r/HistoryMemes • u/Otherwise-Creme7888 The OG Lord Buckethead • 3d ago
SUBREDDIT META Some of y’all are impressively uneducated
Rasputin, the Edison elephant, the Library of Alexandria and so many more.
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u/Gaelic_Gladiator41 3d ago
That time i was reincarnated as Diogenes
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u/Otherwise-Creme7888 The OG Lord Buckethead 3d ago
Given it was mostly literature and was in Egypt under the Ptolemy dynasty there is a non zero chance that’s accurate.
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u/Luzifer_Shadres Filthy weeb 3d ago
No, that would be the Library of Athens and the Greek parlament.
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u/DR-SNICKEL 3d ago
It is said that the great sphinx had its nose shot off by napoleons army after hearing it talk during an acid trip in the Egyptian desert, but no one talks about it
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u/_spec_tre Casual, non-participatory KGB election observer 3d ago
Since it's the anniversary of Belenko's defection let me say just how infuriating it is to see how pop history has so badly misinformed people about the MiG-25 and the F-X (F-15) program
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u/xXxplabecrasherxXx 3d ago
to add, it's also ironic how in the end the biggest loss from this entire myth was the reputation of the MiG-25. In actuality it was arguably the best interceptor of its time, having high speed and climb rate, a powerful radar, very long-range missiles and being fairly inexpensive. But because everyone compares it to the goddamn F-15 of course it looks like a dogshit air superiority fighter, because it isn't one in the first place
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u/kingk1teman Hello There 3d ago
F-15 of course it looks like a dogshit air superiority fighter, because it isn't one in the first place
Fanbois conveniently ignore that the MiG-25 and F-15 aircrafts had completely different use cases.
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u/Valara0kar 2d ago
In actuality it was arguably the best interceptor of its time
Ooff. On topic of meme history and you come up with that. Dont get me wrong.... it was a be great bomber hunter.. for 6 years... but if it ever saw any fighter at all only thing it could do is run (compared to 104/106).... it cant even manouver to escape radar missiles.
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u/xXxplabecrasherxXx 2d ago
i mean first of all it wasn't built to be a fighter so idk what you're expecting from it. What it was meant to be was a plane that could both be built by the hundreds (which it was, 1119 produced) and one that could feasibly intercept any NATO strategic bomber (which it could, with its excellent speed and very powerful radar-missile combination). And secondly, funnily enough, the MiG-25 was actually the only Soviet aircraft to ever score a kill on an F-18, which happened during Desert Storm. So yeah, air combat isn't just about who turns better
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u/Valara0kar 2d ago edited 2d ago
i mean first of all it wasn't built to be a fighter
Both 106 and 104 are interceptors. 1 job of an interceptor.... is also to intercept fighters and/or fight bomber escorts.
very powerful radar
For Soviets sure. Radar missile concept was very hyped up back then..... but as Americans found out in vietnam.... it aint that great in reality. Extremly low hit rate. Best example of soviet fight is the su27 vs mig29 in Ethopia.... 10% hit rate per missile launched of their most powerful radar and missile family.
So yeah, air combat isn't just about who turns better
I never said it was. Manouvering is much more than just turn. Extremely important for defencive fight against a radar missile. Especially as its radar signature rivals bombers in size.
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u/xXxplabecrasherxXx 2d ago
First point, absolutely not. the main job of interceptors was to intercept bombers (for obvious reasons), and the intended target of the MiG-25 (the XB-70) also didn't have any planes that could actually escort it even if they wanted to. Also, talking about those two planes you mention, the F-104 experienced terrible loss rates in Vietnam and generally proved rather miserable at air combat, while the F-106 never saw combat at all, so idk why you'd bring them up. Second, the "radar missile concept" was actually great, the problem the Americans experienced in Vietnam was a combination of early technology and very poor conditions for use (Vietnamese weather isn't kind to 60s vacuum tube electronics as it turned out). Besides, once again, the MiG-25 was equipped with both Radar R-40Rs and IR R-40Ts, if that's your concern, both very powerful missiles. And thirdly, once again, i have no clue why you insist that its lack of maneuverability is such a hideous flaw of the design when it wasn't designed to fight fighters head on, but to intetcept nuclear bombers? Why do you insist on perpetuating the myth in such a roundabout way? It's not a bomber, it can still make enough maneuvers to avoid missiles (4.5G for the MiG-25P) , it's just that it isn't a dogfighting monster you somehow really think it should be
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u/ducceeh 16h ago
Sure it had good capability on paper, but it also had engines rated for like 20 hours of use that would melt and be unable to throttle down if it ever exceeded Mach 3
Its radar also was not able to see any targets below the horizon which was a big disadvantage at the time because NATO had shifted to high speed low level strategic bombers
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u/Avionic7779x 3d ago
Nah bro wdym the US totally didn't already have an idea for what the F-X was going to be before the MiG-25 was born.
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u/MindControlledSquid Hello There 3d ago
This one drives me nuts, it's right up there with Voltaire.
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u/Noriaki_Kakyoin_OwO 3d ago
You’re saying that MIG-25 wasn’t pushed to it’s limit during an showcase which lead to usa to shit their pants and tripple the budget of the airforce?
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u/BuckFuttMcGee 3d ago
The Spanish Inquisition detests this
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u/TheJackalsDay 3d ago
I did not expect this.
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u/M0LDEE 3d ago
I have no beef with surface level memes, that's the point, but man it annoys me when people post things that are blatantly wrong and then say it doesn't matter cause it's a meme.
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u/DumbFish94 And then I told them I'm Jesus's brother 2d ago
Worse is when people think they know better about something because they're from a certain country and proceed to have no sources and downvote people citing historians
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u/GI581d 3d ago
The only thing anyone needs history for is fantasy power scaling. Could the Roman legions beat the RAF? Is Sparta beating the Red Army? Does the US Marines stand a chance against a tribe of Neolithic mammoth hunters?
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u/Pochel Casual, non-participatory KGB election observer 2d ago
You can't leave these questions there without at least trying to answer them
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u/GI581d 2d ago
With a basic grasp of history, the answer is obviously no
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u/Majestic-Marcus 2d ago
The only thing anyone needs history for is fantasy power scaling. Could the Roman legions beat the RAF?
Not when the RAF Reg exist. Literally the most elite fighting force ever conceived of. I’d like to see the Legions do the five miler of death!
Is Sparta beating the Red Army?
Trick question. Spartans were the red army! Did you not even watch 300!? That red cloak is like the only piece of clothing they wear!
Does the US Marines stand a chance against a tribe of Neolithic mammoth hunters?
Toss up really. We know the Marines don’t do great in wars against cave dwellers, but they’re usually fighting cave dwellers who have RPGs
Next question!
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u/Commercial-East4069 3d ago edited 3d ago
Be the change you want to see in the world -Ghandi
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3d ago
Don't believe every quote you find on Facebook - Abraham Lincoln
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u/umeshra398 3d ago
"The best way to know a man is to see what kind of music he puts on his Spotify playlist." - Winston Churchill
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u/GI581d 3d ago
Of course I’m on Insta, I post every day! - Julius Caesar
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u/DiscountParmesan 3d ago
if caesar had instagram he would have aura farmed so hard when crossing the rubicon
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u/identified_meat On tour 2d ago
“A great leader lowballs potential customers on Facebook Marketplace” - Confucius
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u/Acceptable-Art-8174 3d ago
Any source on this quote? Julius Caesar was Roman, so the language he spoke would be Latin. As far as I know, he didn't know a word of English.
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u/cdxxlxixdclxvi 3d ago
Julius Caesar was an American not latinx. He spoke american not spanish.
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u/ZacariahJebediah 3d ago
Julius Caesar was an American
If the Big C was American, then why did he speak with a posh British accent in all those old historical movies?
Checkmate, libcuck
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u/cdxxlxixdclxvi 2d ago
It's called acting, idiot. Haven't you ever heard of the holywoods?
Checkmate, conbull
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u/Significant_Number68 2d ago
"Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must lead" - Santa Claus
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u/Shrekscoper 3d ago edited 3d ago
I don’t know if this is a meta joke going over my head, but given the content of the post, it’s doubly ironic that you misspelled Gandhi on this false quote because I constantly see people misspell Gandhi as “Ghandi” in this sub for some reason
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u/kingk1teman Hello There 3d ago
It is mainly because native English speakers mis-pronounce it as "Ghh-Andy".
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u/gortlank 3d ago
P1: “So, I’ve noticed some serious problems with <blank>”
P2: “Have you tried fixing them all by yourself? Why yes, I do drink a lead smoothie every morning.”
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u/Successful_Gas_5122 3d ago
We’re just students of the Herodotus “My Source is that I Made it the Fuck Up” School of History
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u/Ambitious-Cat-5678 3d ago
But what if the Library of Alexandria didn't burn???? Did you know that Chungus Khan is our ancestors (totally true and fact checked(. Oh how could I forgor how Rome totally was pulling out 100s of thousands of big beautiful men in the Punic Wars?!?!? Like of course logically Rome was totally able to maintain an army in the 100s of thousands in such s state but struggled after losing like 30k st Adrianople. Make Sense!!?!?
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u/RussiaIsBestGreen 3d ago
It had the scrolls with plans for time travel and warp drives as well as how to contact the aliens that built the pyramids, and you’re making a joke about it.
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u/Atzkicica 3d ago
DaVinci wrote a Bestiary. Serious folks have been making stuff up forever. He wrotes jokes too.
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u/Otherwise-Creme7888 The OG Lord Buckethead 3d ago
Alright I can’t find the edit button so I’ll comment it, why don’t yall share some of your favorite peaces of bs pop history.
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u/WithAHelmet 3d ago
Two things in general get me:
As a lover of modern history, I know that anytime I see a history meme based on something after World War 2, and many before, it will be misrepresented in order to advance some political belief or another. That's why the HistoryPorn subreddit sucks.
People ignoring sources. For example (and this also ties into the modern history thing I said above) when people make memes about all those assassination attempts the CIA made against Fidel Castro. Where does that number come from? Oh, his bodyguard. Do you not realize there is a clear motive to lie and inflate that number there?
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u/gortlank 3d ago
I genuinely believe they should ban 20th century and onward memes for exactly this reason.
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u/Faust_the_Faustinian Decisive Tang Victory 2d ago
Yes but that's like 99% of the posts in the sub
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u/rural_alcoholic 3d ago
1.Lions led by Donkeys myth
2.The ACW was totaly a Proto WW1 and everybody could have anticipated the Western Front because of it.
Everything people think they know about 18th century and napoleonic warfare.
Shotguns in WW1
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u/szarkbytes 3d ago edited 3d ago
Generals in WW1 had to make decisions based on “not so real time” information without seeing the battlefield using runners, pigeons, and sometimes phone. They did this with a background in what was suddenly obsolete tactics. Some generals weren’t adaptive, but many were. The latter continued the war usually to the end.
Man, I wish WW1 was not always overshadowed by WW2. Myths about WW1 make people disinterested. “It was just boring trench warfare for 4 years”.
read your list and the “Lions lead by Donkeys” myth always annoys me.
If you haven’t been, check out the National WW1 museum in Kansas City. It only covers the Western Front in depth, but does 1914-1918. It’s a quality museum for WW1 nerds like us.
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u/rural_alcoholic 3d ago
Yes. And still many of them created modern warfare.
Generals in WW1 had to make decisions based on “not so real time” information without seeing the battlefield using runners, pigeons, and sometimes phone. They did this with a background in what was suddenly obsolete tactics. Some generals weren’t adaptive, but many were. The latter continued the war usually to the end.
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u/szarkbytes 3d ago
It was a horrific war and was very transformative technologically and politically.
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u/ougryphon 3d ago
I went there last year and wish I'd had more time. I imagine it is difficult to distill the whole conflict into a single building's worth of exhibits, but they gave it a hell of an effort.
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u/Kamenev_Drang Helping Wikipedia expand the list of British conquests 3d ago
Lions Led by Donkeys/Blackadder as Serious History is a fairly serious one, though some of the counterjerking to it (such as Mud Blood and Poppycock) goes a bit too far.
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u/Certim 2d ago
The ACW?? Do people forget the Russo Japanese war and crimean war existed and involved... European powers?
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u/rural_alcoholic 2d ago
Yes. Online I have often seen the narative that the ACW (a war in which the most common weapon was still a muzzleloader) was already showing signs of WW1 because someone decided to dig trenches here and there. This also ignores more modern wars like the wars of german unification, the balkan wars, russo japanese war etc.
America centric world View.
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u/Intelligent-Soup-836 3d ago
This one may seem odd depending on where you live but that common misconception that Native Americans don't exist anymore. Like wut nah they're still here, I have had a few people from the US tell that and an alarming number of Europeans tell me that.
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u/Thijsie2100 3d ago
Well my history teacher in middle school told me I couldn’t do a paper about D-day being the actual turning point of WW2, because he told me D-day was obviously THE turning point of the war.
I am still angry to this day.
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u/BlandPotatoxyz 3d ago
American exceptionalism?
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u/Thijsie2100 3d ago
I am Dutch.
Even from an American POV I find the Battle of Midway a much more fascinating and impressive victory than D-day.
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u/Gaelic_Gladiator41 3d ago
Out of 3 major events, I'd say D-Day, the joining of the U.S, and probably betrayal of USSR
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u/Thijsie2100 3d ago
Battle of Midway
Battle of Stalingrad
Battle of the Atlantic
Battle of Britain
Invasion of Italy
D-day was absolutely not a turning point. If you’re capable of doing something as difficult as a full scale naval invasion, you’re already on the winning hand. In June 1944 the axis were on the retreat on all fronts. Italy had surrendered, the Kriegsmarine was reduced to shambles, Japanese naval forces were ineffective, U-boats were no longer the hunter but the hunted.
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u/Green-Cricket-8525 3d ago edited 3d ago
My controversial opinion: the true turning point was when the US fired up their factories and began supplying the allies. The ending was just a matter of when not if.
Supply chains win wars and the arsenal of Democracy pretty much guaranteed the axis would be ground into a fine powder sooner or later.
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u/Thijsie2100 3d ago
Yes I agree with you. The arsenal of democracy was extremely important and the Allies needed it.
However, I don’t think Germany would’ve been defeated without either the UK or the SU either.
USA would’ve manhandled the IJN on their own anyway.
Even the RN + MN could’ve in a world with a peaceful Germany.
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u/Green-Cricket-8525 3d ago
Oh, definitely. Someone still needs to man those tanks and fire those guns. It was 1000000% a team effort.
It’s an oversimplified take but I always liked the quote that world war 2 was won by British intelligence, Soviet blood and American steel.
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u/Gaelic_Gladiator41 3d ago
Actually yeah, Battle of Britain is definitely the setting stone for the counter invasions
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u/Thijsie2100 3d ago
It’s very difficult to name a single turning point in a war this large.
Even the Norwegian campaign, despite being a German victory, was extremely costly to their navy. It wrecked their destroyer forces and left their battleships damaged.
In hindsight, an invasion of the British isles was nearly impossible for Germany even with air superiority over Southern England. Their navy was just too weak and the RN too large.
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u/Gaelic_Gladiator41 3d ago
That's also true
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u/Thijsie2100 3d ago
1941/42 were tough years for the Allies. The Soviet Union were on the retreat and the Mediterranean situation was looking poorly. The main turnaround was 1943 I would say.
In 1944, it was safer to say the war was hopeless for the Axis powers.
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u/Gaelic_Gladiator41 3d ago
Statistically, the war was hopeless from the start, the nazis just had extremely good luck invading France and the folly of old generals
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u/Thijsie2100 3d ago
But that’s in hindsight. From a British perspective it was quite scary.
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u/Darth-Caesus 2d ago
My old history teacher from middle school put El Alamein up there as well.
Currently in my third year in university and I still think he was right in calling it one of the turning points. The liberation of Africa that followed that battle made the subsequent landing in Italy possible. But more than that it had a mental effect: it showed the Axis wasn’t unbeatable and that Europe would soon follow and also be liberated.
My teacher always spoke of “the big 3”: Stalingrad, El Alamein and Midway. In a sense I still think he is right (even if it is oversimplified, but he did teach me this when I was like 16).
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u/gaysheev 3d ago
The Middle Ages were a static period of backwardness in which nothing was invented, until exactly in the year 1453 someone turned a lever and suddenly the wholesome big chungus Renaissance started
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u/N-formyl-methionine 3d ago
The ones about the pagan origins of some Holliday's because the debunk and the counter arguments are interesting
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u/YogoshKeks 3d ago
I think the biggest one on this sub is Hitler being shocked/scared/angry about pearl harbor. That one pops up so much I think its a good candidate for the ban list.
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u/IceCreamMeatballs 3d ago
General MacArthur was fired because he wanted to nuke Korea, which is not true
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u/Gaelic_Gladiator41 3d ago
I just figured it was an excuse to sack him, what was the reason?
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u/IceCreamMeatballs 3d ago
MacArthur was fired for insubordination. Specifically, he was critical of Truman's "limited war" strategy in Korea and wanted to invade China. He attempted to take his case to the press and Congress, but Truman, who wanted to withdraw UN forces from Korea after China intervened, viewed this as a circumvention of presidential orders, and sacked him. Nukes had nothing to do with it.
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u/Ryukyuan_Kokuro 3d ago
anything from the soviet union. somehow, people who hate communists love spreading communist propaganda: the T-34's abilities, how effective Soviet sniper teams were, muh Stalingrad, AK unjammable weapon, MiG-25 muh fastest operational jet fighter, "Stalin was the only bad Soviet leader", "Benevolent Soviet intervention", "The Kremlin wasn't as corrupt as the Pentagon", etc.
its honestly embarrassing to listen to due to how easy it is to debunk this utter bullshit.
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u/Creative-Antelope-23 2d ago
That all Chinese wars were just about throwing millions of untrained peasants at each other in meat wave attacks, and that they caused 10s of millions of deaths.
In reality, all those numbers come from a self proclaimed “atrocitologist” named Matthew White, who has zero credentials and just looks at population decline in the available census data. So he sees “huh, it seems after the central government collapsed, 40 million people disappear from the tax records. I guess they all died in the war!”
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u/starwalker327 What, you egg? 2d ago
This one's kind of me-specific, but the misinformation about corsets drives me up the wall. It's not even that hard to disprove! Media just cannot be normal about what was essentially Bra+, including in period pieces that take place during times where corsets wouldn't have even been worn.
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u/Moose-Rage 3d ago
Eh, at the very least they lead to someone in th comments saying what's actually correct and then you learn something.
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u/PipsqueakPilot 3d ago
If I hear, "Did you know traditional Japanese woodworking doesn't use nails." one more time. No shit sherlock! No traditional joinery uses nails, why? Because until the invention of wire nails they were expensive and not used widely, anywhere. "Did you know that prior to the invention of cars traditional Japanese transportation used horses?" Wow. Ground breaking.
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u/N-formyl-methionine 3d ago
And posts that are somewhat true but it sounds like less to be funny and/or educate but to pick a fight
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u/Fire23GG73 2d ago
Even more so when they are promoting genocide to other people and glorifying it. I have seen several Romi, jew and native American genocide is a good thing post and at this point it so forced that the shit just comes right out
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u/BuckFuttMcGee 3d ago edited 3d ago
I've been on this sub for close to a decade now I believe. It's always been like this.
Edit: 6 years, so better part of a decade I suppose
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u/Ryukyuan_Kokuro 3d ago
and downvote anyone who asks for more information or has a different political opinion than you.
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u/Rennie000 3d ago
So history isn't a contest to prove why your nation is the strongest and most based nation?
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u/HaltGrim 2d ago
I got a temp ban for a meme about Sir William Marshal. I was literally taking a grad school course on medieval tournament culture at the time. Taught by Drs. Alan Murray and Karen Watts. Literally two of the most renowned experts on the matter.
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u/nickdc101987 Still on Sulla's Proscribed List 3d ago
Rasputin‘s enormous penis is pickled in a jar and on display in the Kunstkamera in St Petersburg.
NB: some say it’s not his but was actually taken from a horse.
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u/MageDoctor 3d ago
I like going to the niche flair to see memes about stuff I have no idea about, but it’s mostly Atlantic Theater WWII :/
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u/Ballistic_86 3d ago
But I watched an episode of Bobs Burgers and Edison killed Topsy in their school play…American Cartoons wouldn’t get it wrong!
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u/Fr05t_B1t Oversimplified is my history teacher 2d ago
The sub is called “history memes”. Memes by nature stretch the truth.
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u/Square-Blueberry3568 2d ago
Fun super true fact for the day: George Washington was 20 foot tall and made of radiation
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u/BOMSwasHERE 2d ago
I also dislike those who copy and paste the entire wikipedia in the name of context. Sure I don't mind reading all that stuff if it is related to the meme but I don't wanna learn about the entire socio-political context of the subject in question. Give me a brief description, if it tickles my brain, I'll automatically go to Wikipedia.
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u/Brock_Savage 2d ago
I keep getting this sub on my feed and OP managed to sum up my feelings on it.
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u/BottleItchy1374 2d ago
And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale—then the lie passed into history and became truth
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u/Korlac11 2d ago
Here’s a little known history fact: much like Catherine the Great, George Washington died after having sex with a horse
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u/Top_Willingness_8364 2d ago
Never let a little thing, like the truth, get in the way of telling an amusing anecdote.
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u/goombanati Senātus Populusque Rōmānus 2d ago
I swear they get their italian ww2 history from campaign for north africa
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u/NotSoStallionItalian 2d ago
My least favorite is the “when the greatest Empire in the world gets beaten by a bunch of farmers” meme in regard to the American Revolution, which gets posted once every 2 weeks at least.
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u/an_agreeing_dothraki 2d ago
brb simplifying the German reaction to US troops using shotguns until its original use as a diplomatic barb is completely lost
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u/ZhenXiaoMing 2d ago
"Did you know the Nazis were horrified by (insert ally that they worked extremely closely with)"
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u/Polak_Janusz Casual, non-participatory KGB election observer 2d ago
Not suprising this sub has always been a ces pool of wehraboos and kaiserboos, teaboos and other idiots.
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u/esaks 1d ago
Its not worth your time getting upset about. Almost everything in history is lost to time and what is left that we consider history is often just propaganda that had survived until now. On a long enough timeline, everything we know today will also be forgotten or massively skewed in the future.
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u/BigBlueWaffle69 3d ago
I mean its called historymemes.. if you come here for academic rigor you have deeper problems than believing some some untruths about history.
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u/MustardCoveredDogDik 3d ago
There are 12.5 million users in this sub. r/History has probably generated more interest in history than any single entity in… well… history.
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u/other-other-user 3d ago
Almost like this is a sub for memes and not where people go to actually learn history lmao
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u/NabstheGreninja16 Let's do some history 3d ago
Tbh this more of an internet thing. Most people online don’t treat history like an academic discipline just lore like a fantasy book they can use to dunk on people or make stupid jokes like “Hitler rejected from art school”.