What was it they said back in college “History is a set of agreed upon lies” or something to that extent?
I mean it seems like all the time history is being rewritten. For example at one time Christopher Columbus was considered a hero now he is a big villain.
What it comes down to is governments want a certain history to be taught. Its like how maybe your family will cover up the crimes of an ancestor. Now granted that doesnt come up to the the level of the 9/11 stuff but it doesnt help.
Given the light-warp speed with which crank theories spread on social media, it’s especially important to point out their stupidity and refute them ASAP before they can gain traction in the general public.
One new one is that The Government assassinated an opponent of releasing genetically modified mosquitoes into a couple of southern states (she was found drowned in a D.C. hotel swimming pool*, with unverified reports suggesting she suffered from a seizure disorder). The conspiracy-dripping angst on Facebook is something to behold - didja know she was found dead hours before she was going to present a petition with umpty-eleven signatures to Congress opposing GM mosquitoes? Apparently now that she’s dead all those signatures vanish into thin air, rather than remaining on change.org.
Poor lady joins a long parade of “holistic” docs and other providers murdered by The Government/Pharma/Illuminati (including the CDC employee found dead in a river, killed because he was about to Expose the flu vaccine, never mind that he wasn’t working with vaccines).
This stuff isn’t harmless.
*the March Against Monsanto link describes the death as suspicious, citing the day’s temperatures in the 50s as evidence the victim wouldn’t have been swimming. Guess what - it was an indoor pool. :smack:
^THAT
In other words, as it should be, “Stupidity is its own reward.”
Having said that, however, I have to add that the damage that can be done by people who reject true science out of superstition and suspicion while, at the same time, embrace urban legends and conspiracy theories as reality needs to be addressed. I think the only real way is through education.
:dubious:
Not just “now”. His contemporaries also knew he was a brutal monster:
History isn’t so much rewritten as it is revealed-the more you dig, the more you find.
When reading my post that you seem to have agreed with, you missed the most important part. Stupidity being its own reward sounds nice, but stupidity is not a private activity. People’s stupidity affects everyone else, not just themselves. Education: true for the future. What about today?
Except back in those days false accusations to drive someone out of royal favor were rampant. The accusations may well be true, of course, but whenever they come from one source, take them with a grain of salt.
Not to mention during that period stealing corn would almost certainly get you executed in England or France.
No, the issue is we are judging men of the past by today’s standards.
Most of the ancient Greek or Roman philosophers likely kept slaves*, as did Washington and many other worthies up thru the early 1800s. Britain didn’t outlaw slavery until 1833.
Capital punishment or severe whipping was standard for what today we’d consider minor crimes also thru that period.
I honestly don’t know how I’ve resisted joining. Or trolling the 9/11 Engineers list, like Ann Hedonia, but I temporarily have time on my hands.
Perhaps. That does not appear to be the case in regards to Columbus.
Well, you can start with his own words:
Note that Columbus’s proclivity towards enslavement was not encouraged or reciprocated by his Monarch:
However, it was not merely his own words or those of Francisco de Bobadilla which condemn him to posterity. A recent find is ample testimony to his misdeeds:
I would need to see a cite to support this claim. Here is one from 10th century England which appears to contradict your assertion:
Bottom line, the best evidence we have suggests that Columbus was a malignant scumbag. This is very much not an example of a “conspiracy theory”.
If “everybody did it”, then there is no reason to repress the facts about Columbus…but that is precisely what was done for many years. It is next to impossible to accurately judge a person, by either contemporary standards or modern standards, if the facts are repressed. The more we find out, the less history is written by the victors.
THere’s considerable evidence that reports of Columbus’ alleged perfidies were exaggerated, misinterpreted or made up.
“Many of these claims of genocide regarding Columbus are based on the excerpted writings of his contemporaries, Francisco de Bobadilla and Bartolomé de las Casas. A report by Bobadilla accuses Columbus of the most grievous offences and is often cited by the most vitriolic anti-Columbus publications; however, this report is inherently skewed. Bobadilla was a vicious political opponent of Columbus and schemed, ultimately successfully, to depose him as Governor of the Indies. Bobadilla was certainly no friend of the Indians, as he pardoned the rebel leader responsible for the establishment of the repartimiento system. He also accused Columbus of abusing the Indians and had him sent back to Spain in chains for these alleged misdeeds. Though his report is accepted as a piece of objective history by Columbus’ opponents, it should be viewed as a piece of political slander to discredit Columbus, furthering Bobadilla’s selfish bid to become Governor of the Indies.”
Even if Bobadilla’s (or others’) accusations against Columbus do not stand up, it’s still not evidence of a conspiracy against him (as conspiracies are defined for the purposes of this thread).
No one doubts he took slaves. You will have to show that that was considered unusual in the 15th century- because it was very common.
Those accusations are indeed, those put forward by Bobadilla, Columbus’s rival.
Wow, going back to Pre-Medieval days. No, I was talking much more recently, with the ‘Bloody Code’ of English legal system from the 17th Century to the early 19th Century:
http://www.mylearning.org/prison-and-penal-reform-in-the-1800s/p-3272/
“You could be executed for stealing anything worth more than five shillings …”
The Bloody Code is so well known, that asking for a cite it a little bit like asking for a cite that the Boer war happened.
See. Harmless fun!. . . Boring to everyone else. . .
mc
:dubious: Yes, it was so common that for the next three centuries, slavery positively flourished throughout the New World domains of the Spanish monarchy. Actually… uh, no it didn’t. They went with another system. (“However, Queen Isabella of Castile forbade Indian slavery and deemed the indigenous to be “free vassals of the crown”.[4]”)
Accusations that have been, as previously noted substantiated 12 years ago by the discovery of the written testimony under oath of 23 witnesses to his crimes:
No, the 10th century is actually smack dab in the middle of Europe’s medieval period. Your cites come from hundreds of years after Columbus. Moreover, you also made reference to France in your initial assertion. Your assertion remains unsupported.
I abstained from mentioning the work of las Casas, both because he did not report contemporaneously with the alleged misdeeds of Columbus, and also because he intentionally wrote with a polemical bent*. I mentioned Bobadilla as only one of (literally) dozens of accusers of Columbus. To posit that they were all mistaken as to the nature of the man, however, really does start to veer off into tin-foil hat territory.
*It should also be noted that the source of your citation, The Dartmouth Review, is well known as a conservative newspaper with its own share of controversy generally, and particularly in regard to Native American issues.
For most purpose the Encomienda was slavery of a sort. In any case, altho Indian slavery was a on-again off again thing, Black slavery was common until 1814.
Nope, those are the same accusations, made by the same guy.
Executions for theft were common from the Ancient Greeks thru the 1800s:
“Full thievery” meant stealing something worth 1/2 mark or more, and was punished by hanging from a tree or a gallows, or by banishment from the city and its environs.
http://historum.com/medieval-byzantine-history/66551-capital-punishment-stealing-europe.html
*The first codified constitution of
Athens, know as “Draconian Law” after the
man that wrote it, was written in seventh
century B.C. to make sure that everyone
knew what all the laws were. Capital
punishment was more present than ever in
Draconian Law; almost every crime, no
matter how petty and harmless, was
punishable by death (Ellis & Horne, 1913). *
It was most certainly not chattel slavery of the kind practiced initially by Columbus and refused by Isabella. Words have meanings and are not infinitely elastic to suit the purposes of “winning” an argument.
Again, not the point. Black slavery may have become common at a latter time - but not that of Native Americans. If it were common practice to enslave Native Americans, then it wouldn’t haven’t been necessary to import African slaves in the first place!
Again, not the point. Accusations are just that unless and until they are substantiated by evidence. In Columbus’s case, there were nearly two dozen individuals who gave testimony in court to substantiate the accusations - including in some cases Columbus’s trusted friends!
I have no idea why you’re throwing in all these references to punishments outside the time period and area under discussion. In any case, your first citation actually states the following: “In the Middle Ages, fines were the most common punishment for theft”. This in no way supports your original assertion:
Well! I guess we can ignore all that stuff then. :dubious:
My favorite Bobadilla story (OK, I only have one) is from Erik Larsen’s book “Isaac’s Storm”. He mentions the time Bobadilla, having just succeeded/deposed Columbus, was organizing a fleet to take gold and other valuable cargoes from Hispaniola back to Spain. Bobadilla is thought to have deliberately assigned Columbus’ share to a puny, miserable little ship with the idea that if any vessel foundered on the way it would be Columbus’ goodies that would be lost.
As it happened, Bobadilla’s fleet ran into a major hurricane and all ships were sunk - except Columbus’ ship (its captain sensed what was coming and sought shelter in time).
Last I checked there were still a couple on the list that are outright fakes by 9/11 debunkers.
It took Gage forever to remove the various ‘Richard Cranium’ s from his list.
Even while he was bragging about how much he was vetting his members there were at least two variations on ‘Heywood Jawblowme’ festering there.