"A Dangerous Right-Wing Agenda"

[Landshark]

Landshark - you should check out this oldie but goodie from The Onion, America's Finest News Source. It was published before the invasion of Iraq. I think you'll find the article rather relevant to what you've just told us.

Nah, too well reasoned, polite and nowhere near enough SHOUTING.

 

[Ian the Admin]

Really? I thought that Stockwell Day could give any American conservative politician a run for his money.

Day (and most of the Reform Party) are pretty far to the right by Canadian standards, but they're not Religious Right in the US sense. In religious matters (and for that matter most matters) they'd be noticably moderate members of the Republican party if you translated them to the US. They have to be very careful not to get associated with US-style evangelical politics. Canada doesn't have an equivalent of Bob Jones university that I know of, for example, but any politician who visited such a place would instantly kiss their career goodbye. In the US you can do it and become president on a "compassionate conservative" platform. And though I've forgotten the details, there was a national scandal several years ago when a Reform MP made some sort of anti-immigrant or similar comment of the sort that Jesse Helms and Pat Buchanan and similar US politicians let slip fairly regularly.

And, of course, among her many outstanding citizens, Canada boasts my favorite half-Japanese fascist, Adam Yoshida. Either his weblog is satire, in which case he's the funniest person to come out out of Canada since Mike Myers, or he's honest about the things he says, in which case he is the most unintentionally funniest person to come out of Canada since William Shatner.

Yoshida is completely for real, unfortunately.

 

[Adam Parsons]

I noticed that the author seems to be of the belief that history is controlled by, as Blackadder put it, "social-economic...things". This makes him biased in his arguement from the get-go. Of course, whether this is the case isn't really provable one way or another, like a lot of philosophy.

I do, however, resent the implication that I am a conservative naysayer. My ACTUAL political policy is simply: "Whatever works." While occasionally similar, it is not the same as conservatism. So there.

 

[Grey Wolf]

Anyway I think this guy's just appeared on Newsnight on BBC2. I caught the last couple of minutes of it and there was one guy defending "counterfactuals" and another attacking them. Apparently by discussing AH we're undermining the general public's interest in real history or some such.

So that's us told isn't it.

Geez, the public's perception of history consists of Simon Scharmer and David Starkey with a bit of Tony Robinson thrown in for light entertainment (though IMHO it often touches on things deeper than the popular history programmes do, you just have to know how to recognise them)

Of course, in making my assertion what am I saying ? That popular history is a bad thing ? Well, compared to no history in the popular mind, clearly not. Only that 'the public's interest in real history' can hardly be 'under-mined' by counter-factuals

On a similar note, I found the BBC2 programme on those battles where it put teams of people in positions of command to be quite fascinating. As well as the general history, I really most enjoyed seeing the complete balls-up people made ! I remember one battle where this guy took charge with the sole purpose to seize and defend a hill... As one of the commentators said 'Its not a magic hill' !

I also found the complete inability of some teams to work as a team more illuminating than the real history of these battles. It showed just how and why some OTL battles go so badly wrong - one example brough Spion Kop to mind especially. Usually these failed teams consisted of the lower-level commanders losing all meaningful contact with the top brass - either the generals were ignoring them completely, or they were issuing orders based on hopes and not realities. I recall one woman saying pointedly you're ordering me to attack with troops who have already been killed - reminded me of Hitler in 1945 !

Grey Wolf

 

[David Howery]

uh, don't you have to have an interest in regular history to be interested in AH? Otherwise, how would you even comprehend it? If you don't know how the ACW, WW1, and WW2 went, how could you ever appreciate what's happening in HT's How Few Remain/Great War/American Empire/Settling Accounts books, for example....

 

[Thyme]

I think that the author's opinion of the people populating this site would be that they are dangerous reactionaries who should be suppressed. I would consider most of the people here slightly left of center (with some issues where we tend to be fairly un-liberal). He seems to be someone who whould consider buying icecream as a matter of class struggle.

Is any one else bothered that he seems to consider the concept of free will to be an insidious threat.

 

[jgack]

David, you should ask HT that. From everything I've seen about the rest of the Western world anything right of the Green Party is considered reactionary to them, and by the time you get to the Republican Party you are on the border of Facism. It seems kind of horrifying to me that they can think that way, especially since those places have actually experienced Facism in reality, although only the older generations (those in their 70s and older) were around back then. Still, this is coming from countries that have experienced ONLY extremes in their search for Republicanism so I can rest assured, as can most Americans, that America is as close to a moderate country as can still be found on the planet. As for this crazy guy who thinks we are all plotting to undermine American's knowledge of history perhaps he should take a moment to look at some of the liberal "alternate history" like that Aurthur movie coming out soon with the warrior Gwenevier (spelling?) or the stiring tribute to all the warrior women from ancient Greece that we all so fondly remember as Xena. (Yes, I know there were tribes in the ancient world where women fought, but not like that nonsensically raving feminist wetdream.) Not to offend anyone, but that show is pure feminist propoganda and if anyone is going to acuse conservatives of undermining the truth about history someone needs to mention things like this. So my apologies to anyone who may have found this offensive, but a man can take only so much.

 

[MerryPrankster]

I don't particularly mind having Guienevere as an archer; everybody needs a hobby. Having her run around half-naked painted blue though just makes her look ugly, and Keira Knightley is anything BUT ugly.

The scene in the preview where Guinevere nails a Saxon (I think) and the camera follows the arrow straight into the guy's head is pretty cool.

On the matter of Xena, I've heard some lesbian jokes that involve the show. Why is that? I haven't seen much of Xena, but I was under the impression she was heterosexual (weren't there male "love interest" characters now and then?).

 

[edvader]

A Dangerous...

Matt you are so right about my honey Xena. She is straight. She's had men lovers. The history is AH through everyone's eyes. She can and did meet anyone in different eras-Caesar in one, Helen(THAT ONE) in another. BTW Mel Gibson is planning a movie on Boudicia. Could this be an AH? Only ONE woman for the title.

 

[Kit]

Ahemm...there's actually is a lesbian sub-text to Xena. The shows creators obviously tried (successfully and very subtly) to appeal to two different audiences - while keeping the heterosexual male one completely unaware of the occasional in-jokes, side references, double entendres etc that those in-the-know picked up on.