Presentism

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Presentism.jpg
Presentism.jpg
One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.

In literary and historical analysis, presentism is the idea of judging the past by the perspectives/values/biases of today. This fallacy (nunc pro tunc or "then for now"), has been accepted as a fallacy since the 1916 at least, and probably goes back to 1870s. It is a form of cultural bias, and guarantees that anyone practicing it is a fool or a hypocrite: since values are likely to change in the future, what they are saying is they should be judged unworthy of having any valid opinion by a future standard they don't understand or hasn't yet been invented. It also destroys objectivity since you're not looking at the past through the lens that they didn't have, but as a judgy outsider... most often looking to validate your own superiority. Which is why the sanctimonious left (SJWs and other activist progressives) love to use this technique to make themselves feel superior.


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