Pro-Tip: History can't be erased

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Can you present an historical event or series of event where you believe history has been erased as well as your reasonning behind this choice?

One thing that comes to mind is the story of Christopher Columbus. Many history books record him as a brave explorer and completely ignore the fact that he committed genocide.

What did you learn about Columbus when you were in grade school?

Popular understanding of Columbus is a mess. I blame Washington Irving for a lot of it.

I had to find out on my own that Columbus was removed from his governorship arrested, and imprisoned for his cruelty toward the native inhabitants.

I also had no idea that the old narrative about him thinking the world was round and everyone else thinking it was flat was absolute garbage. The sales pitch he shopped around to the royal courts of Europe - i.e. that Japan was a far west of the Canary Islands as Africa was east of them - was absolute bunk, part scam and part bad research by Columbus (including the worst unit conversion error in history before the Mars Climate Orbiter incident).

It was only the existence of a continent nobody in Europe knew about that saved Columbus and his men from dying of thirst and starvation in the middle of the ocean.

 

[esmith]

I assumed your post was in relation to the OP, given that it didn't reference any other particular post. If I was mistaken, I apologise.
My more general thoughts about whether history can be erased are in my post 47

Uh, the title of the post was:
Pro-Tip: History can't be erased

Sometimes we read one post then another and if they somewhat are related to each other then we could very easily think we are responding to one post and not the other.
In this case no harm no foul. I was just confused about what you said.

 

[Tambourine]

If we erect a statue, does that mean we revere the subject? I guess in the past it did. So, when we change our minds, should we tear it down or leave it up as a reminder? Another guess is that it has to do with the maturity of the observers.

You could build statues out of cardboard. That way, a community would have to consciously support it, and it would immediately fall into disrepair if people stopped caring.

 

[tytlyf]

Uh, the title of the post was:
Pro-Tip: History can't be erased

Sometimes we read one post then another and if they somewhat are related to each other then we could very easily think we are responding to one post and not the other.
In this case no harm no foul. I was just confused about what you said.

So you agree that history can't be erased? And removing statues isn't erasing history right?

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Uh, the title of the post was:
Pro-Tip: History can't be erased

Sometimes we read one post then another and if they somewhat are related to each other then we could very easily think we are responding to one post and not the other.
In this case no harm no foul. I was just confused about what you said.

Not to be-labour it, but the title of many threads are written to be 'catchy'.
It's the OP that sets the topic.

Definitely your post I was responding to, I just (mistakenly) believed you were talking about statues.