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The Chamber of Commerce of Great Neck commissions a history of the town, then insists that sections dealing with slavery and the KKK be deleted. Also getting the axe: passages indicating there are Iranians living in Great Neck.

Comments

[Grant Gould]

Tim -- On the one hand, Iranians aren't Arabs. On the other hand, I'm sure that the Great Neckians don't know that either.
--G

[Madog]

Hmm, since they've deleted references to the KKK as well, perhaps they're trying to route out all types of Fascism. And, as we all know, Iranians are Aryans, just like the Nazis, and Nazis are the spiritual cousins of the KKK. So really, they're fighting AGAINST racism and fascism, not being racist or fascist themselves.

[Tim Stich]

"Tim -- On the one hand, Iranians aren't Arabs."

You obviously haven't checked the constantly expanding definition of what being "Arab" includes. I used the term "arab" in my pamphlet copy to cover all of the bases.

Hotel rates are at thier lowest ever. Book now and avoid the rush.

[Lawrence]

Tim, try using the term "Islamist" to cover all of your bases. You'll probably be more on target.

[swash buckle]

Before you know it, passages indicating there ever were any American aborigines (Indians) living in Great Neck will also be struck from school textbooks -- along with any indications that Dutchies founded their state's largest city.

And it wouldn't surprise me if the fact that French beaver trappers roamed their fields, would get the axe as well.

You know, America was once one of the sanest places on earth. Now, with all this PC-nonsense* going on, it's turning into ONE BIG NUT HOUSE -- following in the footsteps of Europe, which is already there.

(*Political Correctness, for you high school greenhorns.)

[Plutarck]

Yet more Orwellian rewriting of history, I see. What a fascinating, and horrifying, sort of thing it all is.

Kind of hard to learn from history when it has been erased, isn't it? Which, I believe, is quite often the whole point - even if it isn't what's intended.

So much for the heroic tales of overcoming the past and failure, eh? Whatever happend to those, anyway?

[Plutarck]

Adding to swash buckle:

One must also wonder if it will one day become common to not even know what the holocaust is, perhaps leaving no memory of its actual occurence whatsoever, because it inspires racial and religious enmity. Further slavery will never really have happened, except perhaps Long Long Ago, and only done by Terrible, Terrible, Inhuman Sorts of People, because it too inspires racial enmity and distrust.

When history is an obstacle to change, then one must simply change it and erase it. Indeed, history is written by the winners - a tale of things which mostly did not occur, brought about by kings who were knaves, executed by soldiers who were fools, doing things which were of little ultimate consequence.

[Madog]

I dunno, old history books weren't that great. I came across one from the late 50s that refered to the "diminuative but brave slant-eyed soldiers of the Emperor" in it's section on WWII. And that was just one part of the book.

Just as bad as the current PC crap in it's own way. It was only when I learned that everyone in history had flaws as well as greatness that I truly enjoyed learning about it.

[swash buckler]

"It was only when I learned that everyone in history had flaws as well as greatness that I truly enjoyed learning about it."

Yeah, me too. But to ERASE all that history?? To simply wipe the slate clean?? That's no worse than book burning.

[SB]

Erratum: "That's no better than book burning." (Or, "that is just as bad.")

[Evilcor]

You want revisionism?
I have two editions of a (sort of) history book commissioned by the U.S. Government. The copyright for the first is 1943, the second is 1946.
In the former, the Nazis are accurately slammed (propaganda is easy against the really evil), while in the latter we discover that the Soviets were also bad guys!
I can't stress how skillfully the alterations were made. The meaning of whole passages (like the storming of the Mannerheim Line) are changed with only a few words out of place.
In case you wondered. . . as of 1943 Stalin's duplicitous foreign policy followed by a totally unprovoked invasion of Finland was "strenuous last-minute diplomacy" while in 1946, Stalin was a murdering psychopath bent on world domination.
I wonder what 'revisions' somebody's cooking up today.

[Tim Stich]

It sounds like the Great Neck Chamber of Commerce should have just stuck to writing travel pamphlets.

Good reasons to visit Great Neck:

? nice beaches
? friendly folks
? no klansmen or arabs
? that Great Neck feeling!

[boncoeur]

Well, evilcor, as long as we can maintain a (relatively) free world, there will always be other sources we can refer to in order to get the true stories about such hicrimes.

(We never sleep either.)