Deep crimson stains mottle the pages of humanity's history. Untold numbers of souls who were skewered, decapitated, eviscerated, or obliterated in anonymity scream out for recognition as one peruses humankind's memoirs. While our historical manuscript is also generously dappled by the milk of human kindness, much of our narrative is dominated by tales of man's savage cruelty to man.
And despite widespread misconceptions, the human collective of the United States has acted in accord with the rest of the players on history's stage.
Relative to its predecessors, the empire sometimes referred to as Pax Americana is not exceptionally exploitative, acquisitive, or genocidal. One can point to numerous historical examples of clans, tribes, or nations with comparable levels of bloodlust. As masters of the world go, the United States has been fairly run of the mill in its pathologies.
Yet what galls many about the United States is the hubristic set of pernicious and enduring myths that portray our nation so disingenuously. Since the founding of our so-called republic, textbook authors, historians, teachers, our government, the mainstream media, and the moneyed elite have striven tenaciously to convince the working class, the rest of the world, and perhaps even themselves of our moral superiority and exemplary virtue.
Recently the Bush administration's egregious and blatant breaches of morals, ethics, and laws have rendered the illusion of American Exceptionalism virtually untenable.
Yet not unlike Joe Pesci's witness in My Cousin Vinny, whose testimony could only have been true if the "laws of physics ceased to exist on [his] stove", there are still many among us in the United States who make claims that could only be true if the "laws of human nature" ceased to exist in our country.
We are as prone to cruelty, greed, gluttony, selfishness, and the like as the rest of the human race. In fact, our refusal to own our collective shadow (coupled with our possession of nearly unlimited economic and military power) has heightened our nation's tendency to behave like a rogue.
Why do so many amongst the poor and working class of the United States embrace the spiritual cancers of consumerism, patriotism, nationalism, blind allegiance to corporations, and delusional thinking so readily proffered by a relatively tiny group of aristocrats who reside on the other side of a wealth canyon that was once known as a gap?
A few days ago, I caught up with Carolyn Baker, an open-minded and deeply knowledgeable author, essayist, publisher and history professor. She worked as a psychotherapist for two decades and has spoken truth to power for years. I felt confident that Carolyn could shed some serious light on the issues vexing me. So I asked her a series of questions....
1. Please briefly acquaint us with your latest book, US History Uncensored: What Your High School Textbook Didn't Tell You (1).
This book grew out of years of teaching recent American history (1865 to the present) when after several semesters of teaching, I realized that I should compile my lecture notes and relevant documents into a book. Because I prefer struggling with questions rather than declaring that I have answers, I introduce the book in this way: "How did we arrive where we are now: American society dominated by corporations and their interests, an economy based on war and the weapons industry, trillions of dollars missing from federal government agencies, the annihilation of our civil liberties and the shredding of the U.S. Constitution, the dumbing-down of America and the reduction of our educational system to the lowest common denominator, Peak Oil-the best-kept secret in America, and the polarization of economic prosperity and quality of life?"
The book raises myriad questions about recent American history and offers possible answers, and very well-documented ones at that.
2. Those who are familiar with Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States(2) are probably thinking that the two books sound similar. How would you compare and contrast your book with Zinn's?
First, Zinn's books are essentially essays, and they are extremely worthwhile. Zinn has been an enormous inspiration for me, and I can't get enough of him, but my book is more than a book per se; it is a curriculum abstract. In other words, it was written not only for the reader who just wants to read about U.S. history from the end of the Civil War to the present, but was also written so that history instructors or instructors of other subjects can utilize it as a supplement to their required textbooks or other materials.
In addition, while I have the greatest respect for Howard Zinn, there are some subjects that I do not feel he has sufficiently addressed such as 9/11 and energy depletion as a motivation for epidemic resource wars around the world.
3. I am curious, and I suspect the readers are too, to know more about you as a person. Please favor us (to the degree to which you feel comfortable) with a brief verbal self-portrait of Carolyn Baker.
