Why Banning Dark Periods of History From Schools Is Unpatriotic

Take it from a German: Teaching the unadorned truth about the past leads students on a path of true respect and love for their country

A culture that shuts out parts of its identity is in danger of disintegrating into a mere myth. Photo by Brett Sayles from Pexels

This past fall, a 96-year-old woman in Germany went on the run. She took a cab in the early morning hours from her nursing home and fled to the city of Hamburg to escape the trial of her complicity in murdering more than 11.000 people. In her youth, she had worked as a secretary for a Nazi commandant in the concentration camp Stutthof. All correspondence regarding this hellish place of hunger, disease, and death crossed her desk. After the war, she claimed she didn’t know anything about the murder machine she had helped run.

Seven decades later, Irmgard Furchner wasn’t able to elude justice once again. Police captured her and brought her to court, where she remained in custody.

The past is inescapable.

Looking back at history can bring up a clump of uncomfortable feelings. I get it, America. Still, I’m bewildered by your reluctance to have an honest historical reckoning. Not least of all because I’m German.

Or was. I’m an American now — one who’s struggling to wrap her mind around this “Can we move on already?!”…