That was a far deeper response than I had expected. Thanks.
My pleasure.
I couldn't agree more with your concerns. I think we should always be aware of our past, good and bad. How else do we learn from it?
Yes. I always say, "I want the truth". About biology, physics, the nature of God, history, everything. No matter how terrible or depressing or shitty it is. Give me reality as it is, and let me deal with the consequences of that. Let me find my own way forward with the truth by my side. Don't hide things or make them seems better than as they are.
We can celebrate the things we did right, and celebrate the lessons we learned from when we fucked up.
Right. Like here's the good things we got right - we got the Enlightenment, where we discovered individual freedom and liberty was important. We got some reasonably good form of science, where we can objectively describe and analyze the world. We got reasonable government structures with democracy and republics, and reasonably good economic structures with free markets. Those are the good things.
Totalitarian societies, which have always ended in disaster (the most notable today being North Korea), is bad. Committing genocide, under any circumstances, is bad. And tons of other things too. Unless you face the harsh reality of just how bad they were, you start thinking like many people and saying "well, if we can just get socialism right this time, it'll be great!"
...No. I'm not going down that road.
That was a far deeper response than I had expected. Thanks.
I couldn't agree more with your concerns. I think we should always be aware of our past, good and bad. How else do we learn from it?
We can celebrate the things we did right, and celebrate the lessons we learned from when we fucked up.
If we hide from our mistakes, we will repeat them.
Humanity has a dark side that can be controlled and directed when confronted. Repressing it has always lead to death and disaster, yet people always want to try it again.