Ken Burns: ‘I’m embarrassed that, as a country, we don’t grasp our history’

https://www.ft.com/content/666f438a-83b7-440b-818a-a36851d69f58?segmentid=c50c86e4-586b-23ea-1ac1-7601c9c2476f

24 Comments

  1. deliciousKittie on

    Because we have a lot of illiterate people who think Trump is the second coming of Christ

  2. aboysmokingintherain on

    My issue is that even the negative aspects of history don’t need to be seen as some blemish. We can acknowledge and fix them and that will help us move forward as a whole. Admitting the US has mistakes or isn’t perfect isn’t as hard as we think it is.

  3. Fickle-Molasses-903 on

    They understand it; they simply want America to return to a time when slavery was accepted and women were relegated to cooking and childbearing.

  4. In the 1950s women traditionally wore black for a period of mourning time after their husbands died. Erika Kirk wore leather pants and had fireworks.

    MAGA makes up this stuff as they go along.

  5. Adding to the din…

    Grasp our history? Um…Mr. Burns? Most Americans don’t, won’t, or cannot **READ**.

  6. All the American heroes who fought in ww2 against the nazis are rolling in their graves watching their children become the new Nazis.

    Maga are brain dead people, who cant think for themselves. Even Trump has called his own followers stupid and insulted them multiple times yet they continue to follow him.

  7. He’s not wrong. I have relatives that prove it. People in this country are lazy. If they studied history( not Hollywood history) they would see the similarities of 1930’s and current events. Right now History is being white washed and education is being attacked as something bad.

  8. From my point of view US history from the beginning has been a conflict between forward thinkers who believe in things like equal rights, the advancement of science and technology, and treating others with decency versus the ignorant, regressive, greedy, reactionaries who care about white supremacy and morally justifying their terribleness.

  9. SatisfactoryLoaf on

    If you think of history as a narrative, then it has to compete with the narrative you already have about who you are.

  10. From the education system that used to tell us we’ve never lost a war and Vietnam doesn’t count for some reason. What does anyone expect?

  11. Glad-Process-3268 on

    That’s what my high school history teacher told the class as he dimmed the lights to play Ken Burns’ *Civil War* for two weeks.

  12. I_like_baseball90 on

    I mean, when you have a president that thinks there were airports during the Revolutionary war, and then eliminates the Dept of Education, you’re in trouble.

  13. ExistentialistGain on

    “History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.” Orwell 1984

  14. Considering most Americans can’t read past a 6th grade level, I’m surprised they can grasp anything at all.

  15. Andurilthoughts on

    the defunding of education and elevation of STEM over all other fields of study might have something to do with it.

  16. How can we grasp our history when people like Ken Burns produce a civil war documentary full of lost cause bullshit?

  17. His Civil War doc didn’t really help much, tbh. It’s good and comprehensive overall but it still gives too much space for lost cause sympathies which are in many ways tied to the root of the current right wing reactionary movement and an article of faith for many that undercuts any other lessons of the war.