Should We Use the “Olden Times” Tactic to Excuse Oppressive Views?

Writers, leaders, politicians reflect a history that is pluralistic and pliable: “That’s how people were back then” doesn’t explain the whole picture

Last week I was talking to a fellow writer engaged in a debate about possible racist undertones in J.R.R. Tolkien’s books. She replied, “Well, wasn’t he just a product of his time?” I thought about her point and conceded that, yes, he certainly may have represented a slant of race relations popular during the 1950s, but there are multiple voices and perspectives at any time in history and major events in the world during the time he was writing, including apartheid, the civil rights movement, protests against the Vietnam War.

Powerful ideas aren’t representative of all

Let’s also not forget that Tolkien was born in South Africa under white rule, which no doubt molded his outlook. The bigger question is who gets to represent what “the times” stand for when public figures whether politicians, artists, writers have a perspective? I’m not sure who ends up making that decision, but it stands to reason that there’s more than one viewpoint whether it’s a popular one or not, that people can take up in history. We could call Donald Trump a product of his time for sure, but we’d better qualify in what way, and how, and in contrast to what.

Some popular representations are harmful

Here’s an example from an online writing course I signed up for led by a famous author who has 58 books tucked under her bibliophile belt. The acclaimed author of more than 58 novels selected two students to read their work and review an excerpt of Hemingway’s ‘Indian Camp.’ At one point, a student reflected on the nonchalant nod to the violent takeover of indigenous land by settlers in the work, that Hemingway had skirted the reality of the Native American in the novel. The acclaimed author commented that the student’s observation was a ‘judgmental’ critique made in hindsight. Whenever I hear people warn us against judging past thinkers based on today’s standards, I ask myself, “whose standards?”

When we make assertions like this, of being judgmental, using today’s moral standards, I often take this to mean, more accurately, that the prevailing and most powerful perspectives in history support inequality, racism, sexism, but for many of those who stood on the receiving end of these forces rejected them.

Let’s use this argument with something that happened to me lately. I am hired a young man from Peru to design a logo for my new business. Word on the street is that he turns out better work if the client is a white person than if they are a person of color, at least his friends said this, and I am beginning to think they could be right.

I have worked with this designer before. The last time was in a team where he was serving my boss, a white woman, and in fact, he did turn out some fantastic work for her. This time, he presented me with something that looked like a rushed, dream-state, two-minute tinker on Photoshop. This time I’m the customer, a Black woman. Let’s fast forward 50 years. We might look back and comment, “You can’t judge him for acting with the standards of the times,” because clearly, one of the standards and strong social currents of the times is that white people are more valuable. So, I suppose we shouldn’t be “judgmental” towards him now, either.

I hope people are getting that I am saying I call bull on the argument of being “judgmental” based on our times because often the current times are just the loudest and strongest, and systemically supported ideas.

An example of plurality in history

I recently read about Kandiaronk, the brilliant Wendat orator, philosopher, and strategist who was tasked with “creating a comprehensive indigenous alliance to hold off the settler advance” in the 17th century (Graeber & Wengrow, p. 49, 2021). Likely, Kandiaronk traveled from his home in the Great Lakes region to Europe where he debated with royalty about European ways that in his view were

“lacking of mutual aid, the blind submission to authority…the organization of private property.”

His critiques were that European practices and politics were a stand-in for domination and power over others stemming from private property and greed. As Graeber and Wengrow Kandiaronk’s interpretation of Europeans,

“Power over possessions could be directly translated into power over other human beings (p.52)”

pointing out that slavery and servitude linked directly to private property. Kandiaronk said,

“I have spent six years reflecting on the state of European society and I still can’t think of a single way they act that’s not inhuman, and I genuinely think this can only be the case, as long as you stick to your distinctions of ‘mine’ and ‘thine’” (Graeber & Wengrow, p.54).

I’m pointing out that Kandiaronk represented an alternate view accepted by many speakers of Iroquoian languages. Kandiaronk and others in his society disagreed with the popular European idea of how politics and social interactions should be judged, and Kandiaronk was also a product of his time.

In 1683, a French aristocrat named Lahontan became friends with many Algonkian and Wendat political leaders, one of whom was the statesman Kandiaronk. Lahontan said,

“They [the Wendat] think it unaccountable that one man should have more than another, and that the rich should have more respect than the poor. In short, they say, the name of savages, which we bestow upon them, would fit ourselves better, [the Europeans] since there is nothing in out actions that bears an appearance of wisdom” (p.52).

Uff! What a statement. It definitely contradicts the belief that money is the basis of a well-functioning and free society.

Kandiaronk was outstanding and unmatched in wit, eloquence, and ‘mental capacity.’ I say this to pay him his due, but not to distance him from the thinking of his indigenous thinking, or the “exceptional” person of color idea. In fact, many similar arguments were found in records amongst other speakers of Iroquoian languages of the times.

The point is, certain ideas of private property were advantageous to a ruling class, but it wasn’t the “only” way of thinking, nor is it representative of “how people thought” back then. Even more pointedly, perhaps the most democratic political pushes came from freedom fighting in Haiti (see the Haitian revolution), enslaved people taking up arms with the British (see the antecedents of the Civil War), and the debates between Kandiaronk and the French governor-general as antecedents of the Englightenment.

There is such a thing as a mistake in history that is representative

So, if you hear someone say, “We can’t judge someone for the mistakes that represented their time,” remember that history is pluralistic, complex, and not just made of the victors with a singular view on politics, religion, and history. The most we can say is, “We can peg this particular thinker as supporting the theme of individualism and private property like many prominent thinkers of the time” which is nothing more than a description.

We cannot say that this was the only idea. It is just a slice, albeit a powerful slice, of the reality pie of that time. It’s like I haven’t heard many people say, “in the 1950s, date rape was not a thing, and that’s just the way men thought at that time, we shouldn’t be judgmental about it.” That is only a slice of the pie and is no way an excuse for certain behavior. Was date rape less horrible because the term “date rape” had not been invented? No. We don’t “give them a pass” for representing a powerful, yet unfortunate view or belief.

As Wengrow (2021) said,

“…human beings, for most of the history of our species, have simply been a much more playful and experimental species than we tend to give ourselves credit for, including a propensity to simply invent and experiment with different forms of political arrangements”.

Let’s extend this truth to our ancestors in history. We are more playful and creative than we give ourselves credit for, so let’s not excuse “the way things were” for inevitability.

Thanks for reading!

~MJ