Circa1865

The following is an introductory paragraph from the June 2021 Chronicles magazine article by Roger D. McGrath identifying the source of many misunderstood events in history. Too often the culprit is poorly researched government or media-generated reports – or simply propaganda – that soon become “history.” This is followed by teachers who pass this on to their students.

“It’s What People Believe Happened That Counts”

“Arguing with my liberal high school teacher did not endear me to him. It got worse when a day or two after one of these class disagreements I brought to class material demonstrating the teacher had been feeding us a false narrative. The teacher was not doing so intentionally but simply out of ignorance, having accepted a narrative generated by leftists in academe.

However, it soon became evident to me that my liberal teachers were quick to accept a leftist narrative not only because it came from university professors – the putative intelligentsia – but because it made America look bad.

The problem worsened in college. Nonetheless, in those days there still existed a substantial minority of conservative professors. I recall discussing with a conservative history professor a topic of great interest to me. He told me I was right about a particular sequence of events, but then added, “Remember, it is not what actually happened that matters – it’s what people believe happened that counts.”

(The Deliberate Infection Myth of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study. Roger D. McGrath. Chronicles Magazine, June 2021, pp. 44-45)