Shockingly biased and politicized

This "audiobook" truly depressed me. I know a fair bit about WWII and the history of America in the first half of the 20th century, due to a lifelong fascination with the period and a lot of reading/documentary watching. So I was delighted by Audible's "free offer" of this book. Excellent! Personal oral histories of the home front during WWII! This should be wonderful!



Little did I know that these oral histories had been skillfully (or perhaps not so "skillfully") stitched together in a manner designed to focus solely on every flaw about the United States, both as a people and as a participant in the war. This is no balanced representation of the time, the culture, and the events of WWII; rather, it is history with an agenda--- a blatant cherry-picking of individual stories woven into a narrative that clearly paints the US as nothing but racist, sexist, provincial, xenophobic, authoritarian, and almost evil.



I am in no way denying the shortcomings of the United States in the first half of the 20th century; we were indeed a sexist culture, and we did indeed practice institutionalized racism. Xenophobia and isolationism were widespread. And the forced internment of American citizens of Japanese origin is a national shame, no question. All of these stories and points of view are completely valid and critical to share. However: Sharing them IN A VACUUM, with no balance of the good sides of American culture and war participation, is disingenuous at best (and willful propagandizing at worst).



This is a very politicized representation of the home front during the war that refuses to take a holistic view of an evolving people, culture, and nation. It appears that the producers of this piece are disgusted with an American people and government that were less than enlightened and perfect, and therefore deserve nothing but judgement, scorn, and condemnation. Which, of course, the purveyors of this "history" are in a perfect position to provide, from their lofty perch of 21st century moral superiority.



Short shrift is given to the context of what made the American people who and what they were at the time. What was the general education level attained by the average American in 1940? How many had traveled more than 20 miles beyond their home towns? What was their experience with The Great War? How had the Great Depression impacted them?



The "chapters" of this book shamelessly hit nearly every nail in the Political Correctness plank (please note: I am a political independent and a centrist, so this is not the knee-jerk complaint of a hard-core conservative). Again, the points made are valid; however, their presentation, one after another, almost as a catechism, represents a lockstep litany of condemnation: Racial segregation and Jim Crow; discrimination against Mexican Americans; sexism toward women brought into the workforce, and then forced out of the workforce after the war; xenophobia prevented our saving Jews from the holocaust; the shameful internment of Japanese Americans; and on and on.



There are indeed important lessons to be learned from these shameful facts and events; but to present them in a vacuum, with little consideration for the history and frailties of the people who perpetrated them, and little representation of the more honorable beliefs and behaviors of those people in the larger context, is unfair at best. Indeed, the biased presentation is so bald-faced and obvious as to be quite breathtaking.



All of the above aside: Every one of the direct interviews is a delight! They are often full of wry acknowledgement of the shortcomings of the time, and even of the speakers themselves. They are honest, lively, and vivid. And, admirably, several who have every right to judge and resent show restraint and understanding. It would have been great to have just heard all of the interviews with a minimum of explanatory narrative inserted in between.



What troubles me most about this book is that a young person with limited critical thinking ability and even less background in 20th century history could listen to this audiobook and come away being completely ashamed of his/her country's part in WWII. And that is just wrong.