Twenty percent of Millennials do not know what happened at Auschwitz, according to the Washington Post. Millennials are awful and entitled, so I do not want to make an excuse for them, but the inability to identify the horror of Auschwitz does not lie upon Millennials alone. Since the 1960s, the trend in United States history classrooms has been to follow the teachings of Howard Zinn (author of the revisionist A People’s History of the United States) rather than the Founding Fathers. When teachers spend class time emphasizing that Americans are awful, as Zinn does, then how can they find the time to describe the horrors, and resulting heroism of the Allied forces liberating Auschwitz.  

The plague of leftism ruining the education of students is rampant in the United States, and, of course this is unsurprising. Leftist universities educate teachers and push them into leftist unions. These unions, in turn, encourage teachers to teach a leftist rendition of just about every subject. There is social justice math, black lives matter civics, and activist picture books that are used to teach students the leftist version of every subject.  This is a problem. 

Leftism is inherently tied to hating America, and it is apparent in the movements their leftist support. It is undeniable that America has a shameful past relating to slavery, among many other issues, but to pretend that America is not the crowning achievement of humanity is absurd and dangerous. By allowing Black Lives Matter to teach history from the perspective of America being evil, teachers inherently leave out major portions of American history because American history, is a picture of the standard of living increasing for not only American citizens but for the entire world. To look at it any other way is wrong and dangerous.

The best of American history is the best of humanity. We fought a war to free the slaves, we enshrined equality in our Constitution, we ushered in democracy everywhere from France to South Korea, and, yes, we helped to end the Holocaust and liberate Auschwitz. Through our market-based economy, we created the first society where your last name does not determine your future success. Through our free-trade policies, we strengthened the economies of China, India, and many others, increasing the standard of living and rights of their people. 

There are many obscure events in World history that only the self-aggrandizing history majors care enough about to understand, let alone remember. But there are moments in history that should be seared into our minds to prevent repeating. The atrocities at Auschwitz are among those moments. The fact Millennials could not find space between condom snorting and Tide Pod recipes to remember what happened during the Holocaust makes me think that they were not taught about it in the first place. 

Continuing to allow the leftists at universities and teachers unions to hijack American history for their own victim revisionism is dangerous. Of course, students should learn about women’s suffrage, slavery, racism, and other atrocities that occurred in the United States, but they should also learn that to place the focus solely on the mistakes of our past will not prevent the mistakes from happening again. Instead we must continue to focus on the people who corrected and continue to correct the mistakes of the past.