Existential problems and fighting with a 14 year old girl

I don't know what to say. Studying history can be such an emotional strain. It's just too difficult to remain impartial, and try distance oneself. When coming up with a thesis statement I sometimes just to write a rant and be done with it. But that wouldn't work out at all, obviously. You're told not to pass judgment on actions made in the past, the same way one is advised not to judge the morality of whatever work of art they happen to be observing. So much easier said than done.
Or am I merely the type that inevitably gets too emotionally involved in such things.
I don't want to think what I've set out to do (whatever it is, I don't know honestly) is of no consequence. Trying to remember someone saying something to me along the lines of "....study history in order to better understand our present". Okay, that sounds like a fine and noble thing to do. We'll see a chain of events that resonates all the way to our current time, that's the understanding. But what does it mean, how is somebody supposed to react? I have a hard time believing that society ever learns very much from past mistakes. Lovely bit of idealism, but the same things happen over and over again, in various ways both subtle and too large to see, and everything in between.
Somebody or something, please restore my faith in humanity. I'd like to believe once again that people as a whole aren't a bunch of idiots, bringing about their own downfall.

I still believe studying literature and language is the foundation to understanding society, if that is even possible, but I'll just say it is and cheer up. My grade eleven English teacher called it looking into the mirrors of society, finding the dreams within them. The previous year, 14 year old me said something like, "I know how to write, what's the point of all this shit?", when she was trying be defiant.
Well, 14 year old me, communication is only a small part of it. And you were a terrible writer and ineloquent. Please, shut up.
So, what did I set out do by switching universities and having the wrath of my mother rain down on me? Hmm, finding a decent job is important, even though that's currently looking remote. Oh economy...
On the other hand, subconsciously, well...that's something I'm keeping to myself until I can better articulate it. Or until I have to write a dissertation in a few years.