This week visitors to the National Park Service’s parks around the country began seeing signs going up telling them to report any derogation of the United States at the parks by staff. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum signed Secretarial Order 3431 which is to insure that staff at the parks are acting in accordance with the new president’s Executive Order “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” executive order.
The new administration claims that historians and the National Park Service rangers have created a narrative blaming the United States for holding non-whites, women, and LGBT people back. According to Sec. Burgum, he has been instructed to “review public monuments, memorials, statues, markers, or similar properties within the Department of the Interior’s (Department) jurisdiction and to restore Federal sites dedicated to history, including parks and museums, to solemn and uplifting public monuments that remind Americans of our extraordinary heritage, consistent progress toward becoming a more perfect Union, and unmatched record of advancing liberty, prosperity, and human flourishing.”
The American Historical Association (AHA) says that while many aspects of our history show progress, it is not always persistent. According to a statement from the AHA: “The stories that have shaped our past include not only elements that make us proud but also aspects that make us acutely aware of tragedies in our nation’s history…No person, no nation, is perfect, and we should all — as individuals and as nations — learn from our imperfections….Patriotic history celebrates our nation’s many great achievements. It also helps us grapple with the less grand and more painful parts of our history.”
The National Park Conservation Association released a statement on the new signs saying that Burgum is creating “a dangerous precedent of prioritizing nostalgia over truth.”
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Good. About time. Federal employees that disparage the USA, the employer, should be fired.
So you think slavery should be presented positively?
All you need is an arm band.