Quotulatiousness

July 3, 2020

Fixing Gettysburg: The Second Day

Filed under: Books, History, Humour, Media, Military, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 06:00

Atun-Shei Films
Published 2 Jul 2020

In this three-part series, I review a classic Ron Maxwell film about a little known historical event that no one talks about called the Battle of Gettysburg. I also present an abbreviated and oversimplified history of the battle, while simultaneously criticizing the movie for presenting an abbreviated and oversimplified history of the battle.

In the second episode, I discuss the first day of fighting on July 2, 1863 – including Dan Sickles’ shenanigans on the left, the 20th Maine on Little Round Top, the 1st Minnesota, and the night battle on Culp’s Hill.

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~REFERENCES~

[1] Stephen W. Sears: “General Longstreet and the Lost Cause” (2005). American Heritage Magazine https://www.americanheritage.com/gene…

[2] W.C. Storrick: The Battle of Gettysburg (1931). J Horace McFarland Company, Page 26

[3] Frederick Tilberg, Scott Hartwig, John Heiser: Gettysburg National Military Park Handbook (2013). Historic Map and Print Company, Page 31-32

[4] Storrick, Page 27

[5] William B. Styple: Generals in Bronze (2005). Belle Grove Publishing Company, Page 222

[6] “The 1st Minnesota Infantry at Gettysburg” (2014). Iron Brigader https://ironbrigader.com/2014/01/03/1…

[7] Storrick, Page 29-30

[8] Tilberg, Hartwig, Heiser, Page 45

Back to the Future Middle Ages

Filed under: Britain, Europe, History, Politics — Tags: , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

At Spiked, Dominic Frisby takes us back to a time when today’s progressive temper tantrums would fit in perfectly with accepted behaviours of the age … the Middle Ages:

A social media heretic faces trial

How much of what went on in the Middle Ages and early-modern periods do we look back on with abhorrence and a certain amount of perplexity? Burning witches at the stake, lynch mobs, self-flagellation – what possessed people to do such things, we wonder.

But take a step back, look about and you see many of these practices are still flourishing today, though they go by different names.

Here are just some of them.

Let’s start with excommunication. Excommunication meant so much more than being banned from taking communion. It involved you being shunned, shamed, spiritually condemned, even banished. Only through some kind of heavy penance – often a very public, lengthy and humiliating contrition – could you and your reputation be redeemed.

Excommunication became a powerful political weapon. It was dished out to enemies of the faith to destroy their legitimacy. Often it was used as a punishment for sins as minor as uttering the wrong opinion.

What are No Platforming and cancel culture if not a modern form of excommunication? Qualified, competent professionals are hounded out of their jobs and publicly shamed just for uttering the wrong opinion, often simply for a misjudged choice of words. Even just the wrong pronouns.

As often as not, their employer wants a quiet life, so he bows to activist pressure and sacks the target of the witch hunt. Cancel culture is excommunication.

Today’s religions, however, are not the many sects of Christianity that once perforated Europe, but climate change, education, the NHS, gay rights, trans rights, the European Union and multiculturalism. Even coronavirus and the lockdown have become sacrosanct.

Intellectuals of the right and left, from Polly Toynbee to Nigel Lawson, have described the NHS as Britain’s religion. It has replaced the Virgin Mary as the divine matriarch. Why this worship? I suggest it goes back to the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when the state began to replace the church as the main provider of education, welfare and healthcare. After 1945, it was just a matter of time before the welfare state achieved altar status.

“Nuclear Attack” – Atomic Bombings – Sabaton History 074 [Official]

Filed under: History, Japan, Media, Military, Pacific, USA, Weapons, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Sabaton History
Published 2 Jul 2020

At 0815 on 6 August 1945, the first atomic bomb, nicknamed “Little Boy”, was dropped out of the B-29 Enola Gay and descended towards the Japanese city of Hiroshima. 43 seconds later, the city was engulfed in a flashing bright light and a shockwave of unimaginable heat and deadly pressure. From the hypocenter of the resulting mushroom-cloud, a blue-green fireball burned and blinded the city and its inhabitants with unprecedented power. 140,000 people were killed in the first few moments. Tens of thousands would die from wounds and radiation. The age of atomic warfare had begun.

Support Sabaton History on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/sabatonhistory

Listen to “Nuclear Attack” on the album Attero Dominatus
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Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Written by: Markus Linke and Indy Neidell
Directed by: Astrid Deinhard and Wieke Kapteijns
Produced by: Pär Sundström, Astrid Deinhard and Spartacus Olsson
Creative Producer: Joram Appel
Community Manager: Maria Kyhle
Executive Producers: Pär Sundström, Joakim Broden, Tomas Sunmo, Indy Neidell, Astrid Deinhard, and Spartacus Olsson
Post-Production Director: Wieke Kapteijns
Edited by: Iryna Dulka
Sound Editing by: Marek Kaminski
Maps by: Eastory – https://www.youtube.com/c/eastory

Archive by: Reuters/Screenocean https://www.screenocean.com
Music by Sabaton.

Colorizations:
– Dememorabilia – https://www.instagram.com/dememorabilia/

Sources:
– U.S. Department of Energy
– Bomb icon by P Thanga Vignesh from the Noun Project
– bockelsound from freesound.org
– Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum

An OnLion Entertainment GmbH and Raging Beaver Publishing AB co-Production.

© Raging Beaver Publishing AB, 2019 – all rights reserved.

From the comments:

Sabaton History
2 days ago

August 6, 1945. On this fateful Monday morning our world changed forever.

Nuclear weapons were now a reality, destruction on a whole new level a possibility. International power dynamics, foreign politics and conflict handling would never be the same once this new kind of weapon of mass destruction had entered the scene. The threat of potentially world-ending nuclear war, the fear that the men in power would push “the red button”, would hang over people like a dark cloud from this day on. The Nuclear Age had begun.

If you’re interested in how politics developed during The Nuclear Age, you can explore that in the day-by-day coverage of The Cuban Missile Crisis over on TimeGhost History. The first introduction, “USA Starts the Atomic Arms Race”, is already up and you can watch it right here: https://youtu.be/zEXjoBe5ZdI

Birth, rapid growth, profitable stasis, bureausclerosis, decline, death – typical tech firm lifecycle

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Business, Technology — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

In the Continental Telegraph, what looks to be a pretty solid characterization of the corporate life-cycle for technology firms:

There are generally, 6 stages in the life of a tech company:

  1. Inception. A couple of smart kids start something in a garage. Massive innovation.
  2. Fast growth. The business moves to some good offices, number of staff increases. They take on smart, fast moving people who are innovating big. A few people know them.
  3. Steady growth. The business is now something of a household name. They get their own small head office. Staff are more like normal business. Innovation continues, but the bureaucracy starts to grow.
  4. Bureaucracy. The business is a household name. They have multiple offices, or something designed by a smart-ass architect. There’s still staff coming in, but they’re mostly seeing it as a nice warm place to sit and be bureaucrats. The innovators start leaving as it’s just not interesting. They might even be making lots of money, but it’s mostly just living off what was built in earlier phases, or large dumb wasteful projects that go nowhere for years.
  5. Decline. A new disruptor arrives on the scene. They innovate in a field you’re involved in. You can’t keep up because in the previous phase, you replaced the innovators with bureaucrats. You’re outsmarted.
  6. Terminal decline and death. You slowly or quickly disappear, maybe holding onto a few customers who habitually use you.

I think there might also be something about when government starts taking an interest in you, and I think it’s quite some time into stage 4. Google are already there. Firing James Damore is very much bureaucracy state behaviour. They wouldn’t have cared when it was a tiny number of staff in an office. And how much have they really innovated in the last decade?

The History of: The British 1942 Battle Jerkin & Skeleton Battle Jerkin | Uniform History

Filed under: Britain, Cancon, History, Military, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Uniform History
Published 24 Mar 2020

The start of another two parter, in this one we cover the British Battle Jerkin family as it helped inspire the US Normandy Assault Vest’s creation.

Music by: https://www.juliancrowhurst.com/

QotD: Pop music

Filed under: Economics, Media, Quotations — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

The thing I always hated hearing from my grandfather was how modern music was terrible and not fit for civilized people. He was a man of his age and class, so he used colorful euphemisms to describe popular music. Even as a kid, I understood that every generation has their soundtrack. Maybe never having known anything but a world where pop culture dominated, this came naturally to me, while my grandfather still recalled an age before everyone had a radio and television. Maybe he knew things I couldn’t know.

Either way, I’ve always just assumed that once I passed my mid-20’s, pop music was no longer for me. Some stuff would be appealing, but most would be aimed at kids and strike me as simplistic and repetitive. There were some good bands in the 90’s that I liked, but most of it was not my thing. By the 2000’s, I was unable to name popular groups or the songs at the top of the charts. Today, I have not heard a single note from any song on the current top-40. On the other hand, I’m sure I’ve heard some version of all of it.

That may be why music sales have collapsed. A 15-year old can go on YouTube or Spotify and find fifty versions of the current pop hits, going back before their parents were born. They can also find stuff from previous eras that was remarkably well done and performed by people with real talent. Justin Timberlake may be very talented as a singer, but no one is confusing him with Frank Sinatra. It’s simply a lot easier for young people to see that pop music is just manufactured pap from Acme Global Corp.

“The Z Man”, “The Soundtrack Of This Age”, The Z Blog, 2018-03-15.

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