I remember growing up and every history class seeming to end at the end of ww2 and being like… ok but then what? Or just like other things around too… like I knew there was more to history than this but it’s all we ever fucking talked about. Didn’t help that this was during that period where the gaming industry was churning out ww2 shooters constantly, I was so fucking sick of it lol
The only context we talked about Korea or Vietnam in school was about the domestic policy and protests because of them. Nothing about the wars themselves.
Yup. Went to a great public school, I was in AP history
We had literally nothing about anything post WWII
If your curriculum covers the Korean War, it goes like this: After WW2, there was North and South Korea aligned with the Soviets and Americans, respectively. Then, one day the North attacked the South unprovoked! Through the UN, America scrambled to defend its ally cause the silly Soviets were boycotting! We were able to push the North out of the South and restore the borders! :)
Nothing about the US' obstructionism towards the creation of the PRK, nothing about how the US handpicked Syngman Rhee, nothing about the Jeju Uprising, nothing about the mass politicide being done in the south that led to northern intervention, nothing about the south keeping colonial administration, nothing about the American massacres of Koreans during the war, nothing about the genocidal level of bombing done by the Americans, nothing about Soviet involvement in the war.
I've told liberals who aren't completely brainwashed about this stuff, and they're shocked and a little disturbed, but it's never enough to change their convictions.
Weirdly, you can read about most of this from Wikipedia. It doesn't even need to be hidden anymore from the American people. :agony-deep:
taught us history, even in the better textbooks, none of that stuff is mentioned. at best you get the "he was no angel" treatment for Syngman Ree.
You’re missing the part about the evil Chinese joining in the war which was sneaky and wrong, only [GOOD COUNTRIES] are allowed to intervene in wars
AND NOTHING ABOUT HOW THE DIVISION WASN'T EVEN VOTED ON, THE US JUST PUT IT SOMEWHAT IN THE MIDDLE WITH SEOUL IN THEIR TERRITORY, SO HOW COULD THE NORTH "INVADE" THE SOUTH????
the south also did attack first, and took a village
Could you give me some good googling terms or a link so I can read about this?
I got it from this book: https://www.pdfdrive.com/killing-hope-e22297642.html
Killing Hope by William Blum is excellent for knowing about America's fascist foreign policy
uncritical support for the DPRK in its heroic struggle to liberate occupied Korea from the genocidal American empire
They don't know.
And if you tell them, the North probably did as bad.
And if you tell them they didn't, it's probably exaggerated.
And if you prove it's not, then it was so long ago and it also doesn't "excuse what the North does today".
None of them know, and if you tell them they think you're being hysterical. We literally have a monument in Washington DC that's the equivalent of the Nazis erecting a monument to the brave camp guards.
I remember talking to an american once, and they were extremely surprised that we were taught formally in our history classes that the gulf of Tonkin incident (the boat sinking that the USA used as an excuse to go into Vietnam) was an inside job.
Not only because an action of the USA was being openly spoken of as a false flag, but because they didn't cover the Vietnam war in their history classes.
I'd imagine it's a similar situation.
I'm an American and I was taught that it was a false flag operation in class. It could have just been my history teacher though
Did your history teacher also basically tell you that JFK assassination was not legit. He showed us the whole theory about the grassy knoll
Now that I'm remembering, he also basically said castro was a Chad who had lots of sex. Could have been a secret commie
The only thing we learned about history outside of Denmark was some actually quite decent classes on the French Revolution. Even WWII was reduced to just being about the German occupation of Denmark. If they even mentioned the Holocaust it was only in passing.
in our history classes that the gulf of Tonkin incident (the boat sinking that the USA used as an excuse to go into Vietnam) was an inside job.
what country? sounds based
We didn't kill a million civilians and raze an entire country to the ground.
And if we did, it wasn't that bad - it's just normal war stuff, everyone does it.
And if it was, that's not a big deal, since they're, y'know... :us-foreign-policy: .
And if it is, it's not our fault, they should have just moved out of the way of the bombs.
And if it was, we didn't mean it.
And if we did...
They deserved it.
most Americans barely know about the Korean War, let alone that it was essentially a genocide of the Korean people
No. Not at all. It's not covered. The Korean War is almost always glossed over in history class or in rare cases where it isn't a brief propagandized version where the wholesome and totally not Japanese collaborating fascist Southern Koreans asked the Americans for help from the totally aggressive and attacking them without provocation or reason ebil communists from the north and then the Americans were winning but then the Chinese came over and the country was divided in half and now North Korea is a giant rock-breaking labor camp filled with Potemkin village type fake cities and such to fool outsiders. Also the Kim family eats all the food.
You can tell them but they would either:
- Let is pass into one ear and out of the other without even processing it.
- Claim that it is Korean/tankie/antisemitic propaganda
- Call it whataboutism and talk about how evil and bad Korea is
- Do the whole "it was a different time" routine
I can already hear pretty much every fellow American I know say "yes but how many people has North Korea killed?" And if you respond that it's infinitesimally smaller, then they not believe you and call you a genocide denier or something; and the irony will be lost on them.
I told a lib at work about the horrific stuff North Korea was put through during the war and the continuing hostile actions by the US and all I got was a glazed look and a monotone "But think of the poor North Korean people"
A children's book series that I came across in 2nd or 3rd grade had a better position on it than most history books: one of the characters, a Korean girl, saying "fighting is wrong, I know because my grandfather Bong die in Korean War".
yeah I came here to say this, theyve heard it theyve just been prepared with a lifetime of excuses
unless you study history in college (and who the hell can afford that?) and take a class specifically about the topic, we never learn jack shit about Korea. in high school, i had to write a one page report on the Korean War using a source provided by class. it was an encyclopedia on a CD-ROM where there was a simple animation of red dots "invading" the south, blue dots pushing the red dots back to the Yalu River, then more red dots entering from China to push the blue dots back to the parallel. there were dates for these events and that's what i had to include to get a good grade. this "report" was in lieu of ever learning about Korea in class.
it is absolutely the narrative of "the commies tried to kill everyone in the south, so we magnanimously fought them, with the backing of the UN, all the way back to the north and almost scored a touchdown, but the Chinese swooped in with a whole bunch of guys and cheated and pushed us back to the 50 yard line. so now the peninsula is only half free.
as i got older and entered the Zinn-pilled phase of my redemption arc, i assumed there was probably something darker to it like everything else. i nibbled around the edges when wikipedia became a thing and stumbled on the Bodo League. even going in assuming the worst, blowback season 3 was shocking and revolting.
Football in particular lends itself a lot to military planning, thinking, and structure.
