George Orwell once said, "History is written by the winners." Rod Dreher intriguingly points out, however, that cultural history is often written by the dissenters (see also this).
The way I might put it is this: History is written by the literate. In any era, the most literate segment of the population is, for obvious reasons, far more likely to be writing things down. From the 1960s onwards, that segment of the population may have been skewed towards cultural dissenters. But what about earlier times?
In an era where issues less than life and death are at stake, you might say that history is written by those who don't have anything better to do.
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