When King Conrad III defeated the Duke of Welf (in the year 1140) and placed Weinsberg under siege, the wives of the besieged castle negotiated a surrender which granted them the right to leave with whatever they could carry on their shoulders. The king allowed them that much. Leaving everything else aside, each woman took her own husband on her shoulders and carried him out. When the king’s people saw what was happening, many of them said that that was not what had been meant and wanted to put a stop to it. But the king laughed and accepted the women’s clever trick. “A king” he said, “should always stand by his word.”
Medieval women were BAMFs.
This movie scene is where I learned the true survival value of being a smart-ass.
Apparently not alot of people have warmed up to the created for TV show character Fish Mooney, played by the beautiful Jada Pinkett Smith. Some have written that she is out of place, and not in a usual position of mob boss for a person of her gender and race. Others have said that she is over the top, which is hilarious when we are talking about a villain who lives in the same city as Joker, Penguin, Riddler, & Killer Croc & Clayface. Maybe they would have been more comfortable if she was playing a maid, cook, or prostitute, or drug addict. So here is a history lesson for all of the people who are having a hard time taking Fish Mooney seriously. When then character was first introduced, I was instantly reminded of Queenie St. Clair.
“Stephanie St. Clair (1886–1969) was a female gang leader who ran numerous criminal enterprises in Harlem, New York in the early part of the 20th century. Despite resisting the interests of the Mafia for several years after Prohibition ended, she continued to be an independent operator never coming under mafia control.
She complained to local authorities about harassment by the NYPD, and when they paid no heed she ran advertisements in Harlem newspapers, accusing senior police officers of corruption. The police responded by arresting her on a trumped up charge, and in response she testified to the Seabury Commission about the kickbacks she had paid them. The Commission subsequently fired more than a dozen police officers.
After the end of Prohibition, Jewish and Italian-American crime families saw a decrease in profits and decided to move in on the Harlem gambling scene. Bronx-based mob boss Dutch Schultz was the first to move in, beating and killing numbers operators who would not pay him protection.
St. Clair and her chief enforcer Ellsworth “Bumpy” Johnson refused to pay protection to Schultz despite the amount of violence and intimidation by police they faced. Eventually Bumpy Johnson, her former enforcer, negotiated with Lucky Luciano and Lucky took over Schultz’ spots with a percentage going to Bumpy. The Italians then had to go to Bumpy first if they had any problems in Harlem. That’s when the legend of Bumpy Johnson began. The book “Harlem Godfather” by Bumpy’s wife, Mayme Johnson, provides a factual account of this.
Luciano realized that the struggle with the Five Families was hurting their business so Schultz was assassinated in 1935 on the orders of The Commission, St. Clair sent a telegram to his hospital bed as the gangster lay dying. It read, “As ye sow, so shall ye reap.” The incident made headlines across the nation.
By the 1940s, “Bumpy” Johnson had become the reigning king in Harlem while St. Clair became less and less involved in the numbers game. She died quietly and still rich in Harlem in 1969.“
A strong black woman who stood toe to toe with the Mafia & the NYPD? Sounds like Fish Mooney to me. She doesn’t look so out of place now, does she?
today i visited the castle walt disney based the Famous Disney Castle on, Neuschwanstein, and learned that the king who made it, lugwig II was a gigantic fucking fanboy that built a fairytale castle bc he was obsessed with this swan knight legend, so he made this useless weird castle to sit in the mountains and look pretty and have all his favorite characters on the walls. this motherfucker built a fake grotto next to his bedroom cuz he saw it once in an opera and thought it was cool. this is like if obama really liked star wars and just built a millennium falcon he could live in. also he loved supporting artists and hired actors to go with him into the countryside and act out legends this MOTHERFUCKER WAS LARPING IN THE 1800s you nERDY fUCK. also ludwig only went out at night cuz his life was so scandalous people talked about him, so he had a carriage/sleigh combo with a battery powered light on it and rode around the bavarian countryside like the useless emo batman fuck that he was. did i mention he was bisexual and retreated into the LARGER GROTTO HE BUILT IN ANOTHER PALACE for years bc honestly what’s more relatable than building yourself an artificial grotto below a palace to be a gay recluse like the goddamn phantom of the opera? this fucking icon now has secret societies and conspiracy theories about his mystery death because only true icons create drama from the fuCKING afterlife. anyway i’ve now found my bisexual depressed fanboy bitch role model
Some people threw white paint on it a few years back.
They want to be a victim so bad.
Fun Fact: That’s a statue of the fist which Joe Louis used to knock out Max Schmeling, Hitler’s favored heavyweight boxer in 1938. Schmeling won the 1st bout by knockout in round twelve, but Joe Louis came back in the follow-up match and laid him the fuck out in the 1st round.
Fun Fact: Schmeling was hated by the Nazis for losing to a black man and for having a Jewish manager, and he hated them right back, stating in 1975 that he was glad he’d lost the fight because the thought of the Nazis using him for propaganda purposes sickened him. He also personally saved the lives of two Jewish children and later became lifelong friends with Joe Louis.
So maybe don’t refer to him as “Hitler’s favored heavyweight boxer”…
I did not know this about Schmeling so reblogging.
BTW, the high five was invented in 1977 which means your parents probably didn’t grow up with it.
For real though Glenn Burke, inventor of the high five was a gay black player in the 70s, and the Dodgers tried to get him to marry a beard and their manager got mad when he befriended the manager’s gay son before being traded to the Athletics, probably for being gay. In Oakland, the rumors of homosexuality followed him and manager Billy Martin started using homophobic slurs in the clubhouse and homophobic behavior from other players lead to an early retirement for the promising young star at 27. After retiring from baseball he introduced the high five to the Castro district of San Franscio where the high five became a symbol of gay pride and identification. ESPN wrote a long form piece about it which I recommend reading, it’s got some homophobic slurs in it although not presented positively.
A few appendices:
Although he was unceremoniously drummed out of Major League Baseball, Burke became the star shortstop for the local Gay Softball League, and even dominated in the Gay Softball World Series, as well as medaling in the 100 and 200 meter sprints in the inaugural 1982 Gay Games. Unfortunately, Burke also picked up a cocaine habit and had his leg and foot crushed in an accident. He spent much of his final years homeless in the Castro, and died from AIDS complications in 1995, but he was in the first class of inductees to the Gay and Lesbian Sports Hall of Fame, and his High School retired his jersey number.
The Dodgers Manager in question was Tony Lasorda, whose son “Spunky” died of AIDS complications in 1992 although Lasorda maintains that it was cancer. Likewise, despite the High Five becoming a symbol of the 1980 Dodgers team, Lasorda maintained and continues to this day to maintain to not know its origin. It’s possible that this isn’t a deliberate slight to Burke, but given his homophobia in other matters that’s a hard benefit of the doubt to give.
The Athletics have, in the years since, attempted to make up for some of the wrongs they committed in this story. When Glenn revealed publicly that he was living with AIDS, the As moved in and helped him financially. Burke was honored publicly at Pride Night at the park in 2015 and his brother was invited to throw the first pitch.
Burke was happy to see the high five catch on, spilling out of sports and into the small joys of every day life. He died believing that the high five was his legacy. Next time you high five your friend, remember that the high five came from Glenn Burke.
Npr has a dope story on it
What? Cool! Maybe I can find some of his baseball cards?
no, i mean this social experiment started by a history teacher in calofornia in 1967
im Intrigued
it’s creepy not so much like paranormal but as in it’s a scary look at human nature. hang on a sec ill explain it
alright so. in 1967, a new history teacher at Cubberly High School in Northern California named Ron Jones was teaching his class about the Holocaust and Hitler’s rise to power. At some point during the lesson, many of his students began to ask why the rest of Germany had stood by and done nothing, and how afterwards they could have said they didn’t know. Many said that they would never allow something like that to happen, but most simply couldn’t understand how the population had allowed it back then. This made Ron curious: what was the answer? Why had so many Germans joined and tolerated the Nazis as their neighbors were dragged away? He realized there was no way of knowing, not without being there, and certainly no way of teaching it – unless, maybe, they could experience something similar.
The next day, Ron came in and began to command his class differently than usual. He had stricter rules, making students stand when asking or answering questions and having them fix their posture. He said it was a lesson on discipline and the phrase “strength through discipline” was written on the board.
The students, shockingly responded positively to the stricter rules; it was as if they had just been waiting for this and wanted more. They worked as a team and answered questions correctly, even sitting quietly until Ron dismissed them at the end of class.
In the next two days, the phrases “strength through community” and “action” appeared on the board. Ron announced to the class that their new rules and ideas were now the cornerstones of the group called the Wave. Their mottos were the three phrases on the board, and he introduced them to a salute (made by curling one’s right hand into the shape of a wave and tapping one’s left shoulder with it). The kids practiced both the motto and the salute that day.
Everything was going well in this experiment: Ron was increasingly seen as an incredibly important leader, the kids were being more well behaved, they were ahead in their studies, all good things, so Ron decided to continue the Wave. In class, he gave the students Wave membership cards, some of which had red x’s on the back. The x’s indicated that those people were to monitor the other members of the Wave and report directly to Ron if someone broke a rule.
Additionally that day, Ron gave the instruction to recruit members to the Wave; all were invited and all were equal in the Wave.
And recruit they did.
Later that week, there were over 200 members of the Wave. The pep rally became an official Wave rally where dozens of new members were sworn in. As the group grew, most everyone joined. However, if someone did not join, they were likely to find themselves very alone and possibly being threatened or hurt by Wave members.
By the 5th day, Ron knew things had spiraled out of control. He had grown into a mythical leader, and the students carried out his orders without hesitation, even if these orders never existed in the first place and were grown from within the Wave. He decided to tell the students that there would be a televised announcement of the Wave’s candidate announcement for the presidential election, and that all members should attend the rally later that day.
When they arrived, the hundreds of students were greeted with a blank screen and Ron. He told them the true nature of the Wave; how it had been born as an experiment that had grown exponentially until he had to end it. The students were shocked, and some even cried. They had all believed in the Wave wholeheartedly after just 5 short days.
The Wave is terrifying because it is real. Not so long ago, a history teacher fresh out from college was able to turn a school into a military state in just 5 days. We as humans are so easily led into fascist dictatorships and we so rarely question what goes on around us. The Wave is a testament to that, and a scary one.
There’s a really great German film of the same name (“Die Welle” – The Wave) based on this experiment – rather than stopping after 5 days however, the teacher lets it continue and things get much, MUCH worse. It’s a terrifying movie, but fascinating too.
Die Welle is an incredibly well done film, fans of Sense8 will recognise Marco being played by the guy who plays Woolfgang.
However it is a deeply disturbing film, just be warned.
Honestly this shit won’t “teach” you anything about the holocaust in PARTICULAR. Like here’s the two immediate reasons why you should know this premise is entirely faulty from the start, and why this film is a waste of time @choking-onholywater:
1.) The fact that Germany had fostered literal centuries of violent (and deadly) antisemitism (and anti-roma sentiment) prior to the Holocaust is not ONCE mentioned in this teacher’s “experiment” – or at least you never mentioned it in your summary.
2.) The teacher assumes that average Germans (aka only Gentile, non-Jewish or non-Roma Germans) all “didn’t know.” This is patently, historically false. Like it’s so false it’s insulting. Germans knew. They were well aware! And they didn’t feel outraged because for non-roma gentile Germans they for the most part A.) didn’t care (as long as it wasn’t them) or B.) actively encouraged or celebrated it it.
Guess what guys? If your explanation of “how the holocaust happened” doesn’t immediately and primarily begin with “centuries of entrenched/systemic antisemitism and anti-roma violence,” then your explanation doesn’t actually explain the Holocaust, all it does it explain behaviors of large groups subjected to peer pressure.
Let me just repeat: If you’re not studying or learning about antisemitism and anti-roma sentiment as a primary factor for the Holocaust, then you’re not really learning about how the Holocaust happened.
And let me tell you, it seems scary to think “oh people didn’t know, people can be fooled or ignorant and led to terribleness like a fascist regime,” but the true fucking horror is knowing that people knew very well what was going on.
Germany in the third Reich wasn’t “surprised” by the existence of death camps and the Final Solution.
The warning signs for the Holocaust weren’t just “increased rules and regulations” or “slogans and salutes.” The Germans weren’t just eager teenagers or school children, they weren’t unaware or ignorant. They hated Jewish people violently. That’s it! That’s the answer. They didn’t have a nationwide boycott of Jewish businesses in 1933 just because they wanted to “follow the rules” guys. They had it because they hated Jews.
Like you need to understand that this is the most asinine and useless way to teach the holocaust, because the quote unquote warning signs were clear as fucking day, and yes, that means German gentiles ignored or supported it.
A sampling of actual warning signs (Just Jewish specific, I could go on forever):
April 25th, 1933: Law Against Overcrowding of Public Schools and Universities targets Jewish students by restricting the number of Jewish students in public schools.
October 4th – Non-Aryan people are banned from Journalism positions.
Pause to note: this is all before Hitler technically becomes President of Germany in 1934, and then subsequently becomes dictator.
1935:
September 15th –Nuremberg Race laws, which “consisted of two pieces of legislation: the Reich Citizenship Law and the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor.”
[Note: August 1st opens the Berlin Olympics in Nazi Germany.]
1937:
July 15 – Buchenwald Camp opens.
Nov. 8th – Antisemitic art exhibition put on by Government at the library of the German Museum in Munich.
1938:
Germany “annexes” Austria in March.
By August, “A new German law requires Jews bearing first names of “non-Jewish” origin to adopt an additional name: “Israel” for men and “Sara” for women.”
On October 5th, all German-Jewish passports are declared invalid: “The Reich Ministry of the Interior invalidates all German passports held by Jews. Jews must surrender their old passports, which will become valid only after the letter “J” has been stamped on them.”
November 9th, German occupied Austria – Kristallnacht. “In a nationwide pogrom called Kristallnacht, members of the Nazi Party and other Nazi formations burn synagogues, loot Jewish homes and businesses, and kill at least 91 Jews.”
November 12th: A new German decree closes all Jewish-owned businesses.
Like hey guys? By this point, Germany hadn’t yet invaded Poland. Germany hadn’t begun to systematically establish Jewish ghettos. (This happens in 1939.) Mobile-killing units targeted Jewish communities in 1941. That fall, they introduced gas vans. 1941 was when Operation Reinhard was implemented, and if you don’t know what that is, take a look.
This movie doesn’t sound terribly helpful when it doesn’t address that like, for six whole years, German gentiles didn’t mind systematically targeting Jewish Germans in the name of the law.
It’s not helpful if the warning signs aren’t like “utterly dehumanizing a group of people and also murdering 91 of them.”
If you want an actual take on the rising “waves” of antisemitism that led to the Holocaust, operation reinhard, the final solution, etc, then please read something about the Holocaust specifically. My recommendation as a good starting point is Victor Klemperer’s journal, published in English asI will Bear Witness: A diary of the Nazi Years 1933-1941. (The second half covers 1942-1945).Victor occupied a unique position in Nazi germany – he was an ethnically Jewish man, but had converted to Christianity and married an “ayran” woman, which kept him “safe” for much longer than other German Jews, until he too becomes targeted. He was also a Professor, at the time. His journals chronicle the loss of his rights, his property, the reactions of gentile germans around him, the fear and tension that grows.
The fact that people were willing to look the other way.
Jeanne de Clisson (1300-1359): the Lioness of Brittany
More historical details and footnotes up later today when I have more time. The short version is: we know she existed, that she led forces against France, that she became a pirate, and that she was protected by England. The extent of her feats varies greatly based on the telling – estimates of the length of her career as pirate range between five months and thirteen years! – but whatever the heck she actually did left quite an impression.
i hope you’re all aware of the 300 recently discovered love letters between two gay british soldiers during ww2 that are going to be possibly adapted into a film.
they’re beautiful and poetic and tragic and heart-wrenching and brave. i highly suggest going and reading the excerpts.
here’s the one that broke my heart:
“Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all our letters could be published in the future in a more enlightened time. Then all the world could see how in love we are.“
Not enough people talk about the fact that Leonardo da Vinci was gay. Like, he’s literally the father of modern technology and one of the smartest human beings to ever live and I never ever learned in school that he was gay.
If all the LGBT people are as “DOOMED” as the bible thumpers think we are, hell, at least we’re in good company.
I was about to say I can’t believe I didn’t know this
and then I remembered the American education system
Yes, I can fucking believe I didn’t know this.
But yeah. Leonardo da Vinci was gay. Pass it on.
Leo painted a picture of his lover as Jesus and that’s the image we use today
Oh man that is sad. I’m sorry your teachers are failing you.
Some Leonardo facts you should tattoo on your heart:
He was actually convicted for sodomy at age 24, but the allegations were dropped for lack of testimony. The charges affected him immensely, as he was by all means, a very private person.
Da Vinci’s models for Christ are unknown. The claim that he depicted his lover as Jesus most likely arose from the bullshit about Cesare Borgia being the inspiration for White Jesus™ combined with the allegations that Leonardo and Cesare were lovers…There is little to no support for these claims. However, it’s speculated his lover Gian Giacomo Caprotti was the model for his St. John the Baptist.
He was universally beloved (minus Michelangelo lollll), like the nicest, funniest, gentlest, handsomest man you’d ever meet. He was generous beyond words, treated everyone equally, and loved to play pranks.
He was also fuckin’ ripped. It was rumored he could bend a horseshoe in half with his bare hands.
Often wore pink and other vibrant colors.
Rumored to sleep approx. 2 hours a night.
Was left-handed and ambidextrous. He was dyslexic, possibly had ADD, and suffered from frequent paranoia.
He was his own worst critic and often destroyed his work. He still left behind over 13k journal pages, filled with sketches and so many dick jokes.
His last words were: “I have offended God and mankind because my work did not reach the quality it should have.”
Would buy caged animals from the market just to set them free. He was allegedly a vegetarian.
For a time he kept a pet lizard and made him a custom set of wings and horns. He would routinely scare the shit out of people with his ‘dragon.’
My all time fave: While staying in the Vatican he would invite guests into a residential room which had been filled with cleaned/dried animal intestines that he had sewn together. He fastened a bellows to the end of the intestines and proceeded to inflate them. Onlookers were so excited to see DaVinci’s new ”invention” that they didn’t even realize this asshole was just blowing up a giant balloon and pinning them to the wall holy shit I love him so much.
Mathee's Blog 