Jason Stanford was looking forward to an online event hosted by the Bullock Texas State History Museum in Austin. More than 300 people had RSVP’d, and the book that Stanford recently co-authored — “Forget the Alamo: The Rise and Fall of an American Myth” — has been generating a lot of buzz and positive reviews.
Four hours before the session was supposed to start, he got word that it had been canceled.
In an op-ed, Stanford explains what he has learned about who torpedoed the event. While conservatives are the ones complaining most loudly about “cancel culture” these days, this cancellation doesn’t exactly fit their narrative.
At a moment when debates over history and how to teach it are center stage, I think you’ll find this story relevant as well as, possibly, infuriating.
Which version of history is the right one? Maybe none?
I am always highly skeptical of modern historians wanting to make their name by writing splashy stories about "how it really was".
Should we trust the historian who wrote about the event twenty years later when he could actually physically interview the living survivors? Or do we trust the guy who arrives 150 years later. Who grew up in a much different society making judgements based on 21st century ideals?
Of course, it can always go the other way too, Texas was trying to fight a war and win a peace so they probably tried to make their justifications for throwing off the yoke of Mexico very one sided.
So it can be just this way with CRT. If you are going to look at America's first one hundred years through a prism that says everything the Founding Fathers did was to take power away from minorities and women, you might find that some people want to dispute their opinions.
Controlling what gets taught in schools has always been an issue around the world. Do you want the federal government making those decisions? States? Local School boards? Parents?
In a perfect world, it would be nice to teach history showing multiple views, but I doubt anyone would be happy with that.
Thomas Sowell: There are no solutions, just trade-offs.
Decades after The Alamo, Slave owners in Texas didn't bother to tell their slaves they had been freed. Two-and-a-half years later, the slaves finally finally found out. Today, it's a national holiday.
