Question authority or not?

A friend of mine recently posted a link to an article about how historians are trying to rework the curriculum to catch up with the times, so to speak. This is causing a great deal of concern and criticism by those who disagree with some of the events being removed to make room for more current events.

A friend of my friend, however, commented to criticize the critics, stating in essence that it’s a sad thing that people with only cursory history education feel they can question or criticize those who have made history their profession.

While he does have a point, for the most part I feel he entirely misses the real point here. It’s not that people are arguing with experts over history (never mind historians frequently disagree with one another amongst themselves), it’s that people disagree with the public policy being advanced by these historians. Most lay men will not argue with historians. I don’t think anyone is saying, “Hey, I don’t think Vietnam happened.” Where the disagreement lays, I suspect, is in what aspects of our history are important to who we are and who we aspire to be as a country, and which are not.

Or, to put it more succinctly, one man’s history is another man’s propaganda.

When it comes to knowing and understanding history I’m quite certain I would trust a historian over my own memory. But when it comes to measuring the effect of the teaching of history on the public psyche and its ultimate influence on culture I’m not so sure that historians know any more than I do. More importantly, I can’t be certain they would want the same effect that I do. Historians, like any other profession, do not exist in a vacuum. They are as susceptible to differening perspectives coloring their views as anyone else.

In short, while the facts are the facts, which facts you reveal and which you conceal will influence someone’s perception of what those facts mean. I doubt any historian would disagree with me. Few historians have the benefit of working with a complete set of facts, even in modern history, and it only gets worse the farther back you go. Deducing entire historical accounts from a few pot shards and re-re-re-retranslated records from a single perspective is risky work.

But of course the problem of when to accept authority and when to question it is hardly limited to history. Pretty much every field of endeavor is open to the same problem. At what point does a person’s expertise in a field give them license to set policy that impacts so many other areas without any questions or criticism by those whose knowledge is less complete? Should we seriously consider putting Stephen Hawking, for example, in charge of the VA? Or even NASA? Sure, why not? But should we be expected to put him in charge and then never question or criticize his actions simply because he is one of the most brilliant physicists in the world?

I don’t think so. I don’t care who you are, or how smart you are, or how many degrees you have. If you are in a position of setting public policy or policy that impacts taxpayer funding you should never be above question or criticism. And, frankly, no one can be so brilliant or experienced as to be infallible in setting policy that they should be equally considered the unquestioned authority in every single area that policy can impact.

Never mind the fact that the country is continually divided on which direction we should be trying to go. Your policy can be entirely sound and somehow consider every possible consequence, but nearly half the country can still be expected to question whether that really is the direction we want to be heading. And they have every right to question.

No one is questioning whether historians know history better than the average person. What people are rightfully questioning is whether their interpretation of what aspects of history are most important and should be taught to our children. That’s a different matter entirely.

Or, too reframe my friend’s friend’s argument a different way, theologians know more about religion than most any of us. By his thinking we should not question when they insist that the curriculum include the teaching of Creationism and daily prayer. They’re the experts. Who are we to question?

Au contraire. America is a democracy. We have a right to vote our own mind, not cede our voice to so-called experts. We have a right to question, and question anyone. One could even say we have a duty to question. Anyone who would lead us, but whose ideas cannot bear question or criticism, is not fit to lead. Anyone who believes their ideas should be imposed on the whole, yet should not have to take the time to explain their reasoning and be cross-examined, does not believe in democracy.

If you’re going to set policy, be prepared to be questioned. Period. To insist that anyone with power over others should be above question is naive, even dangerous. Let the experts recommend, but let us all question.