To what extend is the My Lai massacre taught in your schools?
Posted by HenryofSkalitz1@reddit | AskAnAmerican | View on Reddit | 182 comments
Here in Ireland we are taught about the War in Vietnam and go into pretty deep detail about My Lai.
malibuklw@reddit
I graduated in 1998 and we never got to the Vietnam War. Everything I learned about it I learned after high school.
sagittorius@reddit
I graduated in 2008, no high school teacher ever dared to broach the Vietnam war. Same in college. Everything I've learned about the war has been from my own desire to read and learn.
What a shameful, deplorable, quagmire it was. I watched all 16 hours of the PBS Vietnam War documentary and my worldview was shaken. The United States haven't been the "good guys" like we've been indoctrinated to believe we are for quite a long time.
anneofgraygardens@reddit
I'm close in age to you and this was my experience as well. When I was in high school the Vietnam War was only 25 years in the past - before I was born, but recently enough that a lot of parents and teachers had very strong feelings about it. Teaching it expensive could have been very controversial. I know my own dad would have flipped out if my teacher had hypothetically taught about the war in a way that he didn't like. (My dad was drafted and fought very hard to get conscientious objector status, and had to do an alternate service. For the rest of his life this was one topic guaranteed to make him angry. He hated the war and he was furious that the government had tried to force him to join the army and kill people.)
That said, i obviously have heard of the My Lai massacre.
ThisIsItYouReady92@reddit
Well still. I was 9 in 2001 and I heard from people who were born in 2001 that they learned about 9/11 in high school and it was only 15 years old at that point
ThisIsItYouReady92@reddit
Wow that’s odd you didn’t learn about the war in 1998. I would have thought you would have since you were 30 years out from it and McGraw Hill textbooks definitely had time to write that
Grunt08@reddit
It was taught as part of the broader coverage of Vietnam.
It's actually a bit weird that Irish students are taught in "pretty deep detail" about one event in the Vietnam War. I could understand covering My Lai if you're going into deep detail about Vietnam, and I could understand going into deep detail about Vietnam if American history was a major focus of the curriculum. But if instead the American history curriculum in Ireland focuses on the lowlights of our history...that's kinda fucked up.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
We were taught about My Lai whilst learning about the anti war sentiment within the US, which in turn lended itself to the Civil Rights movement and the like.
Seems like a very important thing to acknowledge if the military is a large part of society
Dr_Watson349@reddit
What do you mean "the military is a large part of society"?
The US military employs less than 3 million people in a country of over 350 million. We don't have mandatory military service.
My daily interaction with the military is zero.
macoafi@reddit
I live in the suburbs of the capital, and my daily interaction with the military is still zero.
Bastiat_sea@reddit
I spent way too long trying to figure out what suburb of DC is in a part of Maryland that was annexed from Pennsylvania.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Come on, you can’t tell me US foreign policy using governed by the fact that you have the worlds largest, best equipped, most funded, and most trained military in possibly ever.
GoodbyeForeverDavid@reddit
There isn't a person that lives here that isn't taught about and aware of the fact that crimes and atrocities were committed by the US military in Vietnam.
macoafi@reddit
Aware, yes. We’ve mostly all seen Forrest Gump and Good Morning Vietnam and MASH (which is set in Korea but was speaking to contemporary events in Vietnam).
But the extent of Vietnam coverage in school for me was during the 9-week “contemporary American cultures” class, when we learned about the anti-war movement, using protest songs as the hook to keep students interested.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
On this very post people have said they’ve never heard of My Lai.
GoodbyeForeverDavid@reddit
That's where you started, yes. As you've seen, your presumption wasn't accurate. More importantly, the reason you gave for asking in the first place is because YOU think it's important for US to know about atrocities committed by the U.S. military in order to avoid such things in the future. Since you don't live here and since you aren't involved in our national debates you couldn't know that anytime a military intervention is brought up, the standard warning is "we don't want this to be another Vietnam". You are also clearly ignorant of the broad view of Vietnam in the U.S. Presumably this is why you asked - but I smell a good deal of bad faith in your motivations and unearned confidence in the responses you've provided people in this thread.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
I’m just some random guy across the Atlantic. I’d confidently say the average American knows a lot more about their history and culture than I do.
I’m sorry if I have come off as preachy or arrogant. It wasn’t my intention. I’m also not trying to unjustly bash the US either, every nation has its faults. Here we had the Magdelen laundries, which remain a stain on our past.
I just am interested in how the US public deals with having a nation/military with as much controversy around it as yours does.
IthurielSpear@reddit
What is controversial about our military?
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
My Lai
IthurielSpear@reddit
That was almost 60 years ago. You all judge today’s military by something that took place that long ago?
GoodbyeForeverDavid@reddit
I too am confident a random guy across the Atlantic that has never been here, never read a book about American history or jurisprudence, never participated in our public life and debates, and never taken a class on the history of the western hemisphere let alone the US knows significantly less than anyone here about it. It makes sense that you would ask a question of us without any background knowledge. But bad faith and rhetorical questions meant to send messages aren't well received.
Maybe the tone I perceived in your writing is a matter of my own predilections, differing cultural norms, and/or the missing inflections of the written word. If so, I apologize for any unfair attributions on you. With that in mind, I'd suggest you craft your responses and questions with a deliberate tone of seeking and avoid what could be perceived as presumptions and indictment. Cheers mate.
GoodbyeForeverDavid@reddit
LoL, nice how you changed your entire comment and it's meaning with no edit . Now it's obvious you're just here just to be a jerk. Pound sand.
IthurielSpear@reddit
Grew up in California in the 70s and was never taught much about Vietnam at all. I tried to find out more by asking my parents and they just got upset that I was asking them questions about a war that left a very bad taste in everyone’s mouth. It wasn’t until I developed more of an interest in world history and more resources became available besides the encyclopedia britanica, that I began to understand what happened there. Damn French.
tibiapartner@reddit
This is incorrect-- I was never taught about the Vietnam war at all in high school and I graduated from a suburban public school in Massachusetts in 2010. I think what OP and you both have in common is a vast underestimation of the variety and inconsistency of state educational curricula and lack of standards across the country.
GoodbyeForeverDavid@reddit
I'm sorry, I don't think I should have to caveat everything single thing I say with "of course there are exceptions". Because of course there are exceptions. I suspect your experience is one of them.
And, no, I'm pretty familiar with our disaggregated public education administration. Despite the decentralized nature there is still a remarkable amount of consistency. Most schools cover American history over two years in high school. Most of them are split between pre civil war and post civil war. Grading scales are largely consistent.I would be shocked if your post civil war curriculum didn't cover the Vietnam war and didn't discuss its failures and criticisms. I suspect you don't remember or are in a unique district. I would also be surprised if you never once heard the "we don't want this to be another Vietnam" in debates on military excursions.
tibiapartner@reddit
Dude, you literally said "there isn't a single person that lives here who hasn't heard of this" and there are nearly a dozen people on this thread, and myself, who haven't. You're coming off very defensive and also weirdly protective of the US military. Good luck with that.
GoodbyeForeverDavid@reddit
What part of colloquialism don't you understand? Also, your confusing specific knowledge of my tai with general knowledge of the Vietnam war and the acknowledgements of it's many atrocities - as I was addressing the OPs stated reason for asking the question in the first place. I've said literally nothing in defense of the military. Just the opposite , I've literally said they're guilty of atrocities. Work on your reading comprehension and stop projecting.
Abdelsauron@reddit
So how much do you think American students should learn about the IRA and the Troubles?
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
As much as they like while fitting in time to acknowledge that US troops committed war crimes
Abdelsauron@reddit
Surely there's enough Irish history that "deep detail" on the My Lai massacre would be excessive, no?
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Nope. Your country’s actions in Vietnam were important enough to warrant our learning of it.
ENovi@reddit
How? I’m not trying to be combative because I’m genuinely curious how the actions of the US during the Vietnam war were important enough globally that Irish schools focus so strongly on them. Anyone who managed to stay half awake during a history class in America can definitely speak to the war’s impact domestically and I can understand it being taught with a certain emphasis in France or Vietnam/the rest of Southeast Asia. I can also understand it being taught as one of many key moments during the Cold War.
What I cannot understand for the life of me is why Irish curriculum would focus so strongly on the Vietnam war and My Lai in particular. Do other (and arguably more impactful moments) of American military history like the Civil War or the Pacific theater of WWII get the same attention?
Again, I am not trying to be a dick. I know I sound a little incredulous but I’m genuinely baffled why Irish schools would focus on this with such intensity. Your own country has centuries of its own rich history and Ireland had no involvement with the war. I’m also not trying to downplay the massacre at My Lai. It was a hideous moment in US history and the handling of it was shameful. It should be taught because those victims deserve to be remembered just as the world needs to remember lest it happen again. I just don’t see what benefit this level of attention gives the average Irish student.
To put it another way a lot of Americans have at least a passing knowledge of the Good Friday Agreement or the Easter Uprising/Irish War of Independence but wouldn’t you be left confused to learn that 11th grade American history spent several collective hours discussing the Troubles with a special emphasis on the Omagh bombing?
blackhawk905@reddit
I'm assuming this is during a world history course in high school? What time period is covered by this class your taking because it has to be a short period of time to cover something like this rather than broader global events.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
We were learning about world history in the 60s, so naturally the Vietnam War was a key topic.
Senior_Manager6790@reddit
The King/Baker Civil Rights movement preceeded the anti-war movement and for most of its history was adjacent to the anti-war movement but not part of it.
US history focuses more on the King/Baker Civil Rights movement when talking about that era then Vietnam, mostly due to which had the greater impact on the US
Grunt08@reddit
Okay...that still seems like overemphasizing My Lai's importance in the war or in broader American history.
And I'm sorry, but not monopolizing students' time focusing on atrocities is not failing to acknowledge those atrocities. There's a lot of history and it needs to be taught in balance.
MrLongWalk@reddit
The military is not nearly as large a part of society as you guys think.
Source: most of my family is in Galway, used to teach US culture to incoming foreign students
zeezle@reddit
It's hard not to seem like devolving into whataboutism, and I think teaching My Lai is very important. But I always find it very interesting when foreign countries spend a lot of time and detail on My Lai and none of the French civilian massacres preceding & during the First Indochina War, nor any of the NVA civilian massacres. Almost like their real point isn't Vietnamese civilians being murdered at all...
I've talked to people who were very passionate about My Lai who didn't even know Vietnam had been a French colony or that the French Indochina War even happened and had never heard of Haiphong, which really blows my mind.
Abdelsauron@reddit
Brain drain is a big problem in a lot of countries. It's tough keeping your best and brightest when American employers can pay them more than domestic employers.
Part of how other country's counter this is by subtly leading their people to believe that America is this evil empire with no redeeming qualities, which is unfortunately an attitude that's begun to take root among our own people
Maquina-25@reddit
I taught US history. We tended to stop around 1965 or so, because after that, anything I say will probably piss off a parent.
If I say my feeling about James Buchanan, nobody cares. If I say my feelings about Reagan, I get called in to the vice principle
WVildandWVonderful@reddit
And biology professors upset parents by teaching evolution, yet it’s necessary for students to learn.
Your kids’ parents weren’t old enough to vote for Reagan. Your students need to understand US history of that era including his terrible policies such as exacerbating the AIDS epidemic, Iran-Contra, and the invention of the “welfare queen” propaganda, as well as his slash-and-burn economic policies.
It’s also important to understand his overwhelming success at the polls, leading to things like Bill Clinton’s describing himself as a Third-Way Democrat, watering down the party conservativism such as DADT and Biden’s crime bill. And, for that matter, the Souther Strategy.
Your students are almost old enough to vote. Can’t you make a case to your vice-principal?
— A sincere question from a history graduate who is not a teacher
macoafi@reddit
Previous person said “taught” not “teach,” so is potentially retired. If that was my high school teacher 20 years ago, then yes, my parents were old enough to vote for him.
IthurielSpear@reddit
I have no idea why you got downvoted. You raise some very good points.
WVildandWVonderful@reddit
Edit: After writing this, I noticed that you aren’t a teacher anymore. However, I’ll leave this up for others.
Maquina-25@reddit
The honest answer to your question in my case is that teaching was the worse experience of my life, and pretty quickly I figured out that not drawing any attention to myself was the only way to get through it.
Cowboywizard12@reddit
If you say anything nice about Buchanan you should be called into the principals office because at that point your teaching credentials are sketch.
Cool things about Buchanan
End of list.
Everything else about him sucked
HotSteak@reddit
Should teaching history really involve "your feelings"?
Maquina-25@reddit
It’s hard for it not to, because what you think matters will inevitably affect what you teach.
It would be somewhat weird to teach history without any discussion of why things matter
pinniped90@reddit
Why not?
Everything in the textbook is somebody's feelings. If your team won, you get to write the book. Your view becomes "truth."
WVildandWVonderful@reddit
Read A People’s History of the United States.
artemswhore@reddit
yes, history makes people feel things
WVildandWVonderful@reddit
I wish more Americans agreed that a child’s right to an education is more important than a parent’s right to dictate their child’s education.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Do you think the same is true for many/most US schools?
artemswhore@reddit
i’d say so. reagan is a sore subject. only now does my mom who was a teen in the 80s recognize what he did to this country
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Forgive my ignorance, but why would some regions of the US be less willing to talk about it than others?
roostersnuffed@reddit
The same reason some regions of Ireland is less willing to talk about "the troubles"
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
True, Northern counties have a more sensitive history with the troubles than the South. But that violence was occurring within those counties. Why would certain American states be more sensitive to the war than other American states when the war was occurring thousands of miles away from all of them?
squidgemobile@reddit
They're talking about former president Reagan, not a region.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Yeah, I misread it. My bad.
MrLongWalk@reddit
Political sentiment, education in the US is disgustingly political in some places.
Adjective-Noun123456@reddit
To the same extent that German schools teach about Malmedy, I'd imagine.
Which is not say, not all, unless the teacher brings it up as an anecdote, because it wasn't a historically significant event. It was awful, yeah, but it didn't have any significant role on the war, so it seems like an odd thing to go into detail on unless you're in a class that's focusing solely on the history of the Vietnam War.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
German education covers the Holocaust and the crimes Germans committed. It’s important because it teaches future generations that we can’t let it happen again.
FlappyClap@reddit
You should head over to Japanese subreddits and present your comment to them. They’re not aware of what their country did in Manila and Nanjing, and they certainly don’t know about Unit 731.
It’s important we don’t make these mistakes, yes, but many Germans still don’t understand why hate and xenophobia are problematic and what it can lead to.
macoafi@reddit
You’re reminding me of our attempts to convince our high school Japanese teacher that the events in Nanjing…you know…happened at all.
Her version was “no no no, you see, China ASKED the Japanese soldiers to come and line up on the border with Russia, to PROTECT China from communists.”
blackhawk905@reddit
My Lai is in no way at all comparable to the Holocaust, the idea of even trying to compare the two is laughable.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
My point was that both are examples of a people committing horrible acts under the guise of it being the right thing to do/just following orders.
That, I would think there is a very important lesson to impart on the youth.
ENovi@reddit
See, this comment gives off the impression that you’re not nearly as familiar with My Lai as you suggest (and that’s ignoring how you’ve watered down the Holocaust to mean “committing horrible acts”). Unlike the Holocaust the My Lai massacre was not put into motion years in advance. The idea they were “just following orders” on the level of Nazi Germany is ridiculous. The Holocaust started from the top down. The orders at My Lai mainly came from Ernest Medina (a captain) and William Calley Jr. (a second lieutenant). They didn’t come from Nixon or the pentagon or a general. It wasn’t even planned.
The only way your comparison would work would be if during WWII a random German battalion went rogue and slaughtered the residents of a random Polish village and the German population was horrified once they learned of it.
Senior_Manager6790@reddit
The issue is the US has far more examples of this same phenomenon happening within the US than My Lai.
Lessons on slavery, Japanese Internment Camps, and the treatment of the Indigenous teach this lesson well.
o93mink@reddit
If the US had carried out an organized campaign of 20,000 My Lai massacres over the course of 4 years, we’d probably talk about it a lot
Florida__Man__@reddit
Guy can’t even be fucked to google Malmedy and he’s tryina hate on the IS schooling system.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Man, I know what Malmedy was. I was speaking on how German education teaches their children their forefathers did some fucked up shit, and shouldn’t always be admired.
drlsoccer08@reddit
US schools talk very very in depth about the Triangle Slave Trade, as well as Westward expansion and the atrocities against native populations that came along with that. Most of the history courses I took spent almost half the term on those two topics. So in general I would say the US education system does a good job acknowledging the atrocities the country has committed over the years.
Senior_Manager6790@reddit
My Lai isn't the US equivalent to the Holocaust, the genocide against the Indigenous and Slavery is.
Adjective-Noun123456@reddit
The holocaust, yes, because the holocaust was an important event that carried immense cultural and political significance.
Malmedy, no. Because even though it was awful, it changed nothing except for lives of the men who were present for it. My Lai is the same.
It didn't influence the war on the tactical or strategic level, didn't have much of an impact domestically due to the coverup, and wasn't even properly resolved until '69.
ThisIsItYouReady92@reddit
We never learn that in thr US
Acceptable_Loss23@reddit
It's very much brought up, if only as a specific example of widespread cruelty. I think Americans generally have no idea to what extent the Nazi is covered in school here.
macoafi@reddit
Oh, look, it’s June, end of the school year, and we only got as far as WWII! My, my, how time flies! Besides, if it’s in living memory, does it really even qualify as history?
Several_Cheek5162@reddit
I mean the Vietnam War is covered but the My Lai massacre isn’t.
Sabertooth767@reddit
I believe it was mentioned, but my history education was very cursory post-WW2.
I don't think it was deliberately avoided, we just didn't spend much time on Vietnam.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Surely such an appalling act committed by American soldiers is very important to be taught? It shows the greyness of morality, teaches students not to blindly follow orders, not to see other people as “inferior” in any way?
FlappyClap@reddit
You don’t actually know much about the My Lai Massacre, do you? You’re aware of it, have a cursory understanding and genuinely you’re well-informed. Of course, that’s typical of most across your continent. So, where are you getting the idea that these soldiers saw them as inferior?
PBS is a very trusted American news source:
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/vietnam-my-lai-massacre/
You should read this article.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
I’m not particularly well-informed on the massacre. I was just curious as to how the US deals with having a convoluted and sometimes shameful past.
Florida__Man__@reddit
Europeans in a nutshell lmao
“I’m not well informed but am going to use the subject to judge your entire country”
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
I’m not judging your country, I’m asking how you judge yourselves.
Florida__Man__@reddit
Yeah but comparing My Lai to the holocaust is purposefully dense on your part. Like we learn extensively about our holocaust level atrocities (slavery, trail or tears) even in history class it’s usually an open question as to if Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the correct move. Shit even Vietnam is considered a terrible war in which war crimes were committed against the Vietnamese.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
A lot of you guys have called me out on this shit, but I wasn’t trying to compare My Lai to the Holocaust in terms of cruelty or scale, I was trying to say that Germany teaches its youth about their nations past, not necessarily how bad that past was.
ursulawinchester@reddit
America’s current borders are the result to the systematic displacement and attempted genocide of native peoples. America’s earliest economic success was in large part because of chattel slavery, a practice that most of our Founding Fathers actively participated in. Yes, our youth learn about all that in addition to more recent atrocities - not limited to the Vietnam War.
UltimateAnswer42@reddit
.. Have you seen Americans on the Internet and America more broadly on the world stage? It's going to be a spectrum of disproportionately loud voices compared to the people they represent. In extremely broad terms, the US doesn't hide it's mistakes like other countries do. We might wait til kids are older to teach them about them, but not hide them. I'd hazard more Americans know about Mai Lai than Brits know abou Easter rising for example. But in general the default 3 responses for [insert significant event concerning American history] are that it was overblown and not a big deal, that it was horrible and should be permanent shame, or "yeah, it happened.... What's your point?".
FlappyClap@reddit
We cover out past, as much of it as we can. Nothing is swept under the rug, nor do we pretend these transgressions and atrocities are nonexistent.
Let your peers know. Too many believe we’re unaware.
“Falsehood flies, and truth comes limping after it, so that when men come to be undeceived, it is too late; the jest is over, and the tale hath had its effect”
MrLongWalk@reddit
Is this event the only way to do so?
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Are there other ways taught in your schools?
riarws@reddit
Yes, chattel slavery and genocide against Native Americans.
Think of it this way: My Lai is taught only briefly, because so much of our history is much, much worse. Any American who paid attention in history class knows that.
JadedAsparagus9639@reddit
Chantel slavery and the genocide of native Americans during the westward expansion are much better examples and are covered extensively
ursulawinchester@reddit
Yes. Nuremberg Trials, Wounded Knee, Abu Graib (although this was discussed in current events class, not history, when I was in high school), that’s just off the top of my head but I’m sure there were others, plus it is a common theme in literature too.
Nor is My Lai the only example to dismantle the myth of American Exceptionalism. Slavery and the treatment of Indigenous Americans are tied for first place there without contest - both lasting longer than a single massacre no matter how horrific.
Also, are you absolutely certain that My Lai is discussed at such length in ALL Irish schools? Perhaps you’re the exception. It was absolutely abhorrent, yes, but it did not change the course of history in and of itself.
MrLongWalk@reddit
We learned about My Lai, along with other atrocities committed by the US government and people.
I just think the idea that My Lai is the only way to tech this is a bit faulty.
MaoTGP@reddit
Generally a lot of history classes stop far enough away from the present day (because as another person said, people have opinions on more recent things and an upset student leads to a parent complaining about a teacher, which reflects badly on the teacher). That said, history classes recently are teaching more about Vietnam as it gets farther and farther away from the present
Infamous_Towel_5251@reddit
Honey, if we were going to bother with low level American military atrocities we'd be tied up for a very long time.
And, frankly, a lot of us simply don't care about a war that happened a lifetime ago. Hell, we don't even care about Abu Ghraib anymore.
Asparagus9000@reddit
Vietnam in general got discussed, but I don't think specifics like that got mentioned.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
How do you discuss Vietnam without mentioning My Lai?
Roughneck16@reddit
In my US History class in 11th grade, we learned about My Lai, as well as the Gulf of Tonkin incident, the Tet Offensive, the Christmas Bombings, and the Fall of Saigon. We didn't go that in-depth, but the teacher did tell us about it.
History classes have tons of issues to cover, so no one event gets that much attention.
Also, I'm surprised you guys learn that much about the Vietnam War in Ireland.
MrLongWalk@reddit
It’s a pretty common thread in European education. When I taught in Denmark my students knew a lot about Vietnam but straight up had no idea that Germany had colonies in Africa.
Senior_Manager6790@reddit
Vietnam has a lot more movies about it.
It means that it's a larger cultural touchstone in Europe and North America.
MrLongWalk@reddit
I mean they spent a lot of time and energy on the atrocities of the US but pretty much none anywhere else.
Anthrodiva@reddit
Yup. They LOVE to talk about US problems, not so much their own history of colonialism.
Anthrodiva@reddit
Do they realize Denmark STILL has a colony?
Steamsagoodham@reddit
Once we get past WW2 we kinda just skim through the rest. There is just so much stuff to cover that we run out of time, and once you start covering events that a good number of people are still alive from and remember things can get controversial.
Even WW2 didn’t receive that much attention compared to the revolutionary or civil war.
drlsoccer08@reddit
In my experience in history class, usually we would kind of run out to time at the end of the year and rush through all history post WW2 quickly. So for Vietnam it would essentially be lumped in a piece of the Cold War. It would pretty much just be “here is one example of the US trying to stop the spread of communism, we killed a bunch of people in the jungle, and e dropped a bunch of Napalm, there was a draft because no one really wanted to fight, there were a bunch of anti war protests, we left and then the Viet Cong took over.” Specific details of the war are brushed over. It’s more used as an example/lesson about why the government shouldn’t just go to war for interests that don’t align with the citizens.
_pamelab@reddit
I took US history over the summer to get it over with, but it was done at speed. We got through WWII, acknowledged that the Korean war happened, and then watched Forrest Gump.
rrsafety@reddit
Massacres occur in every war on both sides so from a historical perspective it isn’t unique. The historical question is what impact it had on policy. I think the typical high school textbook on US history will have a paragraph or two on it but a teacher may or may not discuss it in depth as an example of what war can do to ordinary people who are thrown into it.
n00bdragon@reddit
There's a lot of history to cover. US History is usually taught as two courses: up to 1865 (the American Civil War) as one course, and then 1865 to present as a second course. Though I suspect the break point will gradually move to WWI if it hasn't already.
dystopiadattopia@reddit
To no extent. I'm one of the lucky ones who got taught at least about the Gulf of Tonkin.
riarws@reddit
This is the 2021 US History test that students in Texas had to pass in order to graduate. So teachers would be expected to teach everything on that test at minimum, and students would be expected to remember about 60% of it.
https://tea.texas.gov/student-assessment/staar/released-test-questions/2021-staar-us-history-test.pdf
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Thank you, that was a very interesting paper.
riarws@reddit
When I tallied up the topics, I found that the non-military atrocities, such as slavery and segregation, or more recently Iran-Contra, got more questions than the military atrocities, such as the forcible annexation of Hawaii.
You might also notice that there is a lot of emphasis on the history of fixing problems. The voter suppression questions include questions about activism against voter suppression, etc.
Enough-Meaning-1836@reddit
"Oh, I shot a man in Reno, and a bunch more in My Lai..."
True story, first draft by Johnny Cash, but even the man in black couldn't make it work with the rest of the song. Oh well.
macearoni@reddit
We did not cover it at all, as far as I can remember. Considerably more time was spend on WWII and the Holocaust.
mocha_lattes_@reddit
No. We were taught the broader subject of the war and how against it the American people we along with the mistreatment of the veterans who came back. They were barely men and forced into a war they didn't want anything to do with and forced to commit atrocities or die. The men who made it home were ridiculed and called baby murders by their fellow countrymen. The teacher focused on the failure of our government and failure of our citizens during that time. Americans treat Vietnam vets well now but back then they were treated as scum when they were forced into service. The American government still fucks over its veterans today but that's a whole other story (military family so lots of experience there). We go over it but not in depth or super great detail. For me, American history was a class back in middle school. It covered all of our history so we didn't stay on any period for too long because we only had a year to go over all of the history of America. Curriculum mostly controlled by the States and not standardized across American. You have general requirements from the Department of Education (Federal government), then the States have their more defined curriculums, then each county and school district decides the specifics all the way down to the teacher who decides when to teach what and for how long. Hence why all the variety of answers everytime someone asks if we learned x thing in school.
Personally most of what I know about the war came from my grandfather. He told me all about the friends he lost. The lives he had to take so he could be here today. The nightmares he suffered and the lasting trauma it did to him. It's a huge blight on American history and I'm just glad society acknowledges the poor treatment they received and tries to make it better for the ones that are still here. What we did to Vietnam was an atrocity but what we did to our own was monstrous.
sas223@reddit
I graduated from high school 35 years ago. There was absolutely no coverage of the Vietnam war in my US History class or any other history classes. We got up to WWII and that was about it. We didn’t even learn about the Korean War. I learned about it via cultural references or ‘news magazine’ shows.
MrLongWalk@reddit
It will depend heavily on the school, we went into pretty good depth at mine.
Do you cover other massacres or just those perpetrated by the US?
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Might not be surprising, but we cover the British atrocities that were done against us. We also learn about the Holocaust and the Holdomor.
blackhawk905@reddit
How in depth do y'all go for terror attacks committed against those in Northern Ireland and abroad during the trouble?
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
We know the IRA lost the absolute run of themselves and killed many, many innocent civilians.
blackhawk905@reddit
Y'all certainly go much more in depth than that though right and talk about stuff like the Omagh Bombing since it's the the deadliest attack the Irish groups committed and other such attacks right?
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Yep. This isn’t really the angle to be attacking us from man, we cover the troubles well. And even then, the IRA was NOT our national army, I’d didn’t recruit from the whole country.
MrLongWalk@reddit
Fair enough, I’ve taught plenty of Euros who genuinely only learned about the US or spent a disproportionate amount of time on US atrocities.
Half my students literally thought the Canadians and Aussies were only ever friendly with the natives, etc. I hope you can understand my skepticism.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Yeah, I have learned personally about the First Nation people in Canada and Australia, but as far as our schools are concerned those lands were empty when the Europeans arrived. Which is a great shame, because a lot of Irish people live in Australia today, most students will have family there.
MrLongWalk@reddit
Nothing made me more skeptical of European education than working with Europeans.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Since Ireland did not colonise anybody, we are able to cover European expansion fairly. It doesn’t bring up any…shame? I guess?
I can’t speak for the continent, but I know the UK is severely lacking in teaching it students about its past.
MrLongWalk@reddit
Yeah true, the Irish I’ve worked with, (and the cousins I see a few times a year) tend to have a more holistic view than most Euros, even then there’s definitely some holes that are absolutely ignored or simply excused.
ThisIsItYouReady92@reddit
I graduated high school in 2010 so we learned about WW2, but not about the details and not at all about what happened in Vietnam. Hell, the Vietnamese kids in my class whose parents came from Vietnam didn’t know anything about their history. Maybe they were whitewashed.
ThisIsItYouReady92@reddit
Vietnam isn’t discussed except for the Vietnam War
KJHagen@reddit
We touched on it in school.
At US Army NCO academies we learned about it in detail. We learned about LT Calley, who was held responsible, and we learned about the efforts of WO Thompson to prevent the killing.
I think most people who learned about the massacre in school didn’t know about the heroes who tried to stop it.
Sooner70@reddit
I’m old. History class acknowledged that the Vietnam War was a thing, and that was it. Basically, “and then Vietnam started” would be the last day of class.
Spud8000@reddit
never. ancient history
war is hell. best way to avoid bad stuff is to never go to war
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Surely the best way to teach kids not to go to war is to teach them what happens in war?
Grunt08@reddit
Some countries don't have the luxury of performative neutrality from a position of complete safety guaranteed by geography and countries that are not neutral.
blackhawk905@reddit
I've seen some idiots say stuff like "well Ireland is taking a real risk being neutral since someone could attack them!" As though an attempt to attack Ireland wouldn't instantly trigger the UK hitting NATO article 5 as well, it's laughable. Very cheap defense budget for them.
Grunt08@reddit
I will always admire the great courage shown by Ireland in not picking a side in World War 2 despite one side of it torpedoing them kind of a lot.
The official state condolences for the death of Adolf Hitler were a nice touch.
blackhawk905@reddit
You could say the same for Sweden, they lost an order of magnitude more boats than Ireland and were still neutral.
I looked that last but up and even if the story the minister is telling is true who in their right fucking mind would continue to be friends with someone who worked for the Nazi government and think that not visiting them would set some kind of bad precedent much less want to have the absolute minimum of diplomatic contact with them. This was the end of the war, who gives a flying fuck about diplomatic relations with this Nazi appointee and his failing government.
blackhawk905@reddit
Why would the countless other wars also covered in US history classes not have the same affect or more of an affect? Talking about the horrific things done by the Japanese and Germans wouldn't be as good as My Lai when they're arguably more important for what reason?
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Because it hits home a hell of a lot harder when it could have been your own relatives you are reading about.
Avery_Thorn@reddit
Why on earth would you want to teach your kids never to go to war, when you will be actively trying to recruit them into the military as soon as you get done with the lesson?
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
lol, really?
Avery_Thorn@reddit
That comment should be read with a crap load of snark.
But yes, the military heavily recruits out of high schools, for delayed entry into the military upon graduation.
There are even clubs sponsored by the military to ease students into military life, the JROTC program. U.S. Army JROTC – "To motivate young people to be better citizens"
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Sorry, I didn’t intend for it to come off so condescending.
That’s odd to me, I’m guessing it works fine for you guys, and I know the Military life is desirable for a lot of people, but over here we wouldn’t get away with that kind of thing.
Zip_Silver@reddit
There's plenty of tragedies and time spent on WWII.
Plus, when we go through American history, we tend to run out of school year by the time you get to Vietnam, so teachers tend to speedrun through it and on to the collapse of the USSR, and then school's out for summer.
Brilliant_Towel2727@reddit
I don't recall it being addressed at any point in my K-12 schooling. In general, the Vietnam War tends to not get a great deal of attention in school history classes both because discussing it could still be controversial and because it would come up toward the end of the year when teachers are trying to cram everything in and still have time to review for final exams/state tests.
wvc6969@reddit
We didn’t cover Vietnam in any detail until APUSH in high school and even then it was more about why it was such a stupid idea. We might have discussed My Lai but honestly I don’t remember and high school history class is less effective than just reading Wikipedia.
KarmaticFox@reddit
Never learned it in my school.
That's one of those history youtube channel type of situations.
Infamous_Towel_5251@reddit
The most in depth education I got about the Vietnam War was from two veterans of the war. One was my neighbor, Tom. The other was for former FIL.
When I was a young and living with my first husband's family my FIL, Dave, would sometimes get up ridiculously early, make biscuits and gravy that could make you weep, do Tequila shots, and tell me stories.
When I was slightly older we had moved into an apartment. My neighbor, Tom, would sit on the porch listening to Beatles cd's and slowly drink a beer while watching the neighborhood punks and telling me war stories.
They have both since passed on. Rest easy, guys. Thanks.
Salty_Dog2917@reddit
I remember learning about the massacre and the aftermath, but I don’t remember how in depth we went.
tibiapartner@reddit
I graduated in 2010 from a public school in suburban Massachusetts and in our standardized history classes (through 10th grade/sophomore year/age 16, after that I took AP History which had a different curriculum than the state one) we only got as far as the Korean War in terms of historical conflicts, and then shifted to focusing primarily on the civil rights movement and later domestic social/political movements but barely got out of the 60s in terms of timelines. I'm sure the state curriculum had guidance on teaching about the Vietnam War, but it was largely left up to individual schools and teachers on what they would teach, how long to focus on things, etc. Additionally I always remember beginning the year being told we would get through much more than we actually did, mostly because our teachers adjusted their teaching focus based on how the class was progressing on a whole, spending more time on a topic if it seemed like people weren't understanding. We also had a lot of standardized testing preparation to get through during high school as well, most of which was not necessarily history focused so the priority was always on literature and mathematics. In AP History I believe there were several curriculum streams to choose from, and my teacher had us looking primarily at political and social history, civics, etc, with a lot of focus on the French Revolution for some reason.
All this to say, I never learned anything about the Vietnam War in high school, and everything I've personally learned about it was from an undergraduate class on East Asian history at a university in Canada, and then my own reading after I finished university. I'll also say that from my experience it is very rarely acknowledged that the US lost the Vietnam War within US educational curricula or mainstream news, let alone discussion about atrocities committed by our country. The first time I ever heard that we were on the losing side was from a US Vietnam veteran when I was 17. In fact, I can't recall being formally taught about ANY US war crimes or military losses, aside from discussions about the Confederacy in the US Civil War.
JohnSwindle@reddit
Slightly off topic: I was an American soldier in Vietnam. I refused to carry arms and was drafted as an unarmed medic. I figured my country's government had pressed me into a gang of murderers, rapists, and pillagers. That may not have been an entirely accurate characterization of the US Army, but it served.
The My Lai massacre happened before I got to Vietnam and was revealed after I'd already returned home. When the news broke, I realized that I had thought everyone knew atrocities were happening, if maybe not on that scale, and no one wanted to know.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Thank you for your comment. It must have been tough going against your orders and refusing a weapon, how did your superiors react?
JohnSwindle@reddit
The American military draft at the time made exceptions for persons who rejected all war on grounds of religious training and belief. These conscientious objectors were diverted to civilian service if they refused military service or trained as military medics if they could accept the uniform but not the weapon. I was in the second category. I wasn't supposed to carry a rifle.
I was nonetheless offered rifle training ("for your own protection") and on arriving at "jungle training" in Vietnam was ordered to take a rifle. On that occasion, when I refused, I was ordered to stand on the road behind the targets and warn away any approaching troop trucks. (That wasn't as dangerous as it sounds. There was a dirt bank behind the targets, enough to protect me from rifle fire but maybe not enough to protect people standing in the backs of hypothetical troop trucks.)
ScatterTheReeds@reddit
They do teach it.
Monte_Cristos_Count@reddit
Not very. Every war in history has its equivalent of the My Lai massacre - it's not a very distinguishing or unique thing to teach. Segregation, slavery, and the extermination of the natives get a lot more time in history class
TheBimpo@reddit
I went to school in the 80s and 90s. Our experience with Vietnam was very different than that of the kids of today. My dad was there. The fathers of many of my friends were there.
We get a lot of questions in this sub that are hyper specific to certain events in history. Most of a general public school education is meant to be just that, general. We cover the broad strokes. We’re in class for about 45 minutes, we have to cover everything from prehistoric times up to modern day in a 180 day school year. It’s just not possible to cover the minutia of the entirety of our history in high school. Not to mention that the farther away we get from high school, the less we remember from what was covered the third week of March and 10th grade.
Anyway, even in the 80s when we were still figuring out how to deal with the fallout of Vietnam, the horrors and controversies of the conflict were covered. Cambodia, Kissinger, soldiers coming home, etc. It is an absolutely massive and complicated era of history. I don’t remember if My Lai was covered, it was also more than 30 years ago.
You’d also have to understand as an Irish person, your father wasn’t there. It would be like asking an American to understand The Troubles. Many of us learned a lot about Vietnam at home, through the PTSD of those that were there.
travelingquestions@reddit
1) nice username 2) I can only speak for my own experience, public education varies a lot among states/schools, but I don't remember hearing much about American tradegies unless it was directly related to American history (like on American soil). I probably learned about that massacre from the internet, and I only learned about eugenics ideology from pre ww2 era in my senior year of highschool, because my advanced bio teacher mentioned it outside of the curriculum.
I think knowledge of these topics depend on your teachers interest in sharing them or one's own interest in history. I think many Americans are unaware of the impact their country has had on the shape of the world, outside of beating nazis and terrorists.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
Thank you, Jesus Christ be Praised!
That’s a shame, we are taught of Irelands impact on the world, and we haven’t contributed half of what the US has, good and bad.
travelingquestions@reddit
I agree, but I really do think the awareness of Americans varies a lot. Maybe these days younger kids are more exposed to things in the world due to social media (I'm 29, so Facebook became popular among all ages when I was about 16 and entering highschool). But that being said, there are so many skeletons in the states' closet that it's hard to keep up lol. Plus some of the issues are very nuanced. Not Mai lai...but other foreign policy stuff.
To your question though, I don't think these things are taught about in public schools. Some public schools depending on the state don't really mention much about our treatment of native Americans but others like mine did a lot.
Scrappy_The_Crow@reddit
From your overall commentary, it seems disproportionately emphasized in Ireland ("go into pretty deep detail") and you seem upset that we don't cover it sufficiently to your liking.
This would be akin to us going to AskIreland and asking how thoroughly you cover the killings of British Army corporals Derek Wood and David Howes during The Troubles, then saying that "In America, we go into pretty deep detail about this particular incident."
ramblingMess@reddit
I won’t beat a dead horse too much because other comments have already explained so, but there is practically nothing that is guaranteed to be taught universally in all American schools, especially a single historical event, so the answer to your question is “it depends on which school.”
Anyway, I already knew about the My Lai massacre because I’m a history buff, but it was a topic in a university level business ethics course I took, of all places. My professor was a family friend of Hugh Thompson Jr., the officer credited with stopping the massacre, so that’s probably why he decided to include it in the curriculum. Hugh is also buried in the city I went to university in, and I keep meaning to visit his grave when I’m there, but I haven’t taken the time to do it yet.
blackhawk905@reddit
At my highschool in the course I took we learned that it happened, there was rape and murder, burning of the village, horrible but it wasn't something in depth and it was just a little blurb on what we covered about Vietnam on that day and a little blurb in the textbook we used because we arguably had more important stuff to learn. I took an advanced class so the goal, while teaching US history, was to prepare students for their national level exam at the end of the semester and recent history like Vietnam, Grenada, iraq, Afghanistan weren't on it really and you're trying to cram an immense amount of history into a semester so the more recent stuff is cut or not gone over in as much depth because there simply isn't time.
It's like how in middle school I had a whole year history class that was just state history, there is no way we could cover what we did in that class in a semester long US history class, see what I'm talking about?
Littleboypurple@reddit
I went to public school in California and it got a brief section concerning what happened and the war crime's trials but, that's about it from what I can remember. There is just so much to cover and so little time. Alot of the discussion on the Vietnam War focused more on what was happening in the US with draft dodging and protest against being involved with the Vietnam stuff being more on the usage of napalm. The My Lai Massacre is a massive tragedy but, just another unfortunate footnote that can be researched later in the grand scheme of the extremely messy war.
Subvet98@reddit
I graduated in 92. The last thing we covered in US was the war. It’s mentioned but not a lot of details were given.
Meilingcrusader@reddit
It was briefly mentioned in our Vietnam War lessons, which were part of our broader cold War lessons. I feel like the cold War got less time than ww2 though
RattyHandwriting@reddit
It was covered quite extensively as part of my son’s GCSE history, as part of the Vietnam war and propaganda module.
river-running@reddit
I graduated high school in 2007, so my memory isn't super clear, but I believe that it was at least touched upon.
squidgemobile@reddit
I legitimately do not remember if I learned about it in school or after. I suspect after, although I definitely learned about the Vietnam war and the civil Rights movement in high school.
I will also say that my teachers did cover American atrocities. I definitely didn't leave school thinking "oh yeah, we're amazing and never screwed anything up before".
Tough_Tangerine7278@reddit
None. But my public school was terrible, so I had to supplement my own education as an adult.
EquivalentPolicy8897@reddit
In school I didn't learn too much about Vietnam. The Tonkin Gulf, the Fall of Saigon, and My Lai were mentioned briefly, but not in depth.
I learned a lot more from my father, who was actually in the war. It made me realize just how much gets glossed over in American schools.
HenryofSkalitz1@reddit (OP)
I hope your father is doing okay. Glad he got home.
MaoTGP@reddit
In my history class (which is an ap so we don’t really have time to spend more than 10 minutes on any one specific topic), it was mentioned in one sentence and then we moved on. In my ap lang class, we did a few assignments on it as context for the book we were reading.
BrazilianButtCheeks@reddit
I mean.. we learn about the war with Vietnam but ive never heart the term “My Lai”
notthegoatseguy@reddit
Anything 1970s and beyond is still considered pretty recent. Admittedly I was in high school 20 years ago so maybe they are covering it a bit more nowadays. But a lot of people involved in Vietnam, both on the political side and the actual war, are still alive. Some are still actively involved in politics.
So generally you get a speedrun of recent history if there's time.
There's 180 days in the school year, and a school can't be expected nor should it try to teach everything. And learning can be done outside of the schoolhouse walls.
As for specific battles or events, it would only be taught if it was a major turning point in a specific war. Not many specific WW1 battles are taught because so many of them were just long campaigns ending in stalemates with parties barely advancing. But the Normandy Invasion is taught because it was a significant event that led to the defeat of Hitler and Germany.
krill482@reddit
It was discussed when we covered the Vietnam War, but was very surface level. We didn't discuss anything specific.
audrey_the_atheist@reddit
Personally, never heard of it. When my highschool discussed vietnam it was simply that we had a war with them and no further. Like a list of people who we were at war with at the time but nothing really specific. It was mostly Europe my school focused on like France, Germany, Great Britain, that reigon. Not much about vietnam or china or anywhere like that.
brian11e3@reddit
Most of my history classes didn't touch world history after the 1950's. The text books were so old, it wouldn't surprise me if they were from the 50's. 😂
Chemical-Mix-6206@reddit
When I was a kid, the Vietnam war was still happening. And my parents didn't talk about it at home since their youngest brothers were eligible for the draft and it was an upsetting topic.
Jolly_Ad_2363@reddit
My history teacher actually talked about it. Mentioned how American troops slaughtered innocent civilians and a helicopter had to open fire on them to get them to stop. And then that pilot was jailed.
She did not teach us about all of the rape. She had us thinking the Americans just rolled in and shot everything up. But I cut her some slack because I don’t think she was supposed to teach us about My Lai at all.
1988rx7T2@reddit
Considering Ireland’s diplomatic neutrality, it’s unsurprising these kinds of events are taught. It emphasizes the point of staying out of foreign entanglements.
here in the USA at a collegiate level I took a seminar where we had to read a book about the massacre in the form of primary source documents. It included testimonies by people Who were there, reports and briefings beforehand that were given in preparation of the mission. It definitely showed how murky the whole situation was. The Soldiers who were sent there were basically briefed that the whole place was infiltrated by Vietcong. It made me unsurprised that the massacre happened.
sics2014@reddit
We didn't learn about it. I don't recall hearing much about Vietnam.