10 Uncomfortable Truths About the American Revolution

[LongTomH]

How many of these were you already aware of?

[PSPS]

1. "Uncomfortable?" I stopped watching this blowhard at #8. What an arse.

[bucolic_frolic]

2. No Collusion without Representation!!

[Progressive dog]

3. A little colony defeated the British

and some can't get over it.

[Quixote1818]

7. It's widely accepted we would not have won without the French

http://www.cracked.com/article_20306_5-myths-about-revolutionary-war-everyone-believes.html

http://mentalfloss.com/article/71302/why-there-would-be-no-united-states-america-without-france

[Progressive dog]

11. The French did not help because

they wanted us to win, they wanted the British to lose. The French government (the one that helped us) was overthrown soon after the revolution.
The new rulers executed the old rulers. They jailed Thomas Paine and the Marquis de Lafayette and came close to executing them, too.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/myths-of-the-american-revolution-10941835/

[bitterross]

9. He wasn't talking fake history.

Seriously. I get US Pride and all that. But let's be real. In fact, let's remind the deplorables that it was the nation of France, the one they love to hate so much, is a large part of why we won.

[Progressive dog]

10. Seriously,

his history is selected and spun. It is a tiny portion of the truth, purposely selected to support a point of view. There is nothing in that video that is not available in standard U.S. history books.
Let's get real, the French at that time had a king who was a despot. The colonies went to him for aid because that despot had been recently beaten by the British and had lost Canada to them. The colonies also got loans from the Dutch.
Then, after the war, the new French rulers refused to negotiate with the US without being paid millions of dollars. That was the XYZ affair, John Adams was President and refused to pay. That used to be taught in high school.
1781 (battle of Yorktown) was over 200 years and 7 generations ago. A lot has happened since then. It can all be cherry picked to "prove" that a country is a friend or enemy.

[bitterross]

12. FFS, no one said the French had pure motives. Nothing comes for free.

The motives of the French do not alter the facts on the ground. If they hadn't helped us beat the English we would have lost and been South Canada.

[Progressive dog]

13. FFS, history doesn't deal with stuff that didn't happen.

The French did help--that is fact.
What would have happened if the French didn't help is opinion.

[zentrum]

4. Often wish we'd

…gone the Canadian route. They have a better Democracy than we have and more British safety net, because the Government is still seen as existing to serve the people.

[Marcuse]

5. He failed to cite the preservation of American slavery as an uncomfortable revolutionary truth.

http://www.ouramericanrevolution.org/index.cfm/page/view/m0149

What was a stronger motivation for southern representatives at Philly - taxes on tea or total financial ruin?

[bitterross]

6. It's been about rich white guys from the start.

I think we all know he is correct. It was for rich white men then and they're trying to keep it that way still.

[Quixote1818]

8. Wow! The whole narrative we are used to is complete BS

Just a bunch of rich white men pushing for war to protect their own interests. Why does this not surprise me?