Sins of the father

[sithsaber]

How does the left view this concept? Numerous travesties have been committed by various races and creeds throughout human history. How civilizations confront their past can say a lot about their future. America has a tendency to either sweep their crimes under the rug or admit their faults and tell themselves their ancestors were from an unenlightened time. If they lived back then, they truly believe they would do the right thing. How do places with recent dark histories view their past? How should they? An obvious example of this issue is Germany. Should affronts to humanity be allowed to rescind into history and be viewed as a scab that eventually heals old wounds or should it stay in the forefront as an example of the evils humanity can commit? How do countries like Spain, the Dominican Republic and Argentina deal with the knowledge that many of their fathers and grand parents supported fascist regimes? Should only leftist elements be recognized while the more reactionary groups that form a bed rock of the present political systems be forgotten? How do Australians feel when they know that they inherited their nation through supplanting another people? How much time should pass before humanity can move on?

[Red Rabbit]

They should be lessons we learn from, but not something we should be dwelling on.

[sithsaber]

They should be lessons we learn from, but not something we should be dwelling on.

Agreed but maybe subliminally we sometimes can't help judging someone due to the past. I know people with connections to fascist entities and some who even have somewhat sympathetic views on them. How can a person who doesn't hate Franco or buys into Japanese nostalgia be fully respected by the international community? Even if they renounce that past, they may still have been raised by people who don't, and due to this may have some deep rooted tendencies towards certain topics (kind of like how many non european or N American peoples have vary macho cultures and due to this look down upon gays).

[¿Que?]

I think I see what you're saying. For example, in the US south, there is a nostalgia and longing for the good old antebellum days. There's even a country artists who calls herself lady antebellum and I believe she wona grammy. To white shoutherners, there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with a musical group calling themselves "antebellum," but I can't see this having much appeal among black southerners.

On a more personal note, I have family that was involved in the military during the dirty war. I also have family that was involved in the resistance as well. So my case is a bit ambiguous. But maybe it isn't. Maybe I just have my personal blinders on like the people who support and listen to that band.

Idk, I'm just rambling.

[MarxSchmarx]

How does the left view this concept? Numerous travesties have been committed by various races and creeds throughout human history. How civilizations confront their past can say a lot about their future. America has a tendency to either sweep their crimes under the rug or admit their faults and tell themselves their ancestors were from an unenlightened time. If they lived back then, they truly believe they would do the right thing. How do places with recent dark histories view their past? How should they? An obvious example of this issue is Germany. Should affronts to humanity be allowed to rescind into history and be viewed as a scab that eventually heals old wounds or should it stay in the forefront as an example of the evils humanity can commit? How do countries like Spain, the Dominican Republic and Argentina deal with the knowledge that many of their fathers and grand parents supported fascist regimes? Should only leftist elements be recognized while the more reactionary groups that form a bed rock of the present political systems be forgotten? How do Australians feel when they know that they inherited their nation through supplanting another people? How much time should pass before humanity can move on?

For settler countries (America, Argentina, Australia and to some extent the Dominacan Republic, as well as Canada, and many African, Pacific and western hemisphere states) in the examples you raise, the only way forward is, for better or worse, full integration of indigenous cultures into national culture.

This has already happened to a considerable extent in Mexico, Taiwan and to a lesser extent in, for example, New Zealand. People no longer see themselves as indigenous versus colonizers - they see themselves as the same people of some land. Indeed, most colonizing New Zealanders, Taiwanese, and Mexicans, even of second generation, do not see themselves as British, Chinese or Spanish, respectively, but identify far more with the traditions of their place of birth than with those of their past. There are of course some who prefer to live in the land of their ancestors, but their numbers are so small it is telling.

All this requires creating a culture of integrationism. It is hard and in some cases it doesn't work - the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia are two spectacular failures of attempts to break pre-capitalist bonds, and South Africa's colonists, who never really integrated indigenous traditions, are notorious for their willingness to emigrate. But a common education system, a common language, and an affinity for cultural things like music and dance that deliberately creates a new set of identities that transcend generations are required.

Another example, albeit from a non-settler society, of this phenomenon is Singapore. There, the common language is English, the common culture is decidedly an admixture of Malay-English-Chinese-Indian, and these commonalities far outstrip the day to day experiences of most people who, ultimately, go home to Hindu or chopstick-using or ramadan-observing households. Singapore is a young country, but it's example is not unique for the region - Malakka in south east asia has historically been as diverse and thrived for centuries on a culture that was comfortably multi-ethnic, and arguably Singapore has inherited its mantle.

[sithsaber]

Another example of this issue is a blasian i know (half cambodian half black) who identifies herself as south vietnamese due to some"complicated issues" (most likely due to being raised by vietnamese who may look down on cambodians due to their war with the Khmer rouge )

[Jimmie Higgins]

How does the left view this concept? Numerous travesties have been committed by various races and creeds throughout human history. How civilizations confront their past can say a lot about their future. America has a tendency to either sweep their crimes under the rug or admit their faults and tell themselves their ancestors were from an unenlightened time. If they lived back then, they truly believe they would do the right thing. How do places with recent dark histories view their past? How should they? An obvious example of this issue is Germany. Should affronts to humanity be allowed to rescind into history and be viewed as a scab that eventually heals old wounds or should it stay in the forefront as an example of the evils humanity can commit? How do countries like Spain, the Dominican Republic and Argentina deal with the knowledge that many of their fathers and grand parents supported fascist regimes? Should only leftist elements be recognized while the more reactionary groups that form a bed rock of the present political systems be forgotten? How do Australians feel when they know that they inherited their nation through supplanting another people? How much time should pass before humanity can move on?

I mean first of all I don't think some kind of nation-wide group-guilt is really necessary or productive. It's more useful to understand how and why this happened and actually the battle for this explanation is highly political and loaded.

The Civil War and Reconstruction are an excellent example of the politics of historical interpretations. These events have been viewed differently at different points in US history (and by different people/classes) which reflects the sort of political landscape of the time. At the start of the war, aside from some race-fearmongering by the Southern Ruling class*, everyone agreed that the war had nothing to do with slavery whereas by the end, it was clear to even Lincoln that the war was a war against the power of the slave system. Popular culture and magazine illustrations reflected this shift in the thinking of a section of the Northern Ruling class and the war was presented in biblical and liberation-themed articles and etchings. People (soldiers in the North) sang songs like "John Brown's Body" celebrating someone who today would be called a terrorist or gurella (and was called the antebellum equivalents when he was put to death by the state).

During Reconstruction the ideological and political battles were also reflected in how people interpreted the recent history. But when Reconstruction was stopped and then a period of reaction against the gains of the newly freed people set in, the history changed. The war became seen not like the French Revolution, a war against an old and tyrannical system, to be seen as a tragic war of "brother against brother". In the South, the drive to take rights away and re-institute an unequivocal white supremest order was reflected in a resurgence of pro-Confederacy nostalgia: the war was a "lost cause" a tragic last hurrah of a golden age. Although perceptions of the war fluxualted after that. Noteablely these perceptions got worse in periods of reaction like the 1920s when segregation increased and the KKK gained legitimacy and the war was represented to mass audiences in things like "Birth of a Nation" in which apparently slavery was an institution to prevent black people from attacking white women and the KKK are batman. With the civil rights, John Brown went from crazy to liberation figure again and the whole understanding of the civil war was brought back to focusing on the issue of slavery. Interestingly now it's the right-wing who always seem to insist that the war wasn't about slavery and that capitalism could have ended slavery just through technological improvements (a historically idiotic argument considering that the slave-owning class was digging in further in the years before the war). Their view of history goes hand in hand with their ideological myths about capitalist progress and the color-blindness of the US. History is a battleground.

*EDIT: and many slaves themselves - I've read accounts of slaves running away at the beginning of the war in large numbers because they realized the war could destroy the slave system, the north would no longer return slaved during the war, and the Southern rulers would be too busy fighting to spend a lot of resources on slave-catching.