What On Earth Are We Doing Here: Historical Context

Historical Context

History is a pesky thing that dictators and tyrants would rather do away with. A few years ago, I posed an old saying on Facebook that goes something like this:

“Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it.”

In return, an old friend of mine, let's call him PM, commented, “People take history too serious. The purpose of history is to have fun,” and PM, my old friend from high school, was a history teacher. I can only imagine the other “valuable” lessons from history that he taught his young charges...

A good example of the erasure of history in Germany took place once Hitler came to power. In the accompanying photograph, you can see a German Nazi burning books. The problem is, with teachers in our public schools like PM, you know that Society's Children are not getting all the facts regarding dictatorial and tyrannical regimes, like Joseph Stalin's of the mid to late 1930's.

I believe it's important that we add historical context to this blog, and so we'll begin doing that almost right away. --Al Colombo