When Leaders Die (Struggling to find consistency)

[noamnety]

1. If a former leader is responsible for brutal murders, but also implemented policies that were clearly good, are we supposed to ignore all the good because they are a brutal murderer and discussing the good things they did excuses the bad in some way? Or are we supposed to ignore all the bad things they did and discuss only the good out of respect for the dead/their family?

2. Once a leader commits brutal murders of masses of people, we all want the countries involved to heal in whatever way possible so they can move on. Does that healing occur through pardoning the person responsible, or executing them? Right now, I'm getting the message that only through extreme measures can we heal - and it doesn't matter which one - absolute and final accountability, or none at all - either extreme somehow will work, where moderate actions will fail.

churchill, nixon, reagan, ford, saddam

I am trying to figure out the ground rules here, some standard that isn't affected by the skin color or nationality of the leader.

Conversely, textbooks seldom use the past to illuminate the present. They portray the past as a simple-minded morality play. 'Be a good citizen' is the message that textbooks extract from the past. 'You have a proud heritage. Be all that you can be. After all, look at what the United States has accomplished.' While there is nothing wrong with optimism, it can become something of a burden for students of color, children of working-class parents, girls who notice a dearth of female historical figures, or members of any group that has not achieved socioeconomic success. The optimistic approach prevents any understanding of failure other than blaming the victim. No wonder children of color are alienated. Even for male children from affluent white families, bland optimism gets pretty boring after eight hundred pages."

...

"Denying students the humanness keeps in intellectual immaturity. It perpetuates what might be called a Disney version of history. . . Our children end up without realistic role models to inspire them. Students also develop no understanding of causality in history."

-- James Loewen, in "Lies My Teacher Told Me."

I'm dismayed to find the Disney approach to history rearing it's head yet again, where all characters must be reduced to Good Hero or Bad Villain, with some wanting to whitewash facts where they don't fit the hero/villain mold - which, coincidentally, seems to echo Loewen's observations about race, where there is pressure to portray white americans out to be all good (don't speak bad of the dead), even if they committed brutal crimes, or if they did commit those crimes, it's a footnote to the fact that they were pro-choice, or sure they were responsible for the slaughter of thousands, but you know, they had good intentions when it came to America, they were just misguided.

And anyone who doesn't do the opposite when the leader in question ain't lilly-white - anyone who considers the family, or lays out the good along with the bad of their policies - is mocked and cut down to size immediately. My concern is not respect for the relatives or respect for the dead. My concern, as a teacher, is that we are right now in the process of dumbing down yet another chapter of American history into an oversimplified disney narrative, and I don't for the life of me understand why that's a good thing.

"I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes ..."

-- Winston Churchill

[Redstone]

1. Fuck no. No excuses for murderous dictators. We can argue the death penalty until

we're blue in the face, but there are NO excuses for monsters like Saddam Hussein.

And before you aln start in on me again, no, I am NOT excusing the psychopathic actions of bush and them.

Redstone

[originalpckelly]

2. They fucked everything up so bad, they have even managed...

to make fucking Saddam look better. That's saying a lot. Saddam's execution may be a bigger Samara.

I don't sympathize with Saddam, and I was a voice against Ford bashing, but even I'm willing to admit this.

They just fucked it up royally, so much so that an awful dictator may be a fucking martyr to some stupid Iraqis. Saddam's a metaphor for BushCO's fuck-up.

[Redstone]

5. How right you are. It truly boggles the imagination, doesn't it? What a fucking nightmare

this has been. Except that we can't just wake up from it.

Jesus.

Redstone

[originalpckelly]

6. The only thing that might possibly have been good out of this conflict...

something which seemed forgone, has even been fucked up. (That doesn't mean killing Saddam, but just Saddam being brought to justice in general.)

Of course, if we remember, that's exactly how Iraq was supposed to be. We were going to be greeted as liberators. The war wasn't supposed to last even six months.

Sounds like we bought some magic beans.

[Redstone]

9. And those magic beans grew a malignant vine, didn't they? Do you remember VietNam?

I do. In fact, I'm beginning to remember it a bit too much right now.

Allow me to commend you for being a consistent voice of rationality here at DU, and to sign off for the night.

We'll pick up the good fight again tomorrow, or the next day.

Redstone

[noamnety]

3. that's fine.

I was asking about the whole lot of them though, not just saddam. Do you get equally irate when you see someone holding up Churchill as a standard of goodness?

Or ... not quite so irate for some reason.

I'm really more interested in comparing our reactions - and the forcefulness of them - across the board, not just your reaction (or any DUer's reaction) to any one specific name I listed.

[originalpckelly]

4. I think I know what you mean, and I think I know why we did it.

Saddam didn't do anything to us. When we talk about him, the pain he inflicted isn't our pain, but the pain of people on the other side of the world. It's easy for us to talk about the humanizing aspects of Saddam.

Ford was our guy, and he did something to us. We're not willing to see the things which humanize him, because he pardoned Nixon, and that is a pain in our hearts.

We're just like the Iraqis in that sense, not because we're bad people, but only because we are people. Like it or not, that's just how people are. We try to simplify the world, and sometimes that really sucks.

[Redstone]

7. No, I'll NOT lump Churchill, nor FDR in that group. I will not.

The entire WORLD was at stake. The monstrosity of Hitler and Japan was beyond the scale of anything we can even imagine.

I've fought Russians. to this day, I detest Russians, even though I bear no animosity to any other ethnic group or race.

But if I were in Churchill's or FDR's place, I'd have dealt with that devil Stalin just like they did.

Because the alternative was even worse.

I'm NOT going to second-guess them.

Redstone

[noamnety]

12. Oh!

I have a soft spot in my heart for the Russians, that's funny.

off topic, though, I suppose.

[noamnety]

10. Actually, I have another question for you

or really for anyone, or not. It's not a demand that anyone answers it, I'm just tossing things out here as they occur to me.

Do historians and political scientists have a moral and professional obligation to acknowledge that women's rights were better in Iraq for a time than in surrounding countries, and that access to education and health care improved (and then began to fall again) under Saddam, so that they can work to find why those conditions improved, in an effort to recreate those improvements in other countries (and prevent the falling part)?

Or is it better to not acknowledge those conditions, even if they did exist (and even if the study of how that came to be could help advance human rights for others), because it gives legitimacy to him as a ruler? In other words, is this a case where historians maybe should rewrite history? Maybe not rewrite it, exactly, but maybe leave out some bits?

[Redstone]

11. Yes, you make a good point. At least under Hussein, the average Iraqi only had ONE

entity to be afraid of, which was Hussein and his goons.

Yes, I'll grant you that. Now they don't know WHAT direction Death will approach from.

Under Hussein, women DID have more rights, and (until the sanctions), the average Iraqi did indeed live pretty well by the standards of Middle Eastern countries.

I did not mean to be so harsh in my previous reply. You raise a good point: What, indeed, is the balance?

However, history is full of dictators who brought NO benefit to their population: Stalin, Hoxsa, Ceaucescu.

And I'll continue to maintain that for you to include Churchill in this bunch is just WRONG.

but I understand what you're trying to say.

Redstone

[noamnety]

13. I feel like I should include Churchill

He was the first person to use poison gas against the Kurds.

[illinoisprogressive]

8. History is not Disney but, it's not doom either

You have to take alot of it into the context of the times and eras. They way people thought a century ago was much different from now. What is unacceptable today was normal then.
The culture and times. Churchill was a product of his times, class and british society.
reagan came from a time in his coming of age in the 20s and 30s.
He really believed the wwii thinking and ideas.
W is a product of the baby boomer generation. Alot of his thinking is colored by the boomer mantras of me, me and me. His class and culture reinforced it. But, his sociopathic tendies are from nurture.
Saddam was a product of his tribe and culture and the fact he was raised in an abusive and saddistic home.
ect,. ect.,
This biggest thing is all the political platitudes aside, alot of things are due to home, and culture, ect. You cannot think someone of an earlier age is evil because he did not think like we do now.
In order to understand history and leaders you must open your mind and not be judgemental. Sometimes I fear we close ours in our rightness. The key to understanding and knowledge and making changes is understanding and an open mind.