drakewalkerhateblog posted:

Here it is: how I got Horrible Histories banned from my school. Sit down, I'm going to tell you a story. Imagine a little girl, a 4'9" fifth grader with dimples and twinkling blue eyes. Oh, look, she's going to the school library. Perhaps she's going to rent Little Women, or read On the Banks of Plum Creek by Laura Ingalls Wilder! Five minutes later, she exits the library holding a large stack of books called "Horrible Histories."
And she's thumbing through one called "Angry Aztecs."
Record scratch. Freeze frame.
Yup, that's me! The only history geek in a fifty mile radius. Living in Bumhicksville, Nowhere (name changed, but very accurate) is pretty terrible, and going to school at Caucasian Christian School of Goodness (again, a name change, but an apt description) is even worse. I snapped a bit while I was attending, due to the lack of permissible self-expression, but horrible histories were my guiding light.
Flash forward six months.
Our teacher wants us to do a history project about an ancient civilization. Since our curriculum is Eurocentricism.JPEG, most kids pick the Greeks or Romans (and completely skip over all of the good stuff, like orgies and gladiator fights) in their presentations.
I choose my favorite ancient civilization:
The Aztecs.
My teachers knew I'd been reading Horrible Histories, but what they didn't know was that I'd also been avidly reading all about Aztec mythology. I walk up to the front of the class, pull on a turquoise skull mask, and raise my arms to the sky.
My teacher goes sheet white. I give my presentation and skip nothing. Nothing. Every detail of the sacrifices, every dirty, disgusting part.
It all culminates when I point to the calendar. "It's May!" I shout, my little girl voice rising an octave. My teacher looks like she's about to phone the police. "The Aztecs called May Toxcatl."
No one moves or breathed. I continue blithely. "Toxcatl was a month dedicated to the worship of the god of the night, Tezcatlipoca." I'm still going. Everyone is afraid. Marie, one of my classmates, looks Eke she's about to cry. "They'd dress a brave warrior as the god all year, and at the end, I pull the red streamers out from behind my display, shouting: "They'd sacrifice him!"
The kids shriek as the streamers of "blood" roll out across the floor.
The principal walked in, hearing the commotion, just in time for me to really get into character and shout "BLOOD FOR THE GOD OF THE NIGHT!"
And that's how Horrible Histories and all mentions of the Aztecs were banned from my school.
aelorha As an ancient civilizations grad who specialized in the cultures of Central and South America THIS IS MY FAVORITE THING EVER.

GreenMetalSun posted:

Yeah, pretty much exact variations of this, only more Canadian.

chitoryu12 posted:

At least with Starbucks it makes sense because those places tend to get huge lines, so opening multiple stores helps spread the market out to a more reasonable pace.

boomer facebook posted:

TEACHER FAILS ENTIRE CLASS: An economics professor at a local college made a statement that she had never failed a single student before, but had recently failed an entire class. That class had insisted that socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer.
The professor then said, "OK, we will have an experiment in this class on this plan". All grades will be averaged and everyone will receive the same grade so no one will fail and no one will receive an A.... (substituting grades for dollars - something closer to home and more readily understood by all).
After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy. As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little.
The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around, the average was an F.
As the tests proceeded, the scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.
To their great surprise, ALL FAILED and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great, but when government takes all the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed.
These are possibly the 5 best sentences you'll ever read and all applicable to this experiment:
1. You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity.
2. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.
3. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
4. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it!
5. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that is the beginning of the end of any nation.

quote:

Just left Walmart where a lady with a basket full of TP asked me what kind of dog I had. I said a service dog. Very rudely she yells what type of service? I said he is a BLD. What's a BLD? She asked as she is allowing my dog to lick her face. With a straight face I said "He is my butt licking dog ( BLD ). I can't find any toilet paper anywhere because of people like you hoarding the TP so he licks my rear end clean...... The cashier lost it and walked away from the register.

CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:

Concept: steampunk style alternate history, but all the machines are powered by dogs

The atom is even split by breeding incredibly small but powerful dogs that bite the atom in half. (This kills the dog.)

my_war_crimes.txt posted:

ReidRansom posted:

The other thing that didn't happen there was hiring someone who understands typesetting. That kerning is painful to look at.

Elblanco posted:

Oh my God, I forgot about mall ninjas, anyone have a link handy?