Counterpoint: Nostalgia, pie-in-the-sky won't fix public education We must design education systems to produce a more informed citizenry. By Gary Marvin Davison Text size Copy shortlink: American society is paying a steep price for the failure to face the truth about the nation's history. The United States has many admirable traits, but the version of history that omitted police state conditions in the South and de facto segregation and racial inequity in the North until at least 1964 has left us with a legacy of denial. Partial truth in the conveyance of history makes many objectionable conditions OK until, of a sudden, they are not. When OK becomes not OK, affected groups rise up and demand that multiple inequities pertinent to policing, access to positions of influence, homeownership, health and income cannot continue. Saying so forcefully enough induces city councils, media executives and civic groups to scramble to make amends.