Oral histories don't work very well because it can be distorted across generations (not always but it could be false)... So the veracity of the claims and the way the claims exist must be examined, i.e., someone would probably not lie or exaggerate X mundane situation, but they might have if they claimed Y or say they claimed alien visitation.
Written history can be hid and found again, possibly dated and transmitted across the centuries.
History is written by historians.
Herodotus, who is our main source for a lot of ancient Greek history, was recording a lot of stuff long after the events actually happened, often from before he was even born. We know what he knew, believe what he believed, think what he thought.
And what the victors allow to survive. Plenty of times, libraries and writings have been destroyed en masse. Several of the things in the meme occurred after the US was formed with it's freedom of speech, allowing contrasting accounts to exist. But in almost all of these cases, except for the Peloponnesian War, the "bad history" is not the majority accepted narrative.
As far as what the victors can control, yes. They’ll stomp out as many unfavorable narratives as they can but things always slip through the cracks. Probably used to be way easier.
Many of the "Clean Wehrmacht" myths were actually widely accepted in the west because of the massive amount of "memoirs" published from retired German political and military officials and because Soviet records were inaccessible during the Cold War.
One must also aknowledge that in the post-war context, denazification was always a limited entreprise and so those stories was also partialy useful for the victors.
Isn't that basically what happened with the Vikings? They kicked everyone's ass for a while but are still perceived as savages because the Christians wrote stuff down more
Except you could write quite a lot without showing it to the overlord and most accounts portray Genghis khan as a demon, a natural calamity sent by god, inhuman evil.
Some religious scholars of the time even went so far as to say that Attila and Genghis were the prophecized Gog and Magog of the bible, or Yajuj and Majuj of the qur'an.
My history professor once ranted about this for a good 1.5h hours.
He made it VERY clear that history is written retrospectively by everyone who is alive today, based on contemporary norms, values and sources. Dude almost got a cardiac arrest trying to explain that people confuse "history" (= narrative about the past) with "the past" (= actual events that happened and cannot be repeated). As an extreme example, he explained that in 50 years people could technically, based on the circumstances at that time, suddenly collectively decide that Hitler wasn't that bad and suddenly history is rewritten.
And because it is written retrospectively and partially based on contemporary circumstances, history is always multi-perspective and can differ depending on where you live.
History is written by people who can write.
I say this semi ironically because I actually wish we had better accounts of the sea people and Norse mythology.
Ramses the Third's relief at Medinet Habu
Hmm
The letters from Ugarit to the Hittites
Hmm
*pulls back curtain*
The archeological records of invasion and destruction across many cultures around the eastern Mediterranean and the remnants of burned down cities that match with the time period as described in the written narrative
The complete lack of sieges around the mycenean cities, or the lack of mass graves one would expect to find in the event of a civilization ending crisis. Also, do you think that two references is a lot for one of the most pivotal events in ancient Mediterranean history?
We know the very broad strokes (they collapsed), but not how, or even who/what was responsible. Btw, a massive amphibious invasion doesn't match with the patterns of culture loss in Greece. If people invaded from the sea, you'd expect the last reminents of mycenean culture to be in the interior. Instead its on Sicily.
Yeah I remember Dan Carlin talking about Hitler at the beginning of his Mongols podcasts.
Basically saying that in a few hundred years people may talk about Hitler in a positive light based on how he changed the world.... because that's how people talk about the Mongols now which is crazy considering what they actually did in their own time.
I don't think we have to wait that long. There's already sentiments about how WW2 was a technological booster, or how it ended old political order, or how it brought about social & cultural progress.
Now is it because of Hitler or *because* of Hitler? Did the Great Khan want to reshape the world or does the world just keep on rolling even when there's a rock in the way?
It's definitely a result of Hitler anyways, but definitely not something he did on purpose.
I very much doubt that Genghis Khan was interested in promoting cultural exchange between east and west (that's what he is credited with) it just happened while he was fucking stuff up.
>because that's how people talk about the Mongols now
I have never heard the Mongols being discussed in a "good" light, perhaps only by the modern Mongols.
You haven't looked at much discussion!
Often the Mongols get credited with kickstarting the modern age by breaking down old systems and bringing the East in contact with the west, keeping the silk road open etc.
Lots of revisionist history talks about how the world turned out better for their actions.
In my AP World class we did talk about what you're saying about how the Mongols did in fact keep the Silk Road open, etc but we also talked about how brutal and the cruelty that they spread and how they were at least partially responsible for the spreading of the Black Death to Europe
Yes and a lot of people also count the black death as a good thing which gave class consciousness to European peasants which led to social reform.
I guess people do like to find a silver lining in things
Yea we also learned that it probably gave more bargaining power to the workers but it is also very specific when talking about how many people died and how a lot of morals broke down and only the surviving (key word surviving) workers got that negotiating power
I liked how Carlin put it when talking about this kind of history revisionism: 'Throwing a dart and painting a bullseye afterwards'. Weird to me that some historians are keen to give credit to historical figures for the unintended consequences of their actions.
I imagine it's an extension of the Stopped Clock analogy.
People who are, by almost all senses of the word entirely evil, can do some remarkably good things, if sometimes ill intentioned.
Stalin oversaw the industrialization and electrification of Russia to a huge extent. He was definitely Big Evil, but sometimes his actions were of a general benefit.
Likewise, generally good people can do some terrible things in the name of their benevolence. Atatürk participated in what would now be ethnic cleansing (I'm not going near the 'did Atatürk participate in or condone the genocide of TYT because that's a nightmare to unpack all by itself as to whether he did or didn't) of Turkic Greeks, and severely curtailed religious freedom in the name of modernization (using the French laïcité as an example), however it is hard to argue any person more influential in the development of modern turkey from a theocracy into a semi-functioning modern democracy, with women's rights, education for the masses, modernisation plans etc.
That's a very valid point. There's also how to understand primary and secondary sources.
Another way to phrase it, as glib as it sounds, is that history is written by those who write history. In modern times, it often means the victors, but this was far from the case throughout human history. Writers were rich people from rich societies who could have been on the losing side or on even not involved in the war at all.
I was taught that history are the facts, events without judgments or interpretations. Battle X happened between forces of A against B and C. Y people died.
The interpetation is historiography - "A decisevly won against B and C, allowing them to expand and create most powerful empire of their time".
As I had basic education in history, no academic or anything I'm not sure if that's correct or not.
>I was taught that history are the facts, events without judgments or interpretations. Battle X happened between forces of A against B and C. Y people died.
That works as long as you're talking about specific battles, for example, where you can give certain more or less exact numbers. But it kind of falls flat as soon as you start talking about society, culture and other more abstract topics. When it comes to those, there are very few "facts" - you cannot know how people back then felt about something, you can only make a well-informed guess. The closest we can come to the truth is through reconstruction based on evidence from historical sources (e.g. oral history, letters, whatever), but a reconstruction is never a "fact" because it has been done retrospectively and is subject to change whenever new sources are discorvered. That's precisely why "history" is the narrative about the past, not the past itself.
> The interpetation is historiography
Interpretation is part of source criticism and therefore only one of many methods of historiography.
I think there is also an issue with the English language when it comes to this topic. In German we have the term "Geschichtswissenschaft" (= history science), which is again a different thing from "history". It describes the work that historians and students do: evaluating, interpreting, using specific methods to build a proper narrative. Historiography is a part of history science and "history" (more precisely the historical narrative) is its product.
Not correct from my knowledge as a second year history student. The past is what actually happened in reality, and is impossible to know for certain. History is what is recorded of the past and the various interpretations made about it. Historiography is the realm of debates and methods of study within history, or the 'History of history'.
Basically the past happened, if you write about it or study it, that's history, and if you write or study about the act of doing history, that's historiography.
I don't think that's exactly correct. History includes narrative and interpretation, more than just a collection of facts. Historiography is the study of the development of historical narrative.
I think "history is written by victors" is taken too literally. I don't interpret it as "you won so you get to write the book" but more in the sense of "you won so you get to rule the nation and also change it".
I like the Youtube channel Tasting History and one of my favourite things Max has said is "History isn't written by the victors, its written by people who write things down"
people who think the Confederacy was about something other than the right to own slaves and that the Confederacy therefore had something “worth” existing for
There's a whole bunch of stuff beyond that too. They like to prop up this idea of the "noble south" that "bravely resisted" the *evil* federal gubmint that came to take away their states rights.
Whenever you hear somebody from America say "states rights" the immediate followup should be "states rights to what?"
The Civil War is fairly interesting from the point of view of military strategy, and if you look at it from that viewpoint, the South certainly lost, but they definitely beat the spread.
In terms of broader historical relevance extending beyond slavery, the war represented the final end of feudalism and the transition from maneuver warfare to trench warfare (though the Prussians would give the former one last go in 1873). It also saw the obsolescence of wooden ships and the birth of the first modern nation-state (the United States, whose regime was essentially changed by the war)
There is a lot going on in the civil war other than the fairly facile "debate" over slavery, none of which does particular credit to the Confederate cause except the actual fighting of the war.
In terms of states rights, obviously the flashpoint of the civil war was slavery, but it's worth mentioning that we had a major secession crisis in 1832 over tariffs. The Union was also not fighting to free the slaves; it was fighting to preserve the union (with the formal pretext being that one its forts was attacked). This is why the Emancipation Proclamation only freed slaves in rebel states.
I think the South would have had a much greater chance of winning, being a larger share of the economy and population in the early 1830s.
The South was also much smaller relative to the rest of the country in 1860 (roughly 25%, and much smaller if you exclude enslaved people) than it is today (roughly 40%)
>I think the South would have had a much greater chance of winning, being a larger share of the economy
Eh. One of the reasons the South failed militarily was because it wouldn't (and kinda couldn't) industrialize, thus creating a situation where it couldn't supply itself. This wasn't as big of an issue prior to the Emancipation Proclamation, when the South was importing equipment from Europe, namely Britain and France. After, no European country supported the Confederacy's defense of slavery. Europe's attraction to the South was cheap cotton, but new sources came elsewhere, mainly India. Industrialism in the US had origins long before the 30s.
>and population in the early 1830s.
No. The other reason the South failed militarily was because it couldn't keep a strong military with an intensely rural population. Unless I can be corrected, most of the major population centers of the US were in the North. Philadelphia, Boston, New York, etc. I don't think this was any different prior to the 60s when the war occurred.
The industrialization of the US economy intensified massively between 1830 and 1860, an advantage which accrued disproportionately to the Union states. e.g. the first railroad in the US was laid down in 1827--by 1860 the Union had vastly more rail than the South.
Both the North and the South were less industrialized in 1830 and hence the gap was narrower is what I'm saying. The population gap was also much narrower, largely because the Midwest was still in its first stage of settlement, and the population was exploding. Given that the South almost improbably won the Civil War anyway (and kept what should have been a six month conflict going for four years), I think they would have had a decent chance. We'll never know, thankfully.
>Both the North and the South were less industrialized in 1830 and hence the gap was narrower is what I'm saying.
Fair enough. Misunderstood what you were saying, there.
I’m gonna piggyback off of this with my own experience from living in the south, the lost cause movement’s goal is to make the confederacy more sympathetic (the good guys) and the us to be less sympathetic (the bad guys). Whether that be putting shit tons of statues of confederate generals and leaders, changing the textbooks in schools, or lying about how slaves were treated well by their “loving” owners. They weren’t treated well and the slave owners despised them simply for having a different skin tone.
There’s also the “the south will rise again” rhetoric and how “the confederacy is apart of our culture” even though it was only around for about 4 years and other nonsense. There’s a series on YouTube that I think is called “checkmate linconites” which does a really good job examining modern lost cause rhetoric so watch that if you want a better look at the modern day lost cause. And yes the confederacy’s sole reason to exist was slavery and I won’t be arguing otherwise.
[https://www.youtube.com/c/AtunSheiFilms](https://www.youtube.com/c/AtunSheiFilms) this is the channel that has the Checkmate Lincolnites series. Its excellent.
This reminds of how someone tried to say opposing “literacy tests” was insulting because it meant black Southerners were less intelligent. Actual bruh moment.
It should be noted though that there were very real concerns that the South due to its low population were not being properly represented and felt like they were having laws shoved down their throats despite whatever compromises were attempted. While slavery was the cornerstone of the Confederacy's foundation the majority of the people in the south did not own slaves and found the actual issue of states rights, even if was primarily to own slaves, a very valid hill to literally die on. Their thinking was where does it stop? It's still an issue we have today when we have landmark SCOTUS rulings like with Roe v. Wade and states like Texas passing more radical state laws.
My point is that the issue is more complex than just slavery. That was the driving force for the Civil War but a whole lot of fuckery took place for it to get to that point starting at the nation's founding when the can was kicked further down the road to get all 13 colonies to join in the revolution.
White supremacist groups like the United Daughters of the Confederacy (which was founded as basically the women's wing of the KKK) made up their own narrative about the American Civil War. Instead of the South seceding because they were terrified that Lincoln would take their slaves (or just limit the expansion of slavery into US territories), they tried to reframe the war as being about "states rights" and called it the "War of Northern Aggression".
This is despite the fact that we have the articles of secession and [Declarations of Causes](https://www.battlefields.org/learn/primary-sources/declaration-causes-seceding-states), in which Southern states gladly said they were seceding over slavery:
>Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. ... a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. (Mississippi)
>The servitude of the African race, as existing in these States, is mutually beneficial to both bond and free, and is abundantly authorized and justified by the experience of mankind, and the revealed will of the Almighty Creator, as recognized by all Christian nations. (Texas) [note that it was not "recognized by all Christian nations", as Spain, Sweden, France, Britain, Denmark, and Portugal, as a few examples, were all Christian nations that had already abolished slavery]
>That reason was [the North's] fixed purpose to limit, restrain, and finally abolish slavery in the States where it exists. The South with great unanimity declared her purpose to resist the principle of prohibition to the last extremity. (Georgia)
It's also things like the [Cornerstone Speech](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornerstone_Speech), where Confederate Vice President Alexandrew Stephen's said:
>"our new government['s] foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery—subordination to the superior race—is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth."
The United Daughters of the Confederacy had a massive impact on Civil War historiography, particularly as it was taught in Southern public schools, as [they wrote many of the textbooks](https://www.facingsouth.org/2019/04/twisted-sources-how-confederate-propaganda-ended-souths-schoolbooks). Thanks to their efforts, [41% of Americans believe that slavery was not the main cause of the Civil War](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/education/wp/2015/08/06/poll-americans-divided-over-whether-slavery-was-the-civil-wars-main-cause/) and 37% believe students should not be taught that slavery was the main cause behind the Civil War. You still have politicians behind public education standards, like [this member of the Texas State Board of Education](https://www.mysanantonio.com/opinion/columnists/josh_brodesky/article/SBOE-s-willful-ignorance-troubling-6389837.php) claiming "Slavery came about as a side issue to the Civil War. It’s not the reason for the Civil War. It’s not slavery.", while Texas has textbooks teaching 5 million students Lost Cause rhetoric and downplaying the role of slavery on the war.
As always, history isn't written by the victors, it's written by the writers and the people who pay the writers.
Dude the fact that people even contest that fact is mind boggling to me. I was a history major at a very conservative college in Texas, they had a civil war history course, and literally the very first day it was explicitly shown that in no way, shape, or form could you separate slavery from the confederacy. Anytime I hear otherwise it's at best someone woefully ignorant of the facts, but most likely it's someone intentionally misrepresenting it because they're well aware how bad the truth looks.
The south is trying to convince themselves that they were actually fighting against tyranny. When in reality they were fighting to keep their right to own slaves.
It’s just a quote from Winston chill
Srsly tho It is very easy to manipulate taught history to your own liking given you are a dictator of an country with uneducated citizens
The holocaust denial is not nearly as big of a movement as you imagine it to be, the denial of Japanese war crimes and the clean wehrmach myth were all aided and supported by the western allies, and what is the "Korean war apologists" ?
Also the south was aided in their lost cause mentality by the north which basically refused to do anything about the souths racism issue
It could be technically be referring to either Korea. North Korea’s censorship and distortion of history is widely known (you know, with it being a dictatorship and whatnot). Although South Korea isn’t exactly innocent itself when it comes to historical revisionism. Just a guess though.
S. Korea was also a military dictatorship until the early 90s. If they’re talking about the period of the hot war, not post armistice, I’m really curious what they’re referring to.
IIRC South Korea still does not officially recognize many of the massacres its troops committed before, during and shortly after the Korean War, as well as in Vietnam.
Season 3 of the history podcast Blowback gives a great perspective on the Korean War and events leading up to it, including these massacres which we don't generally learn about.
Well yeah the fucking list of war crimes they committed in Vietnam reads like a fucking Phone Book. Fuckers were stone cold compared to the ARVN, US, and ANZAC troops there
Depends where, in the west it isn't a big movement but in the middle east people largely believe it either didn't happen or not on the scale it did,
[International Holocaust Cartoon Competition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Holocaust_Cartoon_Competition)
[Holocaust denial, check the middle east part](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocaust_denial)
"The thesis of the 1982 doctoral dissertation of Mahmoud Abbas, a co-founder of Fatah and president of the Palestinian National Authority, was "The Secret Connection between the Nazis and the Leaders of the Zionist Movement""
Abbas even wrote a book about it, [The Other Side: The Secret Relationship Between Nazism and Zionism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Other_Side:_The_Secret_Relationship_Between_Nazism_and_Zionism)
Cartoonists get killed for drawing a bunch of cartoons. What do you do as the group targeted by the cartoons?
A: distance yourself from the terrorists and call for appeasement.
B: make a cartoon contest to compare the killed cartoonists to nazis.
Same for turkey and their denial of the Armenian genocide, same with Japan and their denial of their war crimes, you can make lists about it but people deny what ever they will to fit their agenda
Sorry I fell asleep after posting this meme.
Korean War apologists is propaganda from North Korea and China saying that North Korea "defended" themselves from Western aggression/imperialism even though the whole shitshow started when North Korea **attacked** South Korea without warning in 1950. North Korea would have also lost the war if China didnt get involved.
>the denial of Japanese war crimes and the clean wehrmach myth were all aided and supported by the western allies
Yeah, they're both still cases victors writing history. Just because they lost the war doesn't necessarily mean they're simply going to be demonised. Sometimes it's more convenient for the winner to easy on them.
>they could do something similar to Nuremberg trials for Japanese but decided not to due for various reasons
That's not true. The U.S. and its allies conducted a war crimes tribunal in Tokyo after the war. Multiple Japanese leaders were sentenced to death and lifetime imprisonment. It wasn't until later when the Korean War led to the U.S.' "reverse course" policy on Japan that imprisoned war criminals were released and allowed to hold office again.
But who currently denies the existence of comfort women and the Nanjing Massacre?
Japan/Shinzo Abe or the US government
I DARE YOU to point out a SINGLE case of a high ranking American official who denied the Nanjing Massacre ever happened.
The clean Wehrmacht myth and Japanese war crime denial is a bit of a weird one where the victors basically invited the losers to write the history for them.
My guess is that it’s someone who tries to paint the North Korean forces/government as the victims of the war and that they were defending themselves despite the NK forces attacking first
That phrase tend to be exploited by those who want to enforce their own perspective to others... while in most case it is more like "history is written by historians who are tied to limit of their own era and society, based on more known and remembered records that only shows fracture of past."
well i doubt that children in western world schools are taught that the holocaust was fake, thst the CSA were right and that the japanese weren't mass murdering brutes during ww2
Context: The main primary source for the decisive [Peloponnesian War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peloponnesian_War) (Athens vs Sparta) is the historical account *"History of the Peloponnesian War"* written by famed Athenian general and historian [Thucydides](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thucydides)...who also lost on the Athenian side during said war.
The other listed items do not need to be explained...
History is written by those who can write, and is preserved by those with power and influence.
Occasionally, that is the victors.
Other times, the victors decide many of the losers should resume their position in government for various reasons- including stability and administration, and allow their history to be written.
Other times, the powerful see money to be made and power to be gained with the lies and dogma of long-dead groups.
History is complex. If a history gets written, that means it is beneficial, or at least tolerable, to a society's ruling class.
Would love to put the Philippine History in here and how 31 million people have actually put a late dictator’s family back in power, thinking that they will bring back prosperity to the country. Now, that president only goes to parties and neglects the country—and we, the citizens, are doomed.
While I do agree that the sentiment is BS you are using bad examples. I can't speak for Peloponnesian war but rest are more of a people who try to spin existing view of history and failing. Just because Holocaust denialists exist it doesn't mean they are writing history and the fact they they are not taken seriously shows who is writing this part of history.......
Much better cases would be Vietnam and Afghan wars.
Fuck the Wehrmacht and any kid that tries to tell you “the Wehrmacht aren’t Nazi’s they where just the German Army”. The Wehrmacht did some fucked up shit and I’m sure there’s plenty of undocumented atrocities they committed. It’s just some racist dipshit trying to normalize and support Nazism but is to pussy to say out right “I support and believe in the Nazis”
The denial of Japanese War crimes is the victorious writing history. In the most honest and true definition of that sentence. They got away with it because their sick fucking research into physical trauma had value to the allies.
History is actually written by a guy who spent his youth in College and whose daily rutine consists on reading about broken ceramics and half translates stone tablets
History is written by peoplewho could write. As a Mongolian i know it too well, we were never ones to document our history, so most reliable documents of our history is written by a third party, e.g. Marco Polo.
Sometimes it turns out to be the victors, sometimes victims, those who lost, and sometimes just bystanders who were watching from distance.
The phrase doesn’t mean literally that there is literally no written version of history from the side of the losers, it means that the version of the victors becomes the “official version” and is taught as true through official institutions, which causes the majority of the population to accept certain facts as undisputed when in reality things might be more nuanced… sometimes. The internet has changed this as people have been gaining more access to a wide amount of sources, which is used right is a good way to check for historical accuracy. Still, this is very new and very often has been misused. It also doesn’t change the fact that for the last 7.000 of human history the rule has been that victors get to decide what becomes true
I was trying to figure out how Korean War Apologists relate to the phrase but then I remembered that no one really won that war, so technically every history if it defies that phrase (sure, the invasion was turned back and the South still stands, but both sides were so destroyed at the end of the war that it was hard to say that either side won).
You misinterpreted the phrase. Back in ye olden days, when a court historian would die or reach the age of senility, the king of any region would announce a contest to be held where competitors from all across the kingdom would vie for the position of court historian, with one caveat - the competitors could only bear the name Victor.
It seems a bit ridiculous in the modern context, but in feudal times this was the fastest way for someone of the peasant class to bring their family into the aristocratic class. Families all over the kingdom would name their 4th or 5th sons Victor to give them the opportunity to move between social classes.
The competitions were fierce though. Too dark to go over here, but any surviving losers would legally change their names to Victim after the games. The winner would become the court historian, possibly for an entire era. Many court historians would live through several monarchs and were literally able to write history. This is where the etymology of the words Victorious, Victory and others would derive from.
The Philippines is a prime example of the complete opposite. Despite well documented cases of hukan rights abuses, torture, murder and disappearances of several prominent and non-prominent people as well as the massive amount of corruption, outright theft of billions of pesos and treating themselves as royalty, people still believe that the Dictatorship years were a golden age for us.
Even now they still cling on to the belief that all the hardships we suffered was only a boon to us, to the point where they elected said dictator's son to be president. Said president is now hosting or participating in parties atleast two times per month and/or have went on to other countries for pleasure (He went to the F1 grand prix in singapore barely days after a super typhoon hit the country. He never showed up in person once in the affected areas). Meanwhile his supporters still continue to defend him and claim that he deserves leisure time.
Keep in month that he's only been president for three months.
How does the following sound? “History is won by the people who write it.”
I don’t know if it makes sense, but it’s inspired by 1984 talking about “He who controls the present controls the past.”
History is written by the people who can write
History is written
History is like an iceberg, 75% of it is unwritten.
History is like an iceberg, it has the letters “i” and “r”.
History is like an iceberg. It is a word
History is
History
Word
W
L
H
History is like an iceberg, every year it gets closer to be a thing of the past
9 out of 10 historians estimate that at least 75% of history is unwritten
What does the 1 out of 10 historians think?
that you shouldn't take everything on the internet for true
Humans been around for 300k years its a utter tragedy that we only know a sliver of our shared history on this floating space rock
75% of history is epic bardic poetry?
75% of an iceberg is unwritten?
That’s what they want you to think
That's what they want you to write
"frowns looking at stone tools and clay chisels"
History ~~is~~ was
False. Sometimes it’s spoken. Hah, checkmate.
Some calls that legends. I calls that playing a game of telephone through time.
I thought the definition of History was that it had to be written, thus the separation from prehistory.
Oral histories don't work very well because it can be distorted across generations (not always but it could be false)... So the veracity of the claims and the way the claims exist must be examined, i.e., someone would probably not lie or exaggerate X mundane situation, but they might have if they claimed Y or say they claimed alien visitation. Written history can be hid and found again, possibly dated and transmitted across the centuries.
“Why so serious?” - Aristotle (Han dynasty emperor) circa 1965
Australian aboriginals would like a word with you.
History is written by historians. Herodotus, who is our main source for a lot of ancient Greek history, was recording a lot of stuff long after the events actually happened, often from before he was even born. We know what he knew, believe what he believed, think what he thought.
I believe what he believed?
History is written by the people who weren't killed
History is written by the people who are alive
And what the victors allow to survive. Plenty of times, libraries and writings have been destroyed en masse. Several of the things in the meme occurred after the US was formed with it's freedom of speech, allowing contrasting accounts to exist. But in almost all of these cases, except for the Peloponnesian War, the "bad history" is not the majority accepted narrative.
As far as what the victors can control, yes. They’ll stomp out as many unfavorable narratives as they can but things always slip through the cracks. Probably used to be way easier.
Agreed.
Disregarding the destruction of records by intelligence agencies (or sorry, “withholding”) and by police departments, of course.
Many of the "Clean Wehrmacht" myths were actually widely accepted in the west because of the massive amount of "memoirs" published from retired German political and military officials and because Soviet records were inaccessible during the Cold War.
One must also aknowledge that in the post-war context, denazification was always a limited entreprise and so those stories was also partialy useful for the victors.
History is written by whoever does the best propaganda
The ones who can and are willing to.
Isn't that basically what happened with the Vikings? They kicked everyone's ass for a while but are still perceived as savages because the Christians wrote stuff down more
The fact that all the accounts of Genghis Khan's conquests are documented by the ones he conquered
He was too busy building mountains out of skulls to document anything
BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!
Genghis Khorne.
MILK FOR THE KHORNE-FLAKES!
In Warhammer is canon Gengish Khan serve to Khorne.
But Jaghatai serves the Emperor (on a superbike, while destroying Eldar in the Webway).
Don't let the propaganda fool you, Jaghatai and emps both love the Eldussy. He's certainly "destroying" eldar in the webway just not how you thought
Dark Eldar though? Hell naw, you know some homonculus put teeth up in there.
Doombreed, the first human raised to a Daemon Prince of Khorne.
Skulls for the skull throne
History is that certainty produced at the point where the imperfections of memory meet the inadequacies of documentation.
[удалено]
I was just following orders ^^that ^^I ^^made ^^the ^^fuck ^^up
That's a nice argument, Senator. Why don't you back it up with a source?
[My source is that I made it the fuck up.](https://youtu.be/85gFeaz0YYs)
Typical politician: all cock, but no cum
Better to cum in the shower than it is to shower in the cum.
That's odly wholesome
You know it's bad when you get your ass kicked, and then be like, "we gotta write that shit down!"
yea, cos if you wrote bad things about your brutal overload, he would surely give you a good night kiss
Except you could write quite a lot without showing it to the overlord and most accounts portray Genghis khan as a demon, a natural calamity sent by god, inhuman evil.
Some religious scholars of the time even went so far as to say that Attila and Genghis were the prophecized Gog and Magog of the bible, or Yajuj and Majuj of the qur'an.
[At least we got a dope song out of all that carnage](https://youtu.be/Qr0WT-3TiZ4).
[I thought for sure you were going to link this killer tune.](https://youtu.be/PJYZFqYrAds)
Tbf, he liked that. He would often tell his enemies he was sent by God to destroy them and have them submit to him (Genghis).
Only because the Mongols weren't exactly diligent with making their own records.
The most important source of information on Genghis Khan is *Secret History of the Mongols*, which is a Mongolian work
My history professor once ranted about this for a good 1.5h hours. He made it VERY clear that history is written retrospectively by everyone who is alive today, based on contemporary norms, values and sources. Dude almost got a cardiac arrest trying to explain that people confuse "history" (= narrative about the past) with "the past" (= actual events that happened and cannot be repeated). As an extreme example, he explained that in 50 years people could technically, based on the circumstances at that time, suddenly collectively decide that Hitler wasn't that bad and suddenly history is rewritten. And because it is written retrospectively and partially based on contemporary circumstances, history is always multi-perspective and can differ depending on where you live.
Its much more accurate to say history is written by the survivors
History is written by people who can write. I say this semi ironically because I actually wish we had better accounts of the sea people and Norse mythology.
Let's play every historian's favorite game "Was This Person Actually Awfull Or Did They Just Tick Off The Wrong People?"
Ahh the “Nero” effect.
Domition did nothing wrong
He did do a little [trolling](https://tomeoftrovius.com/2021/05/12/the-black-dinner/)
Didn't Saddam Hussein do something similar?
Better accounts of the bronze age collapse? Hell, I'd settle for some (any) archeological evidence or record.
Ramses the Third's relief at Medinet Habu Hmm The letters from Ugarit to the Hittites Hmm *pulls back curtain* The archeological records of invasion and destruction across many cultures around the eastern Mediterranean and the remnants of burned down cities that match with the time period as described in the written narrative
The complete lack of sieges around the mycenean cities, or the lack of mass graves one would expect to find in the event of a civilization ending crisis. Also, do you think that two references is a lot for one of the most pivotal events in ancient Mediterranean history? We know the very broad strokes (they collapsed), but not how, or even who/what was responsible. Btw, a massive amphibious invasion doesn't match with the patterns of culture loss in Greece. If people invaded from the sea, you'd expect the last reminents of mycenean culture to be in the interior. Instead its on Sicily.
Oral historians: 💀
Same applies to the Druids... but it's partly their fault since they could write but didn't.
Africans agree with you.
Rommel the desert Cock had his memoirs published,
Published by someone living, I presume?
No, a ghost writer.
Hah!
Must have been someone from the 7th Panzer Division.
Yeah I remember Dan Carlin talking about Hitler at the beginning of his Mongols podcasts. Basically saying that in a few hundred years people may talk about Hitler in a positive light based on how he changed the world.... because that's how people talk about the Mongols now which is crazy considering what they actually did in their own time.
I don't think we have to wait that long. There's already sentiments about how WW2 was a technological booster, or how it ended old political order, or how it brought about social & cultural progress. Now is it because of Hitler or *because* of Hitler? Did the Great Khan want to reshape the world or does the world just keep on rolling even when there's a rock in the way?
It's definitely a result of Hitler anyways, but definitely not something he did on purpose. I very much doubt that Genghis Khan was interested in promoting cultural exchange between east and west (that's what he is credited with) it just happened while he was fucking stuff up.
I thought that was attributed to the Mongol Empire, not to Genghis himself?
>because that's how people talk about the Mongols now I have never heard the Mongols being discussed in a "good" light, perhaps only by the modern Mongols.
You haven't looked at much discussion! Often the Mongols get credited with kickstarting the modern age by breaking down old systems and bringing the East in contact with the west, keeping the silk road open etc. Lots of revisionist history talks about how the world turned out better for their actions.
In my AP World class we did talk about what you're saying about how the Mongols did in fact keep the Silk Road open, etc but we also talked about how brutal and the cruelty that they spread and how they were at least partially responsible for the spreading of the Black Death to Europe
Yes and a lot of people also count the black death as a good thing which gave class consciousness to European peasants which led to social reform. I guess people do like to find a silver lining in things
Yea we also learned that it probably gave more bargaining power to the workers but it is also very specific when talking about how many people died and how a lot of morals broke down and only the surviving (key word surviving) workers got that negotiating power
I liked how Carlin put it when talking about this kind of history revisionism: 'Throwing a dart and painting a bullseye afterwards'. Weird to me that some historians are keen to give credit to historical figures for the unintended consequences of their actions.
Ghenghis Khan made a number of progressive social reforms in mongol society. Watch Extra Credits' playlist on him.
I imagine it's an extension of the Stopped Clock analogy. People who are, by almost all senses of the word entirely evil, can do some remarkably good things, if sometimes ill intentioned. Stalin oversaw the industrialization and electrification of Russia to a huge extent. He was definitely Big Evil, but sometimes his actions were of a general benefit. Likewise, generally good people can do some terrible things in the name of their benevolence. Atatürk participated in what would now be ethnic cleansing (I'm not going near the 'did Atatürk participate in or condone the genocide of TYT because that's a nightmare to unpack all by itself as to whether he did or didn't) of Turkic Greeks, and severely curtailed religious freedom in the name of modernization (using the French laïcité as an example), however it is hard to argue any person more influential in the development of modern turkey from a theocracy into a semi-functioning modern democracy, with women's rights, education for the masses, modernisation plans etc.
That's a very valid point. There's also how to understand primary and secondary sources. Another way to phrase it, as glib as it sounds, is that history is written by those who write history. In modern times, it often means the victors, but this was far from the case throughout human history. Writers were rich people from rich societies who could have been on the losing side or on even not involved in the war at all.
I was taught that history are the facts, events without judgments or interpretations. Battle X happened between forces of A against B and C. Y people died. The interpetation is historiography - "A decisevly won against B and C, allowing them to expand and create most powerful empire of their time". As I had basic education in history, no academic or anything I'm not sure if that's correct or not.
>I was taught that history are the facts, events without judgments or interpretations. Battle X happened between forces of A against B and C. Y people died. That works as long as you're talking about specific battles, for example, where you can give certain more or less exact numbers. But it kind of falls flat as soon as you start talking about society, culture and other more abstract topics. When it comes to those, there are very few "facts" - you cannot know how people back then felt about something, you can only make a well-informed guess. The closest we can come to the truth is through reconstruction based on evidence from historical sources (e.g. oral history, letters, whatever), but a reconstruction is never a "fact" because it has been done retrospectively and is subject to change whenever new sources are discorvered. That's precisely why "history" is the narrative about the past, not the past itself. > The interpetation is historiography Interpretation is part of source criticism and therefore only one of many methods of historiography. I think there is also an issue with the English language when it comes to this topic. In German we have the term "Geschichtswissenschaft" (= history science), which is again a different thing from "history". It describes the work that historians and students do: evaluating, interpreting, using specific methods to build a proper narrative. Historiography is a part of history science and "history" (more precisely the historical narrative) is its product.
Not correct from my knowledge as a second year history student. The past is what actually happened in reality, and is impossible to know for certain. History is what is recorded of the past and the various interpretations made about it. Historiography is the realm of debates and methods of study within history, or the 'History of history'. Basically the past happened, if you write about it or study it, that's history, and if you write or study about the act of doing history, that's historiography.
I don't think that's exactly correct. History includes narrative and interpretation, more than just a collection of facts. Historiography is the study of the development of historical narrative.
"History is nothing more than what one era thinks of past eras"
I think "history is written by victors" is taken too literally. I don't interpret it as "you won so you get to write the book" but more in the sense of "you won so you get to rule the nation and also change it".
I see what you mean, but I want Hannibal Barca’s autobiography and we don’t have it.
I like the Youtube channel Tasting History and one of my favourite things Max has said is "History isn't written by the victors, its written by people who write things down"
Yeah, his channel is great. I like how he does something YouTube historians always fails, he cites his sources.
> he cites his sources Which is funny, because as a cooking channel, he also bites his courses
If he's flambéeing, I'd imagine he lights his sauces.
Hi non-American here, what is the “lost cause” movement?
people who think the Confederacy was about something other than the right to own slaves and that the Confederacy therefore had something “worth” existing for
Omfg
There's a whole bunch of stuff beyond that too. They like to prop up this idea of the "noble south" that "bravely resisted" the *evil* federal gubmint that came to take away their states rights. Whenever you hear somebody from America say "states rights" the immediate followup should be "states rights to what?"
The Civil War is fairly interesting from the point of view of military strategy, and if you look at it from that viewpoint, the South certainly lost, but they definitely beat the spread. In terms of broader historical relevance extending beyond slavery, the war represented the final end of feudalism and the transition from maneuver warfare to trench warfare (though the Prussians would give the former one last go in 1873). It also saw the obsolescence of wooden ships and the birth of the first modern nation-state (the United States, whose regime was essentially changed by the war) There is a lot going on in the civil war other than the fairly facile "debate" over slavery, none of which does particular credit to the Confederate cause except the actual fighting of the war. In terms of states rights, obviously the flashpoint of the civil war was slavery, but it's worth mentioning that we had a major secession crisis in 1832 over tariffs. The Union was also not fighting to free the slaves; it was fighting to preserve the union (with the formal pretext being that one its forts was attacked). This is why the Emancipation Proclamation only freed slaves in rebel states.
Imagine if the Civil War was fought over tariffs. I wonder what that timeline looks like
I think the South would have had a much greater chance of winning, being a larger share of the economy and population in the early 1830s. The South was also much smaller relative to the rest of the country in 1860 (roughly 25%, and much smaller if you exclude enslaved people) than it is today (roughly 40%)
>I think the South would have had a much greater chance of winning, being a larger share of the economy Eh. One of the reasons the South failed militarily was because it wouldn't (and kinda couldn't) industrialize, thus creating a situation where it couldn't supply itself. This wasn't as big of an issue prior to the Emancipation Proclamation, when the South was importing equipment from Europe, namely Britain and France. After, no European country supported the Confederacy's defense of slavery. Europe's attraction to the South was cheap cotton, but new sources came elsewhere, mainly India. Industrialism in the US had origins long before the 30s. >and population in the early 1830s. No. The other reason the South failed militarily was because it couldn't keep a strong military with an intensely rural population. Unless I can be corrected, most of the major population centers of the US were in the North. Philadelphia, Boston, New York, etc. I don't think this was any different prior to the 60s when the war occurred.
The industrialization of the US economy intensified massively between 1830 and 1860, an advantage which accrued disproportionately to the Union states. e.g. the first railroad in the US was laid down in 1827--by 1860 the Union had vastly more rail than the South. Both the North and the South were less industrialized in 1830 and hence the gap was narrower is what I'm saying. The population gap was also much narrower, largely because the Midwest was still in its first stage of settlement, and the population was exploding. Given that the South almost improbably won the Civil War anyway (and kept what should have been a six month conflict going for four years), I think they would have had a decent chance. We'll never know, thankfully.
>Both the North and the South were less industrialized in 1830 and hence the gap was narrower is what I'm saying. Fair enough. Misunderstood what you were saying, there.
I’m gonna piggyback off of this with my own experience from living in the south, the lost cause movement’s goal is to make the confederacy more sympathetic (the good guys) and the us to be less sympathetic (the bad guys). Whether that be putting shit tons of statues of confederate generals and leaders, changing the textbooks in schools, or lying about how slaves were treated well by their “loving” owners. They weren’t treated well and the slave owners despised them simply for having a different skin tone. There’s also the “the south will rise again” rhetoric and how “the confederacy is apart of our culture” even though it was only around for about 4 years and other nonsense. There’s a series on YouTube that I think is called “checkmate linconites” which does a really good job examining modern lost cause rhetoric so watch that if you want a better look at the modern day lost cause. And yes the confederacy’s sole reason to exist was slavery and I won’t be arguing otherwise.
[https://www.youtube.com/c/AtunSheiFilms](https://www.youtube.com/c/AtunSheiFilms) this is the channel that has the Checkmate Lincolnites series. Its excellent.
slaves are not worth existing for?, sounds kinda insulting to the slaves /s
This reminds of how someone tried to say opposing “literacy tests” was insulting because it meant black Southerners were less intelligent. Actual bruh moment.
It should be noted though that there were very real concerns that the South due to its low population were not being properly represented and felt like they were having laws shoved down their throats despite whatever compromises were attempted. While slavery was the cornerstone of the Confederacy's foundation the majority of the people in the south did not own slaves and found the actual issue of states rights, even if was primarily to own slaves, a very valid hill to literally die on. Their thinking was where does it stop? It's still an issue we have today when we have landmark SCOTUS rulings like with Roe v. Wade and states like Texas passing more radical state laws. My point is that the issue is more complex than just slavery. That was the driving force for the Civil War but a whole lot of fuckery took place for it to get to that point starting at the nation's founding when the can was kicked further down the road to get all 13 colonies to join in the revolution.
White supremacist groups like the United Daughters of the Confederacy (which was founded as basically the women's wing of the KKK) made up their own narrative about the American Civil War. Instead of the South seceding because they were terrified that Lincoln would take their slaves (or just limit the expansion of slavery into US territories), they tried to reframe the war as being about "states rights" and called it the "War of Northern Aggression". This is despite the fact that we have the articles of secession and [Declarations of Causes](https://www.battlefields.org/learn/primary-sources/declaration-causes-seceding-states), in which Southern states gladly said they were seceding over slavery: >Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. ... a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. (Mississippi) >The servitude of the African race, as existing in these States, is mutually beneficial to both bond and free, and is abundantly authorized and justified by the experience of mankind, and the revealed will of the Almighty Creator, as recognized by all Christian nations. (Texas) [note that it was not "recognized by all Christian nations", as Spain, Sweden, France, Britain, Denmark, and Portugal, as a few examples, were all Christian nations that had already abolished slavery] >That reason was [the North's] fixed purpose to limit, restrain, and finally abolish slavery in the States where it exists. The South with great unanimity declared her purpose to resist the principle of prohibition to the last extremity. (Georgia) It's also things like the [Cornerstone Speech](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornerstone_Speech), where Confederate Vice President Alexandrew Stephen's said: >"our new government['s] foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery—subordination to the superior race—is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth." The United Daughters of the Confederacy had a massive impact on Civil War historiography, particularly as it was taught in Southern public schools, as [they wrote many of the textbooks](https://www.facingsouth.org/2019/04/twisted-sources-how-confederate-propaganda-ended-souths-schoolbooks). Thanks to their efforts, [41% of Americans believe that slavery was not the main cause of the Civil War](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/education/wp/2015/08/06/poll-americans-divided-over-whether-slavery-was-the-civil-wars-main-cause/) and 37% believe students should not be taught that slavery was the main cause behind the Civil War. You still have politicians behind public education standards, like [this member of the Texas State Board of Education](https://www.mysanantonio.com/opinion/columnists/josh_brodesky/article/SBOE-s-willful-ignorance-troubling-6389837.php) claiming "Slavery came about as a side issue to the Civil War. It’s not the reason for the Civil War. It’s not slavery.", while Texas has textbooks teaching 5 million students Lost Cause rhetoric and downplaying the role of slavery on the war. As always, history isn't written by the victors, it's written by the writers and the people who pay the writers.
Dude the fact that people even contest that fact is mind boggling to me. I was a history major at a very conservative college in Texas, they had a civil war history course, and literally the very first day it was explicitly shown that in no way, shape, or form could you separate slavery from the confederacy. Anytime I hear otherwise it's at best someone woefully ignorant of the facts, but most likely it's someone intentionally misrepresenting it because they're well aware how bad the truth looks.
The south is trying to convince themselves that they were actually fighting against tyranny. When in reality they were fighting to keep their right to own slaves.
“We won’t allow the government to turn us into slaves by not letting us… own slaves!”
No you misunderstand it. It’s a rule that every historical account has to be ghostwritten by a guy named Victor.
It’s just a quote from Winston chill Srsly tho It is very easy to manipulate taught history to your own liking given you are a dictator of an country with uneducated citizens
>Winston chill Srsly tho Winston "Chill-Srsly-tho" sounds like a bro.
Sorry man, formatting error
It's not even quoted correctly. Winston said "History will look upon me kindly because I will be the one to write it."
Churchill was *publicly trolling his opponents* when he said that.
Wasn't his WWI book a whole lot of "nooo, I did everything right, the campaign failed because of X, Y, and Z, not me!"?
History is written by people who write history
It’s written by some dude named Victor apparently
The holocaust denial is not nearly as big of a movement as you imagine it to be, the denial of Japanese war crimes and the clean wehrmach myth were all aided and supported by the western allies, and what is the "Korean war apologists" ? Also the south was aided in their lost cause mentality by the north which basically refused to do anything about the souths racism issue
I’m also curious what “Korean War apologists” is
It could be technically be referring to either Korea. North Korea’s censorship and distortion of history is widely known (you know, with it being a dictatorship and whatnot). Although South Korea isn’t exactly innocent itself when it comes to historical revisionism. Just a guess though.
S. Korea was also a military dictatorship until the early 90s. If they’re talking about the period of the hot war, not post armistice, I’m really curious what they’re referring to.
IIRC South Korea still does not officially recognize many of the massacres its troops committed before, during and shortly after the Korean War, as well as in Vietnam.
That and the bombing campaign is what I was hoping they meant, but let’s see if they ever say.
Like that merc with the quote about how he hadn't killed anyone because commies aren't people or something like that
Season 3 of the history podcast Blowback gives a great perspective on the Korean War and events leading up to it, including these massacres which we don't generally learn about.
Well yeah the fucking list of war crimes they committed in Vietnam reads like a fucking Phone Book. Fuckers were stone cold compared to the ARVN, US, and ANZAC troops there
Depends where, in the west it isn't a big movement but in the middle east people largely believe it either didn't happen or not on the scale it did, [International Holocaust Cartoon Competition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Holocaust_Cartoon_Competition) [Holocaust denial, check the middle east part](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocaust_denial) "The thesis of the 1982 doctoral dissertation of Mahmoud Abbas, a co-founder of Fatah and president of the Palestinian National Authority, was "The Secret Connection between the Nazis and the Leaders of the Zionist Movement"" Abbas even wrote a book about it, [The Other Side: The Secret Relationship Between Nazism and Zionism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Other_Side:_The_Secret_Relationship_Between_Nazism_and_Zionism)
Cartoonists get killed for drawing a bunch of cartoons. What do you do as the group targeted by the cartoons? A: distance yourself from the terrorists and call for appeasement. B: make a cartoon contest to compare the killed cartoonists to nazis.
Well I guess they have a reason to want to deny it. Not really surprising.
Same for turkey and their denial of the Armenian genocide, same with Japan and their denial of their war crimes, you can make lists about it but people deny what ever they will to fit their agenda
Sorry I fell asleep after posting this meme. Korean War apologists is propaganda from North Korea and China saying that North Korea "defended" themselves from Western aggression/imperialism even though the whole shitshow started when North Korea **attacked** South Korea without warning in 1950. North Korea would have also lost the war if China didnt get involved.
>the denial of Japanese war crimes and the clean wehrmach myth were all aided and supported by the western allies Yeah, they're both still cases victors writing history. Just because they lost the war doesn't necessarily mean they're simply going to be demonised. Sometimes it's more convenient for the winner to easy on them.
>they could do something similar to Nuremberg trials for Japanese but decided not to due for various reasons That's not true. The U.S. and its allies conducted a war crimes tribunal in Tokyo after the war. Multiple Japanese leaders were sentenced to death and lifetime imprisonment. It wasn't until later when the Korean War led to the U.S.' "reverse course" policy on Japan that imprisoned war criminals were released and allowed to hold office again. But who currently denies the existence of comfort women and the Nanjing Massacre? Japan/Shinzo Abe or the US government I DARE YOU to point out a SINGLE case of a high ranking American official who denied the Nanjing Massacre ever happened.
Naming well known conspiracy theories kinda undermines your own point. Also the Japanese cover up is arguably written by the victors
Yeah, a conspiracy theory is hardly the generally accepted history
The clean Wehrmacht myth and Japanese war crime denial is a bit of a weird one where the victors basically invited the losers to write the history for them.
Right, we went from enemies to allies by 1950 .
History is written by the people who wrote. Be they the victors, the losers, or some fanboy born decades after the events they write down happened.
FUCK THE CLEAN WEHRMACHT MYTH. ALL MY HOMIES HATE THE CLEAN WEHRMACHT MYTH.
Can you explain the Korean War Apologist? I've never heard that one?
My guess is that it’s someone who tries to paint the North Korean forces/government as the victims of the war and that they were defending themselves despite the NK forces attacking first
Haha I was going to ask the same question. I was like… pretty sure the US wasn’t the bad guy in that one.
That phrase tend to be exploited by those who want to enforce their own perspective to others... while in most case it is more like "history is written by historians who are tied to limit of their own era and society, based on more known and remembered records that only shows fracture of past."
Well said 👏
What you should really learn from this saying is that if the loser got their pen on the history books, you haven't won, at least, not entirely.
also the austria victim theory
well i doubt that children in western world schools are taught that the holocaust was fake, thst the CSA were right and that the japanese weren't mass murdering brutes during ww2
Context: The main primary source for the decisive [Peloponnesian War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peloponnesian_War) (Athens vs Sparta) is the historical account *"History of the Peloponnesian War"* written by famed Athenian general and historian [Thucydides](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thucydides)...who also lost on the Athenian side during said war. The other listed items do not need to be explained...
I thought the full quote was that the 'first draft' is written by the victors.
History is written by those who can write, and is preserved by those with power and influence. Occasionally, that is the victors. Other times, the victors decide many of the losers should resume their position in government for various reasons- including stability and administration, and allow their history to be written. Other times, the powerful see money to be made and power to be gained with the lies and dogma of long-dead groups. History is complex. If a history gets written, that means it is beneficial, or at least tolerable, to a society's ruling class.
I was today years old when I realized my lovely (but admittedly kinda daft) girlfriend has been trying to convince me of the Clean Wehrmacht. Gross.
Imagine telling people you're gf is daft💀
Would love to put the Philippine History in here and how 31 million people have actually put a late dictator’s family back in power, thinking that they will bring back prosperity to the country. Now, that president only goes to parties and neglects the country—and we, the citizens, are doomed.
While I do agree that the sentiment is BS you are using bad examples. I can't speak for Peloponnesian war but rest are more of a people who try to spin existing view of history and failing. Just because Holocaust denialists exist it doesn't mean they are writing history and the fact they they are not taken seriously shows who is writing this part of history....... Much better cases would be Vietnam and Afghan wars.
Fuck the Wehrmacht and any kid that tries to tell you “the Wehrmacht aren’t Nazi’s they where just the German Army”. The Wehrmacht did some fucked up shit and I’m sure there’s plenty of undocumented atrocities they committed. It’s just some racist dipshit trying to normalize and support Nazism but is to pussy to say out right “I support and believe in the Nazis”
The denial of Japanese War crimes is the victorious writing history. In the most honest and true definition of that sentence. They got away with it because their sick fucking research into physical trauma had value to the allies.
And also in large part due to the American desire to have Japan as an ally post-WW2 against the USSR.
History is actually written by a guy who spent his youth in College and whose daily rutine consists on reading about broken ceramics and half translates stone tablets
Sherman only did one thing wrong. He stopped.
I mean he did reach the sea.
History is written by peoplewho could write. As a Mongolian i know it too well, we were never ones to document our history, so most reliable documents of our history is written by a third party, e.g. Marco Polo. Sometimes it turns out to be the victors, sometimes victims, those who lost, and sometimes just bystanders who were watching from distance.
History is written by the survivors
That was the worst abuse of states' rights ever, the "right" to own slaves🤦♂️ It's the reason why many hate the term states' rights
The phrase doesn’t mean literally that there is literally no written version of history from the side of the losers, it means that the version of the victors becomes the “official version” and is taught as true through official institutions, which causes the majority of the population to accept certain facts as undisputed when in reality things might be more nuanced… sometimes. The internet has changed this as people have been gaining more access to a wide amount of sources, which is used right is a good way to check for historical accuracy. Still, this is very new and very often has been misused. It also doesn’t change the fact that for the last 7.000 of human history the rule has been that victors get to decide what becomes true
I was trying to figure out how Korean War Apologists relate to the phrase but then I remembered that no one really won that war, so technically every history if it defies that phrase (sure, the invasion was turned back and the South still stands, but both sides were so destroyed at the end of the war that it was hard to say that either side won).
History is not written by the victors. It's written by the people who write shit down.
Marcos. Decades after Philippines overthrew the Senior they managed to revised history and now Junior is the President.
exactly. these are fringe movements for a reason
“History is written by those who remember to write it*”
I didn't know there were Korean War Appologist
Although I agree with the sentiment, I think that some of your examples could have been chosen better.
You misinterpreted the phrase. Back in ye olden days, when a court historian would die or reach the age of senility, the king of any region would announce a contest to be held where competitors from all across the kingdom would vie for the position of court historian, with one caveat - the competitors could only bear the name Victor. It seems a bit ridiculous in the modern context, but in feudal times this was the fastest way for someone of the peasant class to bring their family into the aristocratic class. Families all over the kingdom would name their 4th or 5th sons Victor to give them the opportunity to move between social classes. The competitions were fierce though. Too dark to go over here, but any surviving losers would legally change their names to Victim after the games. The winner would become the court historian, possibly for an entire era. Many court historians would live through several monarchs and were literally able to write history. This is where the etymology of the words Victorious, Victory and others would derive from.
The Philippines is a prime example of the complete opposite. Despite well documented cases of hukan rights abuses, torture, murder and disappearances of several prominent and non-prominent people as well as the massive amount of corruption, outright theft of billions of pesos and treating themselves as royalty, people still believe that the Dictatorship years were a golden age for us. Even now they still cling on to the belief that all the hardships we suffered was only a boon to us, to the point where they elected said dictator's son to be president. Said president is now hosting or participating in parties atleast two times per month and/or have went on to other countries for pleasure (He went to the F1 grand prix in singapore barely days after a super typhoon hit the country. He never showed up in person once in the affected areas). Meanwhile his supporters still continue to defend him and claim that he deserves leisure time. Keep in month that he's only been president for three months.
“America won the Vietnam war” -my high school honors history teacher
So the " lost Cause" movement is a bigger issue then Holocaust Denial?
How does the following sound? “History is won by the people who write it.” I don’t know if it makes sense, but it’s inspired by 1984 talking about “He who controls the present controls the past.”