found others saying it too). Yes, FDR wanted to join the war, but not at the expense of being attacked so directly, and certainly not so cripplingly.
 

Creator002

New member
Aug 30, 2010
1,590
0
0
In highschool, I learned Hitler was German and that Einstein was Swiss (despite the books saying otherwise). Hitler is also representative of the views and opinions all Germans hold today (according to the teacher, not to books).
Thank you, year 8 history (and science for Einstein). I learned a lot.
 

dickywebster

New member
Jul 11, 2011
497
0
0
Ironically i later found out the american revolution started more cause of america been dicks than the british.
Oh and the american civil war wasnt about slavery.

But i dont remember direct lies as such from school, just simplifications and glossing over, cause teaching a kid about the kinda stuff thats happened in the past will probably really really screw that kid up.
 

Hipsy_Gypsy

New member
Jun 2, 2011
329
0
0
That "A.D." = "After Death". Oh no, it most certainly does not! This was taught in Primary School, mind you, and we only learnt that it was, indeed, "Anno Domini" in first form in High School.


x