At my high school (not sure about the rest of australia, coz i go to a catholic high school) we do not actully learn about the way the Australian's, New Zealander, British and American Prisoners of War were treated by the Japanese, because we have exchange students from japan, and don't want to offend them. All we are told was, POW camps were horrible places, and many Australian went there. Most of my friends would have had no idea about the death marches and the Burmha-Thailand Railway if they hadn't found out themselves.

He who controls the present, controls the past. He who controls the past, controls the future. ~George Orwell, 1984


Sounds like a plan in action in today's schools.

I think one of the biggest impediments to making logical decisions nowadays is political correctness. It is our own worst enemy. Because of it, unfortunately, certain meaningful actions cannot be taken because they fall under "racial profiling," or "discriminatory."
Well being on topic let me ask you this question: Where are you most likely to find a sack of explosives? At the bottom of a well at the Buddhist Monestary or behind the book shelf at the local Mosque? And if the bomb really is in the well, the Buddhists probably don't know about it either and you should issue an evacuation order.

I believe you are talking about the Koran, but I am at a loss as to what your point is.

Okay here it goes.

Since my daughter is currently studying the American Civil War we'll post just a few "facts" from her text.

The South fired on Fort Sumter because Lincoln was going to free the slaves.

In the North men joined the Union Army because Slavery needed to be ended.

Everybody with me so far?

I'm no Civil War expert by any stretch of the imagination however,it appears to me that many causes and effects of this particular period have been glossed over and prettied up.

The first statement may have a modicum of truth but Lincoln never said he would emacipate prior to 1863. In fact he said " Would that I could restore our Union without freeing a slave I would." It totally ignores the other causes of the war, tariffs, states rights, difference in cultures etc.

The second statement while some abolitionists may have the slavery question to common soliders was a secondary issue. If one studies the histories of the common soliders you find that for the Union restoration of the Union was primary and for the South defending the state was primary.

The Civil War has been prettied up to resemble a great crusade without all the facts being presented.
The Mexican War probably the United States worst moment as an expanding empire was given two paragraphs.

Wow, those are some pretty big lies. I bet your daughter's text book said nothing about how freeing the slaves was a move to keep Great Britian out of the war. I can see why you would be irritated in reading her text book. When I have kids, I will have to set the record straight.

When I become a history teacher after I retire from the Army, I will use textbooks as little as possible. All my good history teachers used handouts and videos more than anything else.

It irritates me to the point that the children are getting a biased and incorrect version of history. In the name of political correctness.
The best history teacher I ever had was a retired Army Infantry Lt. Col. BTW. You want to talk about no gloss.

My US History II teacher in Junior year was an outspoken Conservative, and I can say that I have never had a better history lesson taught to me in my life than that year. I am not saying that it really matters what political beliefs you hold, but Conservative teachers tend to tell kids things more straight up than Liberal teachers who have shown to me in the past the inability to stop making things PC.
To talk about the Mexican-American War, I would have loved to hear more about it since it costs so many American lives to win anyway. I am not ashamed of it, the US was merely taking part in something every nation with aims of power in the future did. You know what's ironic, because we actually annexed our conquered land into our actual country rather than make all conquered subjects second or third class citizens, we probably have one of the most successful and long-standing empires of the 20th century. (Although I believe the British might beat us at that)
Anyway, I think that our teachers should just tell us things strait up and not make the world seem like all Peaches and Cream. Life is tough, you live hard and fast and then die. Accept it, humans do despicable things but I have this belief that in the end everything has happened for a reason. (I mean a positive reason that affects the future)

What I found about textbooks is that they would admit evil things happen, like massacre, fascism, holocaust etc which is a really blurred view on the world and thing which makes me laugh is they are always going on about remebering the past to prevent it in the future but if they tell a pack of lies about it and give a twisted view this "idea" of theirs doesnt make sense.

What amuses me is that "modern" history books see fit to go digging in history for feminism, racism and other such related topics, and tends to skip on the real history. Very frequently, religion is mostly skipped or touched on only lightly, yet if you want to tell history, you simply CANNOT understand without a good understanding of religious beliefs of the day. Try explaining the 30 Years War without going into religion. Political correctness takes precedence over actually understanding what happened.