The Value Proposition

Why should you read this blog, sign up to get it in your inbox, and (should you choose, when the time comes) subscribe for $5/month? This page will give you the value proposition as directly and succinctly as possible.

I'm a conveyor and communicator of history. Most of what you'll read here relates to history in one way or another. The value of history is that it is the carrier of civilization. Everything we are as a people, as a common humanity, is the sum total of our history. By contributing to history, remembering it, documenting it, analyzing it and understanding it, we're carrying on civilization. So that's the basic value proposition here: to carry on civilization. That's what historians do, but it's not a calling exclusive to us. If it was, this publication would be aimed at professionals in their ivory towers. It isn't.

Civilization is, at the moment, under threat. Global warming and its attendant disasters are already causing immense upheaval in human society. The rise of fascism, in the United States, Europe and around the world, threatens us with a new dark age. It's no accident that authoritarians in many countries are targeting history, and the teaching and dissemination of it, as a primary goal of their political agendas. One of the purposes of this publication is to resist, defy, mock, and thwart the anti-historical (and ahistorical) plans of would-be authoritarians.

If these statements of value sound abstract, it's because they are--but that doesn't make them meaningless. It's difficult to quantify the value of history in terms of dollars-and-sense accounting. History is not a product that can be marketed and sold like bottles of beer. Economists and marketing experts are not likely to enjoy this publication. The $5/month price tag is arbitrary. I don't know what $5.00 worth of history looks like. I can't measure its economic demand on a graph. If that bothers you, click away.

Most ordinary people who engage with history consume it as an entertainment product. You may be entertained by what you read here, but I'm not an entertainer. You may (and hopefully will) also learn something; I am a teacher, but this newsletter isn't being aimed at my classroom students. I'm not going to give you a test.

If you're still reading, and still interested, you are the target audience for this publication. Let's get on with the collective work of carrying on civilization, in whatever small ways we can.