hunchback from sardinia

actually just found this book for free on my campus, and picked it up. planning on reading it soon! but yeah, i'm a fan of brown and been wanting to read this book for a while

nah, will check it out. thanks!

every region in the world where nation-states have emerged have seen both minor and major episodes of genocide, that were directly fueled by nationalism

the emergence and continued contestation and consolidation of the nation state has been responsible for the greatest episodes of mass violence in human history

people use the shorthand, "it's because of capitalism" to explain why our modern condition is so fucked, but i think "it's because of nationalism" might be equally if not more accurate

go do it, other person that isn't me!

so yeah, write a book connecting greek democracy and roman republicanism to these cultural revolutions that arose due to sailors, merchants, enslaved people moving around the mediterranean!

but what were the political implications of those revolutions is what remains largely invisible, aside from in greece and rome

what *is* visible indicates that such revolutions in culture were occurring, as seen in the spread, integration, and adaptation of religious practices or in the spread, integration and adaptation of writing, or the same for different art forms

not hard to see how the phoenicians and the greeks could have produced similar conditions to those you observe in the early modern and belle epoque periods, and that that would have unleashed a myriad of local cultural and political revolutions (that are largely invisible to us today)

some books i am thinking about are linebaugh and rediker's "the many-headed hydra" and denning's "noise uprising." current work on iron age mediterranean has gotten closer to these ideas (via a focus on broad cultural hybridity and globalization) but i have not seen this specific connection drawn

really think there's an opening for someone to write a great book that takes existing theories of how sailors, pirates, merchants and enslaved people moving from port to port created the conditions for revolution in the 18th century (and 20th century) and apply it to the iron age mediterranean

people confuse being a know-it-all snob with being on the left, when the two are antithetical

i would HATE being a defender with these VAR offside rules. you play the attacker offside but then have to run like hell to get back and keep playing until the play is over, only for the sideline referee to raise his flag AFTER the play is done

gender roles, racial hierarchies, "might makes right", etc. are all examples

the ultimate triumph of an ideology is when it is understood as being imposed on by "nature"

if you view coaches are dictators (or figures of authority that impose their formation on the group), then what real madrid are achieving is a good thing?

not sure if it's a good thing or bad thing that real madrid does better the worse their coach is. they're an uncoachable team that thrives on individualistic brilliance. and it's a model that has worked for them for decades

from the amarna letters to the epstein emails: a history of ruling class culture through elite correspondence

my 13 year old niece just told me there's some song memorializing charlie kirk that every kid knows by heart...kill me now

not great!

don't love that this epstein stuff is turning me into a pizzagate conspiracist but from the left...

i find it striking that with all the reinterpretations of classic fairy tales to make them more culturally contemporary (empowered female leads, more diverse characters, empathy to outsiders, etc.), they never question the trope of the aspiring prince having to learn how to rule over their subjects

still waiting for disney/pixar to make a movie that doesn't glorify royalty and chieftains

yes, to me it was clearly intentional. there is no explicit reference to any actual real historical figures or events during the entire film, for a reason.

if 'one battle after another' takes place in present day then that means that the french 75 were operating in the 00s, which means that bush was president, which means that...

NO! stop it. that's not how fiction works

Okay yes I’ve been thinking about this. EVERY character in OBAA fucks up, some of them REALLY badly. Willa has a cell phone. the radio guy gives up pat to protect his sister. Pat can’t remember all the code talk after years of drugs and alcohol. Hell, Pat falls off a roof and almost gets caught!

i read it more as an alternate reality meant to reflect back on our present reality, not meant to map directly onto existing timeline of political movements in recent US history

trump's ability to turnout people to vote (first time voters especially) does seem to be a feature of his presidency, and goes against this narrative that they have no capacity to maintain the movement once in office

2024 was still a relatively high voter turnout election, especially when compared with the past 60 years. it didn't reach the peak of 2020, but that was largely due to dems not turning out to the same degree. my take is that trump largely maintained his 2020 turnout numbers