# Hypothetical future revisionist history **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 15, 2018, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989 "2018-10-15T16:24:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Grey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b782af/32.png) [@Grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grey)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/21 "2018-10-17T12:59:53Z")
Lest we forget, **Urbanredneck** ’s sum total understanding of the world could fill Tiny Tim’s thimble. The idea that people actually understand that western countries were riddled with anti-semitism or that Jewish citizens could be falsely accused like Dreyfus exists outside his experience. How you can equate those actions to a systematic program to kill a specific ethnic group is best left as an exercise for the reader. ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/22 "2018-10-17T18:10:31Z")
> [@Grey](#): > > Lest we forget, **Urbanredneck** ’s sum total understanding of the world could fill Tiny Tim’s thimble. The idea that people actually understand that western countries were riddled with anti-semitism or that Jewish citizens could be falsely accused like Dreyfus exists outside his experience. How you can equate those actions to a systematic program to kill a specific ethnic group is best left as an exercise for the reader. Actually I’m quite a history junkie. Sorry if I look at things different than your PC whitewashed version. Other countries tried to either kill off, breed off, or culturally wipe out their undesirables. Consider how in the US we killed off indians and took away their children to be “re-educated”. They also did this in Australia. Also the British did this to the Scotts and Irish. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/23 "2018-10-17T22:41:15Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > Actually I’m quite a history junkie. Sorry if I look at things different than your PC whitewashed version. > > Other countries tried to either kill off, breed off, or culturally wipe out their undesirables. Consider how in the US we killed off indians and took away their children to be “re-educated”. They also did this in Australia. Also the British did this to the Scotts and Irish. True enough. But what is your ultimate point in bringing that up in this discussion? Trying to fight my own ignorance, dontcha know. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/24 "2018-10-17T23:06:59Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > You mean they say black people were never abused or denied rights because of not being white? 😕 Spend some time in South Carolina or Georgia outside “The Perimeter” and you’ll find all manner of apologists and denialists for slavery and people who belive the Civil War never ended. Rmemeber, Georgia has a monument complete with light show and the largest bas relief/act of vandalism in the world devoted to the leaders of the Confederacy which was opened on the centenary of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, which is also an unofficial holliday in many areas of the South. It is pretty much as if the remaining Nazis opened open a theme park in 1960with Adolf Hitler, Hermann Göring, and Joseph Goebbels blasted into Zugspitze instead of skittering off to South America or being secreted away by the United States to work on rockets and chemical weapon research. > [@Grey](#): > > You continue to be a cautionary tale. You sure have a way of telling a feller that he’s got his head someplace unmentionable and gettin’ him ta’ thank you for it. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/25 "2018-10-17T23:43:16Z")
> [@leahcim](#): > > In 20 years, it will be the same with homophobia. Same sex marriage opponents have already been saying “I don’t understand why they had to shove marriage down our throats. Why couldn’t they have been satisfied with civil unions?” Which has the attitudes completely reversed. Probably only around half, at the most, of same sex marriage opponents would have been satisfied with civil unions, and many if not most of the anti-gay marriage state laws/amendments _also_ barred civil unions. If they were so in favor of civil unions they should have voted against those. On the other hand, there were a handful of people who would not be satisfied with mere civil unions and wanted it to be weal mawwiage. But the majority of same-sex marriage advocates seemed to me to be willing to live with civil unions if that was what was acceptable. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/26 "2018-10-18T00:45:49Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > On the other hand, there were a handful of people who would not be satisfied with mere civil unions and wanted it to be weal mawwiage. But the majority of same-sex marriage advocates seemed to me to be willing to live with civil unions if that was what was acceptable. Civil unions are, in general, only recognized within the state where they are registered. States without civil union provisions didn’t have any legal means to recognize the validity of the cilil unions of other states with respect to property held in common, survivor’s benefits, responsibility for issue or adopted children, et cetera. Marriage on the other hand, is understood to fall under Article IV, Section 1 of the US Constitution (also referred to as the “Full Faith and Credit Clause”) that guarantees that states respect "public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state,” despite protestations to the contrary by a specific contingent, which allows gay people who are married in one state to travel to and lice in other states with their marital rights protected just like everyone else. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/27 "2018-10-18T01:15:16Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > But seriously, what is a holocaust "denier’? :dubious: ETA: Redacted on that last bit, just confuses the first issue I suppose. Which is WTF? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/28 "2018-10-18T04:36:56Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > Same sex marriage opponents have already been saying “I don’t understand why they had to shove marriage down our throats. Why couldn’t they have been satisfied with civil unions?” Which has the attitudes completely reversed. Probably only around half, at the most, of same sex marriage opponents would have been satisfied with civil unions, and many if not most of the anti-gay marriage state laws/amendments _also_ barred civil unions. If they were so in favor of civil unions they should have voted against those. > > On the other hand, there were a handful of people who would not be satisfied with mere civil unions and wanted it to be weal mawwiage. But the majority of same-sex marriage advocates seemed to me to be willing to live with civil unions if that was what was acceptable. It seems pretty ridiculous to me for opponents of same sex marriage to go around arguing that the difference between a civil union and a marriage is a trivial one and nobody should get worked up over it - while at the same time insisting that they would fight to the death to defend the sacred institution of marriage. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/29 "2018-10-18T05:03:29Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > Actually I’m quite a history junkie. Oh, so you have _no_ fucking excuse. Good to know! :mad: ---
**Author:** ![Grey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b782af/32.png) [@Grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grey)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 12:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/30 "2018-10-18T12:41:50Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > You sure have a way of telling a feller that he’s got his head someplace unmentionable and gettin’ him ta’ thank you for it. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Catsie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c0e974/32.png) [@Catsie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Catsie)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/31 "2018-10-18T12:51:47Z")
I just scanned the posts so far, so forgive if this is a repeat, but: I’d think there is now too much in the way of record for successful revisionism in this matter: Books, oral histories, photo collections, legislative history, etc. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/32 "2018-10-18T13:09:15Z")
> [@Catsie](#): > > I just scanned the posts so far, so forgive if this is a repeat, but: > > I’d think there is now too much in the way of record for successful revisionism in this matter: Books, oral histories, photo collections, legislative history, etc. One would think so. But what about moon landing deniers? They claim the whole thing was a hoax participated in by many people. That event was quite documented. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/33 "2018-10-18T13:23:48Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > I was thinking about Holocaust and moon landing deniers and I was wondering if in the future people in the USA will deny that black people were ever made to sit in the back of the bus, barred from living in certain neighborhoods, required to go to separate schools, drink from separate water fountains, etc. > > “No, that never happened. That’s propaganda made up to make white people look bad.” “There were no colored schools, churches, neighborhoods, water fountains. If there were, it’s because black people CHOSE to live, go to school, drink there.” > > There’s documentary evidence of the Holocaust, including people who were there (now mostly very old), books written, aerial photographs, the testimony of the soldiers who liberated the camps–but some say it’s all lies. Same with the moon landing. > > I can see the history of Africans who became African-Americans undergoing similar revision in the future as those people who were adults in the 50s and 60s die off. > > I don’t have much hope for the future of our country. I once read a SF book - now long-forgotten except for this part - set in the far future where one part of the action took place in a ‘Gitler Tower’ which the protagonist knew was named after some past leader in ancient times. He knew nothing else beyond that, however. Always struck me as somehow true, though. Go far enough into the future and you can be sure the biggest horrors of the 20th century will retreat into nothingness and be forgotten. Even if not intentionally, per the deniers, but just by time. ---
**Author:** ![TSBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/77aa72/32.png) [@TSBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TSBG)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/34 "2018-10-18T16:02:39Z")
> [@Jonathan\_Chance](#): > > I once read a SF book - now long-forgotten except for this part - set in the far future where one part of the action took place in a ‘Gitler Tower’ which the protagonist knew was named after some past leader in ancient times. He knew nothing else beyond that, however. > > Always struck me as somehow true, though. Go far enough into the future and you can be sure the biggest horrors of the 20th century will retreat into nothingness and be forgotten. Even if not intentionally, per the deniers, but just by time. True, and yet we can now understand a great deal about some horrors long in the past. Ever listen to Hardcore History by Dan Carlin? He revels slightly too much in bloody battle for my taste, but his shows do a fairly good job of conveying, say, what it was like for a city to be sacked by the Mongols. By his admission he is not a historian, but he draws on a lot of other historians, including ancient ones such as Herodotus (though not for the Mongols, obviously). The events he describes are sometimes pretty sketchily attested, but there is some record of what happened. The problems are–first, how well will digitized archives survive? I’m skeptical about them having a shelf life of thousands of years. And second, it is so trivial to manipulate photos, video, sound these days that even if our digital records do survive it will be incredibly easy to produce a revisionist ‘canon.’ ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/35 "2018-10-18T20:02:48Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > Holocaust deniers fall into a few camps, but most generally when we talk about holocaust deniers, we’re talking about people who deny the existence of the holocaust, its goals, or its scope. They deny that places like Auschwitz were used as extermination camps, deny that there was an intentional genocide of Jews, Romas, and others, or claim that the death toll was not what it was and was normal for wartime. [Here’s a nice overview](https://metro.co.uk/2018/01/30/many-subtle-insidious-forms-holocaust-denial-7272520/). > > Y I K E S I liked that article. How it covers everything from out and out deniers to people who use the word “holocaust” for their cause thus diminishing the effect of the original. ---
**Author:** ![Quintas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/48db29/32.png) [@Quintas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quintas)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/36 "2018-10-18T23:54:26Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > But notice how other “nice” countries like France and Poland happily sent away their Jews and were also happy to get rid of gypsies but you almost never read of that. > > . Yes you do read of that. IF you read… ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2018, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989/37 "2018-10-19T01:20:37Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Personally, I don’t think American history is going to forget about the civil rights movement. Because it has a popular narrative; black people didn’t have their rights and then we fixed the problem. People love a happy ending. > > What people want to forget is that it was a struggle. All of the people who were trying to achieve rights for black Americans were being opposed by other people who were trying to maintain the system that denied black Americans those rights. > > The popular memory of the event is that there was a time when everyone was part of a racist system. Then a few heroic people noticed this and pointed out that racism was wrong. And everyone else said _“Wow, I never realized how bad racism was. Thanks for pointing it out. We’ll all immediately stop doing this. We’re good people who welcome the chance to become even better.”_ > > Everyone wants to identify with the people in the movement. Nobody wants to see themselves as somebody who would have opposed civil rights. And of course there is another aspect of this, which is then wanting to believe that since that happened, it’s all right now and there is no continuing problem of pervasive racism nor of the lingering effects of white supremacism, and thus there is no need to address the problems of people of color other than tell them to stop whining and get their act together. Applies similarly re: women, LGBT, etc. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypothetical-future-revisionist-history/822989.md?page=1)