October 2023
It was stated to me recently that the most important event in world human history was the death of Socrates. Made me think. I completely disagreed, but thought, what are the most significant events in human history?
There are two categories here: one, world human history; two, American history since 1789, the implementation of the US constitution. I limit this to human history as the big bang theory, and the destruction of dinosaurs by meteor strike and the ice ages are beyond my detailed reading interest and no one was around to see them.
The Three Most Significant Events in World Human History:
One, The Death of Jesus.
Without the death of Jesus we would not have Christians or Muslims. The two most culturally significant and humanly destructive influences in history.
Cultural significance: Western Europe was unified through the existing and spreading of the Roman Empire until its collapse. By then Christianity was the ruling religion in the Roman empire. The cultural and societal survival of the unifying Christian culture spread to the barbaric (non-Latin speaking) peoples of the Germanic tribes and across Europe, the Mediterranean, north African, and the British Isles. A unifying language (Latin), unifying societal structure, unifying legal and cultural system all came from this. It is possible that this would have happened anyway with Roman influence, but Christianity survived the Roman empire and the division of land masses into countries we now take for granted, ended the tribal wars so vividly experienced by the British Isles between the Celts, Scots, Saxons, jutes, etc. and the Germanic and French tribal precursors.
The Muslim contribution to culture—short version–in Western thought is the facilitation of the Renaissance by having preserved Greek and Roman writings that could be re-discovered by Europe to create the Renaissance and end the dark ages. Less important but a major contribution is their creation of zero. Another minor item, the Romans had a base twelve math system, Arabs had a base sixty system—where we get the sixty-minute hour. I am sure there are more items that I am ignorant of, architecture being one.
There are destructive facets of Muslim and Christian history.
Christians began with the persecution of Jews (Constantine saw a cross in a dream and the church ran with the idea that Jews killed Jesus therefore should die), the crusades, and later the conquistadors. One could state that Christian culture in Europe led to the imperialist colonization of the world but that is attribution to an oversimplified cause. Imperialism is covetousness which is universal among nations and peoples for many different reasons from lebensraum to food supplies. The effect of Christianity on this covetousness is the destruction of the cultures and religions of the conquered peoples. Other conquering societies left the local religions alone—mostly. The Greeks absorbed other gods, the Romans let others worship as they would, the Mongols left the Chinese and the Arab peoples to their own worship. Even the Arab Muslim nations of North Africa created a three-religion society in Spain with Jew, Christian, and Muslim all worshiping in their own ways until Christians forced the Muslims out and then persecuted the Jews for the rest of Spanish history.
Muslims have had their own crusade reaction—jihad, holy war. This has manifested itself in small rogue groups, often funded by nations like Saudi Arabia, doing terroristic activity. This was similar in scope to the crusades in that small groups usually independently funded fought for a cause, claiming an overarching purpose of destroying the infidel. Crusaders did not do their work for public display as terrorists do which is a major difference. The World Trade Centers destruction was the most visible terrorist event to date. But there were wars as a result where the United States started using these events as an excuse for national war in the ‘war on terror’.
Over 50% of the world’s population claim these two religions that only exist because of the death of Jesus. Untold millions have benefited and suffered from them over the last two thousand years. If the Republican party at the time of this writing, gets its way the ‘Christian’ caused suffering will begin again. Keep in mind the suffering caused by these two religions is about power and not the philosophies themselves. Using religion to control thought is a power trip reminiscent of the Catholic power regime before the renaissance and reformation.
Two: Guttenberg and Movable Type
Block printing was invented by the Chinese, but Guttenberg created the movable type system, made from metal. The resulting exponential dissemination of knowledge and ideas goes without saying. It also hastened the end of Catholic control of thought and society. Several reasons for this, the main one, the bible in the vernacular, the ability for people to read what the word of God says directly rather than needing a priest. The exploration of knowledge without the church’s ok changed the power dynamic of European society. The loss of thought control, the exponential expansion of ideas, the inability for the church to control this spread led to the expansion of the inquisition and fractions in the Holy Roman Empire to its total destruction and eventually led to democracy.
One can easily argue that the protestant reformation would have, at the very least, been delayed by possibly centuries if the Catholic power structure had not been shaken by direct knowledge dissemination caused by the movable type printing press.
Three: The Industrial Revolution
A bit different than the ‘event’ of my thesis here but the Industrial revolution keeps changing the world. The period runs ca. 1760 – 1840, according to some. The ‘beginning’ seems to be the invention of the spinning Jenny (1764) and the first steam engine (1786). These led to an increase in production and an increase in the amount of output. Societal changes once the railroad was created were immense. People began to move away from, or just connect with other, towns and villages leading to a diversification of genes and family ties. This has led to a smoothing of human society. This would create a completely new family dynamic in European and later American life and society. It would also lead to the dehumanization of people who became defined as workers and not individuals (I would argue that the internet has pushed dehumanisation to a worldwide breaking point). The first question one asks, ‘what do you do for a living?’ is an unintentional denial of a person’s humanity and personality, allowing only one place in society and that as a cog in the machine.
These three world events changed the world. Of course, all events change the world as a butterfly creates hurricanes, but I see these three events as the most significant.
Next up, three American events from after 1789 which was the official begging of the United States constitution. On 4 March 1789 George Washington’s term of office as the first President began. Obviously, the American revolution was a significant event in the history of the US but technically the country did not exist, so I picked after 1789.
One: The Industrial Revolution and Gilded Age
We will start where we just left off with industrialization. In the United States this really hit society during the Gilded Age—a coinage from a book by Mark Twain, co-written with Carles Dudley Warner. The book is about corruption in land speculation and government. The term speaks of the time, now defined as 1877 – 1900. This period is post civil war and post reconstruction when the industrial age really exploded in American society—sometimes called the second industrial revolution. Railroad expansion is the begging, cause, and result of this industrial revolution that affected America. Up to and during the civil war, North and South had two different track widths. After the war the Federal Government unified the gauge which allowed the nation to combine markets and expand quickly. The Gilded Age, as we now are taught, concerns robber barons who controlled steel and rail expansion. Massive increases in wealth, mobility, and industrial power lead by the likes of Vanderbilt, Carnegie, and Rockefeller among others. (The modern version of these men are Jobs and Gates among others, born at the right time to take advantage of the right new technology and industrial methods to become fabulously rich and powerful).
There were many new items in society during the Gilded Age: public schooling began, massive European and Chinese immigration needed for industrial manufacturing, unionism, monopolies like US Steel exploited all levels of production from the mine, manufacturing, distribution, and sales in a bottom to top market and corporate structure. The era was called the Gilded Age as it was an age of great gold and wealth covering, with a gilded veneer, abject poverty.
The industrial motion and wealth creation of this era resulted in the United States, by 1913, having the largest economy in the world. By the end of WWII, it had a larger economy than the next several largest economies combined according to Guns Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond. The country went on to increase power and influence.
Two: The Civil War
Obviously, this is not quite the right order for a timeline of American history, but the industrial revolution began before this and affected everything during and after the civil war. Also, this is a single historical event. Its actual effect on American culture may still be debated. (Keep in mind the civil war was not about slavery when it started but was about preserving the Southern economic power of rich whites and the wishful thinking of poor whites that wished to become rich.)
The civil war ended slavery and blacks had a short period during reconstruction of freedom and power in the southern states. These advances were removed by ending reconstruction and the implementation of the Jim Crow Era. Slavery’s racism and discrimination lasted officially for another hundred years, until the 1964 civil rights act and the 1665 voting rights act. These did not stop discrimination in the nation. The Republican party has essentially gutted the voting rights act as I write. They are doing all they can to disenfranchise blacks primarily, but not solely, by disenfranchising the poor.
The Fourteenth Amendment is one of the lasting results of the civil war. The effect on everyday life is not fathomed by most Americans. We are learning more about this every day due to the Trump Republican disaster and all the attempts to end US democracy and the constitution (they, of course, say they are saving it). Results over time: Equal protection, citizenship to all born in the US including ex-slaves, the end of separate but equal, the allowance of interracial and same-sex marriage, legality of abortion, privacy rights, and others.
This amendment is the most lasting and most consequential result of the civil war. Most other issues, death of hundreds of thousand Americans at the hands of their fellows; the proven dominance of industrial areas, mostly Northern; the demonstrated, although unlearned, lesson that rich people manipulate the poor to fight for them in the rich’s attempt at self preservation, this being demonstrated today by the poor whites who are violently supporting Donald Trump for President; the effect of 18th century war tactics against an enemy, using the same, when combined with modern weapons systems and the destruction of human life that results on a mass scale was not learned by the European powers who used the same tactics in the Crimean war and to a greater loss of life in WWI.
Three: The Vietnam War
One could argue that Vietnam was the last of the nineteenth century colonial events except for Britain and the Falklands war. The war began because the allies, at the end of World War Two, gave Indochina back to the French. Ho Chi Minh led his people to fight the French imperialists return, as he was an ally during WWII fighting the Japanese occupation of Indochina was thrown aside at the end (You may recognize this, Osama Bin Laden was treated in a similar fashion with devastating results).
Like the civil war there are many lessons from Vietnam. I would re-word the humourists phrase of ‘Do not get involved in a land war in Asia’ to, do not invade other ‘little countries’, to use Lyndon Johnson’s phrase. Don’t try to tell them how to live and govern themselves. Examples: Russia in Afghanistan and currently in Ukraine and the US in Afghanistan and Iraq. US invasion methods have changed to economic manipulation to destabilize governments for US corporate takeover. A long-lasting lesson of Vietnam, unlearned by politicians, is don’t lie to the people. It is not good for the American psyche as it destroys trust in government and American support of policy.
1968 was a year of protest all over the world, but in the US, it was especially devastating as it was a new experience. It began in the 50s with the civil rights movement. By the mid-sixties there seemed to be a generational divide in the country, though this was mostly media made as television became ubiquitous and TV news a regular source of information. I am one who would argue that the protest movements, exception being made for civil rights protests, in fact accomplished little but one thing: Victim Status as an American goal. Victim Status is not in the scope here except to say, Trump, who encourages white men to claim this goal, has come full circle. Most of Vietnam’s related issues, protests, cynicism, and changes in government, were French experiences from 1945 to the American take over in the 60’s and lasted in America to the fall of Saigon in 1975.
Protests and unrest in the streets led directly to the Nixon administration’s activities related to Watergate. The ‘White House Plumbers’ were hired to find information leaks, a direct result of the release of the Pentagon Papers, showing in detail all the governments decisions related to Vietnam from the Eisenhower administration through the Johnson administration. Ironically there was no information on Nixon administration decisions in the Pentagon papers but Nixon was paranoid. His philosophy was ‘do unto them before they do unto you’ (Aside: this is the Republican mantra today, e.g., the only people being arrested for voter fraud are republicans) and this was the impetus of the Watergate shenanigans. It can be argued that the third most important event in American history was actually Watergate, but the cause of Watergate was the Vietnam war, so I began there.
As most people know today, Watergate was a long series of illegal and political uses of dirty tricks done by the Nixon administration against the Democrats to guarantee a Nixon second term. Several things happened as a result of Watergate that have had a great impact on American society to this day.
The reason Trump was not indicted on findings of the Mueller probe was a letter written because of Spiro Agnew, VP under Nixon, that a sitting President could not be indicted. This has never been challenged in court due to the fact there have only been two Presidents that have needed to be indicted, Nixon and Trump. At this time there may be eventual justice for the American people and constitution regarding Trump where Ford’s pardon of Nixon destroyed any justice that would have been possible in 1974.
Money in politics today is out of control. This was a result of an attempt by congress to prevent, in the future, Nixon’s methods of using political money for bribes and illegal activity. Unfortunately the legislation resulted in the creation of political action committees (Pacs), corporate control of politicians by donation (bribes), and an increase in lobbyists. It is my understanding that this legislative attempt to prevent a problem was legitimate but unintended consequences made the problem worse. It has taken the individual citizen out of politics, resulting in many negative results. There have been claimed attempts to use small dollar donations instead of corporate, but this has not resulted in removing big money corporate control of the government. Money now is the key to all political activity and the primary activity of politicians is to solicit donations. Even congressional committee membership is based on the ability to fund raise.
The media changed after Watergate, not altogether negatively. For awhile everyone wanted to be Woodward and Bernstein and bring down the powerful. Before Watergate the media would allow politicians to be off the record or would just ignore some of their more questionable activities. Examples: the affairs of Bobby and John Kennedy, FDR’s paralysis, Woodrow Wilson’s wife was really acting as President when he had a stroke in office. Now the media approach to politics is to dig until dirt is found. In some circles, demonstrated by media support for the Trump Republican party, media outlets are just making stuff up to add dirt. The impetus for this is this adage, ‘the news is what happens between the commercials’. There is one bottom line now in the media and that is selling advertising. Resulting in politicians who are the lowest common denominator of society. Those who seem to only want power, the paycheck, and benefits. Since many potential candidates do not want to put themselves, friends, and family through the dirt slinging. Also citizens are more cynical about government and politicians, having only heard the worst. The trust level of government has hit all time lows in the last several presidential terms. This media approach can have a good side. We do know more about government and those that make decisions than we ever had in history.
Conclusion
There are many other possibles in these lists. The invention of telegraphy leading to radio and television—averaging cultural and knowledge bases. The invention of the punch card as a method of weaving automation that led to the one/zero, on/off design of machine language and the computer—to mixed human results. The discovery of anti-biotics—saving the world. The invention of writing—helping the dissemination and preservation of knowledge. World War II, although a world event–solidified the US as the worlds economic and military powerhouse in the world, for better and worse, they became the world’s policing power.
Hark 