Furthermore, from the book, <People’s History of the United State of America> written by Amercial civil rightist ‘Howard Zinn’ suggest that that the white Americans were able to controlled the past as they controlled the present. A case that reaveal this statement can be traced back to 19 century. When‘Christhoper Columbus’ discovered the new and unknown continent, the Europeans flocked in the America and found the ‘United State of America.’ During the process of settlement, it was inevitable for the new comer to have conflict with the aboriginal population, the India. Literally, I would be correct to say that the Europeans stole every from the Indian – land, culture, and peace – as they were equiped with weapons and modern technolgy that could kill thousand. Hence the new comers were more powerful and stronger side than the Native Indian. Of course, this is absolutely wrong in logical perspective and this history should have been truthfully disclosed to the new generations of American. Moreover, the Europeans came to the new continent in a hope that they could actualize the ideal. However, this did not happen; in fact, they have taught their children that the war was a triump and Native Indian were the people whom hindered their ancesters from establshing the idea, which are in truth, absolutely absurd story. Moreover, this idea of “great triumph” was widely depicted in Amercian movie; you have probably seen in the American movie of cowboy winning over the “evil native Indians”. Therefore, again, this anecdoe agree with the idea of George Orwell – Who controls the present controls the past.
Indeed, as I have discussed above, George Orwell’s comment has seemed agreeable. However, at the same time, his idea does not apply in some area. Firstly, the one who controlled the may not be able to control the future, but rather to be criticized and comtempted. The former leader of “the Soviet Union”, Stalin, whom was called as “The Man of Iron”, was castigated by the new leader Krushchev after his death; and Krushchev launched new policy of “Destalination” that rooted out all the legacy of Stalin. During the period when Stalin had power, he was basically a dictator; more like tyrant. He was the one whom industrialized USSR in such short period of time and his pursuit of extremely communism in Russia led in millions being ended up in death. Literally, his place, his staus in USSR was dominant that no one was able to talk about him; the consequences of critisizing him at the time when he was in power was obvious – purge and ultimately death. Therefore, the case of the dictatior “Stalin” suggests that not only figure who controlled the past controls and influences the future.
Secondly, the new policy of Austrailian governemnt shows that the conventional idea that the winner writes the history of the past. Recently, for the first time, the Austrailian government, specifically the Prime Minister had an apology toward the indigious population and corrected the wrong and made history of the past. Mainly, the aboriginals were neglect in the mainly stream of Autrailian society and they were history was always been interpreted in the way that it can benefit the white population. Hence, this new announcement of regret and apology indicates that things has been significantly changed. Furthermore, this kind of attitudes did not only being shown from the Austrailian but there are increasing cases where you see that the government or groups recognizing the “written history” and attempting to chage those errors.
To summarize, we have seen the cases that the ‘winners’ creating and controlling the past, and future in order to achieve their goal; in America, the control was used to consolidate the relation in their mainstream society; and the English used it to reinforce the control in Indian society and to maximize the economical outcome for their nation. However, we have also seen the cases where Orwell’s idea did not take place; in Russia, the influence of Stalin did not passed onto the next generation; and in Austrailia, the man made history regarding to aboriginals was revised. The reason for such change was mainly people regonized such history was “created and controlled” by the winners and people know that it is not upright to commit does thing especially when it generate grief over other humankind.
In conclusion, I certainly agree with George Orwell’s comment but it does not apply to all circumstance. And the positive aspect is these wrong, written histories are recently being recognized and being corrected. I believe that his comment is not a wholesome direction that a party that are in charge should be heading toward. And finally, throughtout writing this essay, I have learn that it is vital for our generation to identify those made histories and to bring up ourselves to build ability to see our history in the third person’s point of view rather than having strong bias or prejudice.
