Quotulatiousness

March 26, 2021

Fifty Families Murdered Every Hour – WW2 – WAH 031 – March 1942, pt. 2

Filed under: Britain, Europe, Germany, History, Military, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

World War Two
Published 25 Mar 2021

A report on the effect of strategic bombing called the “Dehousing Paper” is spread to justify the targeting of the civilian population of Germany. In Poland, one by one, extermination camps are starting construction. This month, a new one is finished, named Belzec. Here, Jews and other minority undesirables from Poland are gassed.

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Source list: http://bit.ly/WW2sources

Hosted by: Spartacus Olsson
Written by: Spartacus Olsson and Joram Appel
Director: Astrid Deinhard
Producers: Astrid Deinhard and Spartacus Olsson
Executive Producers: Astrid Deinhard, Indy Neidell, Spartacus Olsson, Bodo Rittenauer
Creative Producer: Maria Kyhle
Post-Production Director: Wieke Kapteijns
Research by: Joram Appel
Edited by: Miki Cackowski
Sound design: Marek Kamiński
Map animations: Miki Cackowski, Eastory (https://www.youtube.com/c/eastory​)

Colorizations by:
Mikołaj Uchman
Daniel Weiss
Dememorabilia – https://www.instagram.com/dememorabilia/​
Julius Jääskeläinen – https://www.facebook.com/JJcolorization/​

Sources:
Yad Vashem 1935/15, 3016/2, 1137/217, 10094/1, A4613/1116, 3518/7,1554/1
IWM ART 15747 12, HU 56848, MH 24747, CL 2377, ME(RAF) 3703, HU 107752, C 2364, C 4748, C 4743, HU 74904
Bundesarchiv
Graphic of Vickers Wellington bomber, courtesy of Emoscopes https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi…​
Graphic of Short Stirling bomber, courtesy of Emoscopes https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi…​
www.auschwitz.org
www.deathcamps.org
USHMM
Picture of scratches on a wall of a gas chamber at Auschwitz, courtesy of Lasy https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi…​
from the Noun Project: Watchtower by Eliricon

Soundtracks from the Epidemic Sound:
Johan Hynynen – “Dark Beginning”
Wendel Scherer – “Growing Doubt”
Peter Sandberg – “Document This 1”
Jon Bjork – “Disposal”
Philip Ayers – “Trapped in a Maze”
Fabien Tell – “Never Forget”

Archive by Screenocean/Reuters https://www.screenocean.com​.

A TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH.

From the comments:

World War Two
2 days ago

On the horrors of crafting this, on age restriction, and on covering Allied war crimes – by Spartacus

All episodes of War Against Humanity are difficult to make, but this was an especially harrowing episode to host. When I wrote the conclusion based on Joram’s initial draft, I was composed — it was an intellectual exercise still. That changed once I started giving the words a voice, and as you can see at the end of the episode I had difficulties keeping my composure — when I was done I cried bitterly. But that is how it is supposed to be — the totality of our creation is what brings it home, together with Joram I compile the knowledge, Miki or Karo put it into images under Wieke’s direction, and within all of that it is my job to express it in spoken language as best as I can.

Yes, it is difficult to make and it is difficult to watch — but we sincerely believe that none of us should look away lest we forget. We take upon ourselves to spend hours every week to sift through the minutiae of these events so that we can compress it into 15 minutes every two weeks. We do it not for money, not for fame, and not out of pleasure, but because it needs to be done so that others can spend less time on it than us and still see this time for what it was. It needs to be done by neither glossing over any events, nor the images as horrible as they are. This has two important purposes:
1. driving home that this really happened and
2. defeating any claims towards that we’re just making this up, or exaggerating.
Within that responsibility it is also our duty to report, without prejudice, on what the Allies did that was against human values and rights in this war. We don’t do that because there is an equivalence between events, or to create such an equivalence — we do it for the exact opposite purpose — to show the complete picture and preempt any calls for “what about the bombing of Germany and Hiroshima!?” We do it because we are dedicated to the facts, and the events must be permitted to speak for themselves.

We’re doing all of this in a time when the horrors of WW2 are ever further away in the rearview mirror, when survey after survey shows that the younger generation have little or no knowledge of how earth-shattering this war was. An indication of a growing educational gap, and in many of the countries where you are watching it has long been decided that reporting on these atrocities is of especial importance. That includes decisions to also expose younger people to the reality of it despite the graphic nature of the content. In most places these images are purposefully excepted from age restrictions that befall content made for entertainment, that is to say they do not fall under an 18+ restriction. They are regulated as PG 16 or the equivalent, in some places even PG13.

It then troubles us deeply that YouTube chooses to go against the decisions made by democratically elected bodies and restrict this content to over 18 only. It troubles us even more when this leads to the inevitable result that our viewership has dropped by 50% since they started doing that. That is a drop far above the share of our viewers that are under age, because with the restriction comes a reduction in recommendation to view — users that are not logged in and age verified don’t get notified — the content can no longer be embedded on external sites — in some countries it is blocked entirely, regardless of your age — and all of that further decreases the value of the video in YouTube’s algorithms. The result is that the War Against Humanity videos are now an echo chamber where we only reach those that already know the content.

We have spoken to YouTube to remedy this fault, but we have had no success thus far. As a result we have decided to start making a censored version of the videos that we will upload if or when they get age restricted. We already upload all of our content to https://odysee.com/@WorldWarTwo:6 but that is not a place where anyone will find our content by chance. On that note we should point out that the videos only get age-restricted because they are reported to YouTube by the community as inappropriate, offensive, or false. We take umbrage at that, because in effect this means that YouTube is helping those who would like these events to be forgotten, or even deny that they ever happened. It’s a pity; even morally wrong in my viewpoint. It leaves me despondent and the last weeks have been extraordinarily difficult for me — I have questioned my purposes and wondered why I put myself and our team through all of this, if all we’re doing is preaching to the choir. At first it left me sad, but after YouTube’s glib, bureaucratic responses I got depressed. I considered throwing in the towel, but then I would be nothing else than a coward refusing to stand for those who no longer have a voice. So, I will continue, I will resist, and we will fight against anyone that tries to silence us and the dead — because we must not look away, we must never forget.

Spartacus

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When the science becomes problematic to the narrative

Filed under: Health, Media, Politics, Science, USA — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Alexander Riley looks at a few of those awkward points where actual “scientific” science conficts with the deeply held beliefs of the “I heart SCIENCE!” community:

… human and nature cannot so easily be pried apart. The evidence of the biological reality of the sex difference — not just in gonads and sex cells, but in personality characteristics and behavioral profiles, on average — is overwhelming, and science is daily producing more. Male and female brains are structurally different in ways that map on to the emerging neuroscientific knowledge on how brain structure affects behavior and capabilities. The feminist claim that these differences are wholly a product of socialization becomes more implausible the more we know. In societies where egalitarian gender ideology is arguably most widespread, such as in Northern Europe, there has been no disappearance of traditional sex differences in choices concerning careers. Men are still overrepresented in fields that focus on systems and objects, and women are still the overwhelming majority in fields dedicated to extensive human interaction and social services.

The radical spirit of ’90s feminism represented by [author Judith Butler’s] Gender Trouble did not stop at “deconstructing” gender in the effort to move toward a world in which gender roles are divorced from biological sex. Sex too had to be subjected to such “problematization.” Radicals used the writing of Anne Fausto-Sterling, a biologist who admitted her work was fundamentally shaped by her “1960s street-activist heart,” to suggest that the sex binary was also an oversimplified social construction. Fausto-Sterling insisted there are at least five sexes: males, females, “true hermaphrodites” with one testis and one ovary, male pseudohermaphrodites with testes and “some aspects of female genitalia” but no ovaries, and female pseudohermaphrodites with ovaries and “some aspects of male genitalia” but no testes. Perhaps, she asserted, several of every hundred people might be in one of the three intersex categories, with — the clincher — an “infinitely malleable continuum” between them.

It was quickly pointed out that Fausto-Sterling had been deceptive in her estimate of the frequency of intersexuality. Leonard Sax, in the Journal of Sex Research, noted that she had counted phenomena such as Klinefelter’s Syndrome (biological males with an extra X chromosome), Turner’s Syndrome (biological females with only one X chromosome), and several other conditions typically not recognized as intersex. One of these alone — late-onset congenital adrenal hyperplasia (LOCAH), which involves the overproduction of adrenal androgens — accounts for 90 percent of Fausto-Sterling’s claimed figure of 1.7 percent of the population that is intersex. But LOCAH is not an intersex phenomenon. Many individuals who have it are never diagnosed because the symptoms are so mild, and all who have it are born with typical male or female genitalia that correspond to the male and female genotypes. Nearly all such individuals go through puberty with the typical sexual development for their genotype, as the condition generally does not manifest in women until the early 20s and in men much later. The true estimate of intersex individuals, Sax argued, is roughly 0.018%, about 100 times lower than Fausto-Sterling’s estimate. That is, more than 99.98% of humans are clearly either male or female in terms of biological sex.

But the attack on “standard sex difference science” was undeterred by this decimation of Fausto-Sterling’s case. In Gender Trouble, Butler criticized the work of an MIT group that had just discovered the region on the Y chromosome responsible for sex differentiation, claiming these scientists ultimately had to invoke cultural symbols of patriarchy to legitimate their explanations. In her view, this betrayed the very notion of an objective science of sex difference. We are always trapped in culture, she wrote, which means we are always trapped in patriarchy. A science of sex is impossible. Radical sex/gender ideology attacked science as male knowledge and elevated female knowledge as superior on the basis that women as a class were treated as inferior. Like blacks and other powerless groups, women — at least, women with a feminist outlook — could critically understand the point of view of men and supplement its lacunae with the fuller vision of the female perspective. Marx made similar claims about the superiority of working-class consciousness, though he did not attempt to cast the very notion of science as a tool of oppression.

The MIT group’s finding that what we now know as the SRY gene determines sex is universally accepted science today, and Butler’s ideological criticism has aged poorly in scientifically literate circles. So has her wild overestimation that perhaps one in ten people is outside the normal sex binary.

Tank Chats #100 | Rolls-Royce Armoured Car | The Tank Museum

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

The Tank Museum
Published 6 Nov 2020

The 100th Tank Chat milestone has been reached as the Rolls-Royce Armoured Car turns 100 years old! In this special edition, everybody’s favourite moustachioed tank historian David Fletcher examines his favourite vehicle in The Tank Museum’s collection: the Rolls-Royce Armoured Car, on its 100th birthday.

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#tankmuseum #tanks

QotD: The Furies

Filed under: Europe, Greece, History, Quotations, Religion — Tags: — Nicholas @ 01:00

In Greek and Roman mythology, the Furies were female spirits of justice and vengeance. They were also called the Erinyes (angry ones). Known especially for pursuing people who had murdered family members, the Furies punished their victims by driving them mad. When not punishing wrongdoers on earth, they lived in the underworld and tortured the damned.

According to some stories, the Furies were sisters born from the blood of Uranus, the primaeval god of the sky, when he was wounded by his son Cronus*. In other stories, they were the children of Nyx (night). In either case, their primaeval origin set them apart from the other deities of the Greek and Roman pantheons.

Most tales mention three Furies: Alecto (endless), Tisiphone (punishment), and Megaera (jealous rage). Usually imagined as monstrous, foul-smelling hags, the sisters had bats’ wings, coal-black skin, and hair entwined with serpents. They carried torches, whips, and cups of venom with which to torment wrongdoers. The Furies could also appear as storm clouds or swarms of insects.

Jay Currie, “Character meets the Furies”, Jay Currie, 2018-10-08.

March 25, 2021

Four Workbench Building Mistakes (that we all make)

Filed under: Tools, Woodworking — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 06:00

Rex Krueger
Published 24 Mar 2021

Avoid these common mistakes and make your first workbench last for years.

More video and exclusive content: http://www.patreon.com/rexkrueger?
(more…)

Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

Filed under: Books, Humour, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

I first read Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in the late 1970s and being as callow and inexperienced as most teenagers, I took it for a mostly factual exploit (along with many older readers who didn’t have my excuse for gullibility). I passed the book on to one of my friends who became mildly obsessed with “Raoul Duke” and the adventures recounted in the book. I’ve long since lost touch with him, but I’m sure he’d be horribly disappointed to discover that Thompson probably imagined 90% of it:

    We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold. I remember saying something like “I feel a bit lightheaded; maybe you should drive …” And suddenly there was a terrible roar all around us and the sky was full of what looked like huge bats, all swooping and screeching and diving around the car, which was going about a hundred miles an hour with the top down to Las Vegas.

From the outset, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is an outrageous and darkly amusing tale of two crazed men turned loose in the world’s capital of decadence. Raoul Duke and Doctor Gonzo, clearly based upon Thompson and Acosta, are carrying a veritable pharmacopoeia in the trunk of their rented car, and throughout the novel they abuse a litany of substances as they stumble through casinos, bars, and hotels terrorising staff and patrons alike. Though Duke and Gonzo are, like the real Thompson and Acosta, tasked with covering the Mint 400, their assignment is quickly lost in the carnage. Near the end of the book, Duke admits he “didn’t even know who’d won the race.”

If you are unfamiliar with Thompson’s work, you may wonder why it matters that their efforts to complete a minor assignment ended in failure. Authors like Ernest Hemingway had mined their journalistic experience for material to incorporate into their fiction, so it is hardly unusual that Thompson would find inspiration for a novel whilst covering the Mint 400. But his approach with this book went beyond mere inspiration. Throughout Fear and Loathing, reality and imagination are blurred to the extent that no one really has much idea of what really happened on their trip.

[…]

In this letter, he made the startling confession that Fear and Loathing had not merely exaggerated the debauchery that took place in Vegas, but that there had in fact been no drugs at all. Could this really be true? Was the most notorious drug book of its era really inspired by a drug-free journey?

Before we can answer that, it is important to note the chronology of events on which the book was based. Whilst the book portrays the two men tearing apart hotels and casinos over a period of several days, there were in fact two distinct trips. First, they went to cover the Mint 400 on Mach 21st–23rd, then they returned for the National District Attorneys’ Conference on Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs on April 25th–29th. Thompson simply rolled the two events together into a single narrative. The evidence suggests that, during the first trip, Thompson and Acosta drank heavily and perhaps smoked a little pot, but certainly did no serious drug-taking. The famed pharmacopeia in the trunk of their convertible was fictitious:

    The trunk of the car looked like a mobile police narcotics lab. We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers … and also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of Budweiser, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls.

As tempting as it is to believe that this existed, it was a product of Thompson’s prodigious imagination. He was, however, keen to keep his readers in the dark, hence his letter to Silberman and the inclusion of his photo on the back cover. Since childhood, he had been obsessed with appearing as an outlaw, yet real outlaws never explicitly said that’s what they were. They merely hinted at it.

Of course, Thompson’s “drug-diet” did consist of various illegal substances, which made his descriptions of their effects rather convincing, but not only did he remain mostly drug-free in Vegas, he also wrote the novel with little more than beer and tobacco in his system. Back home in Colorado, he polished his story carefully through many drafts. The result was a far more intelligent and coherent work than almost anything else he published.

It was only during the second of the two trips that they began to consume drugs, but even then their indulgence was mild when compared with Duke and Gonzo’s extravagant excesses. They had marijuana, a few pills, and possibly some mescaline, but nothing else. His descriptions of LSD came from experiments several years earlier, the parts about adrenochrome were entirely fabricated, and — surprisingly — Thompson had not yet tried cocaine by 1971.

Modern Artists: The Original Shitposters! | B2W: ZEITGEIST! I E.14 – Winter 1922

Filed under: Europe, France, History, Media — Tags: , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

TimeGhost History
Published 24 Mar 2021

The interwar era has seen an explosion of art movements all vying to offer the most revolutionary response to modern society. The competition is intense and, as we shall see, often spills over into open conflict.

Join us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/TimeGhostHistory​

Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Written by: Francis van Berkel
Director: Astrid Deinhard
Producers: Astrid Deinhard and Spartacus Olsson
Executive Producers: Astrid Deinhard, Indy Neidell, Spartacus Olsson, Bodo Rittenauer
Creative Producer: Maria Kyhle
Post-Production Director: Wieke Kapteijns
Research by: Francis van Berkel
Edited by: Michał Zbojna
Sound design: Marek Kamiński

Colorizations:
Daniel Weiss – https://www.facebook.com/TheYankeeCol…​

Sources:
Some images from the Library of Congress

Soundtracks from Epidemic Sound:
“Epic Adventure Theme 3” – Håkan Eriksson
“Crimp” – Hysics
“Substage” – Jay Varton
“Appeased Soundscape 01” – August Wilhelmsson
“Stranger Days” – Alexandra Woodward
“Superior” – Silver Maple
“Rememberance” – Fabien Tell
“Ghost Dungeons” – Ethan Sloan
“Ancient Discoveries” – Gabriel Lewis

Archive by Screenocean/Reuters https://www.screenocean.com​.

A TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH.

From the comments:

TimeGhost History
2 days ago (edited)
The original idea for this episode came from me (Francis here, hello) stumbling across a passing reference to the 1922 trial of André Breton buried deep in a Wikipedia article. It led me down a huge rabbit hole on the history of the chaotic artists milling around in Paris, New York, Zurich, and beyond.

Considering that it also takes place in the same season as the publication of Ulysses, the release of Nosferatu, the birth of Brazillian Modernism, and more, I realized that it was the perfect opportunity to dedicate an entire episode to the weird and wonderful artistic movements of the modern era. If this kind is new to you then consider this episode your introduction to the topic. Indy talks about the Cubist revolution, then Dadaism, Expressionism, and more.

In case all that seems a bit too niche for your liking then look at it this way: if you want to understand how people processed the horrors of the Great War, the rise of mass production, and modern geopolitical machinations, then diving into the art of the time is a great place to start.

Watch the video to find out why.

Boris wanted to be a new Churchill, but instead is shaping up as a cut-rate Cromwell

Filed under: Britain, Government — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Bella Wallersteiner on the vast difference between Boris Johnson’s hopes for his premiership and the actual role he’s been playing:

A year has passed since the British public accepted lockdown as the best way to combat the spread of the novel coronavirus, yet we are still living under the strictures of the Coronavirus Act.

In the name of virus protection, we have experienced a level of authoritarianism not seen in this country since the time of Oliver Cromwell – restrictions on freedom of movement, forced closure of businesses, and prohibitions on weddings and funerals have challenged many of our most cherished beliefs about the limits of government power, while the ban on large gatherings means we cannot even legally protest them.

Today, as we mark the anniversary of the first lockdown, we would do well to reflect on just how compliant we have become to what were intended to be “emergency” powers.

Cheery platitudes have ranged from “we’re all in this together” and “we’ll send this virus packing” to the hopelessly inaccurate “it will all be over by Christmas”. But history tells us that governments tend to hold on to additional powers far longer than is necessary.

The Defence of the Realm Act of 1914, for example, granted the government wide-ranging powers in the name of public safety, including heavy censorship of the press and the introduction of rationing. Pub licensing laws remained in place for decades, only relaxed in November 2005.

The Second World War brought The Emergency Powers (Defence) Act 1939 which ceded immense regulatory powers to the government, including provisions “for the apprehension, trial and punishment of persons offending against the Regulations and for the detentions of persons whose detention appears to be expedient to the Secretary of State in the interest of public safety or the defence of the realm”. The Act was finally repealed on 25th March 1959, but the last of the Defence Regulations (which included the maintenance of public order) was not lifted until 31st December 1964.

The Crusade That Ruined Everything

Filed under: Europe, History, Middle East, Military, Religion — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

KnowledgeHub
Published 16 Jan 2017

Sign Up For One Free Month of ‘The Great Courses Plus’ http://ow.ly/uz5c307Lfvl

The Fourth Crusade was a blunder of epic proportions and ended up ruining one of the greatest empires ever seen in Western civilization. While the Crusades can be tales of knights and religious battle, this was a war of infighting, petty deals and financial debt.

Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AltHistoryHub

Music by Holfix: https://www.youtube.com/user/holfix

The second channel from AlternateHistoryHub. Since I can’t talk about everything on that channel, I decided to have a channel where I can? Geography, history, economics? I can talk about anything, as long as it’s knowledge!

I discuss the different parts of history and try to bring a new perspective on education taught in schools.

QotD: Lucas, the Prince of Darkness

Filed under: Britain, Humour, Quotations, Technology — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

Joe Lucas — or, more accurately, the company bearing his name — engineered electrical bits for pretty much everything emanating from the UK, and the notorious unreliability of Lucas components played a key role in tanking the British car industry in the early 1980s. Make the jump for “If Lucas made guns, wars would not start,” and other classics.

  • The Lucas motto: “Get home before dark.”
  • Lucas is the patent holder for the short circuit.
  • Lucas — Inventor of the first intermittent wiper.
  • Lucas — Inventor of the self-dimming headlamp.
  • The three position Lucas switch — Dim, Flicker and Off.
  • The Original Anti-Theft Device — Lucas Electrics.
  • Lucas is an acronym for Loose Unsoldered Connections and Splices

Andrew Stoy, “Joe Lucas, Prince Of Darkness: British Electrical System Jokes”, Jalopnik, 2008-08-04.

March 24, 2021

Eichmann: Mass Murderer or Train Conductor? – WW2 Biography Special

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Germany, History, Military, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

World War Two
Published 23 Mar 2021

Adolf Eichmann was one of the masterminds behind the “Final Solution of the Jewish Question”. Or was he? In his trial, he argued to be merely a bureaucrat who was following orders. This episode attempts to shine a light on the real role of this controversial figure.

Did 90 Minutes Decide the Fate of the Jews? – The Wannsee Conference – WAH 027 – January 1942 Pt. 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hd1gH…​

Join us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/TimeGhostHistory
Or join The TimeGhost Army directly at: https://timeghost.tv

Follow WW2 day by day on Instagram @ww2_day_by_day – https://www.instagram.com/ww2_day_by_day
Between 2 Wars: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list…
Source list: http://bit.ly/WW2sources

Hosted by: Spartacus Olsson
Written by: Spartacus Olsson, Joram Appel
Director: Astrid Deinhard
Producers: Astrid Deinhard and Spartacus Olsson
Executive Producers: Astrid Deinhard, Indy Neidell, Spartacus Olsson, Bodo Rittenauer
Creative Producer: Maria Kyhle
Post-Production Director: Wieke Kapteijns
Research by: Joram Appel
Edited by: Karolina Dołęga
Sound design: Marek Kamiński

Colorizations by:
Daniel Weiss
Spartacus Olsson
Mikołaj Uchman

Sources:
– Yad Vashem: 3887/1, Y69EO4_, 1605/1431, 102co3, 76/68, 4229/59, 29/56, 73GO3_, 74AO9_, 1922/6, 2749/3, 2986/71, 4229/61, 03/198, 4613/789, 73AO6, 1572/17,
– United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
– Bundesarchiv
– Icons from the Noun Project: freight car by Evgeni Moryakov, School by Adrien Coquet, Watchtower by Eliricon
– Picture of Frontkämpfervereinigung in 1925 courtesy of Wienbibliothek im Rathaus, Tagblattarchiv Fotosammlung, TF-999034
– Picture of Wannsee villa courtesy of JoJan from Wikimedia Commons
– Library of Congress

Soundtracks from Epidemic Sound:
– “Rememberance” – Fabien Tell
– “Deviation In Time” – Johannes Bornlof
– “Last Minute Reaction” – Phoenix Tail
– “It’s Not a Game” – Philip Ayers
– “Moving to Disturbia” – Experia

Archive by Screenocean/Reuters https://www.screenocean.com​.

A TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH.

“By now it has dawned on even the most glossy-eyed internationalists that we are well into another sides-picking era of global geopolitics”

Filed under: Cancon, China, Government, Politics — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Like it or not, we’re already a few years into a new Cold War, this time with the Chinese Communist Party. The Canadian government seems to be among the last in the world to recognize this change in the geopolitical situation. In The Line, Andrew Potter shows why Justin Trudeau must stop trying to cuddle up to Xi:

The outrageous secret trials in China of Michael Spavor last Friday and Michael Kovrig this Monday are nothing more than punctuation marks on a storyline that has been obvious for some time now.

Which is why it was enormously gratifying to see more than two dozen diplomats show up to seek admittance to Kovrig’s trial. The fact that none was admitted is unfortunate but largely beside the point — what matters is the public display of solidarity. Even more gratifying perhaps is the announcement (by Canadian officials) that the U.S. has promised to treat the two Canadians as if they were American citizens. After all, it was our acquiescence to a U.S. request to arrest Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou at Vancouver International Airport in 2018 that prompted Beijing to nab Spavor and Kovrig in retaliation. While Chinese officials have denied that what this amounts to is hostage diplomacy, they’ve also made it clear that the fate of the Michaels is tied to that of Meng.

What makes the public support from all of these countries so remarkable is that a lot of them — the Czechs, the Finns, the Romanians — have very little to gain from sticking their neck out for Canada. More to the point, every one of these countries has good reason to wonder just how committed Canada itself is to this show of collective strength. After all, it was only five years ago that senior members of the Liberal party were freely — privately, but freely — saying that as far as the Liberal government was concerned, the U.S. was yesterday’s news and China was the horse Canada was going to ride into the future.

And while a lot has changed over the last five years (not least of which is the fact that Donald Trump has come and gone as president of the United States), it remains incomprehensible that it was just last year the Canadian National Research Council placed its disastrous COVID-19 vaccine bet with CanSino Biologics, a Chinese company with close ties to the Chinese military. What are our allies to make of the fact that only last month, the federal granting agency NSERC partnered with Huawei to sponsor computer engineering at Canadian universities. Or that Canada’s visa office in Beijing is owned and staffed by a Chinese police force?

Whether it is a matter of naïveté, bad faith, or outright cravenness, Canada continues to give every indication that it is a country that is still hedging its bets.

How They Did It – Declaring War in Ancient Rome

Filed under: Europe, History, Law, Religion — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Invicta
Published 24 Aug 2018

The Romans were often at war but have you ever stopped to consider how exactly that was announced. Turns out the Romans had a complicated ritual associated with declarations of war aimed at making their casus belli apparent before the gods. I hope you enjoy this documentary on ancient government and religion!

Sources:
History of Rome Book I by Titus Livius
Handbook to Life in Ancient Rome by Lesley Adkins
The Rise of Rome by Anthony Everitt

Music:
“Quirky Comedy” by 8th Mode Music

#RomanHistory
#HowTheyDidIt

QotD: Politicians

Filed under: Politics, Quotations — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 01:00

The fact that so many successful politicians are such shameless liars is not only a reflection on them, it is also a reflection on us. When the people want the impossible, only liars can satisfy.

Thomas Sowell, “Big Lies in Politics” (syndicated column), 2012-05-22. (via Terry Teachout)

March 23, 2021

Why are Pre-War Shipwrecks Disappearing?

Filed under: Asia, Britain, Germany, History, Military, Pacific, USA, WW1, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Calum
Published 22 Aug 2020

Pre-war shipwrecks are disappearing from the seabed. Why? A look at the sad reality of illegal salvaging that is destroying numerous war graves and historical wrecks around the world, told from the site of some of the most famous shipwrecks in the world; Scapa Flow.

The Guardian has done some amazing work in documenting this problem, worth a read if you have the time:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/201…​

00:00​ – Introduction & History of Scapa Flow
01:00​ – Scuttling & Salvaging of the German High Fleet
02:45​ – The Value of Pre-War Steel
03:54​ – The Disappearing Shipwrecks
06:03​ – HMS Royal Oak
10:16​ – Disappearing Wargraves
10:58​ – Outro

Twitter………………….►https://twitter.com/calumraasay​
Instagram…………….►http://instagram.com/calumraasay​
Website………………..►http://calumgillies.com

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