Let's educate people on historical misconceptions. Explain one popular case of history that is incorrect.
When Karl Marx writes that "Religion is the opium of the masses", he does not merely bully the religious. Opium here refers not to the popular 19th century image of London opium dens where the privileged go to entertain themselves. Nay, Marx is speaking of sedation as a suppressant of pain. Marx considered religion to be a human invention created to heal the wound created by the alienating world. Most of his philosophical influences at the time, while being phenomenal and intelligent men, were in Marx's opinion hiding behind the guise of religion and abstract philosophy in order to avoid having to condemn the state and society that produced the wound. In their weakness, all of them aside from Feuerbach would fall back to Christian obscurantism, rather than social critique. their fear of tearing the veil protecting the Prussian society being so strong. All this is apparent from the quote in context.
"Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.
The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo."
Unlike your average documentary or history teacher tells you, the medieval economic system was a very efficient apparatus given all of its limitations and issues. Also, serfs were not slaves and they couldn't be somehow freely be executed by noblemen. In fact, all the nonsense Game of Thrones et al presents about direct hierarchy and all that did not exist. Landlords were in practise neutered mafia bosses, who didn't govern the villages but collected the reaps. The most they usually did was sometimes bullying the farmers and create insecurity with land grants. But that's about it.
Despite the claim that 6 million Jews died in the holocaust there is no evidence for it. Anti-Semitic historians have attempted to keep the number low in order to trivialize Jewish suffering. The actual number is closer to 20 million
>>551581
why u gotta be like that man
>>551521
Medieval battles were rarely as bloody as we like to think. Most medieval "battles" were short engagements, where the goal was not to kill your ennemy, but capture him to ransom it. Most engagements were short skirmishes or lengthy sieges, and only the lowly infantrymen, carrying nothing but lances and wearing rags would really die.
The exceptions were the crusades, and then the "international" conflicts. At Bouvines, in 1204, the french sergeants (Non-knighted horsemen) would charge the flemish knights, who would not even more a muscle, because for them, it was impossible to fanthom that lowly commoner scrubs could attack them, the nobles.
>>551596
>Most medieval "battles" were short engagements, where the goal was not to kill your ennemy, but capture him to ransom it
That is also a misconception. The reality is somewhere in between the two.
>>551581
Well this thread got 2 replies before going to shit
>>551571
>all the nonsense Game of Thrones et al presents about direct hierarchy and all that did not exist
Well, Game of Thrones is a fantasy adventure with dragons and zombies, not a historical documentary
>>551609
Yea but people incorporate it into their perceptions of reality
>>551521
He never wrote that though. This is what pisses me off. People never do any research. You act like an expert yet you did not take the thirty seconds to google this quote.
People misquote him all the time. What Marx said was:
"Religion ist Opium für das Volk"
Which translates to: "Religion is opium for the masses"
What you're attributing to him is the following: "Religion ist Opium für das Volk", which in turn translates to: "Religion is the opium of the masses".
Obviously there is a huge difference in significance between the two.
Your explanation I have absolutely no problem with. It is spot on.
>>551596
>only the lowly infantrymen, carrying nothing but lances and wearing rags would really die.
Well that's basically every form of warfare.
>>551631
I'm retarded. What Marx said was "Religion ist das Opium des Volkes". (opium of the masses, not for the masses).
Wrote the same damn thing twice.
>>551631
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1843/critique-hpr/intro.htm ?
You're attacking the translation?
>>551609
I have read hundreds of aspies think that it's a "deconstruction" and it's more realistic than other series based on the Middle Ages.
Here's a classic:
>if a peasant was to talk to a princess he would get his tongue cut off
I have never found anything like this to confirm this bullshit.
>>551631
>>551643
Adding to this:
»Die Religion ist der Seufzer der bedrängten Kreatur, das Gemüt einer herzlosen Welt, wie sie der Geist geistloser Zustände ist. Sie ist das Opium des Volkes.«
The main difference is that in one case the masses are being drugged by religion, while in the other the masses are using religion like a crutch, like a drug. So in the first version people are not seen as free agents while in the second they are.
Interestingly, the second, misatributed quote is far more prevalent in leninist works.
Marx more or less stole the quote from Heinrich Heine, though. They were good friends. Heine original:
»Heil einer Religion, die dem leidenden Menschengeschlecht in den bittern Kelch einige süße, einschläfernde Tropfen goss, geistiges Opium, einige Tropfen Liebe, Hoffnung und Glauben!«
My translation: "Hail to a religion, which pours a sweet, slumbrous drop into the bitter chalice, spiritual opium, a few drops of love for the suffering mankind. Hope and faith!"
>>551658
Everyone would run to met a member of the royal family to get privileges from them and to present their complaints about anything.
>>551609
Also I would say it doesn't really seem like what he describes. I mean, the nobles have people who fight for them, but ahead of that most of what they do is collect taxes. We almost never see the peasants in that show at all.
>>551682
True dat. Royalty loved it too, PR was a great way to centralize your kingdom.
But meme historians gotta meme.
The French Revolution of 1789 was not about overthrowing the monarchy. It was about the Third Estate (or former Third Estate) demanding a place in the government which turned into a demand for a constitutional monarchy.
The Mongol world conquest/everything under the blue sky religious thing came after they conquered the Khwarazmian Empire.
Genghis would have preferred to focus on conquering China which was much wealthier and only partly conquered. He even sent messages to the Shah saying as much after his initial conquest (Ill be king of the rising sun, you be king of the setting sun). Yes the merchants were probably spies but thats how every leader got their information. The Shah was a paranoid dick and forced Genghis' hand. After that he needed a reason to support his continuing conquests of neighbouring groups and came up with the religious reasons for doing so.
>>551521
On the same note, "God is dead" means "You poked around with theology so much, people are gonna realise it's a nihilistic world without God, so we have to remake our entire moral framework as a response. Good job, you idiots"
>>551521
There's this popular image of the Sherman tank being a rickety piece of garbage, blown up by the thousands by anything which so much as looked at it harshly, leading the Americans to victory only because of sheer numbers, a "zerg rush" on the Western Front.
Some people, either a bit more educated or more charitable, will say that it was a very reliable tank, a very easy to maneuver tank, but it still came up short in combat when it had to face up against the Germans.
Both views are wrong. Far more often than not, Shermans kicked the crap out of German tanks when they encountered them. People tend to look at casualty figures for a large campaign, note that there were significantly more Sherman losses than German tank losses, and conclude that the German tanks were better.
They're forgetting that the #1 killer of American tanks were mines. #2 were fixed anti-tank guns, and German tanks themselves come in a rough 3 way tie with SPGs and handheld anti-tank weapons, like Panzerfausts. Meanwhile, being on offense, the majority of German armor losses inflicted by the allies were done by their tanks, not by ambush units.
The Sherman was much deadlier than a lot of people give it credit for.
>>551596
>and only the lowly infantrymen, carrying nothing but lances and wearing rags would really die.
Except they weren't on the battlefield
There were black pharaohs in Egypt, but for a comparatively limited amount of time; they were Medjay/Nubian conquerors, not native Egyptians. For most of dynastic Egypt's history, the Medjay were either a hostile foreign power or used as mercenaries.
>>555293
You can explain this a million times like you have and morons and wehraboos will still try to play the Sherman/T-34 = shit game. Its hopeless to think you can counter the stupid.
>>554262
How did it go from that reasonable demand to full muh fraternatie?
>>555424
The whole Revolution began with a noble insurrection.
Then the members of the States joined in a the famous "ball playground" declared themselves a National Asambly and later Constitution maker.
They imposed a Constitutional Monarchy, but the king was caught when trying to flee, he was accused of jhaving sided with the foreign powers to revert the reforms and was finally sentenced to death.
>>555424
The French revolution is what happens when you put 9/11 truthers in charge of a previously corrupt and broken government where no one wants to give up their old "rights", no matter how broken.
Ever reasonable proposed compromise was actually the work of "foreign powers", "hidden agendas", "a path to a coup " or "a hidden restoration of the monarchy", and the only solution was to kill a bunch of people and then come up with a even more crazy solution.
>>555642
>implying 9/11 skeptics are wrong
>implying there wasn't an active agenda by foreign monarchies to restore the French monarchy
>>554262
>It wasn't about getting rid of the monarchy, it was about removing the monarchy from power
C'mon son.
>>555338
Or my favourite, 'it's not a tiger therefore =shit'.
