#ARE NOT WESTERN EUROPEAN.

[queenburd]

Every day I think about Stanleys big nose and the fact the other employees draw it as a big hooked nose and I go “yeah that guys not a white dude”

[mactiir]

in HEMA (aka historical european fencing), much of the sport is done with fencing masks on, so identifying your clubmates during sparring or tourneys is just based on gear. you know, what color their jacket and pants are, what patches they have on it, how is their mask painted. If someone borrows someone else's jacket it's legitimately jarring, like having someone with an entirely different body type and way of moving stealing your friend's face.

Once i read about historical fishermen in the north sea and how they each had a specific hat pattern that their buddies would use to identity them while they were bundled up. It was so much part of their identity that they were often buried wearing those hats. The gear is like your name, a visual identifier of YOU when you do not have a face.

anyway, back when I was buying gear i got my pants in ELECTRIC blue. I figured i was gonna get a black or grey jacket. but HEMA gear is kind of expensive because it's all custom- or handmade, so instead of spending $400 on a new jacket I picked up one secondhand for like 20. Except the only jacket that fit me was bright, SCARLET red. And I already had my expensive, new, custom, BLUE pants. I look like a damn rocket pop or like, a mixed Icee. I was like, shit! I should switch my jacket before i become the rocket pop guy!!!

Long story short, not only am I now the rocket pop guy, the color scheme has bled into my entire wardrobe. Every-fucking-thing I own is red and blue. I look like a french revolutionary. I look like a founding father in a school play. I have become a northern fisherman in my stripey hat. Now, even if I DO get a new jacket, I feel like I GOTTA buy it in red, yk? Otherwise they won't recognize me. Maybe I won't recognize me. I'm the rocket pop guy!!!

[artthatgivesmefeelings]

Rafael Romero Barros (Spanish, 1832-1895) Still life with oranges, 1863

[birdblues]

Western Jackdaw & European Fallow Deer

[kurumeki]

One thing that rubs me so wrong is that Ukraine won last year and UK has "graciously" agreed to host the event, since it cannot happen in Ukraine for obvious reasons, but rather than celebrating Ukraine and their culture and heritage (because Eurovision wants to be impartial), they shove UK heritage down our throats instead. Like... didn't we get enough of that this week with your silly monarchy thing. Give us a break. Celebrate Eastern Europe!

[wenellyb]

White French people hate it when they get a taste of their own medicine. 

I was discussing with one of my colleagues and she told me how she was planning to go to Senegal for the holidays because she thought it was a good way for her kids to see more diversity and people who don’t look like them (ie Black People).

So I told her it was a good idea because I was 4 the 1st time I saw a White person (and I cried btw...) And she was so shocked, like she couldn’t understand that some Black kids have never seen White people in their lives but somehow doesn’t think twice about the fact that her kids are in a similar situation.

Another time, I was talking to someone else about how I arrived in France when I was young but had lived in many African countries growing up (RDC, Kenya , Gabon, Center African Republic...).

And then that person proceeded to go on a tirade about how I must have felt so lucky to arrive in France, and how I should have been relieved to arrive in a developed country like France, blablaba. I just told him “not really”, because growing up I was told that France was amazing and so wealthy, but the first time I saw homeless people was when I arrived in Europe, so I didn’t really understand why people always talked about Europe like that. And again, the guy was shocked, just because I didn’t say my life in Africa was miserable and sad, and because I said that Europe was from what I had heard as a child.

If you’re going to bring your assumptions without knowing, I’ll retort with mine ( the view of an 8-9 year old). I don’t understand how someone can feel so entitled and assume something about your situation without asking first. I’m sorry the only thing you know about Africa is that one documentary you watched in middle school but leave me alone.

[vita-min-ze]

I feel like the root problem of american tankies' shallow ideals is redirected american exceptionalism. Internet and globalization has caused them to realize that that they're not in fact the best country in the world as school etc has told them. But instead of understanding that they have problems just like the rest of us (though tbf, their ability to cause other nations harm is unmatched) they now flipped to saying that the us must be the worst country in the entire world and the source of all evil. They cannot comprehend that non-americans are perfectly capable of doing the most heinous shit and thus assume that behind every war or conflict lies a us conspiracy and influence - because surely non-americans are just so innocent, naive and primitive and unlike americans lack the cunning to advance their political goals without help by the US. The fact that not only the US government but also its enemies can be vile at the same time and that sometimes they can even be on the good side is completely beyond them which is why they are never truly against imperialism, genocide or opression unless it is done by americans or their allies.

[froody]

I can’t stop saying “no. I am, uh, selfish.” in a terrible French accent

[captain-price-unofficially]

French officers in blackened greatcoats and face coverings for night operations, 1915

[feluka]

People are so weird about arab Christians... like bro... they're the originals.

I saw an excerpt from a book, I think by a Palestinian Christian, talking about how western Christians think of the holy land as a fantasy land and not a real place with actual people. That stuck with me, wish I could find the book it's from

i know the book you're talking about, and went to look for it and couldn't find it. anyway the concept it's talking about is called "biblical orientalism" and like you said it pertains to a fantasy viewing of the "holy land" and its inhabitants in a very dehumanizing way.

i am personally not religious or well-read on theology enough to be qualified (or interested tbh) in discussing what "real" christianity is, and i have no intention of convincing anyone that ours is more valid, but what i NEED people to understand is that regardless of the contents of the religion itself, the geopolitical factors that surround arab christians makes it *incomparable* to western christianity. this isn't a matter of 'welllll in the west they worship this but in the east we worship that'. it's a matter of a long history of oppression and the fight against western imperialism. you can't apply the same views you have on western christianity to an arab christian. an arab christian does not hold any power or privilege over other arabs, and you're absolutely deranged if you think a palestinian christian of all people benefits from being christian. (<< thinking about those asks that elios received...)

[yuri-alexseygaybitch]

I try to avoid commenting on proudly evil individuals like Andrew Tate because their existence hurts my brain but it's wholly unsurprising he and others like him are living as sexpats in a former communist country

[sophiemariepl]

Am I the only one here who is so damn angry about the fact that a large portion of the Slavic representation on the Western media is either Russian, Russian-coded (e.g. the Grisha Universe by Leigh Bardugo) or copies the narratives about other Slavic nations that exist in the Russian discourse about them?

[pol-ski]

Ogrodzieniec Early Medieval Festival, Poland

© Aleksander Gabrysiak

[artthatgivesmefeelings]

William Adolphe Bouguereau (French, 1825-1905) L'Amour et Psyché, 1899

[solcattus]

Girl with a Tray

By William Powell Frith

[gwydpolls]

Time Travel Question 35: Ancient History XVI and Earlier

These Questions are the result of suggestions from the previous iteration.

This category may include suggestions made too late to fall into the correct earlier time grouping. Basically, I'd already moved on to human history, but I'd periodically get a pre-homin suggestion, hence the occasional random item waaay out of it's time period, rather than reopen the category.

In some cases a culture lasted a really long time and I grouped them by whether it was likely the later or earlier grouping made the most sense with the information I had. (Invention ofs tend to fall in an earlier grouping if it's still open. Ones that imply height of or just before something tend to get grouped later, but not always. Sometimes I'll split two different things from the same culture into different polls because they involve separate research goals or the like).

Please add new suggestions below if you have them for future consideration. All cultures and time periods welcome.