bjack on 26/8/2016 at 19:20
Even if the ship of the “Special Invasion” made it near shore, it would have still been a bust. They could not storm the beaches in wheelchairs. Pa - dump dump - chiiiiish... Too tasteless?
Sorry to say, but most American history taught today is very different than the past. Not only do they not teach about England, they don't even talk about the revolution. While I agree that it is not cool to celebrate Manifest Destiny with unabridged jingoism, the current trend to paint most everything as a White Privilege fest is over the top.
Check out the “man on the street” videos of millennials being asked who we fought against in various wars. I know, I know... they edit those down to show the idiots and only show 1 or two people that actually know something, but they are still hilarious. In a sickening way. Lot's of kids think the Democrats freed the slaves. They also think the Democrats were all for the Civil Rights Act.
It is interesting and sad that the lies the "pinko commies" are telling are being accepted as truth. They do have some exceptionally good points, but their anti-white rhetoric is getting beyond tiresome. Anyone for the college RA course, “How to stop white people 2K16?
Muzman on 31/8/2016 at 02:01
Quote Posted by bjack
It is interesting and sad that the lies the "pinko commies" are telling are being accepted as truth.
Why would pinko commies have any interest in rewriting the history of the Democratic party?
People don't know stuff about history. It's hardly surprising. Sometimes they even learned it in school and they still don't know.
I've seen the reverse a lot lately too; Republicans trying to refute the idea that Democrats are the best party for civil rights by pointing out the Civil War era voting record and things.
Umm...who cares? You're arseholes now, would really seem to be the salient point. No one cares what team voted for what in 1864. They remember what team the likes of Strom Thurmond
wanted to be on in 1964. The whole stupid angle is just highlighting that things change. It's going to backfire no matter what.
Anyway, the museum and touristy stuff at Battle itself is pretty even handed about the whole thing. Was the promise to William really legit? By our standards probably not. I seem to remember Harold screwing up a few things (you might say, Royally) which didn't help cement his own claim too. So who knows.
There has been a pretty strong feeling that quite a lot was lost in the Norman conquest though, especially with the imposition of the feudal system. You could see that as revisions of other histories and social structures of England becoming more popular as the class system gradually dies off. The impression is that England before 1066 was a more freewheeling sort of place with a very different culture and structure. Some of that is likely the present imposing itself on the past though. It's been fuel to a lot of pop archaelogy and revival movements though, I think.
One thing I think modern retelling are keen to point out though, is that Harold wasn't fighting one challenge but two (at least). The army first had to march north from London to York in 4 days and defeat the scary and undefeated Harald Hardrada, then all the way back down to Hastings with less men while William and co were sunning themselves. No cavalry either and by some accounts they were winning before Harold himself fell (although their tendency to fall for cavalry feints would probably have undone them eventually).
I've never really heard it said that Harold was a particularly bad guy. Ambitious maybe, but it's not like he came out of nowhere into this gig. The tendency of many kid's book style accounts of the past, where the urge always seemed to be to simply decide which one was Hitler and who were the good guys (plus much nicer if the story has the good guys win) has been watered down a lot of late. Maybe it's just age, I don't know. I think a lot of popular historical writing and things like Game of Thrones give people a more ready acceptance of the weird and arbitrary battles of power mad rich people of old, as well as how it really doesn't match up at all with our rule of law sort of civil society and can't be considered very well in those terms.
Tocky on 31/8/2016 at 03:10
Enough of the mamby pamby warbling over who did what to whom. William was right! I know because my male line ancestor was with him. I know that in part due to the Domesday book which Billy boy also created. For added righteousness the knight who I am descended from had my same first name as well. So there.
Then again for all I really know a slutty bar wench just took his name for her bastard child. Still, it has always been a rare name.
demagogue on 31/8/2016 at 09:47
Crusader Kings 2 starts off with the Norman Invasion. I'd love to report on how it handles William's and Harold's loyalty and reputation, but at some point all Paradise games started crashing 5 minutes in because of the Intel graphics. I don't think they used to.
Tony_Tarantula on 31/8/2016 at 17:12
Quote:
I've never really heard it said that Harold was a particularly bad guy. Ambitious maybe, but it's not like he came out of nowhere into this gig. The tendency of many kid's book style accounts of the past, where the urge always seemed to be to simply decide which one was Hitler and who were the good guys (plus much nicer if the story has the good guys win) has been watered down a lot of late. Maybe it's just age, I don't know. I think a lot of popular historical writing and things like Game of Thrones give people a more ready acceptance of the weird and arbitrary battles of power mad rich people of old, as well as how it really doesn't match up at all with our rule of law sort of civil society and can't be considered very well in those terms.
Always been that way, and what's more I don't think anything has changed. A lot of the leaks this year have highlighted how massive the chess game being played between the American oligarchs and Putin throughout the last decade has been.....including everything from proxy wars, to diplomatic efforts, and even shadow funding of "social issues" designed to politically weaken targeted areas. It's also revealed that, just as in Game of Thrones, both sides are assholes.
Muzman on 1/9/2016 at 02:03
Of course it's always been that way, but perception of the tacit rules and morals has changed (as well as the rules themselves) and maybe the level of complexity in a situation people are willing to grapple with. (although you can find plenty to doubt that idea too I guess, but call me an optimist)
I tend to blame World War 2 and the cold war for all this and I feel like we're growing out of its shadow, finally. Some of that is simply me, y'know, learning shit. But I do think it's true that in general the simple good guy/bad guy narratives ruled our comprehension of history and world affairs for a long time there. WW1, for instance, is supposedly Australia's founding myth in some ways and we were taught virtually nothing about it, essentially because it was too hard. WW2 mythology was fairly common by comparison, just because it's easier (even though it's not that simple at all when you look at it).
The making of simple narratives isn't new either, nor is it going away. But with the 100yrs since WW1 stuff is see many people, and quite young, more apt to get to grips with just what the hell was going on there. As well as some older boomer age people who were never taught much about it either. All that stuff also virtually requires some primer on 19th century politics and powers, which is a lot more olde worlde in style than the big superpower tensions of the 20th.
It's just one limited impression, of course, so people can call me a giddy optimist if they like.
