How Johnny Harris Rewrites History

Comments · 11K

• TH

  @ThePresentPast_ · 4 years ago (edited) · pinned

  Update: since the release of this video Johnny has contacted me and he has started citing sources. I fact checked his part two and wrote part 3 of this series with him. Go check it out here: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjieOlWXwTw">https://youtu.be/LjieOlWXwTw</a><br>HI everyone! This got a bit out of hand 😮. This video has the same viewcount as the original. Insane. A lot of you have commented on the points I made and so I thought it’s time for some housekeeping. <br><br>Mistakes <br>Even though I actually have been educated as a historian and do my research, I can and will make mistakes. I don’t have team to check every word I say. So don&apos;t take the word of a youtube historian as the absolute end-all truth. You probably shouldn&apos;t do that with any (internet) person. If you spot an error, please include the source that backs your claim. <br><br>- The graphic showing European population 1300 - 1450 is not right. The script is correct. Graphic should say 1000 – 1340. <br>- I said slavery was forbidden in Europe. This not entirely true. In the 17th century 10% of Lisbon’s population consisted of enslaved peoples. Generally seen white slavery was not accepted in Medieval Europe however. Some people talked about slavery in Roman times. That is a different time period. Some mentioned slave trade by the Kievan Rus. Rus is an interesting one. But most enslaved people were sold to Muslim rulers. <br><br>A lot of people have said Isabella was responsible for giving the gig to Colombus. The source I used says the King Fernando stepped in at the end. <a href="https://archive.org/details/worldsofchristop0000phil/page/132/mode/2up">https://archive.org/details/worldsofchristop0000phil/page/132/mode/2up</a>. If you have a different source do share it with me. <br><br>Omissions/nuance <br>I didn’t mention some things because the video had to be viewable. Some extra pointers: <br><br>- Yes the Portuguese were expanding along Africa in the 1400s. But they hadn’t made it to India. My point was you can’t alter the dates for storytelling. <br>- Iberian colonial expansion has certainly been influenced by Spanish and Portuguese experience in the Reconquista. Both in colonizing land as in how to rule this land. <br>- One reason Spanish colonialism got such a bad rep is because of the Black Legend. The low countries fighting Spain from 1568 found a text from Bartholomeus de Las Casas describing atrocities in the New World. They and others spread it religiously. Casas his work was overly negative and propaganda for reform. Initial lawlessness in the first 30 years had by then been replaced by a more stable colonial administration. The Spanish did not deliberately cause the catastrophic loss to the population. They wanted a work force. This does not mean Spain should have colonized it in the first place or that no atrocities happened.<br>- Some commenters pointed out how local factions that helped Spanish got titles and lands awarded, so it did work out for them in the end. I’d say that is a small consolation for seeing your entire society disrupted. &nbsp;<br>- Some people thought I was not critical enough of JH and have said some nasty things. Making content is hard and shouting from the sidelines is easy. I still think JH has the best intentions. And I think being critical can be done in a civilized manner. <br>- The flag of Spain doesn&apos;t show Aragon. But I think that might&apos;ve been just a mistake. I do think you can say Spain instead of &apos;Union of the Crowns of Castile and Aragon&apos; to make the topic more accessible. <br>- Europe is too big of a term. Eastern Europe was mostly colonised instead of a coloniser. But I understand the decision to say this. <br><br>When discussing these things please keep it civil.

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• JO

  @johnnyharris · 4 years ago

  Great video. I really appreciate the way you approached this and appreciate the amount of work that went into creating this discourse. I&apos;ll just say it right away: I accept your points here, and to be candid, the response to this video was a pretty big wake up call for me. The research on this was overly biased towards a simplistic narrative to which most of the facts bent. My hope with this series was to give an highly simplified almost “story book” version of a vastly complicated 500-year history so that those who are not usually interested in history could access the broad arc of European imperialism. I still believe in that goal but missed the mark with this one. So thank you for the compelling dissent. <br>I’ll do some soul searching on how I’ll address this in the channel and series itself. Again. I appreciate the way you approached this critique. Also REALLY great job on the production. &nbsp;new sub here.<br><br>Oh the Irving analogy at the end was pretty 🔥

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• CH

  @chrisoffersen · 4 years ago

  This is like a YouTube peer review. I can see this having positive effects for the reliability of the platform, especially when it’s responded to with such professionalism as it has been.

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• 2Z

  @2Zemog · 4 years ago (edited)

  Excellent video. As an English/History teacher-in-training, this video inspired me to create an assignment where students criticize popular YouTube history videos, finding the perspective of the video, their mistakes and falsehoods, their lack of nuance or oversimplification, as well as their merit. I think it&apos;s a great starting point to explore the complicated concept of historical narratives, interpretation, myth and contemporary issues connected to popular retellings of history.

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• BL

  @BlindAlan · 1 year ago

  I didn’t realize Johnny Harris worked for Vox. Makes a lot of sense of his biases now

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• TH

  @The2wanderers · 4 years ago

  This is great. &nbsp;I told youtube a long time ago to stop recommending Johnny Harris to me because his videos were very attractive at surface level, but empty and unsatisfying underneath. But real history is so interesting, and it&apos;s great that you&apos;re able to fill in these gaps.

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• CO

  @ConfidentlyUninformed · 4 years ago

  As a viewer of Johnny Harris&apos; channel I am happy to see that this video calls him out and receives great attention for it. This is how discussion on this platform should be.

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• TE

  @TehLicker · 2 years ago

  Did I just witness non bellicose, constructive and thoughtful criticism? Well done!

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• BI

  @BingeHD720 · 1 year ago

  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAeoJVXrZo4&amp;t=620">10:20</a> &quot;In his mind, he was in the East.&quot; - I remember my history teacher in university <b>expliicitly</b> mentioning that colombus died thinking what he had found was not a new land, but instead was India / the far East.

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• AI

  @aimhighguy · 3 years ago

  Love this Youtube Academia vibe - its like your a professor responding to the theory of another academic from a different university. This is peak youtube

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• PE

  @pennycheshire5608 · 4 years ago

  ‘Constantly in debt to landlords’ is a really weird way to describe feudalism. His whole description of medieval European social conditions is quite anachronistic in addition to being ahistorical. Great video! Glad to have found and subbed to your channel 😁

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• FR

  @frogery · 3 years ago

  this is how it should be. you peer reviewed his work and he had the humility to take it to heart. misinformation (intentional or not) is one of the the biggest dangers to society today and we need everyone working together to fight it.

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