reading response #7

Reading response 7

Hitler, A great leader? Or an awful leader?

Not that I am a history expert or anything, but I have learned about Hitler in many history classes during my years of schooling. I don’t know how or why it still bothers me as much as it does, but he really strikes a nerve with me.

When I was attending high school, we had a debate about Hitler. The debate was whether or not Hitler was a great leader. The way it worked was that everyone in the class had to pick a side; however, students were allowed to switch sides at any point during the debate. This made it very interesting. The debate was over when all of the students in the classroom were all standing on one side of the room.

The debate started as most people would think. I would say that 80% of the class was on the side saying that Adolf Hitler was not a great leader, with the other 20% saying he was. It was easy for us to give reasons on why he was not a great leader. Strayer even gives examples of him not being great “Hitler’s leadership proclaimed a message of intense German nationalism cast in terms of racial superiority and bitter hatred for Jews.” (Strayer 639) . Once Hitler came to be in power the first thing that he did was suppress all other  political parties, arrest thousands of people, control the media, and abolished all unions.

Any person that takes those steps once he is brought into power, is not a good leader. That is simply an abuse of power.  A quote that I remember hearing as a young child went something like this “A true test of a man is what he does once he gets a bit of power.” Hitler obviously abused his power and proved he wasn’t a great leader because of the way he chose to use it.

Then it was the other groups turn to debate. I was in shock that they were really going to try to debate the fact that Hitler was a great leader. They started off their argument by defining the word great. They defined it as, unusually or comparatively large in size or dimensions. There argument at first sounded over the top in saying that Hitler was one of the best leaders in the history of the world. They stated facts that he killed numerous amounts of Jewish people and had used all of his power for the wrong reasons.  We quickly made a counter argument and asked, how can one be considered great if they use all their power for the wrong reasons? Their response was that in order to be a great leader, nobody said you have to be a positive leader. Hitler was one of the most negative leaders of all time, but also a great one.

Our debate went on for a couple days, maybe a week. Slowly but surely the entire class, myself included, had moved to the side of Hitler being a great leader. In no way, shape or form did anyone of us support what he did, or how he was responsible for the death of so many people; however we all came to an agreement. We agreed he was a great leader, but for all the wrong reasons. If Hitler were to use his leadership skills and power for a positive reason, the world would have become a better place, a much better place. It is a shame that he chose to do what he did, and I hope that there are no more “great” leaders like Adolf Hitler.

reading response #6

Reading response #6

Forced Labor?

     While reading this section, there were multiple things I wanted to write on. When I read the section, and saw the picture, about the people being forced to work to cultivate cash crops, I knew I had to write about that. If there was no picture in this section, I would be less likely to write about it; however, I am such a visual learner, the picture put a thousand words in my head. The picture on page 600 depicts two young boys, each with a severed right hand. The boy on the right also looks like he has a deformity or some damage done to his left hand as well. The reason they were brutalized in this manner was because their village was unable to produce enough cash crop. In this case the cash crop in Congo at the time was wild rubber. My thoughts?? First of all, I think it is completely wrong at any time to cut off the hand of a person. I know that punishments were different in the 19^th century, but I still think that this punishment does not fir the crime. It does not make sense to me how one or two young men can be punished for the acts of an entire village. Also it does not make sense why they would cut off their hands. If the village already could not supply enough cash crop, they then would have one less hand to help in producing it the next time around.

    

     In German East Africa the cash crop of choice was cotton. Just like in Congo, production was based by villages, and each village would be given days on which they had to cultivate cotton. The working conditions were terrible. One man is quoted as saying “After arriving you all suffered very greatly. Your back and buttocks were whipped and there was no rising up once you stooped to dig.” Was it necessary for the Germans to whip the people that are picking their cotton? Absolutely not. At least not in the manner that they were treated. To me it sounds like they would get whipped not for doing anything wrong, but just to show dominance.

     Harvesting cotton like this must have had a huge effect on the rest of the crops that people were supposed to and had to produce to survive. My thoughts are that if a village had certain days where it is taken to pick cotton, that would make it nearly impossible to harvest other crops in order to survive. In 1905, the best possible thing that could have happened, did. There was a huge rebellion among the workers and that meant the Germans had to end the forced growing of cotton.

     This section absolutely blew my mind. I had no idea that body parts, such as hands were being severed just to prove a point. Now a days, I am glad that we have laws in place to prevent actions like that from happening. 

reading response #5

Reading Response #5

The Atlantic slave trade

Throughout the fifteenth century, all the way until the mid 19^th century, slaves were being shipped to the Americas by way of the middle passage. It has been estimated that over eleven million slaves were shipped during this time period. I have always been strongly against slavery and everything that it stood for, but lets take a second and ask ourselves, has slavery helped our current society? I believe the answer is yes, it has helped our current society. My reasoning on saying this is strictly my own opinion. I believe that in today’s world, in America, we have the most diverse society in the world. I do not believe that we would be even as close to diverse as we are now if we never would have had eleven million slaves come over on boats.

When I make my argument, by no means am I arguing that slavery is a good thing. Obviously, there are way more negatives that came with slavery than the lone positive of eventually making us a very diverse nation. I would love to see the later effects of how diverse we would currently be if eleven million people were not brought over and treated as slaves, but as a regular working man or woman.  If that were to be the case, then there would be more than eleven million. It has been estimated that millions of slaves were killed or died in the process of being shipped to America. Most died due to infection or being mal nourished due to the conditions in which they were shipped, often in the bottom cellars of the ships.

Some scholars will say that the development of racism began because of slavery. It has been said that because the slaves were black, and the people in America were European, this sparked racism. I do not believe that this is true, I believe the Europeans felt that they had a sense of entitlement because the Africans came here by way of slavery.

By no means in this post is my point to prove or  even say that slavery was a good thing. I believe that the act of slavery, and forcing people  into our country by way of boat is a terrible act. My point is that now, that all men are equal in America, it helped make us who we are today as one of the most diverse countries in the world. 

reading reflection 4

Reading reflection #4

A speedy empire, thanks to religion?

That sounds a little bit weird, or unexpected. When I think of how an empire is created, I think of battles, wars, fighting and conquering other nations, which the Arabs did. Shortly after the death of Muhammad, around 630, the Arabs started war with the Byzantine and Persian empires. That was the very beginning of the Arab empire. About twenty years later, the Arabs defeated the Chinese in the battle of the Talas River.

Yes, the Arabs had a fierce army, but I don’t believe their army was the biggest reason for the quick spread of their empire. I feel that the reason their empire grew so quickly was due to the rapid spread of the Islamic religion. Under Muhammad, from 622-632, Islam was wide spread through Mecca and Medina, but didn’t travel much further beyond that. After the death of Muhammad in 632, the Islamic religion spread like wild fire. One of the reasons that the religion helped the empire grow was because the merchant leaders of the Islamic communities attempted to make or obtain all of the wealthy agricultural regions, so they could grow the top products. Once they had a grip on the agricultural market, their goal was to capture the profitable trade routes. Capturing the trade routes was a great way to ensure that your empire would grow. 

Reading Response #3

Reading Response #3

What is the significance of the Black Plague?

I remember learning about the black plague and other deadly diseases such as the Bubonic plague. Naturally, as a boy, my friends and I were intrigued and would make jokes about “All of California dying of the Black Plague.” Now, I look back on those days, and am glad that did not happen. Back in the day, around 430 B.C.E there was very little or no immunity to these type of diseases. Diseases such as these would wipe out entire communities. Diseases would be spread when different communities came in contact with one another.

            The silk roads were the absolute worst thing that could happen during a time of disease. Obviously the Silk Road was a necessity during the time, but it was also the fastest way that diseases could be spread. The silk roads connected all of Eurasia not only for trades, but also kept everyone in constant contact with spreading germs and diseases. The spread of disease was one of the biggest contributors to the fall of the Roman Empire. Because of disease Byzantium was not able to reinstate Italy back into its renewed Roman Empire. If they were able to do so, the Roman Empire would have encompassed the Mediterranean basin.

            The Mongol Empire got hit the hardest by the Black Death. The Black Death was facilitated in the Mongol Empire because of much more face to face interactions with people, just like the Silk Road. So many people suffered from the Black Death that around the era of 1350 close to thirty percent of the population of Europe was suffering effect from it.

                

Reading Response #2

Reading Response #2

When reading this section, the most intriguing section to me was the collapse of empires. In previous history classes that I have taken, I have always learned about how and why empires are created, but never learned about how or why they fall. With the way the world makes advancements in technology, that is a big factor in the fall of empires. When empires continue to grow rapidly, it seems at times that they get complacent. In order to begin an empire, that country must be ahead (or at the top) of the curve in relation to technology. When a nation is in control and has an empire, they often believe that implementing new ideas may be a bad thing; however, changes always need to be made. Change isn’t always a bad thing; subtle changes need to be made to keep up with the times, especially to maintain an empire.

            A downfall to a few empires was that the rich simply got too rich and cost the government money because of it. The book states, “The growth of large landowning families with huge estates enabled them to avoid paying taxes.” Inside of an empire, you want families to own land and be successful, that is what helps create a successful empire. But when families own too much land, have too many workers, and make a mass amount of money off of their land, at times it can cost the government tax dollars. This is evidence of an empire simply getting too big and not being able to keep up with everything they have created.

When reading about Legalism in China, I couldn’t help but relate legalism to our current school system in the United States. The theory behind legalism is just as much a scare tactic as much as it is a reward system. If the reward for doing something good is high enough, then people will do it. If the punishment for doing something bad is too high, then people will not commit that crime. I like to relate things back to high school, since I work at a local high school, and “legalism” is something that is an ongoing struggle. We struggle with things like how much to punish a student for what he has done, and then ask ourselves, is everyone doing that? Does the entire school deserve that punishment? Obviously it was much different in China, because they are working with an entire nation, and not just 900 young men. The theory in China was to promote certain professions, such as farmers and soldiers while giving less value to artisans, merchants and scholars. This doesn’t sound like a bad idea at first glance, but it arises a few issues when you really start to think about it. The first issue is that nobody would want to make less money, or be less valued, so why would they become something such as an artisan? They wouldn’t. So then professions such as an artisan would be in higher demand and would then have to be highly paid. The other problem that first comes to mind is that the middle class would eventually be completely eliminated. It is not necessarily a bad thing to eliminate the middle class, but when you push most of the middle class into the lower class, are you still considered an empire? Not with most of the people in your country poverty stricken. 

Reading Response #1

Chapter one

                 In reading the first chapter, the part that put most of it in perspective for me was reading the reflection at the end of the chapter. The book says we used to view the Paleolithic era as “primitive and superstitious.” We have truly come a long way since those days, especially with technology in every aspect of living. Looking at the Chumas Tomol, it was a great invention at the time. It was used to paddle on voyages from California all the way to the Channel Islands. My previous opinions of these times (without much knowledge) were that they did not travel much, or at all, they mainly just stayed in one location and they traveled by way of foot when they did have to travel. Turns out I couldn’t have been further off. Although the Paleolithic era obviously didn’t have the technology that we have now, but they still made do with what they could to travel, eat, find shelter, etc. Now days we can go to a store to buy things such as food, they had to find other means to do so. They would trade some of the products that they had in order to obtain food, crops, clothing and other essentials. For example they would go into the mountains and bring them things such as fish or beadwork and exchange them for fox skins to be used as blankets. The beads and such types of art were used as a type of currency. The more beads and such that you had accumulated meant that you were wealthier than a person with none or very little.

Chapter two

                A question at the end of the chapter states that “The agricultural revolution provides evidence for progress in human affairs” and then asks if I agree with that statement. To answer that question, I one hundred percent agree with that statement. In the beginning of the agricultural era, the world’s population was close to six million and by the end of the era; it was estimated at 250 million. That is an enormous increase in population, and I would consider that a huge progress in human affairs. The agricultural era produced many essential crops such as teosinte. Teosinte looks nothing like, but is similar to what we now know as corn. I wish that there was a written record of everything that was done during this era so we could truly gauge how advanced they really were for their time.