It seems to me that, with the exception of the Great Depression, history books (and history lessons) only focus on War - without mention of our (US) domestic socio-economic issues. Of course, those who win get the honor of writing history, but the crux of my question is:
Will history books claim George W. Bush was a great Pres because he won his war? What about the Hoovervilles he’s creating in his wake? In short, are [Have] we [been] teaching our children that might does make right?
Jinx (there, I dared to ask and upset the SDope masses…)
Errr, my history texts featured a lot of crap other than war. There was slavery, prohibition, some colonial stuff, something about a manned flight to the moon (Ha! Like I would fall for that one!), women’s suffrage, The ‘Teapot Scandal’, Kennedy, etc.
Wars didn’t get much coverage, and when they did, they focused on stuff like the people involved, key dates that you must memorize, stuff like that. There were no good ‘war stories’, in all of my years of schooling. Heck, they even managed to make the Battle of Midway sound like some ho-hum affair.
‘Might makes Right’ is a natural state of affairs; Kids learn it by default. They may un-learn it at some point, but what passes for a history curriculum over here isn’t going to have much of a say in the matter.
War seems to fill in the gaps between the discussion of cultural evolution of nations, true. But remember that war is an incredibly important aspect (inasmuch as there’s been so darned much of it) in many countries’ histories. I’d say that in terms of general history books (i.e. what you’d get in high school or a similarly-styled survey class), probably 75% would be politics and war. Remember what has helped to shaped this country, in particular, is those two things. And more even than that, history is about conflict, which is certainly present in war;)
I do not think it is difficult to arrive at the position that might has made right inasmuch as:
to the victor go the spoils the history books are by and large written by the winners
the winners decide what happens
It is becoming the case more and more that history books are being written by members of formerly subjugated populations (i.e. a black person writing a history of america c. 1800-1900), and in those writings we see less of an implicitly stated “might makes right”. I think we have been not only teaching children but generally upholding in society the belief that might makes right, and to some extent that will probably always be the case. However, as the truth comes out about the victors and how they obtained their spoils (to being up a hypothetical, but in some cases very real, example), that romantic idea that the victor is some sort of valiant, good and just hero is replaced with a more human element. Jefferson and Lincoln, for example, were hailed as being essentially perfect when I was learning history as a child. I do not think it outlandish to say that this is no longer the case.
In summary: yes, I think we have. I do not think this is as much the case, but I do think that some strong element of it will always be the case.