Historic Political Narratives You Disagree With

[progressive85]

That the Vietnam War was the first war that divided the country the way it did - I learned all about the Civil War battles, but nothing about the Draft Riots in New York City, and it wasn't until I was older that I read just how divisive Abraham Lincoln was, that this man that seemed to be loved by everyone today was actually despised by a lot of Americans.

[America Needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

"Versailles caused the rise of the Nazis and WW2" is a popular one that is blatantly false.

I had not been aware of the fact that this narrative was wrong until earlier this year by the way.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I don’t think the parties switched, but I strongly disagree with anyone who says Abraham Lincoln was a conservative.

A lot of this comes down to what those terms mean and why.

Today, we have conceptualized, "Conservatism" as this discernible and structured movement with a define set of principles formulated by contemporary politics grafted onto traditions and such forth. Prior to the 1950s there was no such thing as a "Conservative movement" in the United States.

There were various people who identified as conservatives because they opposed something, or because of how subsequent generations have defined them as such based on some criteria. This ranges from the harmful (Jefferson was a conservative, Hamilton was a liberal bc muh small gov't uber alles) to the benign.

Lincoln can be accurately classified as "small c" conservative in a couple of ways.

1 Relativist sense within the confines of the Republican Party, Lincoln was "more conservative" in his position towards slavery and the South than the Radical Republicans.

2. Lincoln's rejection of both the "innovations of the Dred Scott decision" and the perils of "arbitary majoritarianism" manifested in Douglas' Popular Sovereignty argument, represent a desire to preserve some foundational aspect of the founding.

3. Perhaps the most basic of these, is the desire "preserve the union" by eliminating/reforming the primary threat to it. Which I would agree with Cody, counts as a "Progressive Conservative" or maybe a "Liberal Conservative" approach.

Two and three are very much in line with the approach of Edmund Burke, who at the same time as opposing arbitrary rule from both the tyrannical monarch and the "swinish multitudes", also aggressively targeted corruption in the imperial system, favored Irish emancipation and defended the American Revolution.

[Kleine Scheiße]

>GeOrGe McGoVeRn WaS tOo FaR lEfT tO EvEr WiN a NaTiOnAl ElEcTiOn

[(no subject)]

Versailles was still an exercise in the French wanting to crush Germany to their own advantage. 1940 proved the true nature of the French though.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

That the Democrats were opposed to free trade until "neoliberals" took over the party or whatever.

Anyone parroting this is effectively arguing that FDR, Woodrow Wilson and candidates like William Jennings Bryan were protectionists, making it a talking point about as stupid as the notion that Bernie Sanders would be a right-winger in Europe.

[darklordoftech]

That the Democrats were opposed to free trade until "neoliberals" took over the party or whatever.

Anyone parroting this is effectively arguing that FDR, Woodrow Wilson and candidates like William Jennings Bryan were protectionists, making it a talking point about as stupid as the notion that Bernie Sanders would be a right-winger in Europe.

In the days of Bryan and Wilson, Republicans were the party of protectionism and Democrats were the party of free trade.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

That the Democrats were opposed to free trade until "neoliberals" took over the party or whatever.

Anyone parroting this is effectively arguing that FDR, Woodrow Wilson and candidates like William Jennings Bryan were protectionists, making it a talking point about as stupid as the notion that Bernie Sanders would be a right-winger in Europe.

In the days of Bryan and Wilson, Republicans were the party of protectionism and Democrats were the party of free trade.

Yes and one of FDR's first actions was repealing Smoot-Hawley which was passed by Republicans. And the most protectionist President since WWII before Trump was definitely Nixon. The only remotely protectionist Democratic President since the Civil War was maybe Carter.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

Versailles was still an exercise in the French wanting to crush Germany to their own advantage. 1940 proved the true nature of the French though.

No. Again this is a myth.

France's main goal at the Paris Peace Conference was to secure French security not by "crushing" Germany but by cementing the war's inter-Allied cooperation into a permanent military alliance between France, Britain and the United States. That was what Clemenceau tried to wring out of Wilson and Lloyd George. The harshest French demand (disarmament was noncontroversial and Lloyd George inflated reparations) was for a demilitarised Rhineland and the Saarland's coal, the latter in compensation for the deliberate destruction of France's coal industry by the German army occupying Northern France during the war.

If anything 1940 proved the French approach at Versailles entirely correct: they had been left economically, demographically and (with the collapse of Russia) diplomatically weaker vis a vis Germany than France had been in 1914. Clemenceau's entire gambit was to get a new Entente, and if he couldn't, keep the German army away from France's borders. If you want "crushed", look at Trianon. Or Sevres. Or Saint-Germain. Or Brest-Litovsk. Or Bucharest. Or hell, look at what the victorious Allies imposed on Germany after the Second World War (such as the ethnic cleansing of more than 10 million Germans from Eastern Europe). The idea that France was vindictive at Versailles is laughable. It wouldn't rank in the top 5 harshest treaties of the war, even if France got everything it asked for...

[(no subject)]

If the French hadn’t been such incompetent fools and cowards in 1939-40, if they had pressed the Saar offensive… if, if, if… HOW many people wouldn’t have died by the Germans’s hands?

[Statilius the Epicurean]

If the French hadn’t been such incompetent fools and cowards in 1939-40, if they had pressed the Saar offensive… if, if, if… HOW many people wouldn’t have died by the Germans’s hands?

Not sure what your point is. 1940 was a cascade of Allied failures, including from the British and Belgians as well as the French plus a lot of German luck. Dunno what it has to do with the Treaty of Versailles.

[(no subject)]

French person: Wait! The cheese, she stinks! No, wait... it's me!"

[TheReckoning]

      I disagree with the idea that Central Powers were “just” the enemy in WW1, and that WW1 had no “good guys” or “bad guys.” The brutality of the Central Powers isn’t talked about as much because of how the Axis in the WW2 were much worse, but if one has the moral capabilities of recognizing how depraved the Axis were, they should be just as able to see that the Central Powers were undoubtedly the evil side of WW1, from committing to genocide to war crimes against civilians to violating treaties and international law.

[darklordoftech]

      I disagree with the idea that Central Powers were “just” the enemy in WW1, and that WW1 had no “good guys” or “bad guys.” The brutality of the Central Powers isn’t talked about as much because of how the Axis in the WW2 were much worse, but if one has the moral capabilities of recognizing how depraved the Axis were, they should be just as able to see that the Central Powers were undoubtedly the evil side of WW1, from committing to genocide to war crimes against civilians to violating treaties and international law.

I think a lot of Americans were confused by WWI and didn’t know who two the sides were and what they were fighing over.

[(no subject)]

People love a world of pretty princesses and feathered hats. That the CP monarchies are so alien, yet so close, helps too.

[All Along The Watchtower]

"Versailles caused the rise of the Nazis and WW2" is a popular one that is blatantly false.

A related myth: the "clean Wehrmacht."

[Senator Incitatus]

American Revolution (or even most revolutions) as ideological

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

      I disagree with the idea that Central Powers were “just” the enemy in WW1, and that WW1 had no “good guys” or “bad guys.” The brutality of the Central Powers isn’t talked about as much because of how the Axis in the WW2 were much worse, but if one has the moral capabilities of recognizing how depraved the Axis were, they should be just as able to see that the Central Powers were undoubtedly the evil side of WW1, from committing to genocide to war crimes against civilians to violating treaties and international law.

I think a lot of Americans were confused by WWI and didn’t know who two the sides were and what they were fighing over.

Many soldiers were similarly confused.

[Tartarus Sauce]

These aren't exactly political in the modern sense and are just more historical, but I figured I'd post them anyway since they came to mind.

-Super-low hanging fruit, and it's already been largely cast aside by academic historians, but it must be mentioned since it is still firmly emblazoned in the mind of the public; 476 AD as the end point of the Western Roman Empire. Easily one of the most overrated dates of history in terms of importance attributed to it. Its overemphasis has eradicated the average layperson's understanding about any of the important events happening before or after this point, which is ironic since the actual collapse of the Roman civilization way of life in the Italian Peninsula that is generally associated with the "Fall of Rome" didn't occur until more than half a century after this point. The fact that a punkish, puppet child usurper getting ousted and the title of Emperor being abolished is a more well known event than the Gothic Wars reducing Rome into a practical ghost town seems like a serious misplacement of emphasis.

-On the other hand, historian circles seem to be somewhat botching the emphasis when it comes to the Thirty Years War. It seems quite obvious to me that it's at the very least partially connected to the backdrop of the religious wars that engulfed the European continent in the wake of the Protestant Reformation. Yes, I understand that it was a very complex, confusing war that transitioned more into a struggle of convoluted cross-faith alliances challenging the Habsburg Dynasty's supremacy as the war dragged on, but religious conflict played a central thrust in the initial trigger for the war in the first place. Religious strife clearly plays a contextual role in the framework of HRE's sociopolitical environment that caused everything to unfold in the manner it did, and the attempt by many historians on the topic to decontextualize its influence on events is something that I've found rather baffling.

[darklordoftech]

“Neocon” meaning internationalist and the Iraq War being an internationalist war. Does anyone remember “freedom fries”?

Also the claim that Republicans were ever for open boarders.

[All Along The Watchtower]

“Neocon” meaning internationalist and the Iraq War being an internationalist war. Does anyone remember “freedom fries”?

Also the claim that Republicans were ever for open boarders.

Good calls. The invasion of Iraq was pretty blatantly illegal under international law. But muh "coalition of the willing."

The internationalists in the Bush administration ie. Colin Powell and others primarily at the State Department were marginalized. Of course plenty of those who aggressively championed the invasion and mocked the UN and OLD EUROPE at the time have condemned the likes of Trump along with Russia for undermining the Rules-Based Liberal International Order. Counting on short memories, and all that.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Super-low hanging fruit, and it's already been largely cast aside by academic historians, but it must be mentioned since it is still firmly emblazoned in the mind of the public; 476 AD as the end point of the Western Roman Empire.

Appreciated you putting this here.

[Yeahsayyeah]

"The Weimar Republic ended because of its flawed constitution and the FRG was that much better because the Grundgesetz has no flaws"

"The right and the left are both equally to blame for the end of the Weimar republic".

[Yeahsayyeah]

"Versailles caused the rise of the Nazis and WW2" is a popular one that is blatantly false.

It's a massive oversimplification, but I wouldn't call it blatantly false. The "dictated peace of shame" was clearly influential in shaping the German post-war political culture, the reparations were a huge liability to the economy which clearly did not help the trust into the democratic government.

[(no subject)]

"The Weimar Republic ended because of its flawed constitution and the FRG was that much better because the Grundgesetz has no flaws"

"The right and the left are both equally to blame for the end of the Weimar republic".

the KPD has a big part of the blame, yes. Thankfully, Thaelmann got what he deserved.