Revisionist History: University of Washington: Pappy Boyington

[IntheNet]

I saw this on WorldNet Daily; made me sad to think of its historical implications :

Students reject honor to 'Baa Baa Black Sheep' hero
Member of Marines not 'sort of person UW wanted to produce'
Posted: February 14, 2006/1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2006 WorldNetDaily.com
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=48808
The University of Washington's student senate rejected a memorial for alumnus Gregory "Pappy" Boyington of "Black Sheep Squadron" fame amid concerns a military hero who shot down enemy planes was not the right kind of person to represent the school. Student senator Jill Edwards, according to minutes of the student government's meeting last week, said she "didn't believe a member of the Marine Corps was an example of the sort of person UW wanted to produce." Ashley Miller, another senator, argued "many monuments at UW already commemorate rich white men."

A political body on a university going back and forth about revisionist history; this case concerns a highly decorated U.S. Marine pilot... one of our best! I see this as 'revisionist history' in this sense: the condemnation of this fine soldier of WWII will give a generation of students at the University of Washington the wrong interpretation of history... certainly something we as a nation should be concerned about... far beyond this protest being a political statement, this condemnation of Pappy Boyington should concern us all, especially those of interested in accurate history...

Those interested in exploring this sad protest further: UW Student Senate minutes follow at link below; it makes for entertaining reading.
http://senate.asuw.org/secretary/min...02-07-2006.pdf

[yokefello1]

Sickening.

But as a Libertarian, I ask why not use money that gets spent on memorials for textbooks for underprivlidged future heroes and icons of the school?

[CosmosKramer]

Well, it can't be denied, the guy was kind of an ***hole.

I remember when I was 10, for a book report, I decided I would read my hero Gregory "Pappy" Boyington's autobiography Baa Baa Black Sheep.

First, adult book I ever read - whoa what an eye-opener. I believe I can trace my lifelong fascination with boozing, gambling and whoring directly to it methinks.

:)

[MikeLastort2]

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/259719_pappy16.html

Of course, the right wing lunatics have blown this entirely out of proportion.

[russ]

Well,the memorial didn't pass,so there is a story.

The "out of context" defense gets hammered when BushCo uses it,so why give it a pass here?Kids and adults,you say what you say,and words matter.

Rather than the weasel "give it to all the MOH winners" backup plan,I wish one of the kids would propose a memorial to all the Wobblies killed in the labor wars of the 1880s-1900s.Keep the battle going.:)

[taosjohn]

I saw this on WorldNet Daily; made me sad to think of its historical implications :

Students reject honor to 'Baa Baa Black Sheep' hero
Member of Marines not 'sort of person UW wanted to produce'
Posted: February 14, 2006/1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2006 WorldNetDaily.com
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=48808
The University of Washington's student senate rejected a memorial for alumnus Gregory "Pappy" Boyington of "Black Sheep Squadron" fame amid concerns a military hero who shot down enemy planes was not the right kind of person to represent the school. Student senator Jill Edwards, according to minutes of the student government's meeting last week, said she "didn't believe a member of the Marine Corps was an example of the sort of person UW wanted to produce." Ashley Miller, another senator, argued "many monuments at UW already commemorate rich white men."

A political body on a university going back and forth about revisionist history; this case concerns a highly decorated U.S. Marine pilot... one of our best! I see this as 'revisionist history' in this sense: the condemnation of this fine soldier of WWII will give a generation of students at the University of Washington the wrong interpretation of history... certainly something we as a nation should be concerned about... far beyond this protest being a political statement, this condemnation of Pappy Boyington should concern us all, especially those of interested in accurate history...

Those interested in exploring this sad protest further: UW Student Senate minutes follow at link below; it makes for entertaining reading.
http://senate.asuw.org/secretary/min...02-07-2006.pdf

I'd be more concerned about the implications in re the current level of education of the students making the decision! I assume from the context that this was a budgetary debate-- how best to spend these dollars?-- rather than an up-down vote on Boyington's validity; and it does seem somewhat unfair to draw heavy political conclusions from careless comments in such a context. But how could anyone associate "Boyington" with "rich white men?" I suppose its reaching to ask that the student understand much about a childhood in a Panhandle Idaho logging camp in the 20's or 30's, but all you have to do is look at a photo to know he had some diversity going... :confused: And the implication that there is something
politically disreputable about a Marine killing someone in time of war, while very Christian I suppose, is just silly. You don't enhance the cause of permanent peace by pretending past wars were meaningless and those who fought them criminal...

But I don't see any reason why UW needs to commemorate him over anyone else; his achievements are not as "in the pocket" of the University's purpose as they might have been had he invented the helicopter or designed the Concorde or some such. Or if the University were Annapolis or West Point. I bet there's something in Coeur'd'Alene or St Marie's remembering him...

He is, in fact, rather better remembered than his individual real achievements might warrant. I have no objection because he stands well for that whole demographic of fliers who had such a huge collective part in the war: citizen soldiers, depression kids, "can-do" types who approached a dangerous task with courage and intelligence not because they were told to but because it fell to them and they believed it needed doing. The poor kid who turned to education for upward mobility without losing the rough edges; astraddle the labor-capital issue without feeling much stress there, not terribly law abiding but more troublesome to the enemy than the law... this country discovered an oversupply when it needed them most, and he's a reasonable representative of the class. But there were thousands of them, and its his name and Ted Williams' we remember. Joe Foss maybe, and a very few would recognize the name of Dick Bong or Butch O'Hare.

This is really just another "Dukakis vetoed the Pledge of Allegiance" shtick isn't it? "Lefty Lib Pinko Students dis war heroes, we gotta stop this instead of paying attention while our service evading administrators lie cheat steal break the law and shoot themselves in the foot..."

There have to be twenty long term faculty in UW's history who it would make more sense to spend U funds memorializing.

[Owen Gohl]

Perhaps some people believe they can prevent future wars by refusing to commemorate those of the past.

In old but similar news, San Francisco has rejected the USS Iowa:

http://www.sfexaminer.com/articles/2005/07/13/news/20050713_ne03_iowa.txt

"But Supervisor Gerardo Sandoval pointed out that another battleship, the USS Hornet, has lost money for years across the Bay and currently owes $500,000 to Alameda."

The USS Hornet is an aircraft carrier. The ignorance of journalists and politicians aside, this sort of thing isn't strictly confined to universities or leftists bastions like San Francisco.

My home town used to have a memorial honoring its World War I dead next to the city hall. The last time I was there I noticed it was gone.

[Norsk Troll]

I don't necessarily agree with the students' decision, but this is not "revisionist history". They're not trying to re-definie actual events - they're just saying they don't think war is an honor-worthy situation. That may go against the uber-patriotic jingoistic tendencies of this country, but that's not the same thing as "revisionist history".

[IntheNet]

I don't necessarily agree with the students' decision, but this is not "revisionist history". They're not trying to re-definie actual events - they're just saying they don't think war is an honor-worthy situation. That may go against the uber-patriotic jingoistic tendencies of this country, but that's not the same thing as "revisionist history".

There is a good discussion of revisionist history on Answers.com... while this site is rather elementary in most of its offerings, the discussion on this precise point; i.e., historical revisionism, is quite good.
http://www.answers.com/topic/historical-revisionism?method=22
Even getting a handle of the definition of revisionist history is tough as historicans themselves disagree on its meaning. But for our purposes the following is relevant from the cited source:

"The term historical revisionism has a second meaning, the illegitimate manipulation of history for political purposes, for example Holocaust deniers and Japanese historical revisionists..."

I content that University of Washington's senate students are purposely practicing revisionist history by not honoring Gregory "Pappy" Boyington as he is far and away more historically relevent to the University as an alumni than others whom they propose to honor via funding memorial... worse these University of Washington's senate students are using their partisan feelings about the contemporary War on Terror to influence this decision on who to memorialize and presupposing to speak for the entire student body. I say again, what the University of Washington's senate students are doing is precisely ...the illegitimate manipulation of history for political purposes...; known as revisionist history (or historical revisionism) by definition.

I wanted to clarify that point; that is why I called it 'revisionist history' in my initial post.

[Norsk Troll]

"The term historical revisionism has a second meaning, the illegitimate manipulation of history for political purposes, for example Holocaust deniers and Japanese historical revisionists..."So you're saying (a) denying a factual event (the holocaust) took place, is the same as (b) admitting factual events took place but merely disagreeing on the worthiness of those events to receive honor?

Again, that's not revisionist history. They're not "manipulating history" - they're simply saying that warfare is not worthy of honor. Sort of how once upon time Americans honored the US cavalry in its dealings with the red savages, but now have decided that maybe that wasn't such an honorable time in our history. The slaughter was always recognized, but we finally decided that maybe slaughtering others wasn't such a greath thing. Again, I'm not saying I agree with the students' decision, but they are not trying to deny, or alter, the "facts" of history, but merely disagreeing with you as to the honorable nature of those facts.

[needs]

The use of "Revisionist history" pejoratively only reveals that the speaker knows little about the practice of actually doing history. The answer.com link provides a colloquial usage that has nothing to do with historical practice but reveals a larger social disjuncture between professional historians and American nationalists.

And calling this revisionism stretches the term to the point that it's totally meaningless.