Dorothea Lange’s Censored Photos of Japanese American Internment Camps (2017)

still indiscriminately expected to have white guilt

Doesnt seem nuanced enough or productive for American society

Not just because it was good land, but because japanese family farms were very efficient and proficient "truck farms" (growing cash crops like strawberries, peppers, beans, gourds, … for markets and restaurants): californian japanese farms had almost 10% of that market before the removal order, and their farms were worth ~$250/acre on average, versus ~$40 US average.

Stumping for the "victory garden" was a direct consequence of the internment order, and tens of millions worth of truck crops unexpectedly missing from the market.

Schools and teachers aren't 100% standardized in America. Some have thorough history programs. Some absolutely do brush over a lot of bad parts in history, and my high school in the South was one of the types to say "The Civil War had nothing to do with slavery." Our biology class also had a huge disclaimer about evolution and how nobody had to, or really should, believe it, but they were just required to teach it.

So I think when some people talk about how ridiculous/amazing the school system is, it's because that's just their experience. Schools are completely different depending on what state or even what part of town you live in.

Take the impeachment of Johnson as an example. The narrative has always been that Congress had gone out of control and tried to remove him out of some plot to gain more power. In actuality the Republicans were trying to save what was left of Reconstruction.

The role of slavery as a cause of the American revolution is non-existent in anything but graduate level historical research.

While it's not 1984 levels of indoctrination it's wrong to say that there aren't approved narratives that support the legitimacy of the State.

'The important thing is to keep them pledging,' he explained to his cohorts. 'It doesn't matter whether they mean it or not. That's why they make little kids pledge allegiance even before they know what "pledge" and "allegiance" mean.'

- Captain Black, in Catch 22

The idea of a soviet expansionist theory that actually impacts the US is laughable to enough of the population

Nobody powerful actually believes the teachings of Karl Marx except to placate their internal public

People kind of seem to understand that interference in the middle east creates danger from very specific people who dont represent everyone, not really protecting us from anything

so now that paranoia leads us to ideological introspection, in the absence of a common enemy

>"Our detention centres are concentration camps and must be closed

>Many Australians may wonder why it was necessary to set up detention centres in the far north of the country, or offshore, far from the Australian mainland, surrounded by guards and razor wire, in circumstances of great secrecy, with all staff and visiting medical personnel banned from telling outsiders about conditions in the camps, or reporting physical or sexual abuse of detainees.

>Or why it was necessary to make it nearly impossible for lawyers or journalists to visit the centres. Or why the Immigration Department was allowed (or required?) to delay vital medical treatment to Hamid Khazaei, causing his death. Or send a raped and pregnant detainee for an abortion to Port Moresby (where it is illegal) rather than Australia; or delay the treatment or transfer to Australia of the man who committed suicide last week by setting himself on fire on Nauru?

>When Nazi Germany set up concentration camps in the 1930s, the purpose was to separate various groups – communists, Jews, homosexuals – from the German community, to prevent them being "tainted" by such people. The camps were maintained in great secrecy; most Germans had little or no knowledge of the awful and dehumanising conditions in which detainees were kept.

>Australia's detention centres in Nauru and Manus Island may have originally been intended to hold detainees for a short period – say, six months – while they were investigated and their claims to refugee status were assessed. But that has long since ceased to justify the existence of these centres.

>The conditions there are bleak, the tropical heat extreme, airconditioning is rare (guards, of course, are in much better, airconditioned, accommodation) – the guards and surrounding locals are hostile, and detainees are regularly physically and verbally abused.

>The worst aspect, however, is the indefinite nature of the detention, and that so many of the refugees who have established their entitlement to refugee status have been held for more than three years, and face an indefinite future in detention.

>Australia's policy towards asylum seekers is one of deliberate and calculated barbaric cruelty. It is clearly designed to make the situation of asylum seekers intolerable, to dehumanise them, and to force them to return to their original countries; for example, Hazaras from Afghanistan must return to a country increasingly dominated by the Taliban, which have waged genocide against them; and those who have fled Iran must return to the waiting arms of the Revolutionary Guards and Tehran's appalling Evin prison, one of the most frightful hell-holes in the world. Iran last year executed more than 1000 prisoners.

>That Australia's policy is intentionally cruel is well demonstrated by government ministers who have rejected all offers, whether from New Zealand or the premiers of all Australian states, to settle any of the present asylum seekers. The Minister for Immigration and Border Protection, Peter Dutton, rejected those offers out of hand. The Prime Minister said it would not be a good marketing look.

>The camps in Manus Island and Nauru have long since ceased to be mere detention centres. They are now concentration camps.

>Labor's immigration spokesman Richard Marles has called offshore processing "the single most important policy that any Australian government has made". The Prime Minister recently described those who oppose the government's policy towards asylum seekers as "misty-eyed".

>A week ago, representatives from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees visited Nauru and told detainees that none of them would escape from the camps within 10 years. In the past week, two have set themselves on fire. It is the only way to end their suffering. Are those cowards and hypocrites in the Australian Parliament going to tell us that this is merely another attention-attracting device?"