feedmegin posted:There was a genuine belief that most plantation owners took care of their slaves, in a paternal kind of way, and needed to because black people were childlike and couldn't take care of themselves (see also the White Man's Burden for the British imperialist take on this). White Man's Burden was mostly about how America should invade the Philippines so it can join the cool kids imperial club. There were much more involved pseudo-scientific descriptions of why black people needed whitey to look after them, see this excellent article To quote from elsewhere: quote:Followers of this technique quickly assembled a large collection of skulls from around the world and began making pronouncements such as that the ‘Hindoos’ had been conquered by Britain because of their ‘small organs of destructiveness and combativeness’. Scientific racism was born and quickly spawned a number of societies including the Anthropological Society of London which brought meetings to order with a mace topped by a ‘negro’s head gnawing a human thigh bone’ and preached that the white man’s duty was to enslave, control and denigrate inferior races. These people were batshit insane. An unholy alliance of people who actually understood Darwin and Christians managed to destroy these fuckers. quote:They also argued that slaves were better off on the plantation than as free poor people, because look how bad poor people had it in the mills in the North and Britain (and, disturbingly, in some cases they might even have been right about that - life as a working class white person was pretty poo poo in the Victoria era, let alone being black and dealing with worldwide casual racism on top of that). It was generally better to be a pre-Industrial British farmer than a British factory worker 1830's-1840's era for sure. But it's still nothing compared to slavery. The workhouse, however...not as far removed of an experience as people would like to think. But still less bad. The worst thing about slavery was arguably what happened in Africa, given 30-50% of all the people captured for slavery died before transit. Re: Russia - hilariously, Cossacks still do a pilgrimage eastward on rafts every year to celebrate their conquest of the Russia-China border zone. They just get drunk and yell racist poo poo at Chinese people across the river from their boats. Disinterested fucked around with this message at 12:25 on Jan 19, 2015 |
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Jan 19, 2015 12:21
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Disinterested posted:White Man's Burden was mostly about how America should invade the Philippines so it can join the cool kids imperial club. Um seeing as it's a poem by Kipling, I really don't think so. I was talking about British colonisation of Africa. As for the slave trade itself - yeah, totally. But the pro-slavery people had that covered; the Atlantic slave trade itself was evil of course and should never have happened, but that was mostly done by the British before independence. And now you've got a lot of black people over here who can't take care of themselves, so they need to be taken care of.  feedmegin fucked around with this message at 12:27 on Jan 19, 2015 |
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Jan 19, 2015 12:25
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feedmegin posted:Um seeing as it's a poem by Kipling, I really don't think so. I was talking about British colonisation of Africa. Compared to that lot, Roman policies of "slave's a slave, who cares about the color" seem downright progressive. ...I might be mistaken, never did study Rome.
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Jan 19, 2015 13:24
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feedmegin posted:Um seeing as it's a poem by Kipling, I really don't think so. I was talking about British colonisation of Africa. Wikipedia posted:The White Man's Burden" is a poem by the English poet Rudyard Kipling. Still, it's not like Kipling invented the concept.
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Jan 19, 2015 13:25
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feedmegin posted:Um seeing as it's a poem by Kipling, I really don't think so. I was talking about British colonisation of Africa. As above: quote:It was originally published in the popular magazine McClure's in 1899, with the subtitle The United States and the Philippine Islands.[1] The poem was originally written for Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee, but exchanged for "Recessional"; Kipling changed the text of "Burden" to reflect the subject of American colonization of the Philippines, recently won from Spain in the Spanish-American War. quote:In September 1898 Kipling wrote to Roosevelt, stating 'Now go in and put all the weight of your influence into hanging on permanently to the whole Philippines. America has gone and stuck a pickaxe into the foundations of a rotten house and she is morally bound to build the house over again from the foundations or have it fall about her ears'. But yeah, this was hardly the definitive statement at the time of the concepts you are talking about, it's just become that to us in retrospect. You have to dive in to what people were saying much earlier to explain wtf was going on. JcDent posted:Compared to that lot, Roman policies of "slave's a slave, who cares about the color" seem downright progressive. Romans didn't have a terribly well developed racial theory. They didn't think at all in the same kinds of way that a modern person does about race; they definitely didn't perceive it in all of the gradations a modern person does. Imperial racial theory is a form of pseudoscience that comes as part of 19th century biology, phrenology, anthropology etc. De Gobineau being the ultimate example of this. Roman attitudes to slavery did colour 18th and 19th century ones though, both from the pro and anti-slavery perspective. Evangelicals like Wilberforce who fought slavery in large part did it because slavery (defined by Rome as dependence of will) made redemption of slaves impossible, since without a free will one cannot come to Christ under one's own power. Disinterested fucked around with this message at 13:42 on Jan 19, 2015 |
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Jan 19, 2015 13:32
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feedmegin posted:There was a genuine belief that most plantation owners took care of their slaves, in a paternal kind of way, and needed to because black people were childlike and couldn't take care of themselves (see also the White Man's Burden for the British imperialist take on this). They also argued that slaves were better off on the plantation than as free poor people, because look how bad poor people had it in the mills in the North and Britain (and, disturbingly, in some cases they might even have been right about that - life as a working class white person was pretty poo poo in the Victoria era, let alone being black and dealing with worldwide casual racism on top of that). You speak like this is a thing in the past. It isn't, here in the South. In fact, I remember a major politician (I think a congressman?) getting caught saying this in a private speech to donors a few years ago. 
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Jan 19, 2015 14:03
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It's interesting since it's also tempting to suspect on a psychological and sociological level that when you have a repressed class of people who are visually distinct from yourself, it's much much easier to dehumanize them, whereas with Roman and Greek slaves you had the prospect of ending up as a slave yourself in the back of your mind, especially for the middle class who could actually end up in servitude if they hosed up severely enough. Of course, the several slave rebellions during the Republic probably also contributed to the relatively benign treatment of slaves in Rome.  By the imperial era you had other things to worry about and you really didn't want an insurrection in Italy out of the blue.Additionally, manumission was a thing, and worked well together with the patronage system and the emperors really, really loved citizens since they had to pay taxes.
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Jan 19, 2015 14:05
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People think that poo poo about poor people quite openly in lots of places. 'Silly poors, can't look after themselves. If they had money they'd just spent it on TV's and tacky clothes instead of food.' Roman attitudes towards slavery got a lot more progressive over time, too. Like, you couldn't just murder your slaves at will and do whatever you want to them after a few reforms, which led some commentators on Roman slavery in the civil war period to write 'look, not even the Romans took this poo poo as far as you people. They were basically admitting it was wrong back then.' Romans also thought that being a slave made you more slavish. Which is a way of saying to pro-slavery people 'no poo poo your slaves act like slaves, you've had them in chains since they were infants. How else are they going to act? Like Patrick loving Henry?' Disinterested fucked around with this message at 14:09 on Jan 19, 2015 |
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Jan 19, 2015 14:06
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There's some good posts about this in the Ancient History thread, but the short version is that you have to remember that Roman and Southern Slavery take place on opposite sides of the Enlightenment. The South has to deal with the fact that people have intrinsic human rights, and the only way to justify slavery in that paradigm is to reason your way into deciding that the people you are enslaving aren't real people. Once you've convinced yourself of that, anything goes in how you treat them. The Romans on the other hand didn't have the same concept of human rights, it was more that everyone existed on a spectrum of civil rights that differed wildly based on your position in society and everyone just accepted that was the case. That doesn't mean that being a slave wasn't poo poo in Roman times, but it explains why in the South it was illegal to teach a slave how to read and write, whereas Roman patricians wouldn't think twice about having an educated Greek slave tutor their children or act as a chief-of-staff of their household.
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Jan 19, 2015 14:23
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Thomamelas posted:In 1977 or 76 an armory in Denver was looted. About 100 M-16s and 6 M-60s were taken. The got put in the pipeline of a guy named George Harrison who was an IRA veteran and they end up over in Ireland. My first thought upon reading this was 'how the hell do you steal six Pattons and smuggle them to Ireland?'
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Jan 19, 2015 14:52
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Nenonen posted:My first thought upon reading this was 'how the hell do you steal six Pattons and smuggle them to Ireland?' You're not alone.
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Jan 19, 2015 15:29
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Nenonen posted:My first thought upon reading this was 'how the hell do you steal six Pattons and smuggle them to Ireland?' They disguised them as tank destroyers so that no one would care, obviously.
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Jan 19, 2015 15:58
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100 Years Ago Sometimes I get annoyed by the downplaying of French activity in the war. However, when it means I have to try to spell "Hartmannswillerkopf" several times... We've also got the first air raid on Britain, and hands up anyone else who didn't know the Michelin Man used to smoke giant cigars? The more you know...
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Jan 19, 2015 16:10
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Nenonen posted:My first thought upon reading this was 'how the hell do you steal six Pattons and smuggle them to Ireland?' You get a really long snorkel and just drive it across duh.
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Jan 19, 2015 16:16
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Nenonen posted:My first thought upon reading this was 'how the hell do you steal six Pattons and smuggle them to Ireland?' The same way Russia is supplying the Separatists in Ukraine with heavy materiel. By creating fifty alternative stories, no matter how absurd. EDIT: Oh, I didn't notice that they were stolen in the US, that changed everything a bit.
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Jan 19, 2015 16:40
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Trin Tragula posted:100 Years Ago Hey, I think I found the article in question about Bethmann-Hollweg from the other day. I was looking at the January 1914 articles previously.  It's dated December 14 (before his son was killed) and was published January 6, so the Telegraph citing it a week later is reasonable. The Times' coverage of the war is surprisingly thorough. Thanks for your daily postings! I'm really enjoying them.
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Jan 19, 2015 16:42
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Yeah, I don't reply to these all that much, but please keep them coming. 
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Jan 19, 2015 17:01
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Rabhadh posted:I remember a British army report stated the IRA could continue the war "indefinitely" with the amount of equipment they got from Libya. The estimates I've seen say that the IRA received 2,500 weapons smuggled in from the US. Most of them were 9mm pistols of various types along with a lot of AR-15s with the M-16s and M-60s. It's dwarfed by the number of guns the Libyans gave them and it looks like they got a tiny trickle of them directly from the Soviets. I know tracking down the M-60s was a high priority for the SAS.
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Jan 19, 2015 17:38
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Arquinsiel posted:Not exactly military history but... Sure, and recently there was also three Canadian soldiers that were targeted in October, an Israeli soldier in November, and a French soldier back in May 2013. It's extremely rare but it happens. But one should remember that Rigby wasn't wearing a uniform when he was killed - his attackers recognized that he was a soldier all the same. Honestly, if you know what you're looking for most soldiers stick out like a sore thumb until years after their discharge. If a jihadist wants to ambush Western soldiers or police, and isn't particular about their target, they'll find someone eventually. To my mind, that isn't sufficient justification for a policy of telling soldiers to conceal themselves as if they should be ashamed or afraid of the general public. Kaal fucked around with this message at 17:49 on Jan 19, 2015 |
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Jan 19, 2015 17:44
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Kaal posted:Sure, and recently there was also three Canadian soldiers that were targeted in October, an Israeli soldier in November, and a French soldier back in May 2013. It's extremely rare but it happens. But one should remember that Rigby wasn't wearing a uniform when he was killed - his attackers recognized that he was a soldier all the same. Honestly, if you know what you're looking for most soldiers stick out like a sore thumb until years after their discharge. If a jihadist wants to ambush Western soldiers or police, and isn't particular about their target, they'll find someone eventually. To my mind, that isn't sufficient justification for a policy of telling soldiers to conceal themselves as if they should be ashamed or afraid of the general public.
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Jan 19, 2015 21:18
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Antti posted:It's interesting since it's also tempting to suspect on a psychological and sociological level that when you have a repressed class of people who are visually distinct from yourself, it's much much easier to dehumanize them, whereas with Roman and Greek slaves you had the prospect of ending up as a slave yourself in the back of your mind, especially for the middle class who could actually end up in servitude if they hosed up severely enough. My understanding is that antebellum slaves had no legally protected property, meaning it was impossible for a slave to buy their own freedom. Freeman could be re-enslaved at any time. You essentially had a heritable brand on a whole ethnic group marking them out as having fewer rights. Southern antebellum slavery was worse on a scale greater than that in all history, and more atypical than ever in the post-enlightenment time period. So it's pretty annoying when people go "See! See! Other societies also had slavery as well, that makes the Confederacy Not So Bad! Also we should bring back slavery."
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Jan 19, 2015 22:05
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The US should definitely bring back slavery, just not of black people. Just enslave everyone who owns a confederate flag. PROBLEM SOLVED.
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Jan 19, 2015 22:09
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Slavvy posted:The US should definitely bring back slavery, just not of black people. Just enslave everyone who owns a confederate flag. PROBLEM SOLVED. I don't know, I think I would be endeared by anyone flying something like this (reverse and obverse): 
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Jan 19, 2015 22:32
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Nenonen posted:I don't know, I think I would be endeared by anyone flying something like this (reverse and obverse):
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Jan 19, 2015 22:40
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Why are state flags so terrible? The only one I can think of off the top of my head that isn't an eye-raping abomination is the Texan one, but everybody else seems to insist on throwing in fiddly symbols that take forever to draw or be recognized.
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Jan 19, 2015 22:43
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Maryland and New Mexico have flags that rule.
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Jan 19, 2015 23:03
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Tomn posted:Why are state flags so terrible?   Americans spend too much time worrying about their right to bear arms and not enough worrying about arming their bears.
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Jan 19, 2015 23:08
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Phobophilia posted:My understanding is that antebellum slaves had no legally protected property, meaning it was impossible for a slave to buy their own freedom. Freeman could be re-enslaved at any time. This is wrong, slaves could (and some did) take side jobs and save up enough money to buy their freedom. I'm sure there were situations where that money was stolen, or slaves were not denied the chance to go make that money, but it was a thing that happened. Likewise, it was absolutely illegal to re-enslave a free black person. That didn't mean it never happened, but it was illegal.
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Jan 19, 2015 23:12
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Patrick Spens posted:This is wrong, slaves could (and some did) take side jobs and save up enough money to buy their freedom. I'm sure there were situations where that money was stolen, or slaves were not denied the chance to go make that money, but it was a thing that happened. Likewise, it was absolutely illegal to re-enslave a free black person. That didn't mean it never happened, but it was illegal. It was incredibly commonplace to re-enslave freed slaves. It was even quite commonplace to abduct black British subjects who had never been slaves and enslave them. The foreign office would have to send a letter to ask for them back and begin gruelling court proceedings. That it was notionally illegal didn't really achieve all that much unless you were fortunate.
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Jan 19, 2015 23:36
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I read a (terrible fiction) book recently where it was implied that the Mig 25 had vacuum tubes instead of solid state electronics because it was intended to be resistant to EMP (a phenomenon the soviets apparently were aware of before the west) and also potentially be developed to shoot down ICBM's. Any truth to this?
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Jan 20, 2015 00:33
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Patrick Spens posted:This is wrong, slaves could (and some did) take side jobs and save up enough money to buy their freedom. I'm sure there were situations where that money was stolen, or slaves were not denied the chance to go make that money, but it was a thing that happened. Likewise, it was absolutely illegal to re-enslave a free black person. That didn't mean it never happened, but it was illegal. A master was also not required to allow slaves to buy themselves out, and could basically say 'oh, you want to pay me $300 for yourself? Too bad you-and your money- belong to me anyway.' Interestingly there was a legally enshrined right in some Spanish colonies where a slave could basically demand that their master put a price on them and then they had a certain amount of time (two years, I think) to save up that money.
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Jan 20, 2015 00:35
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Would you guys recommend "Vietnam in HD" series from the History Channel?
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Jan 20, 2015 01:07
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Waci posted:Americans spend too much time worrying about their right to bear arms and not enough worrying about arming their bears.  Zheleznogorsk's flag never gets old.
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Jan 20, 2015 01:15
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Slavvy posted:I read a (terrible fiction) book recently where it was implied that the Mig 25 had vacuum tubes instead of solid state electronics because it was intended to be resistant to EMP (a phenomenon the soviets apparently were aware of before the west) and also potentially be developed to shoot down ICBM's. Any truth to this? Yes and no. The reason the Soviets used tubes was they were far more temperature tolerant and easier to maintain in austere conditions than solid state electronics, the EMP thing was just a side effect (albeit an oft-cited one) that almost certainly was not considered during development. Tubes also allowed far more power than the current Soviet transistor technology. Since weight and space were pretty much non-issues for the Mig-25 the choice made a lot of sense at the time. For the next generation interceptor radar (the MiG-31) though they moved to solid state.
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Jan 20, 2015 01:22
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bewbies posted:Yes and no. The reason the Soviets used tubes was they were far more temperature tolerant and easier to maintain in austere conditions than solid state electronics, the EMP thing was just a side effect (albeit an oft-cited one) that almost certainly was not considered during development. Tubes also allowed far more power than the current Soviet transistor technology. Since weight and space were pretty much non-issues for the Mig-25 the choice made a lot of sense at the time. For the next generation interceptor radar (the MiG-31) though they moved to solid state. Everything about the MiG-25 was incredibly  . loving thing weighs more empty than two loaded F-15s, is made of steel rather than composites/alloys used in contemporary design, but had two goddamned massive engines that would crash that brick through the air at well over twice the speed of sound, with the ability to book at over Mach 3 if poo poo got real enough that the engines wouldn't matter if you didn't catch whatever was hauling rear end at triple the speed of sound. The fact that it was so inelegant is a measure of elegance in itself. Why screw around weighing each bolt when you have thrust to spare?
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Jan 20, 2015 02:18
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Patrick Spens posted:This is wrong, slaves could (and some did) take side jobs and save up enough money to buy their freedom. I'm sure there were situations where that money was stolen, or slaves were not denied the chance to go make that money, but it was a thing that happened. Likewise, it was absolutely illegal to re-enslave a free black person. That didn't mean it never happened, but it was illegal. Actually, it was more common for slaves (with a skill) to be rented out as skilled labor with the master pocketing all the earnings. This also had the added bonus of depressing wages for non-slave labor and driving resentment between the races. Win-win-win for the entrenched plantation elite! Probably ultimately not as profitable as grinding them down in the cash-crop fields, but a useful side-source of income in areas where plantations weren't as common. IIRC, was most common in Maryland (and the north, pre-revolution).
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Jan 20, 2015 02:30
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HEY GAL posted:The hell is that on the left, eggplants? Nobody's going to be inspired to fight by a loving shrub. That's cotton, dingus. Alabama, 1861.
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Jan 20, 2015 03:03
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bewbies posted:Yes and no. The reason the Soviets used tubes was they were far more temperature tolerant and easier to maintain in austere conditions than solid state electronics, the EMP thing was just a side effect (albeit an oft-cited one) that almost certainly was not considered during development. Tubes also allowed far more power than the current Soviet transistor technology. Since weight and space were pretty much non-issues for the Mig-25 the choice made a lot of sense at the time. For the next generation interceptor radar (the MiG-31) though they moved to solid state. FAUXTON posted:Everything about the MiG-25 was incredibly Ok, what about the ICBM thing? Is shooting down a terminal warhead even possible at all?
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Jan 20, 2015 03:16
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Slavvy posted:Ok, what about the ICBM thing? Is shooting down a terminal warhead even possible at all? Only if you switch off the targeting computer.
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Jan 20, 2015 03:41
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Slavvy posted:Ok, what about the ICBM thing? Is shooting down a terminal warhead even possible at all? I'm not as sure about shooting it down, but hitting the thing with a crapload of iirc neutron flux (I think it was irradiate the warhead till it'd fizzle) was doable a long time ago. According to Hitting a Bullet With a Bullet (sorry about the godawful link) quote:The Army subjected the NIKE ZEUS to a thorough testing program, firing 69 miles, the first in August 1959. In December 1961 the ABM intercepted a ballistic missile over the White Sands range. To clarify, the missile was designed to carry a nuclear warhead that had a lethal radius measured in hundreds of feet (unspecified in the unclassified sources). These warheads were not carried in the missle tests, therefore "successful" interceptions were judged on getting the NIKE ZEUS within the warhead's lethal radius of the target. After repeating this successful intercept, the operation moved to Kwajalein. The first test against an Atlas D ICBM in June 1962 failed because either the radars (according to the Army) or missile (according to the Air Force) malfunctioned. The army considered the second test in July also as a failure, missing by more than a mile, a missile failure according to the Army, radar tracking the reentering fuel tank according to the USAF. But on 12 December 1962 the ZEUS came within the lethal radius of the proposed warhead, and then on the 22nd, even closer within 200 meters. Nine further tests against Atlas and Titan missiles between March and December 1963 also went very well, with two assesed as partial successes, and the last seven as successes. Overall, then, the Army considered nine of the thirteen tests against the ICBMs successful. They later proposed adding a phased array radar to help deal with penetration aids and the airpower thread's heartthrob, the Sprint missile, to deal with numbers by giving a layered defense. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvZGaMt7UgQ
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