As was foretold, we've added advertisements to the forums! If you have questions, or if you encounter any bugs, please visit this thread: https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/240191/forum-advertisement-faq-and-reports-thread/

The Even Cooler Stuff From [History] Thread

1457910100

Posts

  • Donovan PuppyfuckerDonovan Puppyfucker A dagger in the dark is worth a thousand swords in the morningRegistered User regular
    Krieghund wrote: »
    Fencingsax wrote: »
    Rhan9 wrote: »
    Top hats are serious business. I honestly wish they were still a thing, as they look dapper as hell.

    Who's stopping you?

    Edit: Let's do this.

    You say that, but just watch how quickly the currently fedora-clad manchild demographic adopts top hats if they get even a teensy bit popular.

    As a somewhat on-topic aside, that is essentially what happened to the fedora, itself.

    Fédora was an 1882 play starring Sarah Bernhardt as princess Fedora Romanov. Bernhardt was probably the most assertive female celebrity of her day, and as a result, the hat she wore in the play was soon adopted by the suffragettes and other women's rights groups. From there, it found its way into women's fashion in general. It wasn't until after WWII that manufacturers began pushing the hat as menswear, and its social acceptability for women began to decline.

    But what about the existence of the actual wide-brimmed fedora as worn by Indiana Jones, and the trilby that most neckbeards now call a fedora? Which headwear does that tale apply to?

    Jones wears something more akin to an Akubra.

    Akubra is a brand, not a style.

    http://www.akubra.com.au/

    Do you guys down under still wear hats like that? I think the only people that wear a hat like that is people in our western states that are trying to be cowboys still. But man, that store is great if I wanted to dress up like Indiana Jones for Halloween or something.

    People who work outside often wear hats like that. They DO have a variety of different styles... You'd look like a complete fucking idiot if you wore an American country singer style hat here though, because it wouldn't keep the sun off the sides of your face and by the end of the day you'd be so sunburned on your cheeks you wouldn't be able to open your mouth. Actual stockmen wear hats with a broad, stiffer (bound) brim like the Cattleman or the Tablelands.

  • KrieghundKrieghund Registered User regular
    Well, no. Most people would try for a Stetson, lol.

    http://www.stetson.com/hats/cowboy-hats

  • KanaKana Registered User regular
    As a quick break from the horribleness of mass civilian deaths, how about the horribleness of juicy 1920s racism?
    rhinelander-final.jpg

    In 1921 eighteen year old Leonard Kip Rhinelander, the heir to one of New York's wealthiest families, met Alice Jones, a light-skinned 22 year old. Alice worked as a domestic near Connecticut's Orchard School, an inpatient clinic where Leonard was being treated for a variety of socially embarrassing traits, including “stammering and extreme shyness”. Alice was the daughter of a white English immigrant mother and a taxi-driving West Indian father of mixed ancestry, while Leonard's father in contrast was, “a member of several historical societies, whose membership is confined to the descendents of those who settled America”. Although Leonard would later confess in court that his initial intention was to have sex with Alice without marriage, Alice and Leonard seem to have genuinely struck it off and visited each other regularly, including long stays together posing as a married couple at a New York hotel.

    Leonard's father soon found out about these secret get-aways – not surprisingly, as Leonard would use the family chauffeur to drive them to and from the hotels. A lawyer who worked for the Rhinelander family arrived at the hotel to remove Leonard, who was then sent off on chaperoned trips around the country, and eventually enrolled in an “open ranch” school in Arizona from 1922 until May 1924. Despite his family's attempts to distance the two, they continued a regular and often sexually explicit correspondence up until Leonard's return to New York at the age of 21. They immediately continued their romance, and on October 14th, 1924 were secretly married.

    Throughout this courtship, it's not clear what Leonard thought of Alice's racial background. He had already met her darker-skinned father, as well as Alice's African American brother-in-law, but nothing came of it until November when The Standard Star, a local newspaper, ran an article with the headline, “Rhinelanders' Son Marries the Daughter of a Colored Man”. The Jones' family was soon swarmed by reporters, and although Alice continued to insist to Leonard that she was white the Rhinelander family lawyers soon uncovered Alice's birth certificate, which identified her as “black.” Leonard returned to the Rhinelander family home, and only a week later filed – or more likely was forced to file by his father – a motion to annul their marriage, on the grounds of fraud.

    New York state, while having no official anti-miscegenation laws and only vague legal definitions of race, shared the strict social definitions of the rest of the country. As the Yale Law Review pointed out a year after the end of the case, the 19 American states without anti-miscegenation laws at the time all had black populations below 5%. Rather than necessarily being more racially tolerant, states without anti-miscegenation laws had simply not had it be an issue before. The rapid social changes of the Great Migration had essentially changed New York's racial makeup in ways that the law had not been prepared for.

    With no anti-miscegenation statute the marriage was not automatically void and instead it was up to the Rhinelander family lawyers to prove that Alice had committed fraud, defined as “active concealment of facts that touched a vital spot in the marriage relationship”. One's racial heritage was never questioned by the New York courts as being one such vital spot, meaning that legally, “knowledge of a spouse's race was considered to be as central to marriage as the ability to consummate it” (Onwuachi-Willig, 2396-2397).

    Although Alice initially publicly declared that she had always believed she was white her own lawyer soon abandoned the argument, viewing it as an impossible argument to win. Instead he argued that Lawrence had known all along that Alice was “secretly” black, and therefore that no fraud had occurred. Without any fraud Lawrence would have to resort to a divorce, which while it would still end the marriage would not de-legitimize it, and would allow Alice a right to alimony. Alice herself continued to protest her love for Lawrence, and declared to the press that Lawrence was only being forced into it because of his father.

    The trial began in 1925 with a jury of twelve men, all white and all married. Over the next two months the case was followed intently by both black and white New Yorkers. The trial was front-page news in the New York Times, which ran at least eighty-eight stories about the case between 1924 to 1925, and national and even international newspapers regularly followed the trial's events as well.

    The trial itself reveals the complex ways in which white society tried to prove that a light-skinned person was in fact obviously, indisputably, and entirely black. Ironically Alice's own defense lawyer argued that there was no way Lawrence wouldn't have known that Alice was black. Alice's complexion during the trial is not even mentioned as an indicator of her race, having a black ex-boyfriend and a negro brother-in-law is enough. Socially and legally Alice was either black or she was white, and since according to white social norms no white woman of any class level would willingly associate with black people, Alice must be black. In contrast Lawrence's lawyers argued that because Alice regularly functioned in white society and had white friends, she was therefore perpetrating a con on poor Lawrence. Paradoxically it was Alice's side that was arguing for an indisputable racial divide, while Lawrence's lawyers had to acknowledge at least the potential for confusion by a white person. As such it's maybe not surprising that the all-white jury eventually found in favor of Alice, deciding that no fraud had occurred and that the marriage was legitimate.

    I've seen two different theories of why the all-white jury decided in favor of a woman they agreed was black, both of which offer insight into the complex interplay between race, class, and gender in 1920's America. Angela Onwuachi-Willig argues that the white jury wished to punish Lawrence for “failing to meet expectations regarding his race, gender, and class identities”. Lawrence's eager pursuit of pre-marital sex, his embarrassing shyness, and his apparent lack of concern over the racial makeup of his wife's family were all signs that he deserved to be punished, in this case by forcing him to stay married to a black woman. During Lawrence's cross-examination Alice's lawyer even took the time to point out Lawrence's kindness towards a black housekeeper's 3 year old child as evidence of his inherent racial transgressiveness. Essentially, the jury decided that just as a woman could be defined as black by willingly keeping black company, Lawrence's marriage was not illegitimate because he himself was – if not black – at least not truly white. As a sign of the delegitimization of Lawrence, a year after his new bride had become the first “black” woman to appear in the New York Social Register, both Alice and Lawrence were removed from it.

    An alternate interpretation is offered by Bela Walker, who in an examination of 13 different race-based annulment cases from that era found that surprisingly most juries found in favor of the “colored” woman. Rather than being a sign of racial or gender equality however, Walker agues that white courts attempted whenever possible to not even acknowledge the possibility of inter-racial romance. In cases where racial identity was questioned, “courts guaranteed that anyone already functioning in white society was white. Acknowledging the potential fluidity of racial boundaries would attack the very foundation of American society”. The idea that a black woman could “pass” as white must never be acknowledged, and therefore the jury ruled in favor of Alice, because if she was able to able to make so many other white people believe she was white – not only her skin color but her behavior and culture - then she must be white.

    Following the annulment, the Rhinelander lawyers agreed to a divorce settlement, which would pay Alice an alimony in perpetuity. Lawrence himself was apparently disowned by his father, he moved out west and newspapers published rumors that he was now working as a logger. He eventually returned home to New York but died of pneumonia at the age of only 36.

    As part of her agreement with the Rhinelander family, Alice agreed to never publicly discuss the details of the case or her relationship with Lawrence, or to use the Rhinelander name, and lived quietly in New York until 1989, when she died of a stroke. She never remarried, and at her request was buried with a headstone bearing the name, “Alice J. Rhinelander.”

    For some additional reading:

    http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2014/06/07/319813854/when-one-of-new-yorks-glitterati-married-a-quadroon

    http://scholarship.law.berkeley.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1202&context=californialawreview

    http://via.library.depaul.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1202&context=law-review

    A trap is for fish: when you've got the fish, you can forget the trap. A snare is for rabbits: when you've got the rabbit, you can forget the snare. Words are for meaning: when you've got the meaning, you can forget the words.
  • DarkPrimusDarkPrimus Registered User regular
    I'm not sure I can process all the mental backflips and logical bow-ties in that case.

  • KrieghundKrieghund Registered User regular
    Just can't awesome that. Very instructive and interesting, but holy shit, depressing.

  • cckerberoscckerberos Registered User regular
    Kana wrote: »
    I've seen two different theories of why the all-white jury decided in favor of a woman they agreed was black, both of which offer insight into the complex interplay between race, class, and gender in 1920's America.

    Interesting post, thanks for that.

    I don't know that I can really accept either theory as presented, though. Or perhaps it would be better to say that I'm not sure that there's a need for a broad sociological explanation for the jury's verdict. At least as you've presented things, Leonard's case seems to have been extremely weak. So the verdict isn't inherently surprising, even given the racism in 1920's America. That reduces the theories' impact, IMHO. I mean, I can certainly believe that the jury was unsympathetic towards Leonard because he transgressed against white societal norms, but I would tend to consider that an exacerbating rather than central factor.

    If one were to emphasize non-evidential factors, however, I'd be curious as to the socioeconomic makeup of the jury and how that affected their view of the upper-class Leonard. I'm also curious as to how annulment cases of the era break down in general. I wouldn't be surprised if a general tendency for juries to find in favor of women had existed at the time, given the stigma placed on being a "ruined woman". Was the tendency for juries to find in favor of minority women that Walker mentions unusual or in line with overall trends?

    I'll admit I haven't looked at any of the links you posted, however, so it's possible that these points are already addressed there.

    cckerberos.png
  • Rhesus PositiveRhesus Positive GNU Terry Pratchett Registered User regular
    That_Guy wrote: »
    If one can manage to divorce the idea of nuclear power and nuclear weapons being one in the same, it would be obvious. From a safety standpoint alone nuclear power is better. Roughly 13,000 deaths per year can be attributed to fossil fuel power. It's hard to find reliable numbers, but even the worst estimates put the total number of deaths attributable to nuclear power under 300,000. It could be as little as a few hundred. Nuclear power is cheaper, cleaner, and less impactful on the land. Clearly fossil fuels are off the table. Large wind turbines can put out around 2.5mw under ideal conditions and can take up achre or 2 of land each. A single Russian BN-800 Reactor can pump out 880mw when running at full capacity. When it comes to efficiency, we are talking an entire order of magnitude. A fast neutron reactor like the BN-800 can recycle it's own fuel until there's almost no fissionable material fuel left. The mining of fissionable material is not much worse than coal mining. If done underground with modern containment and protection, it can be quite clean.

    Wind and solar is great, but they require far too much space and don't work all the time. Nuclear Fission is the only viable stopgap until the boys at Lockheed's Skunk Works finish their 100mw Fusion reactor.

    I'd like everybody to read a list of all the deaths attributed to Three Mile Island, so I pulled the names into a spoiler. Maybe this will demonstrate how the worst accident in U.S. commercial nuclear power plant history affected people.

    In addition, the cleanup cost $1billion - that's almost half of what the Deepwater Horizon spill cost the fishing industry alone!

    [Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
  • RMS OceanicRMS Oceanic Registered User regular
    But radiation is scary!

    That's what it comes down to, methinks. You can perceive the hazards of oil and fire and water, so you appreciate the danger. If you can perceive radioactivity unaided, it's usually too late.

  • Rhan9Rhan9 Registered User regular
    People have been, are, and will be forever shit at understanding risk, probabilities and actual consequences.

  • destroyah87destroyah87 They/Them Preferred: She/Her - Please UseRegistered User regular
    But radiation is scary!

    That's what it comes down to, methinks. You can perceive the hazards of oil and fire and water, so you appreciate the danger. If you can perceive radioactivity unaided, it's usually too late.

    Oh, and it gets even better. Stick a geiger counter into the steam plume or waste water outflow of a nuclear power plant and see what it reads.

    Then go do the same thing even near a coal power plant. Guess which one will have a higher output of radiation?
    Hint: It's not going to be the Nuclear Plant.

    Also, what's actually slightly scary to me is that every nuclear plant operating in the US is at least thirty-eight years old. (Built in 1977 or earlier.) Thankfully, there are finally some new plants and reactors under construction and some might already be in operation.

    steam_sig.png
  • KrieghundKrieghund Registered User regular
    Is Three Mile Island really the poster child for nuclear accidents? I would think Cheyrnoble or Fukashima would be more recent and relevant.

  • NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in Action North CarolinaRegistered User regular
    Yeah, but 3 Mile Island is 'Merrican!

    I'm not sure on other countries' stances on nuke power, but that's why 3MI gets hyped in the states.

    newSig.jpg
  • DevoutlyApatheticDevoutlyApathetic Registered User regular
    But radiation is scary!

    That's what it comes down to, methinks. You can perceive the hazards of oil and fire and water, so you appreciate the danger. If you can perceive radioactivity unaided, it's usually too late.

    I also don't think it helps things that the public got "educated" on Nuclear tech back in the 70's and that's about where the public knowledge stayed. Newer reactors are just so much better and safer it's ridiculous but because people still think they're built like Chernobyl and so are scared of them.

    Nod. Get treat. PSN: Quippish
  • Rhan9Rhan9 Registered User regular
    I'd replace all the coal plants and other such power generation systems with nuclear in a heartbeat. With thorium, if possible, due to the shorter storage requirements for the spent fuel.

    And renewable energy where possible, but otherwise nuclear all the way, at least until somebody cracks fusion on a scale that's actually useful for power generation.

  • EchoEcho ski-bap ba-dapModerator mod
    I also don't think it helps things that the public got "educated" on Nuclear tech back in the 70's and that's about where the public knowledge stayed. Newer reactors are just so much better and safer it's ridiculous but because people still think they're built like Chernobyl and so are scared of them.

    It should also be noted that Chernobyl was largely caused by human error and intentionally disengaging safeties.

  • destroyah87destroyah87 They/Them Preferred: She/Her - Please UseRegistered User regular
    edited March 2015
    Echo wrote: »
    I also don't think it helps things that the public got "educated" on Nuclear tech back in the 70's and that's about where the public knowledge stayed. Newer reactors are just so much better and safer it's ridiculous but because people still think they're built like Chernobyl and so are scared of them.

    It should also be noted that Chernobyl was largely caused by human error and intentionally disengaging safeties.

    The sequence of events at Chernobyl could be described in hindsight as a step-by-step checklist to cause a Chernobyl at Chernobyl given the reactor design at Chernobyl.

    Granted, it's not a very helpful or informative way of describing it.

    destroyah87 on
    steam_sig.png
  • zagdrobzagdrob Registered User regular
    Krieghund wrote: »
    Is Three Mile Island really the poster child for nuclear accidents? I would think Cheyrnoble or Fukashima would be more recent and relevant.

    The Three Mile Incident had the misfortune of happening less than two weeks after the release of the movie 'The China Syndrome'.

    Having a nuclear (near) disaster a few weeks after a major movie about a nuclear (near) disaster really imprinted that incident on the American collective consciousness.

    It was also the first major incident - something that tends to make it more notable (think Challenger disaster vs. Columbia disaster) and it happened in the US vs. 'over there'.

  • Knuckle DraggerKnuckle Dragger Explosive Ovine Disposal Registered User regular
    I've always thought the Yankees had something to do with it.

    -General George Pickett, when asked why the Confederacy lost at Gettysburg.

    Let not any one pacify his conscience by the delusion that he can do no harm if he takes no part, and forms no opinion.

    - John Stuart Mill
  • DisruptedCapitalistDisruptedCapitalist I swear! Registered User regular
    Sounds nice and all but what about the nuclear waste? As far as I know there still is no national place to store spent nuclear fuel and most plants are still storing their old fuel on-site. Despite promises to the public, there is still massive opposition to setting up facilities in people's "back yard".

    "Simple, real stupidity beats artificial intelligence every time." -Mustrum Ridcully in Terry Pratchett's Hogfather p. 142 (HarperPrism 1996)
  • Rhan9Rhan9 Registered User regular
    Sounds nice and all but what about the nuclear waste? As far as I know there still is no national place to store spent nuclear fuel and most plants are still storing their old fuel on-site. Despite promises to the public, there is still massive opposition to setting up facilities in people's "back yard".

    Newer reactors are more efficient, reducing the about of fuel required for a certain amount of energy produced. Nuclear doesn't produce huge amounts for storage anyway, and if a switch to thorium were made, the amount of time that it needs to be stored would be massively diminished, making storage easier, since you no longer need facilities to last for millennia.

    There'll be waste, but its storage problems are far less of an issue than the mass pollution from coal plants and the like.

  • That_GuyThat_Guy I don't wanna be that guy Registered User regular
    edited March 2015
    It's funny. The enviromental movement has done just as much damage as the industrial movement. It's just
    Rhan9 wrote: »
    Sounds nice and all but what about the nuclear waste? As far as I know there still is no national place to store spent nuclear fuel and most plants are still storing their old fuel on-site. Despite promises to the public, there is still massive opposition to setting up facilities in people's "back yard".

    Newer reactors are more efficient, reducing the about of fuel required for a certain amount of energy produced. Nuclear doesn't produce huge amounts for storage anyway, and if a switch to thorium were made, the amount of time that it needs to be stored would be massively diminished, making storage easier, since you no longer need facilities to last for millennia.

    There'll be waste, but its storage problems are far less of an issue than the mass pollution from coal plants and the like.

    To elaborate on this. A traditional thermal reactor may run out of usable fuel pretty fast. In a proper nuclear infrastructure, this is only the beginning. The waste that comes out of a 1st gen thermal reactor can be sent though a A fast neutron (breeder) reactor (a 20 year old design). That reactor can recycle it's own fuel until the only material that's left is fuel for a 3rd generation molten salt reactor. The waste that comes out of a 3rd Gen reactor is only radioactive on the order of decades and can be disposed of with medical waste.

    Storage has never been a problem. Nuclear power stations in the US sell their waste to countries that run fast neutron reactors (like France). France is a great example of a clean, effective nuclear power infrastructure. They get some 75% of their power from nuclear and have had few issues, none resulting in casualties.

    Edit: If you have ever lived down-wind from a coal plant, you would know just how nasty they can be. Coal is usually stored outside in giant heaps because silos are expensive. On a windy day, coal dust gets kicked up and will literally blanket miles of land. I was staying with a buddy who lived about a mile away from a coal plant a while back. One morning I go out to my car. It was almost like it had snowed the previous night. I must have been parked in just the right place because there was almost a half inch of dust on my car. It took me 20 minutes to hose it off. The grass looked like it had been though a fire.

    That_Guy on
  • Donovan PuppyfuckerDonovan Puppyfucker A dagger in the dark is worth a thousand swords in the morningRegistered User regular
    Sounds nice and all but what about the nuclear waste? As far as I know there still is no national place to store spent nuclear fuel and most plants are still storing their old fuel on-site. Despite promises to the public, there is still massive opposition to setting up facilities in people's "back yard".

    Thorium salts reactors use a new process that creates far less waste, and the waste they do create is both much less dangerous, and has a tiny half life (in comparison, it's still a couple of hundred years from memory)...

  • PhyphorPhyphor Building Planet Busters Tasting FruitRegistered User regular
    All power generation involves waste. Coal just stores it in the atmosphere

  • Gabriel_PittGabriel_Pitt (effective against Russian warships) Registered User regular
    Echo wrote: »
    I also don't think it helps things that the public got "educated" on Nuclear tech back in the 70's and that's about where the public knowledge stayed. Newer reactors are just so much better and safer it's ridiculous but because people still think they're built like Chernobyl and so are scared of them.

    It should also be noted that Chernobyl was largely caused by human error and intentionally disengaging safeties.

    The sequence of events at Chernobyl could be described in hindsight as a step-by-step checklist to cause a Chernobyl at Chernobyl given the reactor design at Chernobyl.

    Granted, it's not a very helpful or informative way of describing it.

    The only reason the Dai-Ichi accident happened, despite the plant operating something like 20 years passed it's intended shut down date, was that the emergency generators, and their backups, were located below sea level. It was pants on head stupidity of the operators, again, that caused the accident.

  • DisruptedCapitalistDisruptedCapitalist I swear! Registered User regular
    edited March 2015
    The US sells waste to other countries? Last I heard about plants in my area was that they were still storing their spent fuel on-site because of no other alternatives.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilgrim_Nuclear_Generating_Station
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vermont_Yankee_Nuclear_Power_Plant#Spent_fuel

    Obviously, these plants are over forty years old, so that's part of the problem. Are other, more modern plants selling the waste?

    DisruptedCapitalist on
    "Simple, real stupidity beats artificial intelligence every time." -Mustrum Ridcully in Terry Pratchett's Hogfather p. 142 (HarperPrism 1996)
  • That_GuyThat_Guy I don't wanna be that guy Registered User regular
    I got a lot of my information from Pandora's Promise, a pro-nuclear documentary. It gave me the impression that the US was selling it's waste to be cycled though newer reactors. Maybe it's just other countries.

  • EchoEcho ski-bap ba-dapModerator mod
    The Soviet authorities didn't admit anything going on at Chernobyl until the fallout cloud reached Sweden and our nuclear plants went "wait, that's not us..."

  • ElvenshaeElvenshae Registered User regular
    Echo wrote: »
    The Soviet authorities didn't admit anything going on at Chernobyl until the fallout cloud reached Sweden and our nuclear plants went "wait, that's not us..."

    I can't imagine how unbelievably tense those days were, while trying to figure out WTF was going on.

  • Knuckle DraggerKnuckle Dragger Explosive Ovine Disposal Registered User regular
    In the wake of WWII, the Soviet Union tried to reinforce its control over cultural influence with a widespread ban on various types of music. This did not just include Western jazz or rock, but any music that had not been approved by state censors, including a great deal of traditional and folk music. The result of this policy was, of course, a thriving black market in bootleg records. Now, vinyl records were expensive and hard to come by for the average proletariat, which meant that in order to meet the demand within budget, these records were printed on plastic or other suitable materials...

    1LcxOMz.jpg

    It turns out one of the most common materials that could take a groove was the x-ray sheet. These sheets were obtained in one way or another from hospitals, cut into circles and given a spindle hole with a lit cigarette. They could then be grooved with a modified phonograph, creating a low-quality record that would probably wear out quickly, but only cost a couple roubles. Until the advent of magnetic tapes in the '60s, this "bone music" was one of the only ways for the average Soviet citizen to listen to non-Soviet music.

    Let not any one pacify his conscience by the delusion that he can do no harm if he takes no part, and forms no opinion.

    - John Stuart Mill
  • Crimson KingCrimson King Registered User regular
    brb writing a bestselling murder mystery called Bone Music set in 1950s odessa

    it's about a conflicted NKVD agent investigating the mysterious disappearance of a jazz smuggler. the only evidence he has to go on is a duke ellington b-side featuring an x-ray of the smuggler's visibly decapitated head

    i might also try to work in those jewish nazi sympathisers somehow

  • Rhesus PositiveRhesus Positive GNU Terry Pratchett Registered User regular
    I bet those records would sell like hot cakes amongst the metal fanbase

    [Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
  • Kipling217Kipling217 Registered User regular
    Echo wrote: »
    The Soviet authorities didn't admit anything going on at Chernobyl until the fallout cloud reached Sweden and our nuclear plants went "wait, that's not us..."

    That must have been a pants wetting moment for the safety engineers at the plants. Imagine just doing you job and having all the contamination alarms howl at you. "Oh shit we have major leak and we don't know what is causing it!"

    The sky was full of stars, every star an exploding ship. One of ours.
  • KanaKana Registered User regular
    .
    cckerberos wrote: »
    Kana wrote: »
    I've seen two different theories of why the all-white jury decided in favor of a woman they agreed was black, both of which offer insight into the complex interplay between race, class, and gender in 1920's America.

    Interesting post, thanks for that.

    I don't know that I can really accept either theory as presented, though. Or perhaps it would be better to say that I'm not sure that there's a need for a broad sociological explanation for the jury's verdict. At least as you've presented things, Leonard's case seems to have been extremely weak. So the verdict isn't inherently surprising, even given the racism in 1920's America. That reduces the theories' impact, IMHO. I mean, I can certainly believe that the jury was unsympathetic towards Leonard because he transgressed against white societal norms, but I would tend to consider that an exacerbating rather than central factor.

    If one were to emphasize non-evidential factors, however, I'd be curious as to the socioeconomic makeup of the jury and how that affected their view of the upper-class Leonard. I'm also curious as to how annulment cases of the era break down in general. I wouldn't be surprised if a general tendency for juries to find in favor of women had existed at the time, given the stigma placed on being a "ruined woman". Was the tendency for juries to find in favor of minority women that Walker mentions unusual or in line with overall trends?

    I'll admit I haven't looked at any of the links you posted, however, so it's possible that these points are already addressed there.

    Some of those points you mention are brought up in the links, especially looking at the larger trend of when juries tended to allow annulments and divorces and when they didn't. Speaking more specifically, it's an interesting trial in how directly lawyers were making these racial arguments. That Laurence was racially transgressive wasn't just implied through winks and nudges, it was an explicit argument by the lawyers, they had witnesses to testify that Lawrence had been nice to black people. And that's the side that won, so it's not as if either side won through some sort of long-standing legal precedent.

    But I think it's pretty hard to overstate just how pervasive racism was in the 1920s American judicial system. If black women were only being treated in line with how women in general were being treated, that then in and of itself is worthy of note.

    A trap is for fish: when you've got the fish, you can forget the trap. A snare is for rabbits: when you've got the rabbit, you can forget the snare. Words are for meaning: when you've got the meaning, you can forget the words.
  • KanaKana Registered User regular
    Another interesting bit from 10 Years in Japan, Ambassador Grew's account of his decade in Japan before WW2. Considering the popular understanding at the time of Japan as a great yellow peril, monolithic and unknowably oriental, I'm constantly impressed by his grasp on the subtleties of what was really going on.
    Tokyo, August 13, 1932
    Strictly Confidential

    Dear Mr. [Secretary of state Stimson], - The outburst in Japan against your speech before the Council on Foreign Relations savors distinctly of a tempest in a teapot if not of a guilty conscience on the part of the Japanese, for we now understand that the speech was merely an academic discussion of a hypothetical case, while the Japanese took it as a specific charge of guilt. Unfortunately I was unable to take any steps to mitigate the effect here, because neither the text of the speech nor a resume of its substance and intentions has reached me, and by the time the text arrives from Shanghai the incident will presumably be closed. However that may be, the Foreign Office has used the speech deliberately to pour fuel on the temporarily quiescent flames of public animosity against the United States. I say deliberately, because the violent Japanese press reaction was based not on the press dispatches from the United States but on the Foreign Office's inflammatory interpretation of Japanese Ambassador Debuchi's cabled account, and this interpretation was given to the Japanese press a day before it was released to the foreign correspondents.

    This situation reminds me strongly of the efforts of the German Government, by calumniating foreign nations, to build up a public war psychology in 1914, the effort being repeated whenever some new venture, such as the indiscriminate submarine warfare, was about to be launched. Here in Japan the deliberate building up of public animosity against foreign nations in general and the United States in particular has doubtless a similar purpose - to strengthen the hand of the military in its Manchurian venture in the face of foreign, and especially American, opposition.

    I believe that on the part of the Japanese it is a sign of weakness, not of strength. The internal economic and financial situation in Japan is serious and may become desperate. The plight of the farmers is very bad, many industries are at low ebb, unemployment is steadily increasing. The yen is falling and prices have not yet risen proportionately. Money cannot be obtained from abroad. I was recently told, although I cannot vouch for the reliability of the information, that the Government had tried without success to obtain loans from England, France, and Holland in turn. It will become increasingly difficult to obtain domestic loans. This situation is not critical, but it may become so when the ability of the National Bank of Japan to absorb domestic bonds comes to an end.

    Meanwhile millions of yen are being squandered to support the Manchurian venture, of which the eventual economic advantage is highly problematical, and when the full purport of these expenses becomes known to the people, in their own serious deprivation, there is no telling what effect it will create. I believe that a steadily increasing anxiety exists among the Government and the thinking men of the country outside of the hotheaded military clique which refuses to face these facts. It seems primarily this military element - vocalized by such men as Shiratori - who believe that the best way to obscure these facts is to work the public into a patriotic and nationalistic fervor by representing foreign nations, particularly the United States, as trying to thward Japan's efforts for alleged self-preservation.

    Such a national temper is always dangerous. The German military machine, supported by a carefully nurtured public war psychology, took the bit in its teeth and overrode all restraining influences in 1914. The Japanese military machine is not dissimilar. It has been built for war, feels prepared for war, and would welcome war. It has never yet been beaten and possesses unlimited self-confidence. I am not an alarmist but I believe that we should have our eyes open to all possible future contingencies. The facts of history would render it criminal to close them.
    Respectfully yours,

    A trap is for fish: when you've got the fish, you can forget the trap. A snare is for rabbits: when you've got the rabbit, you can forget the snare. Words are for meaning: when you've got the meaning, you can forget the words.
  • MayabirdMayabird Pecking at the keyboardRegistered User regular
    Dr. Leila Denmark passed away in 2012 at the age of 114 years, 60 days.

    slideshow_1002339716_LEGEND2_544298.jpg

    Unlike most other supercentenarians, who seemed to have reached their extreme long lives through process of not actually doing much living with their time, Dr. Denmark was a prominent figure during her life. For starters, it may surprise you to learn that it was not common at all for a woman born in 1898 to become a doctor. She was already a pioneer in her youth, being the only female from her graduating class at the Medical College of Georgia (and only the third to that point, period), which she then followed up by being one of the developers of the original whooping cough vaccine. Dr. Denmark became a pediatrician afterward (the first female pediatrician in the state of Georgia), practicing for the next 73 years. By the end, she was seeing the great-grandchildren of some of her original patients. When she retired, at age 103, she was the oldest practicing physician in the U.S., and she would have continued but her eyesight was starting to fail. She still enjoyed another 11 years of retirement, dispensing medical advice over the phone during much of it.

    She is #97 on the list of oldest verified people in history.

  • PhyphorPhyphor Building Planet Busters Tasting FruitRegistered User regular
    Pfft, I grew up with an average 132 in snowfall

  • KanaKana Registered User regular
    I'm still trying to finish Grew's book before I finish any more WW2 posts. I've usually assumed (not unjustifiably) a pretty big share of orientalism in a lot of America's foreign policy, but even though Grew still has a bit of that he's just too thoroughly a diplomat to let mere racism explain the world for him.

    In this diary entry Japan has withdrawn from the League of Nations following the league's condemnation of Japan's invasion of Manchuria and subsequent creation and recognition of their puppet state of Manchukuo. Grew meanwhile has observed the military completely solidify their hold on the Japanese government, with all moderates sidelined and in fear of their lives.
    [...] [T]he more one mulls over the whole problem, the more one is inclined to question whether the peace machinery which the world has been trying so earnestly and painstakingly to erect these last fourteen years is basically sound, or rather whether it is basically practical.
    To let one's imagination rove a bit - compare the Manchurian situation in 1931 with the Cuban situation in 1898. If the latter crisis had developed subsequent to the conclusion of the Kellogg Pact, and if the Maine had been blown up in Havana Harbour, resulting in a war psychology sweeping over our country like a forest fire and the words "Remember the Maine" on the lips of every man, woman, and child in the land, could our Government ever have prevented hostilities with Spain? McKinley wanted to avoid war in 1898 but couldn't. Even if the Kellogg Pact had existed at that date, might we also not have occupied Cuba without declaring war, on the grounds of self-defense, forced by public opinion to do so? The public guesses but does not know to-day who blew up the Maine. The public guesses but does not know to-day who engineered the incidents which led to the Japanese attack of September 18, 1931.
    [...]
    My point is not to excuse Japan but to question whether the peace machinery is sufficient to deter any country, even our own, from hostilities if the urge is sufficiently strong. Could the Kellogg Pact, for instance, conceivably have prevented the South African War? ____ of the British Embassy, tells me that his father was literally stoned in his own village for advocating peace at that time. The Jameson Raid was quite as outrageous a procedure as the Japanese action of September 18, 1931, and the British themselves would have condemned if it it hadn't been for the Kaiser's telegram to Kruger. That telegram, trivial incident as it was, furnished the match that set the war fever ablaze.
    [...]
    Then if moral ostracism is ineffective, or likely to be ineffective, what more can we do? How can we implement the Kellogg Pact? Certainly not by force of arms, which would be contrary to the very principle for which the Kellogg Pact stands. The great war to end wars has signally failed in that particular purpose. If other world wars are the only method of protecting our peace structure, then we had better abandon that structure here and now, because civilization itself will be in jeopardy. Severance of diplomatic relations would be futile unless followed by other steps. Arms embargoes are generally ineffective in practice. In the present case they would simply aid the aggressor. There remains an economic and financial boycott. Probably futile in practice. In the present case, an economic boycott would simply cause Japan to occupy those parts of China whence needed supplies could be obtained, with the resultant risk of a general world conflagration. Financially Japan cannot even now obtain a loan abroad; she has tried and failed, but she still carries on.
    Clearly, then, our peace machinery while magnificent in theory is ineffective in practice.

    It's kind of touching to see a dude who's already presciently predicting a world war vainly trying to figure out how to get everyone to just sit down and realize how stupid war is.

    A trap is for fish: when you've got the fish, you can forget the trap. A snare is for rabbits: when you've got the rabbit, you can forget the snare. Words are for meaning: when you've got the meaning, you can forget the words.
  • AngelHedgieAngelHedgie Registered User regular
    edited March 2015
    AngelHedgie on
    XBL: Nox Aeternum / PSN: NoxAeternum / NN:NoxAeternum / Steam: noxaeternum
  • AngelHedgieAngelHedgie Registered User regular
    XBL: Nox Aeternum / PSN: NoxAeternum / NN:NoxAeternum / Steam: noxaeternum
This discussion has been closed.