As a person who has always been interested in figuring out how things became the way they are today, it was inevitable that I would choose to become a history major. Although being a history major may or may not be the most marketable choice of major for job recruiters, I have come to realize that there is much more to life than trying to accumulate wealth for wealth’s sake.

Being a history major, I have been exposed to the fact that trying to understand the past is more complex than one would normally assume. This goes far beyond the normal subject of history that is taught in the majority of high schools across the United States.

Although it is easy to say we understand the past when we look at a textbook and see the narrative that is written, in reality, there are numerous perspectives that go unaccounted for due to the inherent bias that everyone possesses, a bias that influences the historian’s decision as to what is included or not included in their version of history.

For this reason, our understanding of how and why history is written is incomplete if we simply read the words of the textbook and neglect to question the motivation that has shaped what is written in the textbook itself.

With this in mind, one can see that if they have an incomplete view of the past, in effect, they have an incomplete view of the present. Although people like to believe they are fully aware of their own thoughts and decisions, in actuality, they live in a society that has systemically enforced an agenda to supress its citizens’ ability to question their own belief system. An agenda carried out based on the foundation of a fabricated version of the past.

It would surprise many to know that men like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson were large plantation owners who relied on slave labor to accumulate massive fortunes, while at the same time being advocates of such ideologies as liberty, equality, and a representative form of government, an unsettling notion in my opinion.

We have also been conditioned to accept that money equals power and it is wrong to question the system that spoon-feeds this ideology to the masses. That system being the government of the United States. However controversial,  the fact is that society is still based on the same paradigm that allowed George Washington and Thomas Jefferson to exploit those of a lower class, in their case, slaves, and live a life of luxury while other human beings were forced against their will to work at the expense of these privileged individuals.

Many might not know of the  radical idea known as wage-slavery, and at first glance, may dismiss it as an outdated and unrealistic notion that does not apply to our modern political and economic situation. However, as founding fathers of our nation wrote the blueprints to a society that would indeed benefit those that were in the same elite class as them, disregarding the masses that they viewed with utter contempt.

Why have we never been taught that George Washington was one of the largest slave owners in Virginia, and due to exploitation of forced human labor, was the wealthiest president to hold office? It is because that would make America, “land of the free”, a contradictory notion, exposing a system where a sentiment may be publically expressed, but the reality of the situation is far different from the view presented by the source of information.

This example may help one to further understand the culture we live in today, where our political actors and the mass media tell us one thing, and another is done without our knowledge or consent. This lack of transparency has been facilitated by the fact that many decisions made by our government are influenced heavily by non-governmental parties in order to achieve a desirable result for their cause, driven by self-interest.

While I strongly wish to believe the story steeped in myth that the United States of America is a nation born of immaculate origins; its founding was anything but innocent in nature.

From the brutal subjugation of the Native Americans, whom this land was inhabited by for thousands of years, to the forced slavery of millions of Africans against their will, not to mention the numerous wars the United States has instigated since its rise as a political power; the history Americans  are taught has been transcribed into a simplistic myth that has created a distorted view of the United States’ past. It is a myth that has influenced how we perceive ourselves as human beings, and has altered our perception of the system that governs our lives today.