Howard Zinn was a national treasure. He was a historian who wrote the immensely popular A People’s History of the United States. When I read it years ago, it took me a long time, because I kept giving my copy away: “Here, you really need to read this!”
I’m not sure how many copies I went through, but it was a few. And it’s that good. It is American history told from the positions of the slaves, from the factory worker, from those who suffered racist policy.
Some might roll their eyes and assume this is just a bunch of leftist mumbo-jumbo. It is not; it is careful scholarship. The version of history we are accustomed to is told from the perspective of power. Many Americans know we lost 58,000 service personnel in Vietnam; most do not know, or even consider the fact, that Vietnam lost 2-3 million people.
Yes, change has occurred. We have rethought Christopher Columbus. But most of our thinking is oriented toward power. An educated population is a threat. Therefore a palatable version of the country’s history is presented in the classroom. Is this a conspiracy? Teachers are presenting sanitized versions of the history under the watchful eye of secret police? No.
It starts when we’re children. A certain way of thinking is absorbed by children. This thinking was provided them by adults. Why do you think America got “sucked into” Vietnam? Because that is what was drilled into your head. Because we do not want to think of our country committing crimes. And that is the issue.
We conflate the population with the machinery of state. We look at the flag, thinking “I am America.” Children in droning unity, hands over hearts, say the pledge of allegiance every morning. “[W]ith liberty and justice for all.”
“I am America.” The flag means “me.” If the flag does something bad, I did something bad. If the flag kills innocent people, I killed innocent people. “And I’ll be damned if someone’s gonna accuse me of bad things. I am a good person! And therefore American must be good!”
Tribal thinking runs deep in American culture. If people get angry about police brutality? The Thin-Blue Line flags come out, saying “Leave White people alone!” If gay people, who have been treated like dirt for forever, have a pride parade? We begin seeing straight-pride parades cropping up. Black Lives Matter? All Lives Matter.
Why cannot people get on the side of those being abused and oppressed and killed? Why does the switch get flipped to a tribal reaction? “No one criticizes White people!” The thinking here is “I am White, I must be the one being criticized.” “I don’t have privilege!”
Zinn even goes through the history of how the power elite saw common cause being found between Black slaves and White indentured servants. Can’t have that. Solidarity? That had to be prevented. And it was. Many racist concepts used by White people today can trace their genesis to this chapter in America’s past.
Reading Zinn’s book can, dare I say, help encourage you to become a better person. We all need to be better people.
Why do I get the feeling someone just read that and thought, “I don’t!”
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/aug/06/howard-zinn-the-peoples-historian-book