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Monday, July 9, 2018

July Ultimate Blog Challenge - history



The word of the day is history. Not my usual blog but the tenor of recent times has me disturbed.

Why are people so intent on re-writing history simply because it doesn't reflect how things are presently?  You can't eradicate something that happened in the past just because you don't agree with it now. Don't they realize what happened in the past affects the future? Even if you manage to erase all memory or mention of an incident or an attitude that happened to be prevalent at that time, it has already imprinted the present.

I am a fiction writer. Many of the novels I've publish have been set in the past, preferably our country's past. My greatest satisfaction comes with the research this requires. I put a lot of effort into being historically accurate in all the details. If you're interested, go to https://www.amazon.com/author/gayingram and check out a couple like Mai Lin, Troubled Times or my latest George Washington, From Boy Surveyor to Soldier.

History, both the good and the bad, is there to teach us and to illustrate how we humans have evolved. Learn from the past but keep it in context of the times. Recognize society and people at that time differed from the present. What was acceptable then is not today simply because of history's effect.

You can't go back & change history but you can look back, learn from it not to make the same mistakes. That is the value of our word of the day - history.

2 comments:

  1. I agree with you completely, Gay. I'm half-way through my History MA, which I started because I realised I knew so little about so many things. You read a lot about bad things and bad decisions, but it's easy to point out what went wrong with hindsight. I don't like judging people, because what we have done in their position with the information available at the time? I wish we learnt more from the mistakes made and appreciated people's achievements more, even if their values were different.

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  2. appreciate you stopping by & commenting

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