Historical Revisionists

[sugoi-chan]

Oh, I just remembered this guy I encountered on a wargaming forum. He claimed that, though in high school, he was taking college-level Chemistry, Physics, and Biology classes and claimed to be a super-genius. Just... Just read this:

Oh wow. Aliens, Atlantis, and Hitler all in one sentence.

Was the guy you were talking to this guy:

?

 

[Dudeofteenage]

Some Atlantean pseudo-history is just batshit without an obvious political motive, but most of it is broadly similar to what @MarineTrainedTard is talking about. It's either overtly in the service of white racism by claiming that the Atlanteans were some kind of superior, even supernaturally endowed white race that shares their bloodlines with the current superior white race, or it's covert in that it doesn't actually promote an overtly racist agenda but it serves to delegitimise non-white culture by claiming its achievements were actually those of some disappeared hypothetical civilisation, not the people actually living there.

 

[MarineTrainedTard]

.....Now I'm wondering if Aryan-Alien-Hindu-Hitler kid is a relative of our friend Amud, who similarly claims to be gifted in numerous academic and artistic fields yet has no real understanding of the one thing he claims to truly be a revolutionary expert in.

 

[Dudeofteenage]

Somewhere in the sweaty perineum of the internet, Amud's distorted maxilla are tingling.

 

[Bassomatic]

I've always personally more taken the idea Aliens Atlantis etc is more just a shame to all of us as a species. Oh no way dumb humans can figure how to fly etc.

 

[Vitriol]

from blog writingwithcolor:

writingwithcolor
FOLLOW
anonymous asked:

I'm writing a story with a character from Egypt in the Victorian era. Can you offer any help? I've only been able to find anything on how Victorians were obsessed with ancient Egypt, not how Egyptians acted/dressed during that time.

Egypt during the “Victorian Era”
So the Victorian Era was the early 1800s (1837) to early 1900s (1901). The indigenous Ancient Egyptians (Black Africans) were conquered and mostly driven out by the Asiatic (Arab) groups in the 7th Century AD. There were other evasions and racial mixing that still reflect the people of Egypt today (known as Kemet aka the “Black Land” back then) those groups being Libyans, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Turks, Arabs and West Europeans.

I don’t think a lot of people grasp the fact that the Ancient Egyptians were Blackdue to white supremacy yes perhaps from looking at modern day Egypt (plus Asiatic groups upon conquer were calling themselves the original Egyptians and creating art like them thus some of the ancient Egypt art depictions with predominately lighter skin) Plus just think of who gets to be seen as “All-American” but who are the original and indigenous “Americans” eh?

So if you could represent Black Ancient Egyptians in this story, that would be more than fabulous…but in general I suggest looking for sources on Egypt by Egyptians and watching out for whitewashed sources as they’re everywhere.
I have a tag on Ancient Egypt on my regular blog that might help too.

~Mod Colette

“1800’s Egypt” is going to yield better results than including the word “Victorian” in there. The reason you’re getting search results about Victorian British attitudes toward Egypt rather than 1800’s Egypt is that the term “Victorian” refers specifically to Queen Victoria, so it’s not necessarily appropriate for other countries even if they were under British rule (which I admit I have no idea if they were or not.)

~Mod Shira

At one point, I wanted to write a story about the same time period - this was like, back in middle school - and I got the same results when I added in Victorian. Keep in mind the issue of colonialism and how certain searches are more likely to bring up that narrative than others.

~Mod Kaye

#Ancient Egypt#Egypt#research#whitewashing#whitewashed history#representation#asks
https://archive.is/5nHil

or maybe people don't know the ancient egyptians were black because they left pictures of what they looked like ffs.

 

[Hummingbird]

Revisionism makes it into lower-level education too. It's definitely not just weirdo SJW stuff. Can't count the amount of times I've come across people that argue, sometimes with a disturbing amount of passion, that the American Civil War was fought because of anything other than slavery. "States rights" and economic concerns (usually about tariffs) is usually the biggest reason offered and almost always it's because it's what they learned in elementary/middle/high school as a result of Lost Causism making its way into the curriculum.

I've read plenty of articles on the right wing as trying to do their revisions such as...

• Thomas Jefferson being downplayed/replaced with John Calvin. Who they claim was a massive influence on the Founding Father's idea of a "Christian Nation."
• Glorifying Ronald Regan to the point that he single-handedly brought an end of Communism, saved the economy, etc. (In a way, he's like the far-right's waifu.)
• Playing down slavery and the problems with the Native Americans to keep kids from hating America.

 

[MarineTrainedTard]

Man it must be really hard to type "19th Century Egyptian" into google and then click "images".


Oh, wait, I just did it and it was really easy?

 

[Dalish]

There's more overlap between those two groups than you might expect, my friend.

i think i can explain parts of why.

the uwu-culture likes to take a lot of shit from black radicals uncritically. like... louis farrakhan (who also does historical revisionism-- the nation of islam is wildly hateful towards jews).

in the knee-jerk defense of black people or other minority groups, jews are the first people to get thrown under the bus for whatever reason. a lot of it has to do with the issue of education, or lack thereof, of jews from 79 CE until the holocaust. no one learns about the diaspora, the pogroms, the massacres and blood libel, the lynchings of jews, etc. as a result, because they don't have the information and jews aren't as ~oppressed~ as other minorities, antisemitism runs rampant.

(as an aside, i think some of the antisemitism also has to do with tumblr's stance on israel literally being nazis u guise, no matter how wrong and offensive that comparison is)

 

[sugoi-chan]

“1800’s Egypt” is going to yield better results than including the word “Victorian” in there. The reason you’re getting search results about Victorian British attitudes toward Egypt rather than 1800’s Egypt is that the term “Victorian” refers specifically to Queen Victoria, so it’s not necessarily appropriate for other countries even if they were under British rule (which I admit I have no idea if they were or not.)

This bit is really telling about the blog and how people like this seem to speak with historical authority. "Victorian" is not something limited to only Victoria herself, and the influence of Victorian "culture", without a doubt, going to resonate across all corners of the globe given the British Empire's reach and influence during the second half of the 19th century. Yet she reminds us that she's not an expert in the very next sentence by not admitting to not knowing a fact that ten seconds of Googling can answer. (Nominally Ottoman province for part of the Victorian period, British protectorate for another part of it.)

 

[Dudeofteenage]

That Egypt post, ironically, revels in yet another type of historical revisionism, albeit a rather soft and insidous one - that Ancient Egyptians are the "real" Egyptians, and that everything that's happened in Egypt since the end of the Kemetic religion is just irrelevant and boring.

The responder is really confused, because on the one hand they poo-poo the current inhabitants of Egypt as "Asiatic" people who "pretend to be the original Egyptians", but then they recommend that the writer look for depictions of Victorian Egypt by Egyptians... which is good advice (although it rather questions why the 'writingcolor' resource even exists), but haven't we just decided that contemporary Egyptians aren't really Egyptians and are lying about Egypt's past?

Like, maybe the ancient Egyptians were black, maybe they weren't, but it's totally irrelevant to a story set in the 19th century, because it's about the 19th century. It's like if the writer wanted to write about 19th century England and got a response all about Picts.

(And it's super ironic, because there were most definitely plenty of black people in 19th century Egypt).

 

[Jomadre]

Also, I admit my knowledge of African history is woefully lacking, but I do seem to recall reading a bit about a couple of great African Empires built and ruled by black cultures. Wasn't the Mali Empire kind of a big deal? If these tumblristas really cared about African history and educating people about it, there's loads of great ancient African societies they could be sperging about.

Believe it or not, Ethiopia (then called Axum) was for a brief period of time the richest, most powerful nation in the world. It's kind of interesting.

 

[Morbid Boredom]

That Egypt post, ironically, revels in yet another type of historical revisionism, albeit a rather soft and insidous one - that Ancient Egyptians are the "real" Egyptians, and that everything that's happened in Egypt since the end of the Kemetic religion is just irrelevant and boring.

Indeed. Check out Medieval Lives With Terry Jones (Yes, of Monty Python) he stated he wanted to do this series because he felt that historians were terribly dismissive of the people who lived between the Fall of Rome and the Renaissance.

Believe it or not, Ethiopia (then called Axum) was for a brief period of time the richest, most powerful nation in the world. It's kind of interesting.

The most amusing part of all of this is that your average white supremacist and SJW are in perfect agreement about people of color or whatever you call them... they imagine those people were sitting around waiting for Europeans to use and abuse them.

 

[Vitriol]

Man it must be really hard to type "19th Century Egyptian" into google and then click "images".


Oh, wait, I just did it and it was really easy?

and the best part is if you are really interested in victorian egypt you will sooner or later come across this series by Deutsch of egyptian guards in the 1890's. so no need for revisionism and white guilt:

this is what really annoys me about a lot of tumblr revisionism- its unnecessary lying, the africans don't need to have colonised the usa or india there are lots of interesting civilisations of their own, likewise the ancient egyptians don't need to have been black because plenty modern Egyptians are.

 

[sugoi-chan]

That Egypt post, ironically, revels in yet another type of historical revisionism, albeit a rather soft and insidous one - that Ancient Egyptians are the "real" Egyptians, and that everything that's happened in Egypt since the end of the Kemetic religion is just irrelevant and boring.

Someone on /r/badhistory had a really good term for this kind of thing, but I don't remember it. It basically came down to "denying people their agency in order to fit a point you're making". You see it a lot in inane comments like the Egypt one or in ones that usually oversimplify the Christianization of Scandinavia to make a point about "evil Christians stomping out the culture of true Vikings/Norse".

I love that sub. About the only thing I miss from Reddit.

 

[MarineTrainedTard]

Yeah, it's like saying "I want to write a story about an American serving under Admiral Perry in his 1852 trip to Japan" and ranting at length about the Algonquins and Iriquois getting fucked over by the British and French and 'It'd be great if you portrayed him as a Native American". Which, ultimately, has nothing to do with anything.

 

[Keerakh]

Im not sure if anyone mentioned this particular guy but there's a mathematician, I forget his name, who apparently developed an alternate chronology. According to him, Jesus (Assuming he was real) was crucified 1000 years ago. So basically, that history is really condensed. Apparently he has former Chess Grandmaster Garry Kasparov to believe him.

Another interesting group are Vedic Creationists. They believe humanity has been around LONGER than the established scientific timeframe, citing "Out of Place Artifacts" and many of the things that Ancient Alien believers would point to.

 

[Dudeofteenage]

Someone on /r/badhistory had a really good term for this kind of thing, but I don't remember it. It basically came down to "denying people their agency in order to fit a point you're making". You see it a lot in inane comments like the Egypt one or in ones that usually oversimplify the Christianization of Scandinavia to make a point about "evil Christians stomping out the culture of true Vikings/Norse".

I love that sub. About the only thing I miss from Reddit.

I had to stop visiting that sub because it was just sucking up too much of my time.

its unnecessary lying, the africans don't need to have colonised the usa or india there are lots of interesting civilisations of their own, likewise the ancient egyptians don't need to have been black because plenty modern Egyptians are.

It is ironically a recreation of the Victorian racist approach to Egypt, which was fascinated by pyramids and sphinxes but treated contemporary Egyptian culture as barbaric and worthless. The SJWs are essentially doing the same thing - they need to "claim" ancient Egypt as a black civilisation because nobody cares about modern Egypt, which is definitely home to millions of black people.

(Although for the record I think it's quite likely that ancient Egyptians would have looked 'black' to a modern eye. They certainly wouldn't have looked as 'white' as they are often depicted today. But I don't think it really tells us anything about ancient Egyptian society or culture, because they wouldn't have had any consciousness of themselves as 'black').

 

[Foltest]

Ahhh yes, Medievalpoc. As someone who is on his second year of history at the university, I feel dumber for reading that crap.It is so stupid. I remember also from earlier this year, when A man in black (An anti-GG) wanted Moors in Kingdom Come Deliverance (which I can't wait for) . The game is set in Bohemia. in the 15 century. Yeah...

 

[sugoi-chan]

Ahhh yes, Medievalpoc. As someone who is on his second year of history at the university, I feel dumber for reading that crap.It is so stupid. I remember also from earlier this year, when A man in black (An anti-GG) wanted Moors in Kingdom Come Deliverance (which I can't wait for) . The game is set in Bohemia. in the 15 century. Yeah...

Did Grand Galactic Jay take his geographic understanding of Bohemia's location from Shakespeare? (Though I do agree that it's probably a bit of a stretch to say that there were no blacks in Bohemia at all during the time period.)