Whereas their Majesties the Askhistorians Moderators, by the Grace of Automod, of the subreddit and its environs Overlords, Deleters of Posts, Keepers of Gates, Masters of the Ivory Tower, have been pleased to grant to /u/kugelfang52, Educator Extraordinaire; /u/dankensington, Lased-focused Locater of Questions; /u/soviet_ghosts, Phantom of the Steppe; /u/silverappleyard, Searcher of the Deep and Forbidden Tomes; /u/jbdyer, [REDACTED], the separate and singular degree title honour and dignity of Moderator, together with all rights privileges and advantages of the same degree.
We do hereby certify that the names of the above have been entered upon the roll of Moderators in witness whereof we have affixed the seal of the said subreddit on the Twelfth day of March in the 9th year of the Moderators' reign and in the Year Two Thousand and Twenty One.
Silliness aside, we are delighted to welcome five new* moderators to the r/AskHistorians team. As is tradition, rules will be relaxed in this thread to allow you offer our new mods congratulations, commiserations and bribes.
Let the cider flow and the feasting begin!
^*technically ^speaking ^/u/soviet_ghosts ^is ^not ^new, ^but ^I ^may ^or ^may ^not ^have ^forgotten ^to ^do ^their ^introduction ^post ^when ^they ^were ^added.
I comma square bracket recruit’s name square bracket comma do solemnly swear by square bracket recruit’s deity of choice square bracket to uphold the Rules and Regulations of the subreddit of Askhistorians comma serve the public truſt comma defend the ſubjects of His ſtroke Her bracket delete whichever is inappropriate bracket Majeſty bracket name of reigning monarch bracket without fear comma favour comma or thought of perſonal ſafety semi-colon to purſue evildoers and protect the innocent comma laying down my life if neceſary in the cauſe of said duty comma so help me bracket aforeſaid deity bracket full stop Automod Save the King stroke Queen bracket delete whichever is inappropriate bracket full stop.
(With all credit and apologies to Sir Terry. I couldn't resist.)
Also, I should like it noted that I am a notably shorter-than-average frustrated humanities student who didn't make it into my preferred institution of higher learning, who is now doing business in a related region north of where I was originally from.
Suckers.
Welcome, welcome, to our new recruits, all of whom we've recruited from amongst our finest flaired members! No doubt you have already met the zombies who hoarsely moan 'where are all the comments?' as they pass by on their way towards the content they crave. No doubt in the past, you have groaned, and hidden til the horde passed. But no more!
As a member of the team, we have granted you two weapons!
Firstly, we grant you access to The Sacred Library of Macros! The next time someone has posted a 3-line 'answer' that is in fact a copy-paste from Wikipedia, we authorise you to remove their comment and post the polite but exceedingly firm reminder that Wikipedia is indeed not a primary source nor even a secondary source. Nay! It is a tertiary source, twice exiled from the contested truth of the matter, and as such deserves our derision when used as a source for information except in quite limited circumstances!
Secondly, we grant you the Fearsome Green Username Switch! This is a fiendish and awesome reminder to the aforementioned zombies of your terrible power that should not be dismissed. "Your words have no power here," it says, "...but mine do."
Thirdly, we grant you....
Sorry, our three weapons are the Sacred Library of Macros, the power to make your username go green, and finally, the fearsome power of the ban for violating our rules of civility! No more shall you see virulent racism and be limited to just reporting it to the mods. Nay! As a mod, you will have the power to boot those people to the kerb, and render them speechless in the sacred spaces of the historian! However, as you will discover, /u/mimicofmodes will probably have banned them first.
(Welcome!)
I for one welcome our new mod overlords, welcome them to the cabal, and would like to say that the rings of power you've been given are not forged from pure evil, but instead come with immense power over history.
So when do I get the secret robes and ceremonial sword? I was promised a sword.
Bienvenidxs! Welcome aboard this fantastic team.
Secret New World Order meetings are every full moon, unless it rains. Book club is cancelled until further notice because someone stole my copy of Summoning E.P. Thompson and Other Historians.
Please refrain from feeding the bots. Last time it happened, one of them ruptured the space-time continuum, got the subreddit banned and rearranged the Chichén Itzá pyramids to make them look like the ones in Egypt, and we had to blame it on the admins. Yes, we blamed all of it on them.
The fools have signed! Now we have their souls forever!
Mwahahahahaha!
Thanks to (redacted), (undecipherable smudge) and ■ ■ ■ ■, and I look forward to helping with (script of unknown origin)!
Welcome welcome welcome! Can't wait to ban Nazis with all of you!
In ignorance came
Without adequate forethought
Damned eternally
New mods? Time for another sacrifice of weird history memes! And since I've evolved into also covering the niche of conlangs since the last mod announcement, we get those included alongside the usual Greek theatre/mythology memes!
Now, some glorious "primary" sources that I offer as tribute to our moddy overlords:
May these memes count as gratitude, and payment to fend off bad answers for yet another day.
*Top part is actually from the lecture.
‡This one is particularly niche, so this old write-up should provide some context to explain the joke.
Congrats to all of the new mods!
Every time a new mod is recruited, and old mod is [removed] from the mines and allowed to see sunshine for 20 (year rule) minutes.
May their reigns be that of a finely cooked steak: bloody, costly, and short lived! Huzzah!
*technically speaking /u/soviet_ghosts is not new, but I may or may not have forgotten to do their introduction post when they were added.
I was going to say, I thought /u/soviet-ghosts was a mod already. Or am I that out of touch that they left and rejoined?
What was the usual structure of standard letters patent, let's say in England? Is there usually an address at the start, along the lines of "From the moderators general to all to whom these letters present come" or some such?
I welcome and congratulate our new overlords and thank you taking on these tasks
Congratulations! And good luck :)
