As a general rule, my undergraduate degree in history hasn’t given me a greater appreciation for national museums dedicated to the topic. If anything, it’s made me overly skeptical of oversimplified stories told in pictures and posters, designed for mass consumption.
It would be nice, perhaps, if we could trust museums to come up with unbiased versions of national tales. Hypothetically speaking, it’s possible. History is composed of facts — things that really happened at a very particular instant in time and are, as a general rule, inarguable. A museum, a history book, or a school curriculum should, in an oversimplified world where everything is perfect, be able to present these facts in the order they happened, as they happened. No bias. No propaganda.
The problem is, of course, that there are a very large number of events that have taken place. Some are important, some are not, and people (whether they are historians or not) generally disagree about which events fall into either camp. And then, of course, historical events are generally driven by people with intentions, misunderstandings, and perspectives we sometimes don’t know or do not understand, but about which we naturally have opinions. Suddenly, telling an unbiased story of the past seems increasingly impossible.
That brings us to the Smithsonian Institution, which runs the museums lining the National Mall and received $1.09 billion in federal funding last year. (RELATED: Spoils Must Be Taken, and With No Hesitation or Reservation)
Museums, whether you like it or not, are especially susceptible to being turned into vehicles for propaganda; the Smithsonian is no exception. To his credit, President Donald Trump seems aware of that fact. Last week, the administration announced that it would conduct a review of eight of the Smithsonian’s 21 museums.
In other words, the administration would really like to make sure that exhibits tend to be relatively pro-American while the country is celebrating its 250th birthday.
The goal, per a letter sent to Lonnie G. Bunch III, the secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, is to “reflect the unity, progress, and enduring values that define the American story.” In other words, the administration would really like to make sure that exhibits tend to be relatively pro-American while the country is celebrating its 250th birthday. Fair enough.
Leftists were expectedly skeptical of the whole project. The Smithsonian, after all, has been churning out anti-American propaganda for a while — take, for instance, an exhibit that mischaracterizes the flight of Cubans from Fidel Castro’s regime as a result of the U.S. backing “numerous dictators,” or a 2022 Latino Exhibit that offered “an unabashedly Marxist portrayal of history, religion and economics” (per the Heritage Foundation).
Then, on Tuesday, Trump took to Truth Social to clarify the issue.
“The Museums throughout Washington, but all over the Country are, essentially, the last remaining segment of ‘WOKE.’ The Smithsonian is OUT OF CONTROL, where everything discussed is how horrible our Country is, how bad Slavery was, and how unaccomplished the downtrodden have been — Nothing about Success, nothing about Brightness, nothing about the Future,” he wrote. His solution? To “start the exact same process that has been done with Colleges and Universities where tremendous progress has been made.”
That, of course, got some attention. To hear ABC News, CNN, or the New York Times tell the story, Trump believes the problem with the Smithsonian Institution is that it emphasizes the evils of slavery. Trump, the media claimed, wants to completely erase the Black American experience. This is, per the New York Times, yet another example of Trump framing himself as “a protector of white people both in the United States and overseas.”
That’s a rather unfair reading of Trump’s post, of course. The issue isn’t that slavery is discussed and portrayed as a bad thing, but that the message the Smithsonian’s millions of visitors take away is that America has an irredeemably evil past — that the country isn’t exceptional for its people’s success in championing human rights or driving technological and social advancements. Trump, as CNN’s Scott Jennings observed, is really more interested in defining America by its best moments, rather than its worst.
In other words, Trump is far more interested in having the Smithsonian promote pro-American history rather than anti-American history. You can call that propaganda if you like — it probably fits the broad definition — but the reality is, given the oversimplified nature of museum storytelling, the Smithsonian will push propaganda of some kind.
It just seems that if the American taxpayer is going to pay for the museum, the museum should tell the American story in a way that favors Americans.
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