Churchill, hero or villain? Prince Charles, goodie or baddie? Jesus Christ, yes or no? John McDonnell, modern Herodotus or fool? Tick the boxes and pass the GCSE. Welcome to the new history. McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, is entitled to dislike Winston Churchill, but why for Tonypandy? Churchill happened to be Liberal home secretary in 1910 and was asked to authorise a small company of soldiers to help local police during the Rhondda disturbances. He did so with reluctance and later professed sympathy for the miners. The one man who later died was hit on the head by a Glamorganshire policeman. The soldiers were not involved.
What is this really about? The answer is yah-boo history: binary storytelling charged with fake emotion, sucked dry of fact or balance. It is history as partisan docudrama. Why did McDonnell not mention Churchill's role in the death of hundreds of thousands of innocent Germans? Does he not care about dead Germans? Is he for bombing civilians?
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