History With a Zinn[g]!

Anyone who takes an advanced history course at the university level, and is not seeking a degree in said study, will have broken through a thick wall that obscures the true scholastics of history from everything else. Though there are date memorizations imperative to studying history, the bulk of it is really a sifting through of multiple interpretations of events and what little empirical evidence remains. For example, there is little parsing over the occurrance of the Holocaust, and rightly so; however the direct causes are still subject to debate. On the one hand there is the "intentionalist" interpretation which insists that the systematic killing of Jews and other so-labelled subhumans by the Nazis was never far from Hitler's mind, whereas the "functionalist" interpretation counters with the theory that, while the obviously anti-semetic Hitler was accordingly aggressive towards the Jews, the later events of the Holocaust were as much, if not more, propelled by bureaucratic wheel-spinning on the parts of Reinhard Heydrich and Aldof Eichmann as the most pragmatic way of managing the disaster of the ghettos. I'm simplifying both sides admittedly, but that the gist of both. Clearly more people side with the former than the latter since all history that most average people are willing to learn has a slight cast of moral indoctrination for whatever reason -- and since it sounds a lot like Star Wars made real, they love it. Look, if you will, at the divide between historians on Lincoln. Whereas political scientist cum polemicist Harry Jaffa's view is dominant, there is always the work of M.E. Bradford or Thomas DiLorenzo nipping at its heels, however radically. The same is true of the left of course, which is no less dubious, but now it's simply gotten irritating.

Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States is an iconic, almost biblical text for most avowed leftists. Its history-as-written-by-the-losers point of view is not a dishonorable approach for an historian, for instance his lesson on Columbus' "discovery" of America -- the truth of which I knew since I was 10, obviously not under the guidance of a teacher -- is a much needed dose of clarification. Mostly though it is a work that seizes the heart more than the mind, especially of those who have an intense disliking of squares, corporations and conformists who like Sarah Palin; so mostly rich college kids, their first name-basis professors, certain yuppie parents, and celebrities, the final of which is the focus of this piece.

Political celebrities are not exclusively aligned with the left -- Jon Voight has spoken recently at a Tea Party gathering, while his daughter, though something of a Rand fan, remains annoyingly, even cruelly ambiguous -- their more rebellious, idealistic take on moral history is as sexy to the young as [some of] their looks. This has not been lost on the celebrities and so they give more fodder than Trey Parker and Matt Stone could ever ask for with their Zinn-inspired and -produced performances of Zinn's sources and inspirations on the History Channel. The immediate and lasting effect however weighs less on the informative and more on the masturbatory, as can be glanced at in the trailer:



I've always found pure oratory to be overrated, and this shall serve as my key piece of evidence. While many of the works performed are significant testaments of thoughtful people reacting to unpleasant circumstances forced upon them or witnessed by them, and serve as excellent documents of historical, intellectual and literary relevance, they are channeled by the actors, similar to Zinn's work, with more heart than mind, though usind primary text makes it far less tolerable. Rather than read, these documents are emoted for the sole purpose of extracting their pladitudes above all else seemingly in order to prove how conservatives and libertarians are bashing to dust America's very foundations. (Really it's the Republicans doing that but why split hairs at this point?) The manner in which the pieces are read are enough to spur nausea in any thinking person. Sandra Oh's overly enunciated rendition of a piece by Emma Goldman should discount her from acting for the remainder of her life; Kerry Washington's reading of Sojourner Truth, while maintaining the simple wit and style of "Ain't I a Women?" seems, shall we say, overly sassed. The one that's underdone seems entirely inappropraite: "Fight the Power" is a great song, but a simple reciting of it seems to hardly do it justice. Perhaps most aggravating is Matt Damon doing the Declaration with his Jason Bourne serious face in its stoney hilarity. Naturally this has been done to death by both sides of the political spectrum, being read over and over again since 1776, and this was clearly the intent. But given that its principal composer remains unmatched as both American history's worst public speaker and its best writer, when is it going to get the thoughtful literary reading rather than the self-serious dramatic one? It's also worth nothing that Zinn's views on Jefferson and the other founders are less than sympathetic.

It's quite telling that Damon, Washington and other contributors such as John Legend, Don Cheadle, Viggo Mortensen, Marissa Tomei and Mos Def endorsed Barack Obama in '08. It shows their total lack of sense when it comes to politics. Any intelligent person can plainly see that supporting Zinn's view of history while also supporting Obama's presidency, one that has never been anything short of moderate, displays a total absence of logic. Zinn is aware of this but seems not to care all that much. It should also be noted that if we're reading from the canon of the antiauthoritarian fringe, one must logically include bits and pieces from The Turner Diaries, the Unabomber's manifesto, and the columns of Westbrook Peglar. Also strangely left out are any mentions of the pro-life movement, something that should also be considered at least liberal in spirit, but strangely isn't.

Though I detest getting before a stage and reading anything, I wouldn't mind getting together my own speaking engagement, documentary, whatever, that is a little more thought out and with no more ambitious an agenda than to simply offer interesting ideas that are eloquently expressed but without shielding the complexity and sometimes amorality of America's history, intellectual and otherwise. Some of the works I'd include, but not limit to would be:

"Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" by Jonathan Edwards
Thomas Jefferson's first inaugural address
The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine
Selections from The Federalist Papers (primarily Hamilton's)
"The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions" by Abraham Licoln (aka his Young Men's Lyceum address)
"The Moral Equivalent of War" by William James
"The Soldier's Faith" by Oliver Wendell Holmes
Notes on Democracy by HL Mencken
"Civil Liberties 1952 -- A Study in Confusion" by Irving Kristol
Barry Goldwater's GOP nomination acceptance speech (written with not yet anarcho-capitalist Karl Hess and afforementioned pro-Lincoln conservative Harry V. Jaffa, odd pairing indeed)
"My Dungeon Shook: A Letter to My Nephew" by James Baldwin
The SCUM Manifesto by Valerie Solanas
"From Montgomery to Stonewall" by Bayard Rustin
"Pink Triangle and Yellow Star" by Gore Vidal
"The Myth of Natural Rights" by LA Rollins
The Redneck Manifesto by Jim Goad
"We Are All Cultural Libertarians" by Kerry Howley

This would be open to anyone, but might be better for those who find that Obama's speaking and Obama's thinking are not entirely one and the same.