Being a history major has given me a kind of superpower. Studying the past has granted me the power of historical perspective — it’s the lamest superpower of all time, but a superpower nonetheless.
As I watch those around me panic over current events that they claim to be unprecedented, I take comfort in my knowledge of history.
Perhaps the biggest obstacle to overcome in educating the masses on historical context is the 24-hour news network. I’ll admit that the concept of around-the-clock news is unlike anything in history, but what is all too familiar is the doomsday rhetoric of the pundits.
Newscasters with too much time to kill are quick to blow any story out of proportion, simply to have something to talk about. Reporters fight for ratings by making every event seem like a sign of the coming apocalypse. What is easy to forget, however, is that people have been expecting the end of the world to come soon for millennia.
The talking heads on the television love nothing more than shouting about the division in our country. Whether it is Republicans vs. Democrats or the fight of the 99 percent, the news outlets are quick to paint the United States as being on the brink of civil war.
However, viewed through the lens of history, such claims are incredibly misguided and offensive to our ancestors.
It is important to compare current events to historical ones, if not to learn from our past mistakes, then at least to remember our strength. While the news tells us that the economy is in a meltdown and that gold and fallout shelters are the only wise investments, any eighth grader could tell you that our country has been through worse.
Less than a century ago, the Great Depression prompted a national economic resilience that reporters now ignore.
Meanwhile, while protesters occupy nearly every major city in the U.S. demanding change, news reports describe the atmosphere like a lit fuse ready to explode into riots, or even war. For historical perspective we need only look back 50 years. In Birmingham, black men and women, no older than us, protested not for politics or money, but for rights that should be granted to every human being.
A short time later, Vietnam protests would rage across the entire country. Unlike the public sentiment we see today in opposition to wars in Iraq, Afghanistan or Libya, the protesters of the ’60s and ’70s were fighting against a war that had a draft. Sons, brothers and friends would be forced to risk their lives unless the war ended.
The newscasters of today act as though pepper spray and barricades could set off a revolution among Wall Street protesters, when 50 years ago, fire hoses, attack dogs and even the shootings at Kent State failed to irreparably divide us.
The study of history is a pursuit that is both humbling and comforting. To see that the problems of today are not unique and are no greater than the problems of the past reminds us all that things always sound worse than they are. More importantly, it reminds us of our nation’s strength.
The United States has already seen a civil war; it has seen political division and economic downturns. It has seen unpopular wars and unpopular presidencies, social injustice and violent protests, but it still remained strong. We as a people have remained strong.
No matter what the news networks tell us, we are not a nation divided. We are a country with a tumultuous but powerful history that we can learn from every day.