Dr. Gabriel Baker

"Lethal kinetic warfighting warrior lethality."

I know that the people who need to read this aren’t here, but here goes:

Rules of engagement aren’t for the enemy. They’re for you. They’re for your soldiers when they’re captured or wounded. They’re for your civilians when they’re in range of the enemy. They’re for your allies, to reassure.

There's probably a starter pack that includes you, I would guess.

Trump might start a war with Iran. Can anyone stop him? Trump might start a war with Iran. Can anyone stop him? Congress, public opinion, and administration insiders aren’t reliable constraints on Trump’s foreign policy decisions.

Quick reactions after learning that no, nobody could stop him. 1/ goodauthority.org/news/trump-m... 1/

Alysa Liu telling 60 Minutes “I love struggling, it makes me feel alive” is a legit revolutionary statement from a Bay Area native in a time when copious amounts of time and resources are being put toward convincing us to opt out of experiencing struggle, friction and self-actualization

Folks, this is Alexandra Sills' (@belovedofoizys.bsky.social) new podcast, so please give it a follow!

Even in the Mid Republic, women are active participants in defining what virtus *is* and the bounds of its requisite behaviors and attitudes! To say women are "outside" of it or somehow separate from it is a wild reading of the evidence.

My dissertation adviser is chairing your panel! She's great! Also I wish I'd made arrangements to go to this SMH, because those ancient history panels look great.

The 5 stages of the ‘enshittification’ of academic publishing Academic publishing now shows the same decline that has hit social media and online marketplaces.

'Reclaiming academic publishing as a public good will require a return to not-for-profit models and sustainable open-access systems. Quality, accessibility and integrity need to be put ahead of profit.'

Operation Just Because

I want to treat "Roman Helmet Guy" as a serious interlocuter, and I want to do it as someone who does what might be called "New Military History," applying cultural studies to military history (religious violence and apocalypticism during wars): you can't study war without studying people.

Okay locking this thing up. Let's all go enjoy the lovely day.

It's cool and my apologies too--I'd
read a bunch of other/negative commentary before replying, and that became the lens through which I read your comments. I'm generally not internet-fighty and should've asked questions rather than start on defense.

"not nearly the depth of analysis you’d get in other sub fields" indicated an overall tone or attitude, or that's how I read them. Sincerely, I don't want to talk past one another here, and I do apologize if I missed the point.

Hm, well, as I said in the 2nd piece of the thread, I may be misunderstanding. I don't think my comments indicated that I felt personally attacked, so much as I was defending the subfield. I thought some comments indicated read in your thread/replies,
e.g.

Very true!

For sure, and thanks for saying so. I'm just surprised to learn that a bunch of historians are unaware of this fact, and/or have a very outdated view of the subfield. Another fun day of Discourse.

This right here.

Yeah I guess that's where some of the confusion lies. I study the same topics as you, but for antiquity, and I would say I am a military historian.

Put another way: I feel like we can poo-poo on bad actors without throwing shade at entire subfields.

I am a non-entity and will likely regret and ultimately delete this post, but this isn't the first such comment I've seen recently, and it is disappointing.

Maybe I am misunderstanding the intent? I realize Helmet Guy is imagining fife-&-bugle, weapon fetishist stuff, but I'd expect my historian colleagues to know that's NOT the field's cutting edge, or even where most of the work is happening.

I don't understand the point of this comment. Because from where I'm sitting, it is actually not a Good Thing for a world class university--situated in a democracy that is frequently at war, where a disproportionate number of future policy makers are educated--to NOT teach military history.

May the Ents march forth and tear your data centres to the ground

This really is a must read for anyone in academia.

Precisely this.

I use this exact painting in class to illustrate... a Greek phalanx. (That Paestum museum is the gift that keeps on giving for class images!)

Introduce yourself with four spaceships.

U.S. Coast Guard will no longer classify swastikas, nooses as hate symbols The military service, which falls under the Department of Homeland Security, has drafted a new policy that classifies such items “potentially divisive.”

Just a reminder that I'm happy to speak to any journalist, or to recommend other scholars to do so, about why prejudice and "potentially divisive symbols" like swastikas (!) are so harmful to morale and cohesion in militaries

In an encrypted group chat, National Guard members question Trump deployments As President Trump's call for National Guard deployments rings out across the U.S., a small contingent of Ohio guard members is quietly expressing concern in an encrypted group chat.

www.npr.org/2025/11/10/n...

"'I swore an oath to the Constitution, not a person,' she says. 'I just really, really implore my peers and everybody outside looking in, to just think about that. Really think about that, and think about what that means.'"

"Wouldn't it be fascinating to live in the late Roman Republic?"

(Monkey paw curls).