Sometimes I feel like history is the bad parent of the present.
You know that moment, when you’re a kid - and it happens no matter how good your parents are - that moment when you look at your parents and you think think, “Well, you made me this way. And now I’m stuck like this, no matter what I do. No matter how I change in life, I’m always going to have this hangover of the things you believe and the things you wanted me to be.”
And history’s done the same thing! The present’s grown up with all these weird prejudices that the past taught them to have, and strange superstitions from when the past didn’t know any better. Which makes me worry, a great deal. Because - I’ve no intention of having children, for the very reason that I know I would be an appalling parent. And yet, somehow, I’ve ended up inadvertently responsible for the future! And one day, someone in the future, sitting in a history class, with the wisdom of experience and accumulated common sense, is going to cross their arms, and purse their lips, and shake their head at me, because of how I’ve messed things up for them.
