"I don't like learning about other histories."
"Really? Why not?"
"Well... you know. It doesn't deal with me."

So I'm just going to make a journal talking about this. Nothing other than that, really. Just a personal rant, so I may take it down later.
I was talking to my friend on Friday after watching another 30 minutes of Moby Dick and mentioned the classes I would be taking next semester. I would not have to take any more history and she would have to take U.S. History. We talked about previous classes we had, too. My favourites were Art (despite the bat-shit crazy teacher), Russian, and World History. That's where the conversation above comes in.
She hated World History because it focused on other continents and countries. Nothing ever related to her so she didn't enjoy the class. I can understand not enjoying it. Hell, I hated writing essays on everything. I was terrible at that. She says, "no, it's not that. It's the HISTORY part, Mel. I want to learn about America. I don't want to learn about Europe, or Africa, or even Mexico."

The same thing we've had to learn about for multiple years? I had gotten tired of it. Don't get me wrong, I'm very much interested in the U.S. of A.'s history, too, but we hardly dabble into Vietnam or go past the 50's. Women's rights? Let's stop there! We don't even get to talk about the war we are currently in unless someone brings it up in conversation because it doesn't deal with just us. We will proudly support our troops, but we won't talk about what they're doing unless it's seen on FOX news.

Let's not forget my town. My small, backwater town. (Sorry of you who know me in real-life and are offended by this. You know as well as I do that hardly anyone that has ever lived here has left or has any intentions of leaving.) We're so ashamed about what we have done that our schools won't teach much of it. America has had a black-eye many times, but we need to know about it to avoid making those mistakes again. "Let's spend three days on Native Americans and then go on into a different subject." or how about, "So it was all England's fault for us entering WWII." Yes, England was a large part of that, what with Impressment and all, but England was NOT the only reason. Teachers are not intentionally making it seem that way. It's just how it's being told. We know very little about the Netherlands, Ireland, Russia (other than the Cold War), or even our own Alaska. Let's not forget the Baltic and Slavic nations who don't even get so much as a full paragraph in an outdated textbook.

History, all of it, deals with us in some way. Be it insignificant or a major part, it deals with us. (For example, like oil. Oil effects just about everything here in the U.S. . Oil was used in cars that brought our clothes to stores. Oil is used in our electricity. Oil was used to import that Lemur from Madagascar on that ship.) Our entire world deals with us. We're so quick to talk about how weak the French are, or about those "damn commies in North Korea" when we don't even know much about them at all. Maybe, I don't know, we can take some time to learn about these countries and not refuse to learn about them because they will never or have never had anything to do with us?

Maybe I'm just taking myself too seriously.