Sloppy Past–>Sloppy Present (Updated) 1
If you wonder why so many folks are able to believe the lies spouted by the Teabaggers and other factions, look no further.
It’s quite one thing for two persons of good will to interpret events differently. And it is true that we tend to interpret the past in the light of the present. One hopes that greater distance breeds greater objectivity, though it doesn’t always do so.
It’s quite another when even the events are wrong:
These are among the dozens of errors historians have found since Virginia officials ordered a review of textbooks by Five Ponds Press, the publisher responsible for a controversial claim that African-American soldiers fought for the South in large numbers during the Civil War.
This is quite frankly appalling.
Afternitpick:
New Orleans was a French possession in the early 1800’s.
Addendum:
It gets worse.
The problem is that, if the basic facts (names, dates, who said and did what) are wrong, any conclusions drawn from them are wrong, leading Virginia to end up like Texas, which consciously uses its textbooks to warp its students understanding of the past.
September 22, 2011 at 12:12 pm
[…] Last year, it was discovered that a history text book used in Virginia schools was riddled with egregious errors. […]