[karen1977]

I never knew Lady Hamilton was Nelson's mistress - i always assumed they were married. My dad and i were yesterday discussing King Henry VIII's falling out with Rome & even though we're both Catholics (of a sort), we both agreed that at far as England was concerned & wars aside (some which have been raging right up until recent years), that what he did ultimately was for the good of England - though for him, it was probably more about his desire to produce an heir and having an itch he wanted to scratch - namely Anne Boleyn! We wouldn't be anywhere near as wealthy as we are (global financial crisis notwithstanding, lol), due to the fact that all riches would go to Rome and the Pope, and as you rightly mentioned concerning Henry V, we'd probably still be saying mass in Latin. In one sense it caused a world of trouble - the reverberations still being felt in Northern Ireland right up until a few years ago. But from a political point of view, it emancipated us from the grip of Rome & allowed us to be independant as a nation - something we still value to this day. My dad disagrees with me about scratching the itch - he says Henry VIII pleaded time and again with the Pope to allow him to divorce his then wife, Catherine of Aragon, even quoting scripture as grounds for divorce. He found a passage which said that if a man lay with his brother's wife, (as Catherine was before he died and she then married Henry), there would be no fruitful union - it was God's will that he divorce her, as he was lying with his brother's wife. The Pope did not accept this and further warned of the consequences of pursuing this mad idea. He was eventually excommunicated by the Holy Mother Church & according to my dad, was completely heartbroken about it all. He also thinks he wasn't alone in formulating his 'Church of England' and pronouncing him 'defender of the faith' - my dad thinks there were other forces at work, forcing his hand, as it were to look to Protestantism as the way forward for England, but i think it was ultimately his choice; though i do think that the excommunication may have given a bit of momentum to this idea. I'm fascinated by the house of Tudor, in particular ElizabethI. I reckon she was probably the most inspiring, courageous and powerful leaders we have ever had. Mary Tudor also interests me - did she die before condemning Elizabeth to death, or could she not bring herself to sign the death warrant of her half-sister? There was certainly no love lost; she was often referred to as 'the ******* child of that *****, Boleyn' - history would've gone in such a different direction if she had signed. And what would she think of her beloved Philip of Spain proposing to Elizabeth before the sheets of his marital bed had cooled - Mary was barely dead when he popped the question and understandably, she was both shocked and disgusted at his request, and sent him packing, i imagine. I wonder if she had accepted - there would be no Spanish Armada either - Spain would still rule the waves & God knows what would've become of 'the new world'.
It's a marvel how one incident, one decision or even one word, could've changed the course of history so massively.
Tell you who sounded like a really nice man (not) - Oliver Cromwell - never was there such a cruel, miserable, Christmas cancelling, bigoted....i could go on and on! If ever a man deserved to be dug up and hanged for Regicide, it's him. Got any dirt on Cromwell? Not much of a challenge, i know, lol.

[windigo]

hehehe. Perhaps they should call the new drug "dope on a rope" :P

[windigo]

The main problem with history is illustrated by a quote from George Orwell;

"Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past. "

With very few exceptions, the "official" story is tained to show propaganda. A prime example of this was Nazi germany. Granted they killed about 8000000 people with the camps. Problem is the attrocities commited by our "allies" joseph stalin and karl marx. Well over FIFTY MILLION died in their "purges". Some estimate it to be closer to 100 million but the graves are deep within russia. Do you see even ONE paragraph about this in the "official" history? No. Of course not...... The allies can't say they were condoning genoside.........

Another point people have left out is that ITALY (controlled by the Vatican) was an ally to hitler. Yet not one of the vatican was ever tried for WW2 crimes....
In fact, one of the people who sold the nerve gas to germany FOR the chambers later went on to be pope John Paul II.......

Yah. The history books turn a blind eye to a lot of things .........

Yes. I can provide documentation on request.

[AMP]

Topic is the US using LSD for interrogations?

[karen1977]

I don't doubt you can, Windigo! Churchill gave nerve gas to Saddam Hussein when he overthrew the previous regime - for 'crowd control'.
It's true; history is written by the winners, and all history is biased in favour of the writer.
This is not off topic either; the tangent we've gone off on just describes that the original thread was the tip of a very large iceberg. A clever man once said "Power corrupts. But absolute power corrupts absolutely". Stalin is one of the many proofs that this is true & us getting into bed with him, even for the greater good, was equal to doing a deal with the Devil. Churchill must've known Stalin's motives - if not he must've been far drunker than he always looked. Then there's the vatican turning a blind eye, when Italy's fascist leader was allied with the Nazis, (though of course they would argue that the Vatican is a principality and as such, has nothing to do with Italy - not even Rome!). Then there's the thousands killed by the allies, when they dropped not one, but TWO atomic bombs on Japan - and apparently, we had right on our side!
As for propaganda - well, that still goes on to this day; ever seen Ross Kemp in Afghanistan? Our soldiers are always being shot at (surprise, surprise!), but they always out-fox the Taliban (as they would) Then they patch up all the locals who've been caught in the crossfire (poor mites) and give the kids sweeties (awwww). Are we really meant to believe that this is the reality of being at war? Handing out lollipops? Is this our strategy to win 'hearts and minds'? Pah! If your mum's dead, your sister maimed, your brother being treated for shrapnel & your father's lost a leg - a lollipop somehow doesn't cut it. We NEED to know were winning; we NEED to know we're the 'goodies', but more than this, we NEED to know that the kiddies have lollipops! How many men were arrested under suspicion of terrorist activity, held for weeks, sometimes months, only to be released WITHOUT CHARGE - but not before their mugshots gone in the paper though? Too many. And why? So we THINK they're onto it - truth is, it's our governments who are the real terrorists - they're the ones frightening us, they're the ones suggesting you should be nervous around muslims, while at the same time feigning promotion of inter-racial cohesion. It stinks; we're up to our necks in double-standards! If it weren't for Thatcher, id say let the women have a go - maybe they'd have a cup of tea and sort it out once and for all! Now, thanks to Caligula there, i can't honestly say that things would improve! What i can say is i HOPE - all's not lost if you still have hope.

[Warwick]

Hope... hmmm. This site, and most of the people on it give me hope - all is not lost, and everyone is not fooled by the newspapers, TV, politicians and the so-called 'authorites'! Watching the news is almost bound to cause despair these days... apart from the odd item about the public's steadily increasing cynicism and mistrust of our various governments.

Fortunately there are antidotes in the UK, like Have I Got News For You, Mock the Week, Bremner Bird and Fortune, QI and (sometimes) Newsnight and Question Time. The problem is, however much we laugh at, deride and even despise and loathe those in power, there isn't much we can do about it - in time honoured tradition, they protect themselves, ignore public opinion and arrange their own immunity from the law, as and when necessary. Only a few sacrificial lambs and goats are sent away to "spend more time with their family" or otherwise consigned to the dustbin (even being 'promoted' to the Northern Ireland office has lost its sting!).

Perhaps some of the traditions of Ancient Rome should be revived, to encourage responsible and accountable leadership? I am certainly no fan of the Romans, but they had ways of dealing with inept, dishonest, excessively greedy or overly ambitious leaders that dealt with the likes of Julius Caeser, Caligula and Nero with a minimum of fuss and little expense (no 'golden handshakes' required for them!).

Unfortunately we seem to have abandoned such methods shoerly after the Civil War, when Parliament seriously began to look after the interests of its members and their supporters, instead of advising monarchs and influencing policies by financial restraints. Before the Tudors, despots such as King John, Richard II and III were indeed fully answerable to 'the people', with little need for 'democracy' or parliament. Charles I was the last monarch to pay the price of incompetance, but I doubt Charles III will have any worries about facing the music, just as Charles II didn't....

Windigo is right of course - history is always written by the victors. This is why we are instilled with such negative images of the Vikings, Huns, Vandals, Goths, Danes, Mongols, Moors and many other undesrving 'barbarians'... they were enemies of Rome and thus the Christian Church, who are still fighting desperate rearguard actions to hide all the atrocities commited by the Inquistion, Jesuits and other agencies of enforcement they used. These Barbarians all lost of course... the Saxons get a mixed historical review, as many were early converts to Christianity, absolving their race/tribe somewhat, whose earlier practice of human sacrifice, and enthusiasm for fighting and slavery have been glossed over if not forgiven in many history books.

In fact, Rome and the Romans even before Christianity are still looked on with (what is to me) unfair favour, despite their ruthlessness, cruelty, corruption and frequent incompetance. Having baths and 'respectable' haircuts helped of course, but since they usually won in the end, they and their many historians and writers (whose work thus survived) present Rome as 'civilised' and good... when what they were really good at was manipulation, conquest and administration. Therefore the Carthaginians (bar one, Hannibal - who was a 'winner' for a while) are damned along with the Persians, Germans, Franks, Spaniards and almost everyone else who opposed Rome or her allies - apart from the Egyptians of course, who 'came to the fold' thanks to Cleopatra, and thus get a good write up (despite the Ptolemys being one of the most evil, sick regimes in the ancient world).

Go back further and Greece shines out, despite the incredibly dubious things they got up to... few good words for anyone they beat, such as the Persians, Trojans etc. etc. Once again, the Eyptians get a good press thanks to Alexander, who took their empire without any trouble, and created Alexandria to make the most of it. Also inherited from that era and beyond is the negative image of peoples like the Philistines, Hittites, Babylonians and others - doubly reinforced thanks to the Bible in later years.

Getting a balanced view of history is still very difficult, even though there have been encouraging developmants recently. I was taught back in the 60'd and 70's (which are by now history themselves!) and was left with a bizarrely distrted, completely one-sided view of the world, with Britannia still ruling the waves (no mention of not having an empire or navy any more), and being a substantial power, which had single handedly beaten Germany and the forces of Nazism and was too important to bother with things like the Common Market... far too 'European'!

World War II is of course the latest even to get an unbalanced write up. Quite rightly, the atrocities of Hitler and the Holocaust continue to horrify, morbidly fascinate and shock, and continue to be minutely examined and detailed by documentary makers to this day... 'lest we forget' they usually say. Such a thing must never be allowed to happen again, that's another careworn phrase - it shouldn't, yet it has and does, all over the world, without anything being done in time despite plenty of warnings and harrowing news reports. Rwanda, Kudistan, Yugoslavia, Iraq to name but a few... for the same old reasons, tribalism, religion, colour, 'ethnicity'... in other words, 'differencies' - which outsiders can't even see sometimes.

I wonder how history will judge us? I fear it will be as a bunch of sheep, who allowed themselves to be coerced, fooled and increasingly controlled by cunning, paranoid and manipulative governments and leaders, who ignored the greater good of the world in favouir of selfish interests. It remains to be seen if this will result in ecological, climatic or other disaster... the financial one already seems underway, caused by a fragile trading system based on greed and profit rather than needs and welfare. Let's hope we see the light?

[windigo]

The sadest offense the vatican perpetrated was butchering the historical records of almost every region they ever set foot in :smt027 . Usually this was done at the end of a sword..... or torch and cross........

Some examples of edited history. The "official" line of bovine excrement is that "civilization" started with sumaria about 10,000 years ago. This is FAR from the following facts ;

1) carbon dating places some Native American tribes (expecially Hopi and Cherokee) are well over 100,000 years. The Hopi had their caverns in the Nevada desert for ages!! :smt028

2) The Nordic vikings poped onto the geological records about 150,000 years ago....... well before Sumaria was a mound of sand in the desert......

3) The Vedics (the founders of Hinduim and writers of the Rig Veda) date back to about 200,000 years ago.....

4) Druids were up there as well. They were based on the Nordic beliefs and shared quite a few of their gods. Donner for Thor. Woden for Odin. etc.

5) Then we got the one closest to my heart in Taoism. The "official record" puts its founding about 500 BC. The truthg of the matter was Lao Tzu was basing his teachings on the I chang (written about 5500 BC). The I chang was in turn based upon the Ba GUa (the yingyang and 8 trigrams) and was formulated about 20,000 years ago.......

Basically anything that doesnt fit in with their ideal model that civilization started from their ancestors is surpressed and or altered to fit. :smt013 To me it's the worst crime in history..... literally the raping OF history.....

This doesnt even TOUCH on the god and goddess issues....... They tried to edit her out of the beliefs too.....

his story >> history , her say >> herasy :smt102

[Warwick]

In the end, it comes down to how you define the word 'civilised' really?

I'm not sure if the Romans or Greeks invented the word, but the Romans (both Pagan and Christian) certainly considered they had a monopoly on it. If you consider it 'civilised' to enjoy the sight of animals and humans being publicly slaughtered, tortured and executed - for amusement - maybe they were? The subjugation of entire countries and peoples with brutal military force, and use of the conquered (who were not paying tribute and taxation) as slaves, all well and good.

The Roman example has been followed by others who considered themselves elite and superior of course, and considered they had the right to build empires through conquest, and take whatever they liked from 'less civilised' inferiors (including slave labour)... the Nazis even had those silly little SPQR things! And of course, a Praetorine Guard lookalike, c/w with sable uniforms and much strutting. They also had a peculiarly inefficient, uncohesive and corrupt leadership structure, comprised of bickering, paranoid, ambitious and ruthless amateur tyrants, who would have been a laughing stock in any other regime. Like the Romans, of the ones who weren't bumped off by their 'comrades', most came to unpleasant and well deserved ends when it all fell apart.

Nowadays few wish to associate with Rome (although I believe one country still has a 'Senate'?), but the Roman stranglehold on 'history' remains mysteriously intact, despite all efforts of Terry Jones, and the lurid documentaries and re-enactments seen on BBC2, Ch4 and the History Channel. I personally consider the Romans were as barbaric as humanity has ever been, routinely upset by treason and murder at all levels of society, dominated, misruled and fleeced by half witted and insane leaders of the worst kind, and when they turned Christian, things became even worse. Good riddance I say... and many thanks to my great great... great uncle Alaric and his Visigoth hordes, who first sacked the rotten place!

Being distantly descended from the Visigoths does not of course affect my opinion about Rome, for as a keen historian... (cont P9

[windigo]

The roman empire did not die warwick..... they just moved into the vatican...... :shock:

[Warwick]

:evil: And of course split in two, and changed their name - what hypocrisy to add the word 'holy', dear me!

I saw a documentary the other day, that concerned the continuing expansion of Christianity - which is actually happening, not just propaganda. I have to say I had doubts, thinking about the sorry state of the CofE and disrinct lack of 'bums on pews, but all was explained - it is another legacy of colonialism, and most of these new converts are in Africa.

What followed was somewhat disturbing. It seems that African Christianity is somewhat different to the stolid, lacklustre version we have in the West (as it kept being called), and I was surprised at how 'conservative' their leaders appear to be. Despite all the happy clappy exultation (plus extra drums) with which they enthusiastically worship, there is an undercurrent of medievalism and an unpleasant reverence for the Old Testament, Hellfire and Damnation. No homosexuals or women priests (even if they have been circumcised), and a sinister obsession with witchcraft, demons and 'evil spirits', that reminds me of the works of Henry Rider Haggard.

Africa has always had 'witches' of course, and for thousands of years witch-doctors, shamans and healers have been a part of their society and tribal religions. When millions of unfortunate Adricans were enslaved and transported to the W Indies, attempts were made to 'civilise' them by conversion to Christianity... which many did, with very strange consequencies. The heady mix of Hellfire and Damnation Christianity and the beliefs they brought with them from Africa, combined to produce Voudon, which isn't really as menacing as Hollywood would have us believe, but certainly has a rather dark side, and involves destructive magic of the worst kind sometimes.

Ironically, that seems to be what 21st century Africans are now turning to in droves, c/w witch hunts, curses and persecutions. Even more disturbing was the way some of their leaders claimed (as Christians so often do) that there way was the real, right, correct way, and expressed desires to evangelise and convert all us spiritually impoverished Westeners to the 'way of the Lord' as they regard it. I can't say it worries me at the moment, apart from a few dismembered Nigerians being found here and there, I have no fear of an impending 'crusade' at the moment. If anything, it is very saddening to see how they have combined two sets of beliefs, and chosen the very worst parts of both to PTL...