I know that USA was against the Soviet union in the cold war and it was basically a fight between communism and capitalism. I know I sound like a toddler but why couldn't they mind there own business? Why didn't each country abide it's own policy and just leave it be? Did they mean to impose there ideology on one another? Or was there something else?
USA has been fighting Russia for decades now; not directly but through "proxy wars", example: Vietnam war, the soviet war in Afghanistan and the korean war. It is this conflict that I believe to be one of the main reasons for the turmoil in the middle east; all for what?
I'm sorry if I sound frustratingly dumb but I need someone to help me understand this.
Edit: grammar
1 Answers 2016-12-20
Did they pick a side? Did they send observers to study modern war? Were there collections for those displaced in the war?
2 Answers 2016-12-20
First of all, I acknowledge several flaws in my question - the generalization of an entire region, the lack of specificity with regards to time period and the very eurocentric way the question is posed. Sincere apologies. I am, however, in the process of doing some research for a (fantasy) Dungeons and Dragons campaign that I would like to be set in maritime, desert culture with strong Arabic influence. I am aware of the importance of centres of learning, but I was wondering whether someone could shed light on social gathering in public places throughout the Middle East and whether there is a tavern/inn equivalent to be found.
1 Answers 2016-12-20
The below comment was recently made on /r/truereddit.
This is how the Roman Republic fell.
For most of its history, the Roman Republic was governed by old political families and reliable power brokers who knew how to keep the masses in line. Elections were held, but they were deliberately designed to give the capitalists and the aristocracy the lion’s share of the popular vote. If the Roman aristocracy, which voted first, chose a man for office, officials often would not even bother to count the ballots cast by the lower classes.
On occasion, disgruntled farmers, tavern owners and donkey drivers would unionize and rise up, pressing for debt relief and a real voice but these revolts were put down quickly with promises of better times ahead and by hiring a few police-gladiators to beat up the chief troublemakers
The man who ultimately brought down the Republic was a wealthy and ambitious nobleman.
Augustus guessed rightly that the ordinary people, long oppressed by the rich and powerful, sighed for the government of a single man, a man who would be the ultimate master, not the accomplice, of those petty tyrants The people of Rome, viewed with a secret pleasure, the humiliation of the aristocracy, and they demanded only bread and public shows; and they were supplied with both by the liberal hand of Augustus.
The poster argues that even though there was a democracy in place, the real power was held by a few kingmakers, and that eventually, the lower classes rose up and installed a dictator. Is this true?
1 Answers 2016-12-20
My friend wants that as a gift and I wasn't sure which would be best. Any ideas or suggestions?
2 Answers 2016-12-20
1 Answers 2016-12-20
During the period of communist control, how did West Bengal change relative to the rest of India? Did their pursuit of communism lead to conflict with the capitalist Indian government? How did the state government of West Bengal interact with other communist groups, such as the Maoist party and the Naxalite insurgency?
1 Answers 2016-12-20
1 Answers 2016-12-20
https://imgur.com/a/sIVHF#Pv1xzPY
I heard from someone saying they were fake and modded but I am curious if any of these are true. Sorry this is a weird as hell question.
2 Answers 2016-12-20
Similar to how someone today might have an 80's party, did parties from previous eras exist in the past? Or is that more of a modern concept?
1 Answers 2016-12-20
I was reading this article today http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/12/04/how-a-fart-killed-10-000-people.html and this paragraph really stuck out.
"The ancient fear of farting is justified when we consider the surprising number of the stories—that is, more than none—about wars provoked by farts. According to the Greek historian Herodotus, a fart set off a chain of events that led to a revolt against King Apries of Egypt. The repercussions were even worse in first-century Jerusalem: The historian Josephus tells us that an irreverent Roman soldier lowered his pants, bent over, and “spoke such words as you might expect upon such a posture.” The incident took place shortly before the Passover and caused a riot that led to the deaths of 10,000 people."
Are there any other sources for a fart leading to a revolt in Egypt or a deadly riot in Jerusalem?
4 Answers 2016-12-20
There has been a push to use Czechia as the English language name for the Czech Republic. This is a region that has had many names (Czechoslovakia, the Czech lands, Bohemia) and have changed for a number of reasons.
A website (http://www.go-czechia.com) promoting the use of Czechia claims "Fact: The first recorded use of Czechia was in 1602 in Latin and in 1841 in English."
Can anyone verify this claim? Does anyone have any more insight into the changing names of Czechia?
1 Answers 2016-12-20
[deleted]
1 Answers 2016-12-20
2 Answers 2016-12-20
For punishment, for protection (or "protection"), for politics--humans have a rich and richly evil history of locking each other up. Tell us some gruesome tales of justified or unjustified imprisonment from your area of expertise!
Next week: Soldiers on Leave--crazy military stories from off the battlefields
1 Answers 2016-12-20
There have been many fictional depictions of life in the Stalinist period of the USSR. Likewise, many authors have incorporated supposed aspects of life in the USSR into narratives designed to warn against totalitarianism (Orwell's 1984 springs immediately to mind). A frequent trope of these fictional depictions is of a hyper-paranoid society in which husbands denounce wives, children denounce parents and where the state presumes all of the accused are guilty.
My question is: are these depictions accurate portrayals of every day life in the USSR during the immediate pre- and post-WWII era?
It is hard for me to believe that such a society could exist without considerable unrest and dysfunction.
1 Answers 2016-12-20
I'm looking for books that don't rehash the same topics over and over again but if they take a unique approach to it I'm open to reading.
7 Answers 2016-12-20
1 Answers 2016-12-20
1 Answers 2016-12-20
the exact relevant text
'General recognition of the exclusive sovereignty of each party over its lands, people, and agents abroad, and responsibility for the warlike acts of any of its citizens or agents. Issuance of unrestricted letters of marque and reprisal to privateers was forbidden.'
I am looking for help finding an academic source I could use for this information! Thanks
1 Answers 2016-12-20
I recently watched a video on the Battle of Fulford and then Stamford Bridge.
It mentioned that after Edwin and Morcars defeat south of York the city was not sacked, probably at Tostigs request as he wanted his Dukedom of Northumbria back.
If so, would it not have made more sense to garrison inside and near the town as opposed to to the East? Did York's Roman walls not offer much in the way of protection? remember learning the Dane tore them down some time in the ninth century, but I imagined they would have been rebuilt since then as York was a busy and affluent trading hub.
1 Answers 2016-12-20
The cases of fraternizations between French/British soldiers and German soldiers on the Western fronts are often mentioned, but was there any such case on the Eastern front? I imagine the difference in calendar could make this more complicated, seeing as for the Russians it wouldn't be Christmas for two more weeks.
I'm also thinking of the 2005 film "Joyeux Noël", about such a (fictionalized) fraternization on the Western front. At the beginning, the German soldiers are shown receiving Christmas trees sent by the Kaiser, and them putting them outside the trenches is one of the events that kicks off the truce. Did the Kaiser really had Christmas trees sent to the whole front? If so, what was the reaction of soldiers to this gesture? I can imagine that, as nice as it might look, they would have enjoyed additional food more.
1 Answers 2016-12-20
Scott Adams of Dilbert fame has been blogging about how to understand the world through what he calls the "moist robot" hypothesis / filter. This seems to be a philosophical school of thought, a theory of mind of some kind and rather unique. I'm trying to find evidence of similar schools of thought, similar mindsets from history, and also to evaluate how widespread understanding of such theories was in their time.
What follows is my attempt to bridge Adams' description of the "moist robot" idea to the culture of /r/AskHistorians with links to source material at the end.
The "moist robot" filter of the world views language as the programming interface of the mind and humans as complex robots. It claims that certain people through history, through natural predilection and deliberate study, have learned ways of using this programming interface to create culture and behavior to keep human society going. Adams refers to these people as "wizards" and claims that their skills include those described by the modern fields of hypnosis, psychology of influence, group psychology, memetics and marketing.
My knowledge of history is not very good, but if I had to describe things from the past that somewhat remind me of Adams' theory of mind, I would point to the following.
Plato's concept of a "noble lie" as a sort of culturally generative myth deliberately constructed by the elites to herd the masses towards harmony and mutual benefit seems to describe the work that a "wizard" does to "moist robots".
Shamanism traditionally seems to be about explaining the world to the local people with an eye towards social harmony - the creation of culturally generative myths to herd the tribe. The tradition of shamanism includes various partially or entirely dissociative drug experiences, which Adams claims are helpful in understanding the "moist robot" mindset and the programming interface of humans.
Modern advertising is about painting with emotional associations in order to elicit specific purchasing behavior from the targeted audience. Psychology of influence (Cialdini, Heath brothers) studies this scientifically.
But when and where have you seen this mindset arise in the past? Specifically the idea that the masses are ruled by myths, which explain how they got here and prescribe appropriate social behavior and that these myths are deliberately constructed by people who understand that this is what they are doing? Do we know of any religious or ruling classes from the past, which knowingly created culturally generative religious and secular myths to herd the great masses?
Do we know of any societies from the past where the understanding of the concept of a "noble lie" has been widespread in society? Where the great masses basically know that their social behavior is an agreed-upon social convention while giving lip service to it being dictated by some myth they understand to be false?
If we subscribe to the idea that civilizations have natural life cycles, then would it be fair to describe that a society first starts out in a state where the majority believes the noble lie (what we experienced as "modernism"), then proceeds to understand it as a lie, but keeps behaving like it used to out of inertia (what we experienced as post-modernism), followed by... what?
Here are the key posts on Adams' blog about this topic:
TLDR: I found Scott Adams' theory of human behavior to be fascinating. I'm trying to see if he ripped it off from history and whether these same ideas have been widespread in any society in the past. Can you help me?
P.S: Please stick to the rules and do not mention current events or your post will be deleted. I already got my previous version of this submission deleted for the exact same mistake.
1 Answers 2016-12-20
I keep thinking that the "fake news problem" we have today can't be new. Yes, back in the day it was a lot harder to set up a media organization that could reach millions of people. But surely there were ample incentives for tabloids to publish false and clickbait-y information to get more subscriptions, right? How did people cope with this problem back then?
2 Answers 2016-12-20