The Historical Nonfiction Thread

[Kaveh]

Some things you guys should read since you no longer believe in your civilization:

Donald Kagan’s The Peloponnesian War. This guy is the principal scholar of this period in Greek history, and Thucydides’ account of that war, where democracy and oligarchy came into conflict, characterized James Madison’s belief that factionalism could fragment the nascent United States.

It’s a good book in its own right and covers a fascinating period that, shockingly, you guys aren’t really educated about in school anymore, and 400 of the 500 pages are very entertaining. It somewhat drags at the end, but it’s very important. Honestly, so is Thucydides’ eyewitness account, but I don’t think any of you would get through that

Adrian Goldworthy’s Philip and Alexander. All of you know Alexander, but most of you aren’t familiar with the genius of Philip. This chronicle will take you through some of the most important moments in the “Great man of history theory,” but you might find that Philip was the truly innovative and important person in creating the Hellenistic world

I’m gonna go with another Adrian Goldworthy title. The Fall of Carthage addresses all three Punic wars, to the minutiae. A+

As an aside, all of you should teach your children Latin, piano, and chess. Thanks and God bless

[Mblake81]

^

Could be worthwhile ideas if you plan on having children.

If not, yolo motherfuckers

[magnetaress]

Cool sounding books.

[Gwaihir]

Are you aware that, while the large majority of westerners idolize Plato as being an agnostic philosopher this couldn't be further from the truth. In fact, The Republic provided the basis for modern fascist and socialist projects, including the elimination of marriage and the family, compulsory education, the use of eugenics by the state, and the employment of deceptive propaganda methods.

According to Plato, "all these women shall be wives in common to all the men, and not one of them shall live privately with any man; the children too should be held in common so that no parents shall know which is his own offspring, and no child shall know his parent"

also
"the best men must cohabit with the best women in as many cases as possible and the worst with the worst in the fewest, and that the offspring of the one must be reared and that of the other not, if the flock is to be as perfect as possible"
"the offspring of the inferior, and any of those of the other sort who are born defective, they will properly dispose of in secret, so that no one will know what has become of them. that is, the condition of preserving the purity of the guardians' breed."



The Republicpg 423e-424a


Totally worth idolizing over Jesus. *eyeroll*14076

[Kaveh]

^

Could be worthwhile ideas if you plan on having children.

If not, yolo motherfuckers

All of those books are still worth reading. And you should have kids, you gonna let the foreigners like me win? Unamerican buddy

[strongNpretty]

Man my family had no interest in teaching me an instrument... And chess I don't think i learned to play until my mid 20's? I had rebound to play as a kid.. My fingers still hurt from flicking those metal balls as a kid..

https://i.imgur.com/uTn1mAZ.jpg

[magnetaress]

the best men must cohabit with the best women in as many cases as possible and the worst with the worst in the fewest, and that the offspring of the one must be reared and that of the other not, if the flock is to be as perfect as possible"

Well, the E'state would definitely fuck this up.

[Gwaihir]

His other works delve heavily in occult knowledge he was plagiarizing from the Babylonian mystery schools.

In the “Parable of the Cave” of the Republic, Plato makes use of the image of a cave, in which shadows of objects are cast by a fire onto a wall. Men enchained in the cave cannot turn their heads to see the fire or the objects, and know only their projected images. The allegory is designed to explain the prison of illusion within which humans are generally trapped. If fortunate to be released from his shackles, that is, initiated, the philosopher may recognize that what he had thought was real were mere shadows of props projected by a false light. He may then begin the ascent upward to the entrance of the cave, to gaze at the true light, or true knowledge, symbolized by the Sun, as the Mithraists, who seek union with Mithras, the Sun.14077

[zodium]

plato was the ur-lib

[Jibartik]

By my count we should see the writing on the wall as early as 2023

[Kaveh]

I welcome other book suggestions in the historical nonfiction genre. Thanks!

-a Handsomillionaire

[zodium]

i'll recommend The Jakarta Method.

[HalflingSpergand]

I'm a little suspect of historical records call me crazy

[Jibartik]

I believe this is a non fictional historical account of the events that take place in the book of revelations.

https://www.amazon.com/Antichrist-Second-Coming-Examination-Thessalonians/dp/1615790373

The Antichrist and the Second Coming looks at the Antichrist and the Second Advent of Christ from a preterist's (The bible is a telling of events of the past, there are no predictions) perspective and provides a unified interpretation of the little horn, the prince to come, the king of the North, and the man of lawlessness.

McKenzie shows how the Antichrist was ultimately a spiritual ruler from the abyss (Rev. 11:7) that worked through Titus in his three-and-a-half-year destruction of the Jewish nation (AD 67-70; cf. Dan. 9:26).

This spirit of Antichrist was about to come out of the abyss in the first century (Rev. 17:8 NASB) and was destroyed by the Second Advent of Jesus in AD 70 (a spiritual event).

It's a really cool take, and if you're hyped on a coming battle between satan and jesus at megido, it will take the hype you have and throw it in the trash.

[Kaveh]

i'll recommend The Jakarta Method.

Have you seen the killing fields ? Pretty bad stuff

[Byue]

well it is not like I have a master in philosophy and could help on this topic but pretty much none of you will listen.

I'm looking at you, Gwaihir.

Edit: lord of the ring-esque book about ancient egyptian but entirely based on reality. The Egyptian by Mika Waltari.

[Jibartik]

Does that book elude that maybe Egyptians evolved from DNA that landed on earth in east Africa? Because Im right about that.

[magnetaress]

Does that book elude that maybe Egyptians evolved from DNA that landed on earth in east Africa? Because Im right about that.

Yes you are.

[Jibartik]

Woo!

[zodium]

Have you seen the killing fields ? Pretty bad stuff

yeah. getting nationalism in your socialism has a real bad history. its like putting a mentos in your coke except it sprays blood.

we can learn a lot from history.

[Kaveh]

we can learn a lot from history.

Well shucks on that we agree, as its the point of this thread.

On the Indonesian topic, they have been, and continue to be, shockingly barbaric as a society. They are actively ethnically cleansing their portion of papua even as we speak, and transferring non-indigenous Javanese and Sumatrans over

Bad bad stuff

[Kaveh]

Edit: lord of the ring-esque book about ancient egyptian but entirely based on reality. The Egyptian by Mika Waltari.

Sounds interesting, I’ll give it a look

[zodium]

On the Indonesian topic, they have been, and continue to be, shockingly barbaric as a society. They are actively ethnically cleansing their portion of papua even as we speak, and transferring non-indigenous Javanese and Sumatrans over

Bad bad stuff

i thought this was the historical nonfiction thread.

[Kaveh]

I’ll just stay on topic and recommend Philip and Alexander again

Next week I’ll start recommending some Anglo-Saxon stuff

[zodium]

peep this review (https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/2020/08/02/book-review-the-jakarta-method-washingtons-anticommunist-crusade-and-the-mass-murder-program-that-shaped-our-world-by-vincent-bevins/) of the jakarta method.

Ask most people what they associate with Copacabana in Brazil and Seminyak in Bali, and it’s likely to be a tropical idyll. However, The Jakarta Method, the new book by Vincent Bevins, might just change that. These palm-fringed sands take on a darker aspect when one learns of their prominent roles in a transcontinental web of political intrigue, mass killings and the assertion of US hegemony, with Seminyak playing host to mass graves and Copacabana a recurring location for far-right agitation.

...

Some of the episodes featured will be more familiar than others, with the Indonesian Mass Killings of 1965-66 having recently been brought to global attention by the critically acclaimed 2012 documentary, The Act of Killing. While Joshua Oppenheimer’s film placed those responsible for the killings in the public eye, this book depicts the victims themselves in a way that emphasises their humanity, a quality that was so long denied. For example, one of the people presented in the book is a young Indonesian woman seeking her fortune in the capital Jakarta, only to find herself marked out for punishment due to suspected Communist ties simply for being in a union. Due to this, she experiences years of torture, rape and imprisonment as well as ostracism in the present day.

...

Alongside these personal stories is the bigger picture of the Partai Komunis Indonesia (PKI) – then the third largest Communist Party in the world (and largest non-ruling) with up to three million members – being crushed almost overnight, resulting in the estimated deaths of up to one million people. What is particularly notable about this is that rather than the costly ‘boots on the ground’ intervention seen in Vietnam, this was carried out by domestic players: in this case, the Indonesian armed forces and political vigilantes, with significant CIA/US State Department support. This ‘scorched earth’ approach to the complete annihilation of opponents via proxies, whether through mass murder or campaigns of terror, led to the titular ‘Jakarta Method’ of suppression and extermination being exported around the world, with the CIA often acting as the common element in these atrocities.

[magnetaress]

Plato on point.