Is my history book biased?

Or am I wrong?

Okay, so for the French Revolution, the Royalists and Louis XVI are portrayed as total bastards that did not like peace or care for the people. Yet the Jacobins are portrayed as freedom fighters who had to do what they had to do. Yet when we learn about Franco and his Fascists who murdered liberals to protect the Church, he is portrayed as a bastard as well. I will say that the book condemned Robespierre for his reign of terror, but they almost made it sound like the aristocracy deserved to die, yet they defend Republican Spain in the spanish civil war. We also learned that Andrew Johnson was a white supremacist, yet we do not even mention that FDR covered up the usage of chemical warfare in Bari Italy (http://www.noblis.org/MissionAreas/nsi/BackgroundonChemicalWarfare/OceanDumpingofChemicalWeapons/Pages/default.aspx). So, like why is one viewed as a hero and the other is the worst president in history? Im not saying Johnson was a great guy, but why should I even think of acting seriously in school when I see this. My teacher is cool and presents both sides, but i think my school board are a bunch of douchebags for buying these books and such. But I would like to know, is my book right? It seems so strange that the history i know is contradicted by my book, but if i am wrong, i would like to know that for writing papers and such, and then obviously i will just ignore the issue.



Answer on Is my history book biased?



I don't know if I would say "biased", because the editors of the book most probably just wanted to present the most popular position, without caring much about correctness. You are, however, always free to buy yet another history book and use it for reference. If your teacher is really cool, he/she would let you cite data from more than one source. Although I am happy with my history book, I also have another. I use both simultaneously to be sure that I always get the right idea even when historical sources are unclear or there are contradicting POVs.

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