4 ms·

Funny enough, I ended up with the opposing view - history doesn't matter, narratives do. During the last year I learned about propaganda, psy ops and myths much

Funny enough, I ended up with the opposing view - history doesn't matter, narratives do. During the last year I learned about propaganda, psy ops and myths much more than I knew before. And at the risk of sounding as an edgy teenager, I can vouch for the phrase "History is written by victors" which stopped being a platitude for me and became a part of my worldview

BeFlatXIII 3y ago
I prefer the existentialist "history is written by those who write history." Often, the victors give themselves a better justification for their conquest than admitting that someone bigger and badder may eventually dethrone them. However, some losers write histories praising their new overlords and their incredible military might, not out to gain favor with the new king but to preserve the dignity of the old king. The defeat was inevitable because of the invader's futuristic military powers aided by the Gods (instead of admitting the old king had no strategy).
- Paul-Craft 3y ago
  In the words of Norm McDonald, "It says here in this history book that luckily, the good guys have won every time. What are the odds?"
  - deanCommie 3y ago
    Funny enough, the very premise of "good guys" existing is proof of the concept we're discussing. Except it's not funny because then it leads to people both-sidesing genocide and actual nazis because the allies also committed war crimes. History is a mess because humanity is a mess. But we like to think that we aren't. Probably as a defense mechanism.
deanCommie 3y ago
You're not wrong but what's the difference between history and narratives? "History" is the study of different narratives to TRY to come to a semblance of truth, but even for recent events this is almost impossible. Pick an example like "Did the US dropping the nuclear bomb on Japan ultimately save lives, or was it unnecessary" and it's impossible to find the truth between 2 conflicting narratives, each fairly justifiable. Another one is, most Soviet Anti-American Propaganda was true.
- postsantum 3y ago
  The real history is often a horrible mess, narratives are built by carefully cherrypicking facts to support a worldview. This is similar to what happens to mass media - they don't need to lie, just present only those facts that support their position
  - UncleMeat 3y ago
    I think you are mistaking historical memory for history here.
UncleMeat 3y ago
Frankly, this is spoken like somebody without a history education. Not only would "narratives matter" be an uncontroversial statement among historians, they'd tell you that all historical writing is narrative construction. And they'd hand you a book on historiography and teach you about the methods that historians use to understand an honestly present narratives in their writing. Note that this does not mean that historical writing is bullshit. A lot of engineers seem to come up against these observations in the humanities and then just assume that nothing can be done and that entire fields must be discarded while the people working in those fields have been living with this stuff for their entire careers.

BeFlatXIII 3y ago

I prefer the existentialist "history is written by those who write history." Often, the victors give themselves a better justification for their conquest than admitting that someone bigger and badder may eventually dethrone them. However, some losers write histories praising their new overlords and their incredible military might, not out to gain favor with the new king but to preserve the dignity of the old king. The defeat was inevitable because of the invader's futuristic military powers aided by the Gods (instead of admitting the old king had no strategy).

Paul-Craft 3y ago
In the words of Norm McDonald, "It says here in this history book that luckily, the good guys have won every time. What are the odds?"
- deanCommie 3y ago
  Funny enough, the very premise of "good guys" existing is proof of the concept we're discussing. Except it's not funny because then it leads to people both-sidesing genocide and actual nazis because the allies also committed war crimes. History is a mess because humanity is a mess. But we like to think that we aren't. Probably as a defense mechanism.

deanCommie 3y ago

You're not wrong but what's the difference between history and narratives? "History" is the study of different narratives to TRY to come to a semblance of truth, but even for recent events this is almost impossible. Pick an example like "Did the US dropping the nuclear bomb on Japan ultimately save lives, or was it unnecessary" and it's impossible to find the truth between 2 conflicting narratives, each fairly justifiable. Another one is, most Soviet Anti-American Propaganda was true.

postsantum 3y ago
The real history is often a horrible mess, narratives are built by carefully cherrypicking facts to support a worldview. This is similar to what happens to mass media - they don't need to lie, just present only those facts that support their position
- UncleMeat 3y ago
  I think you are mistaking historical memory for history here.

UncleMeat 3y ago

Frankly, this is spoken like somebody without a history education. Not only would "narratives matter" be an uncontroversial statement among historians, they'd tell you that all historical writing is narrative construction. And they'd hand you a book on historiography and teach you about the methods that historians use to understand an honestly present narratives in their writing. Note that this does not mean that historical writing is bullshit. A lot of engineers seem to come up against these observations in the humanities and then just assume that nothing can be done and that entire fields must be discarded while the people working in those fields have been living with this stuff for their entire careers.