Runoko's History Lesson for today:
Family, I think that one of the great flaws in Kmtyw-centered scholarship today is the general tendency to cherry pick information that supports our positions while simply ignoring all of the rest. That is really not scholarship and should not be called such. That is just advocacy. There is nothing wrong with advocacy. We all do it. But we should at least be honest about it. We must, all of us must, guard against taking the same approach in our research as those arrayed against us have done. Don't go around with a halo over your head proclaiming that you are only "telling the truth" when what you are really doing is advocating a position without context and on which facts get lost or used or misused only when it is convenient to do so. That is not scholarship. It is important that we bear in mind the context from which we are writing. And we can't just use the information that we like and ignore evidence that contradict our claims. If that is the case, we are only an Kmtyw version of the Tea Party. And that is nothing to be proud of. If what we are saying is right then it should withstand the full light of day. Both our Ancestors and future generations deserve at least that much.