You hear this all the time, people saying that history is being made. Well, of course it is, history is being made all the time. What they mean instead is that a momentous event, in their opinion, is happening which will be noted down and remembered for some time. This is why public events, such as national elections or major sporting events often fall into this cliche.
Yet, as I have said, history is being made all the time. We think of the past, the present and the future though this is not the case. The present does not really exist. As I type this blog, the words are already in the past. The words I am about to write are in the future. The fleeting present has already been and gone.
Everything in the past is history. Everyone is making history all the time yet some people make more history than others. What I get up to over the next few days will be forgotten in an instant. I often can’t remember what I did yesterday, let alone last week.
What others get up to, however, will ripple across the world. As I write this Viktor Orban has lost the presidency of Hungary while Trump continues to threaten to block the Strait of Hormuz. Both of these events will have dramatic consequences and so will be remembered for weeks, years and perhaps even centuries. Historians will write about these people.
History is made and remembered through perspective. The more recent it is, even the smallest event or incident can be remembered. As we travel through time most things get forgotten while major events are still fresh in the mind. Eventually enough time has passed that only kings, queens and wars are remembered. By then history becomes the opinion of whoever wrote it but that is a whole new story.
Everything is history, it is being made all the time. Even this blog will go down in history, only to be forgotten in an instant!
Thoughts from a Guerrilla Worker 