World History Quotes

“Eurocentrism is quite simply the colonizer's model of the world.”
― J.M. Blaut, The Colonizer's Model of the World: Geographical Diffusionism and Eurocentric History

“More often and more insistently as that time recedes, we are asked by the young who our "torturers" were, of what cloth were they made. The term torturers alludes to our ex-guardians, the SS, and is in my opinion inappropriate: it brings to mind twisted individuals, ill-born, sadists, afflicted by an original flaw. Instead, they were made of the same cloth as we, they were average human beings, averagely intelligent, averagely wicked: save the exceptions, they were not monsters, they had our faces, but they had been reared badly. They were, for the greater part, diligent followers and functionaries, some frantically convinced of the Nazi doctrine, many indifferent, or fearful of punishment, or desirous of a good career, or too obedient. All of them had been subjected to the terrifying miseducation provided for and imposed by the schools created in accordance with the wishes of Hitler and his collaborators, and then completed by the SS "drill." Many had joined this militia because of the prestige it conferred, because of its omnipotence, or even just to escape family problems. Some, very few in truth, had changes of heart, requested transfers to the front lines, gave cautious help to prisoners or chose suicide. Let it be clear that to a greater or lesser degree all were responsible, but it must bee just as clear that behind their responsibility stands that the great majority of Germans who accepted in the beginning, out of mental laziness, myopic calculation, stupidity, and national pride the "beautiful words" of Corporal Hitler, followed him as long as luck and lack of scruples favored him, were swept away by his ruin, afflicted by deaths, misery, and remorse, and rehabilitated a few years later as the result of an unprincipled political game.”
― Primo Levi

“The history of the world is a whitewashed history, where great many facts are distorted to maintain white supremacy – such as Columbus discovering America or Gandhi liberating India – Gandhi didn’t liberate India, Subhas Chandra Bose did and Columbus never even set foot on America.”
― Abhijit Naskar, When Veins Ignite: Either Integration or Degradation

“By the time the war ended, Iceland was a changed country. Not least among the changes, in 1944 it had negotiated full independence from Denmark. Now it was free to negotiate its own relations with the rest of the world. Because of cod, it had moved in one generation from a fifteenth-century colonial society to a modern postwar nation.”
― Mark Kurlansky, Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World

“William Penn planned to use this land for a colony where Quaker ideas would be followed. He wanted the settlers to be like brothers, all equal to each other. The capital city would be called the City of Brotherly Love--in Greek, Philadelphia.”
― Susan Wise Bauer, Early Modern Times: From Elizabeth the First to the Forty-Niners

“The world doesn't have history, what we have is a white-washed history.”
― Abhijit Naskar

“White supremacists boast about white americans being superior. Let's look at it reasonably, shall we - not that you can reason with fanatics!

Most of the third world speaks two or three languages, yet you say, white americans are superior!

Dreamers from the third world bear ten times more difficulty to achieve their dream, yet you say, white americans are superior!

Humankind's earliest scientific achievements came not from the West, but from the East and the Middle East, yet you say, America is superior - a juvenile
country whose very existence is rooted in humankind's worst of atrocities.

Well done! You really are superior - in cooking up fiction.

The fact of the matter is, excellence has no race. And the only inferior people on earth are the ones who think of others as such.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“All too often world history is told as if religion did not matter. The Spanish conquered New Spain for gold, and the British came to New England to catch fish. The French Revolution had nothing to do with Catholicism, and the U.S. civil rights movement was a purely humanitarian endeavor. But even if religion makes no sense to you, you need to make sense of religion to make sense of the world.”
― Stephen Prothero, God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World--and Why Their Differences Matter

“. . . I've learned over the years that if more people knew more about history, our world would be a better place. History is constantly speaking to us. Travelers enjoy a privileged way to hear it—and sometimes an up-close chance to witness history in the making.”
― Rick Steves, For the Love of Europe: My Favorite Places, People, and Stories

“By 1937, every British trawler had a wireless, electricity, and an echometer - the forerunner of sonar. If getting into fishing had required the kind of capital in past centuries that it cost in the twentieth century, cod would never have built a nation of middle-class, self-made entrepreneurs in New England.”
― Mark Kurlansky, Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World

“[Louis XIV] announced that he would now rule absolutely, without a council of advisors... No French king had ruled without advisors for almost a hundred years. And no one believed that this elegant young man... would be an efficient ruler.”
― Susan Wise Bauer, Early Modern Times: From Elizabeth the First to the Forty-Niners

“During [Louis XIV]'s reign, France became the largest and most important nation in Europe.”
― Susan Wise Bauer, Early Modern Times: From Elizabeth the First to the Forty-Niners

“Louis XIV had sent hundred of soldiers--all men--to New France. These soldiers wanted to start families... But there were six men for every woman... [Louis XIV] announced that he would pay young Frenchwomen large amounts of money if they would go and live in the colonies. Many young women accepted the King's offer...”
― Susan Wise Bauer, Early Modern Times: From Elizabeth the First to the Forty-Niners

“The days of kings and lords first began to lose their brightness when philosophers and scientists realized that the ancient Greeks, who had long been held up as the wisest men in the world, were sometimes wrong.”
― Susan Wise Bauer, Early Modern Times: From Elizabeth the First to the Forty-Niners

“Galileo was one of the first scientists to use the scientific method. Instead of accepting old ideas, he carefully observed the world around him, and then tried to make a theory that would explain his observations.”
― Susan Wise Bauer, Early Modern Times: From Elizabeth the First to the Forty-Niners

“In his scientific notebook, Newton wrote, "Amicus Plato amicus Aristoteles magis amica veritas." That is Latin for, "Plato is my friend, Aristotle is my friend, but my best friend is truth.”
― Susan Wise Bauer, Early Modern Times: From Elizabeth the First to the Forty-Niners

“In [Two Treatises of Government], John Locke explained that he had discovered universal laws that could predict how people should act. Every man and woman, Locke wrote, was equal. Every human being had, by "natural law," the right to seek "life, health, liberty, and possession.”
― Susan Wise Bauer, Early Modern Times: From Elizabeth the First to the Forty-Niners

“Isaac Newton, John Locke, and many other men and women in England and Europe began to... believe that universal laws, discovered through observation, governed every part of human life. Today, we often talk about these ideas as "Western ideas." Sometimes, we talk about the years when these ideas became popular as the "Enlightenment.”
― Susan Wise Bauer, Early Modern Times: From Elizabeth the First to the Forty-Niners

“Having voted for independence, they now needed to discuss and vote on the text of a declaration of independence that Thomas Jefferson had drawn up. The text Jefferson had written was read aloud, and throughout the day the delegates made changes. They deleted about twenty-five percent of the text, thinking it not applicable, or too emotive, or beside the point.”
― Janet Benge, John Adams: Independence Forever

“In 1934, my parents and the aunts and uncles that accompanied them on their return to Germany, stayed with my grandmother and other family members during this difficult time. To get away from the overwhelming stress everyone felt, they took a day’s outing to the grassy countryside known as die Luneburger Heide, which lay about 50 km southeast of Hamburg. North Germany is not known for its good weather, but I heard that on that particular day it was sunny and perfect for a picnic. From their slightly elevated vantage point, they watched a parade of young men in the Hitler Youth march by. As the band played and the Nazi flag fluttered, most of the people got up out of respect… or could it have been from fear? That is, everyone but my family stood up! They were new Americans and proud of their adopted country, so they alone didn’t salute the repressive flag that was paraded by and they certainly didn’t feel that they had to show any loyalty to it. It did not take long before my family was aggressively surrounded by “Nazi Brown Shirts” and confronted for this unpardonable violation. Pretending not to understand German or the importance of the circumstances, they were allowed to depart from the scene, being thought of as uneducated schweinehunde, another derogatory slang word meaning pig-dogs. It seems that this conflict could have been avoided, had they just stood up and paid due deference to the flag. Considering the times, it was lucky that they got away with their little scam. To the Nazis it was not just a game, the swastika represented their new order, in defiance of the Treaty of Versailles. I don’t know if my family realized how lucky they were, that this incident didn’t escalate.

It is interesting to note that civil servants and members of the German military were expected to take oaths pledged to Hitler himself, and not to the Constitution or the German state. Oaths were taken very seriously by members of the German armed forces. They considered them to be part of a personal code of honor. This put the military in a position of personal servitude, making them the personal instrument of Hitler.

In September of that year, at the annual Nuremberg Nazi Party rallies, Hitler euphemistically proclaimed that the German form of life would continue for the next thousand years.”
― Captain Hank Bracker, "Seawater One"

“America’s rise to greatness has been marred by numerous disgraces, prime among them the mistreatment of the aboriginal peoples and the enslavement of millions of African Americans. Yet judged against the broad sweep of history, it has been a huge positive. America has not only provided its own citizens with a prosperous life. It has exported prosperity in the form of innovations and ideas. Without America’s intervention in the Second World War, Adolf Hitler might well have subdued Europe. Without America’s unwavering commitment to the Cold War, Joseph Stalin’s progeny might still be in power in Eastern Europe and perhaps much of Asia. Uncle Sam provided the arsenal of democracy that saved the twentieth century from ruin.”
― Alan Greenspan, Capitalism in America: An Economic History of the United States

“We are hardly the first victims of perfidious Soviet policy, which has, already several times in history, placed the interests of power of the Greater Russian Empire— which is probably the most suitable name for the true essence of the complicated little internal Soviet unions— above all the interests of proletarian internationalism. What was the annexation of the Baltic peoples, the Latvians, Lithuanians and Estonians? To this day, he hatred these nations feel for the Russians is so great that a European [sic] cannot even comprehend it.
Mladý svět (Young World), special edition no. 4, 26 August 1968”
― Josef Koudelka, Invasion 68: Prague

“To see the world as it is, first we gotta take off our western glasses. Look at the human world with human eyes, only then you'll fathom justice and progress.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“The history of the world is a whitewashed history.”
― Abhijit Naskar, When Veins Ignite: Either Integration or Degradation

“The world doesn't have history,
what we have is whitewashed history.
The world doesn't have progress,
what we have is westwashed progress.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“World History 101 - The Actual History

History is not a record of truth, history is a record of triumph. The triumphant writes history as it fits their narrative - or to be more accurate, history is written by the conquerors for maintaining the supremacy of the conquerors, while the conquered lose everything.

Let me give you an example. In a commendable endeavor of goodwill and reparations a descendant of the British conquerors, President Lyndon Johnson started Hispanic Heritage Week, which was later expanded into a month by another white descendant, President Ronald Reagan - fast forward to present time - during the Hispanic Heritage Month the entire North America tries to celebrate Native American history. But there is a glitch - Spanish is not even a Native American language.

Native Americans did not even speak Spanish, until the brutes of Spain overran Puerto Rico like pest bearing disease and destruction, after a pathetic criminal called Columbus stumbled upon "La Isabela" in the 1500s.

Many of the natives struggled till death to save their home - many were killed by the foreign diseases to which they had no immunity. Those who lived, every last trace of their identity was wiped out, by the all-powerful and glorious spanish colonizers - their language, their traditions, their heritage, everything - just like the Portuguese did in Brazil.

The Spaniards would've done the same to Philippines on the other side of the globe, had they had the convenience to stay longer. Heck, even the name Philippines is not the original name - the original name of the islands was (probably) Maniolas, as referred to by Ptolemy. But when the Spaniard retards of the time set foot there, they named it after, then crown prince, later Philip II of Spain.

Just reminiscing those abominable atrocities makes my blood boil, and yet somehow, the brutal "glory" of the conquerors lives on as such even in this day and age, as glory that is.

That's why José Martí is so important, that's why Kwanzaa is so important, that's why Darna is so important - in the making of a world that has a place for every culture, not just the culture of the conquerors.

No other "civilized" people have done more damage to the world than the Europeans, and yet, on the pages of history books their glory of conquest is still packaged as glory, not as atrocity. Why is that? I don't know the answer - do you?

Trillions of dollars, pounds and euros in aid won't suffice to undo the damage - but what just might heal those wounds from the past, is if the offspring of the oppressors and the offspring of the oppressed, both hand in hand and shoulder to shoulder, unravel the history as it happened, not as it was presented - what just might heal the scars of yesterday, is if together we come forward to learn about each other's past, so that for the first time in history, we can actually write "human history", not the "conquerors' history" - so that for the first time ever, we write history not as conquerors and conquered, not as oppressors and oppressed, but as one species - as one humankind.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“No other "civilized" people have done more damage to the world than the Europeans.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“No universal history leads from savagery to humanitarianism, but there is one leading from the slingshot to the atomic bomb.”
― Theodor W. Adorno

“... the official history of this world is not necessarily to be believed.”
― Sarah J. Maas, House of Sky and Breath

“There never was a war of the free world against fascism, there was only war between two versions of fascism - because the so-called free world has tortured and massacred more lives than the third reich could only dream of.

There never was a world war between good and evil, there was only war between two evils. There never was a world war against tyranny, there was only war between an established tyrant regime and a rising one. The real first world war has just begun - the war between good and evil - the war between emancipation and occupation - between inclusion and exclusion - between expansion and contraction - between reason and rigidity - between humanity and inhumanity. I call it, World War Human.

And unlike previous times, we won't win this war by old-fashioned bullets and bombs, or by deceit and diplomacy. The World War Human can only be won by education, and education alone - by an ardent, absolute, unambiguous, unbending, undoctrinated, unphobic, unwhitewashed, decolonized, nonpartisan, gender neutral, valiant, self-correcting and conscientious execution of education.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets