Jack Weatherford: belief

Transcript context

…There is a point that you correctly identify, and you’ve also written about Native Americans and so on, that history does seem to be written by the non-barbarians. But in reality, history is not divided in this way. And the barbarians are not these crude, brutal, plain, simple people. That there is a sophisticated, deep culture within them as well. All the different kinds of peoples that came from the steppe. Yes. I guess if there’s one thing that I try to do in my career of writing, it is to get us to recognize the importance of tribal people in the history of the world. We tend to have two categories for them. They’re barbarians who kill people and eat one another, or they’re victims and we should feel sorry from them and nostalgic about everything about them, and maybe wear some of their beads or some of their clothing to show how much we sympathize with their suffering. That’s the two roles for tribal people. But I’m trying to show them in a different light. That they conquered. Yes, they were conquerors, but they also created great things in the history of the world. And that the Mongol Empire was really the first modern empire in the way that I’m putting together that story. And Chinggis Khan was the genius behind that, who created this idea that there could be one world in which there would be one set of supreme law, but all people could follow their own law. You could have any religion you wanted, but ultimately you had to obey the great ethics of the sky. And there were things like that about his vision that I think very few people in history had, a vision. And I look around the world today, and in my lifetime, since the time of Roosevelt’s death, I look around, I don’t see much vision. I see lots of slogans, lots of talk, policy papers. Oh my God, we can produce it. Where’s the vision? It’s always, we’re going to have peace and we’re going to have a better life and vote for me or vote for my party and we’re really for the people. What the heck are they talking about? There is no vision there. So what is this country? What should this country be? What is this world? How should we… No. No vision. Well, those figures, I mean, they’re rare through history. The legendary figures that come along that have vision, but are able to capture the public imagination and heart and mind with the vision, but also have the skill to execute and implement it, and all of those things combined, and have the mental fortitude not to be corrupted by success along the way. All of those things.…

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