I'm really interested in finding a reliable, historically unbiased account of the history of the Vatican and the Catholic Church. I've found a lot of titles, but I'm not sure which ones to trust and I'd really appreciate some recommendations from historians.

I'm curious how this 1000+ year-old Scandinavian form of hair dying would effect someone's skin or hair, after having completed the process. Were the ingredients of this bleach organic? Was the practice unhealthy for one back then?

So this might fit more in /r/badhistory, but I'm posting here because I'm hoping for some sources. I recently went to a lecture entitled, Nazi Propaganda for the Arab World during the Holocaust and It's aftereffects and Echoes in Recent Years. It's a really terrible name, and the lecture was equally awful. Among the lecturer's claims was the notion that all modern Islamic anti-semitism descended from Nazi propaganda through the influence of such individuals as Amin Al-Husseini, and that the Soviet Union was the sole aggressor of the Cold War, and had morally failed, and thus was responsible for modern day bigotry, by supporting Israel's enemies such as Egypt and Iran.

Point is, it was bad. However, one point the lecturer made was that sometime in the 1930's a turkish boy had been expelled from the Hitler Youth. After complaining to his father, who then complained to the embassy, the Nazi party decided to officially revise their policies regarding race. They renounced anti-semitism and decided that their policies were going to be distinctly anti-Jewish, not anti-semitic, so as not to offend any potential arab allies. The boy was invited back to the Hitler Youth, happily rejoined and from then on the official stance of the Nazis was that semites were ok, so long as they weren't jews. Now, I don't know if any of this is true or not. The rest of his lecture makes me suspect, especially considering how much effort he put into trying to tie Naziism to Arabs, and it does seem a little unbelievable, especially considering turks are not semites. I've never heard about this event before, and I have spent a while searching around for any references to it but can find nothing. Can anyone clarify whether this event actually happened or not, and if it did I'd greatly appreciate any sources.

Also, did the parents have to pay for their kids to attend?

When did the individual states start involving themselves in primary and secondary education?

Presently, the states are very intertwined with the local education systems. Generally, I am interested in how the education system in America evolved to its present state.

From the antebellum period to the reconstruction era, it was mostly the republicans who were pro-abolition, correct?

Yet, fast forward to the 1940s-60s and it is the Democratic party who is now more favorable to African Americans with an executive order for no segregation in the armed forces and policies in the New Deal that caused many blacks to switch to the Democratic party. It makes sense that Truman was trying to appeal to the black northerner vote for the 1948 election, but why didn't the Republicans do this? They used to be pro-abolition and now what?

Obviously, there is a huge time gap between the periods that I'm comparing, but it still seems strange to me that a party's stance on a matter could just swap like that? Why did this happen?

Thanks!

Were they mainly monogamous? I have read about certain tribes having non-binary gender systems.

So after reading a TIL about Switzerland's defenses such as explosives built into key infrastructure and hollowed out mountains. I know about the elaborate nuclear infrastructure built like NORAD, or other fallout shelters, but what defensive network, if any, were developed in counter a possible land invasion. I guess a follow-up question to that would be if that is still used to today?

Any documentaries our articles would be great if you could provide them!

Probably not the best way to phrase that question.

The Arab world was known for its science and math but now education is being repressed in that region. What happened?

This is not a phenomenon I see currently in other countries so I'm highly curious about the historical background of the matter

Edit: I understand this is a controversial issue for some people, but I think it should be possible to have a discussion about the historical background of this (with appropiate sources of course) without getting into the opinion field. That being said: thank you for reading! Looking forward to your answers

I've been reading a bit about the Algerian War, and I have read a few explanations for why the Algerian War ended up so vicious. Especially in comparison to the other colonial resistance wars in Africa, most prominently to my mind the British. I was wondering if any of you guys happened to have a preferred explanation or some further reading you think would be applicable?

I'm not sure if this is just due to my American schooling but it seems that Spain just dropped from being the conquistadors and colonizers to a pretty minor country in the span of a few hundred years.

My mom is from spain and I asked her and she didn't even know.

I hope this doesn't come off as stereotyping or racist, but for example alcohol is still illegal in many parts of Alaska for this very reason. Or is this just a myth? Maybe some examples of how alcohol has affected the indigenous populations in America specifically , but also around the world would be in order

The Philippines were colonized for roughly the same amount of time as South and Central America, yet we don't call people of Filipino descent Latino or Hispanic. Filipinos are often just called Asian.

I remember it vividly, because men would start slamming down liquor and beer around 9:30, and by 10:15 the streets would be full of angry drunken Glaswegians, a terrifying prospect. What was the point?

I just don't understand how a structured society of 150 million people can just collapse.

I always hear stories about people waking up one day to the news that the Soviet Union had collapsed. What exactly is the process of it collapsing?

I think about the USA and wonder, how would it collapse? It wouldn't be overnight..

Hey all - I read John Fairbank's China: A New History a couple months back and thought it was fairly dry. I lent it to a friend today, who within the first ~30 pages put it down because they found Fairbank making kind of ridiculous claims (i.e. filial piety is an inherently negative system, women ruined China whenever they were in power, the repeated use of "backwards" for a system different from a western one) and thought it was rather offensive. I hadn't noticed these things on my read through.

I suppose my question is - these criticisms are substantial and as far as I can tell, aren't really exaggerated. Has anyone else criticized Fairbank in such a way? Why is he still regarded as the "doyen of western Sinology" if so?

With such a vast distance between the two countries, why would the countries even ally? Could there be any benefit for either country?

I've recently become interested in how modern tanks were developed, and I'm looking for book recommendations. Google Play store would be my preferred way to read, but anything works.

Sorry for all the quotations.

Today one of my professors brought up the idea that one of the causes of the differences between China and Europe is that China has had "too much continuity", meaning it has not experienced the collapses, revolutions, and changing of the guard that Europe has over the past few thousand years. Apparently some historians argue that this is why China became weaker than western nations.

Obviously, this is a huge simplification of thousands of years and glossing over many other differences, but is there any truth to this idea?