#ACOUP

[andmaybegayer]

This is the first part of the third part of our four(ish) part (Ia, Ib, IIa, IIb, IIIa, IIIb, IVa, IVb, IVc, V) series

Yet another homestuck-ass acoup series

[space-wizards]

Bret Deveraux, summarizing the various ways Sparta sucked ass. Convenient!

[confusedbyinterface]

The fact that Cleopatra stays for a month after Caesar’s death suggests to me that she hoped to get Caesarion recognized as Caesar’s heir, which in turn suggests that Cleopatra had a poor grasp of Roman law and politics, both not realizing that her mere presence was a liability to the one person she needed to succeed (and not be stabbed 23 times) and also that the quest to get Rome to acknowledge Caesarion as Caesar’s heir was almost certainly hopeless. Caesarion could not be Caesar’s heir; as a non-citizen Caesarion wasn’t even a valid target as primary heir of Caesar’s will and so the chances of getting him recognized as Caesar’s heir through a Roman court was basically nil. In any case, Caesar’s will made Octavian his sole heir, which is a twist Cleopatra really ought to have seen coming since Caesar was openly preparing the fellow and planning to bring him along on his next campaign. Personally, I suspect Caesar always knew Caesarion wouldn’t be acceptable in Rome and never had any intention of making him his heir; that Cleopatra doesn’t seem to have known this is a striking indictment of her political acumen. And if you are thinking, “but wait, Antonius later seems to think he might be able to sell this at Rome” – yes, he might well have. He was also a lot less politically astute than Caesar.

Devereaux wouldn't say "Famous himbo Marcus Antonius" but I'm certainly thinking it

[superstrijder00]

Highly dissapointed in the inability of Paradox's Imperator to simulate dread emperor Traiterous

[ID: Screenshot of text saying: These two statistics, power base and loyalty then interact. First, each point of power base lowers loyalty directly by a significant amount for any character that is not the country ruler (who is always 100% loyal to themselves)]

[cynosurus]

I have met a great many very intelligent people who imagine in their formidable mastery of a field that if they could just order the world to their whims, things would be so much better than the current system whereby regular people are allowed to make their own decisions; experience tells us it is not so.

from

[brutish-impulse]

indeed, due to disease effects, above a modest size, cities could not maintain positive population growth and so required continuous inflow of migrants

Ancient cities sound kinda horrifying

[stainlesssteellocust]

Types of Guy you will find on Sbee and Svee, an incomplete list

People who get really intense about Fate lore

Circular Firing Squad Leftists

Worm fans

Worm fans who hate Wildbow

Worm fans who have never read Worm

Worm fanfic authors who have never read Worm

Guys who use phrases like “omniversal tiering” with a straight face

Guys who are still really into Lyrical Nanoha in this foul year of our lord 2023

Guys who don’t read history books but have read one (1) Bret Deveraux article on the subject and will link it at you if you give them the slightest opportunity

A type of guy who isn’t actually a guy at all she just doesn’t know it yet

Guys who have been around since the late 90’s and remember when the site was about spaceship videos

People who have been banned from one of the sites and now lurk on the other one, bitterly

Hidden cryptofascists

[jurakan]

Bret “Orc Logistics Guy” Devereaux watched “Rings of Power”

Highlights:

[greatwyrmgold]

A blog post by an academic about the state of academic employment. TL;DR: Stealth gig economy takeover, most professors aren't.

[tadrinth]

ACOUP once again with the banger 4th of July posts.

[elbiotipo]

A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry talked about this better and more pedantly than me recently, but it's interesting to see the Galactic Republic and the Galactic Empire from Star Wars, rather than a modern representative republic that falls to fascism, as the Holy Roman Empire. A (galactic) "republic of princes" with an elected senate (or diet?) and leadership but is otherwise a collection of independent states each with their own militaries, governments, etc.

The Clone Wars could be seen as a conflict between these princedoms (a lot of what happens in the Clone Wars series is about convincing such and such system to support one way or the other) similar to the Thirty Years' War, and the Empire as an attempt to centralize power in a single sovereign much like it was seen in the history of early modern Europe, which of course is an expensive and difficult effort (especially in a galaxy accostumed to the 'traditional' loose government of the Republic). Since the Emperor himself is not a good sovereign at all,not only Evil but also incompetent, he quickly falls out of favor from the princes, and his centralized military is defeated by the Rebel Alliance. Presumably, Order Is Restored, but you can see that after such a thing, there would be very fundamental changes all over the galaxy that I don't either the old expanded universe and definitively not the new canon have resolved. (the Star Wars Enlightment/Napoleonic Wars, anyone?)

Anyways, Star Wars is obviously a story abut a family of space wizards, but it's very interesting to imagine how the wider Galaxy works from a political, historical, etc. perspective, and I found this idea very appealing, an interesting thing to support my Space Empires worldbuilding post.

[space-wizards]

Today's ACOUP post's first footnote is so long it's impossible to read the in-line pop up all the way through. I can't scroll any higher to read the preceding sections, and there's still a paragraph and a half below this screenshot.

[confusedbyinterface]

Thinking about those early jurists from the Roman Republic, when "lawyer" wasn't really a job yet. They weren't getting paid for it they just liked writing legal documents enough they did it as a hobby.

[superstrijder00]

Great piece showcasing some positive news from the past decades:

[andmaybegayer]

RSS readers enable you to be haunted by blog posts the same way you can be haunted by a book you haven't read yet.

[thetrashknightofbreath]

[Image Text: (The passage is highlighted) And I certainly don't expect Martin, or the showrunners, to bring their story to a screeching halt in order to discuss horse lactation schedules and making dairy products]

Well I fucking do.