Many lament that there is very little interest in history among the young generations. What purpose history serves to new generation when all histories so far written are practically tinted with ideologies, religious propaganda and at best modified truths. Most of the historical writings are derived from religious writings and the writings of scribes of the winners. Anyone challenging that is condemned as heretic or traitor. There is no human history written anywhere in the world which is acceptable to all. Western history writers of the past depended on whatever piece of information reached to them to write new history books and they ignored contributions made by the Oriental Scholars. British are masters of this type of distortion and then who is not? Communist rewrote to suite their needs and so did Nazi Germany. Many think Bible is a Historical source and Islamics and Hindu religious writings cannot be challenged without invoking the wrath of fundamentalist then why read past history? We definitely do not behave like our historical heroes and what happened in the past is just about impossible to recreate. Can we have another French or Bolshevik revolution today in spite of all the circumstances needed for such radical events pop up some place or the other on this planet. Chinese Students did not succeed and everyone knows what happened to Shia and Kurd uprising in Iraq after 1st gulf war. 
I think it is a good thing that the current generations have decided not to read past history but stay on course to create history today, record it and such history has much more chance of being challenged and authenticated.  I read past history all my life and I know what it did to my psyche. Now I read it with pinch of salt only to compare writers of one genre to another and to make my own conclusions. An exercise of retired person totally unsuitable for young generation.

Welcom, cosmicray. I don’t suppose I qualify as the “young generation” anymore, but I’m not retired either. I would say I think the study of history is extremely improtant. It’s true no totally objective, unbiased analysis of causes and implications of past events can be written. But it is likely true that bias and subjectivity are problems in any attempt to acquire knowledge or understanding. We can’t escape them, but that doesn’t make the pursuit of knowledge pointless. We simply find the best method for minimizing their effects and take all our understandings as provisional, to whatever extent seems reasonable and justified. I think there is a lot to learn from history even if it, like religious texts, reflects a point of view and can be reworked to argue opposing positions, and I think it is important for young people to be exposed to it.

Welcome cosmicray.  Glad to have you here.  As for history, I also think it is important, even though it is onesided more often than not.

Sincere thanks for welcoming me. I enjoyed everyone’s response to my topic. Perhaps I gave an impression that I am against the written history. I am not against it I am just drawing attention to the fact that our history as the history of Human Race needs to be revisited, examined, and if possible set straight closure to the facts. If this exercise can be successfully undertaken then one would accept it as “Truth”. My solace and comforts in reading history of current period as truth comes from my faith in the free press and the technological advances which make access to information relatively easy and one doesn’t have to depend on the official interpretations of events.

Lastly I quote The Avatamsaka sutra of Pure land Buddhism which states,” It is like full moon, round and bright, its image reflected in all rivers and ponds. Although reflection is everwhere, there is a single moon....”

So it is with Truth. It is up to us to write truth as we understand it and not as written in some holy book or revealed to any prophet.  If we do this sincerely then future generation will respect us much more than we respect past history writers.