[porphyrogenitus]

His thesis sounds similar to the one referenced here; that racism is wrong, thus we need to talk about how evil whitey (exclusively) is, and tendentiously and mendaciously slant the narrative to present Whitey as uniquely wicked, because that’s how you fight racism. Any comparison of this method of activist historiograpy to that of Streicher in his prime or of Goebbels would, of course, be inappropriate. However I will note that this sort of thing is a prime example of the progressive-as-therapeutic-manager-of-public-opinion rather than historian.

That said I second your interest in how the professors here would respond to your points (1) and (2). I tend to share Kelley Ross’s position on the whole Civil War thing.