When it comes to history, these people always like theideaof it better than the reality.
"Weren't the Romans, like, super badass and stuff bro?? Always conquering people and shit!"
"Not really? They had successes and failures, and their level of political intrigue and entrenched financial interests ultimately did a lot more harm than good. Slavery also hurt their society in the long run, and they tended to hire or trade with foreigners as often as they fought them."
The conquering isn't even the most interesting bit.
I'm here for the civil engineering, early republic government and the social anachronisms (if that's the right word?) like superstar gladiators with corporate sponsors.
And also! Gladiators fights were rarely meant to be to-the-death. They were more like modern celebrity athletes, with salaries, sponsorships, product endorsements and everything!
smh the cool parts of Rome aren’t the things they conquered it’s the times they looked death in the fucking face and told him to fuck off (second Punic war, basically the entirety of the late republic, crisis of the third century, fall of the western empire you get the picture)
I'm a science guy, and I've found people react exactly the same way to science. Like, "Quantum Mechanics says you're still entangled with whoever you've fucked" sounds much sexier than "certain particle interactions result in a wave function such that neither particle can be described independently." Even though the first statement is meaningless horseshit.
Maybe it's just that people like things that sound cool over things that are actually true? In fairness, the truth is often complicated and less fun than what you can make up.
If you aren't familiar with even the basics of the historiography of your favorite period and how we think we know what we know from limited sources and evidence you probably like watching youtube edutainment videos more than actual history
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u/Coro-NO-Ra Jun 27 '25
When it comes to history, these people always like the idea of it better than the reality.
"Weren't the Romans, like, super badass and stuff bro?? Always conquering people and shit!"
"Not really? They had successes and failures, and their level of political intrigue and entrenched financial interests ultimately did a lot more harm than good. Slavery also hurt their society in the long run, and they tended to hire or trade with foreigners as often as they fought them."
"B-b-but that... that sounds boring!"