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approach the historical episode at Hiroshima?

Your teachers would describe to their class exactly what happened there. They would include all the facts—all the facts—which led up to that event. They would seek the views of historians from both sides of the encounter, realizing that there is more than one point of view on everything. They would then not ask the class to memorize the facts of the matter. Instead, they would challenge the class. They would say: “Now, you’ve heard all aboutthis event. You know all that came before, and all that happened after. We’ve given you as much of the ‘knowledge’ of this event as we could get our hands on. Now, from this ‘knowledge,’ what ‘wisdom’ comes to you? If you were chosen to solve the problems which were being faced in those days, and which were solved by the dropping of the bomb, how would you solve them? Can you think of a better way?”

Oh, sure. That’s easy. Anybody can come up with answers that way —with the benefit of hindsight. Anybody can look over their shoulder and say, “I would have done it differently.”

Then why don’t you?

I beg your pardon?

I said, then why don’t you? Why have you not looked over your shoulder, learned from your past, and done it differently? I’ll tell you why. Because to allow your children to look at your past and analyze it critically—indeed, to require them to do so as a part of their education—would be to run the risk of them disagreeing with how you did things.

They will disagree anyway, of course. You just won’t allow too much of it in your classrooms. So they have to take to the streets. Wave signs. Tear up draft cards. Burn bras and flags. Do whatever they can do to get your attention, to get you to see. Your young people have 129