Studying Other Cultures- The Great, the True, and the Ugly

My personal belief is there are only three aspects talked about in history: The good, the bad, and the ugly. In the history of mankind, each and every culture has had triumphs and defeats. But where you are in the world will determine which side of the story you get. There is the loser’s version, and the winner’s version, and it is almost always the winner who gets to spread their story the furthest. The winner is celebrated (great). Perhaps there will be moments where they did not take the perfect course of action, and they will often play this moment up to be a simple transgression, nothing more than a mistake that need not be neither remembered nor repeated. This is not always the case. There will sometimes be outside forces, which will pressure the winner to acknowledge the events. The rising movement of political correctness relates to a recent augmentation and more widespread education on vulnerable groups’ histories and struggles. Yet, I can argue, even with this education we do not get a full perspective. We know the loser’s side, we know the winner’s side, but we do not have the true story. From the winner we get the great, from the losers we get the ugly. The way human nature works is we evolve our thinking. We do not think the same way we did a year ago, two years ago, three years ago. The past inevitably changes our perspective. Yes, in retrospect, by today’s standards, that was bad. That was an ugly period in our history. We shouldn’t compare the past with the present. We are likely committing atrocities we are not even aware of, that will be pondered and condemned in the years to come. The bias that comes with reporting old events is inevitable. To filter through this bias, we need to present information from primary sources, such as videos and photos. The selection of these photos should not be up to the educators, but the learners. Access to all perspectives needs to be available. Selective education is primary education. We are not educating ourselves to have one perspective; we are educating ourselves to have three perspectives (the great, the true, and the