I wonder how much of History can we trust? After all, history is written by victors. Something that was written a thousand years ago (or longer) - how can we verify?
In today’s world, how much of Netflix “documentaries” are rigorously researched and how much just made up, to save time and money? It is not like Netflix is going to get in trouble, legally or in public opinion…
If you go to the town of Sainte-Mère-Église in Normandy, there is a manakin of a paratrooper hanging by his parachute snared on the steeple of the church. This is in reference to a well-known D-Day story, famously illustrated in the movie The Longest Day, of paratrooper John Steele.
The problem is, this story is probably a fabrication.
That series was a historical drama, not a documentary. Ulana Khomyuk, the woman speaking at the start of that video, didn’t even exist. As acknowledged in the series itself, she was a composite of several Soviet scientists for narrative purposes.
It’s not misleading to take artistic liberties in a work of fiction designed to entertain, even if based on true events. That would be damming for a documentary, but this was not one.
Pretty much any biopic or historical documentary struggles with the tension between the realities that, on the one hand, they can't completely make up everything out of whole cloth and, on the other, the writers don't want to let facts get too much in the way of a good story.
But some number of people get POd when not everything is literally true.
I think people get angry when something turns out being different in nature than what they expected, especially when it comes to accuracy. If I start watching a show, and most of the information matches with my understanding of the topic, I might start to believe that it's more of a documentary. Then something comes up that unrealistic, or I know to be false, I might feel tricked.
I'd love it if instead of saying "The following story is based on true events", they were obligated to say "The following story is based on true events, and has been modified for your entertainment".
But some number of people get POd when not everything is literally true.
By pandering to irrational fears about nuclear power, 'Chernobyl' and similar works have consequences that translate, more or less directly, into fossil-fuel pollution.
I'm inclined to be more forgiving towards a Borges manqué who uses his talents to defraud hipster travel websites than I am towards people who are successful enough at spreading FUD and bullshit that they make the world an objectively-worse place.
Chernobyl seems like an odd target for such overwrought criticism. It's not like it was dramatizing a nuclear reactor accident that didn't happen. By general consensus, it was pretty true to life as far as the main points were concerned.
A related thing I 'learnt' (or rather 'realised' having not thitherto thought about) via Fargo was that 'true story' are just words you can say, they don't mean anything and there's no regulatory oversight or whatever.
The showrunners agonized over making the show historically accurate vs fitting the story into a TV format. It sounds like they traded the minor details to get the broad brushstrokes right - and especially dissect the themes around hubris, willful ignorance, and so on. The 'making of' podcast where they discuss this is quite interesting:
He seems to be completely missing the distinction between what might be said in a meeting with high ranking politicians and what you might write in a nuclear physics exam. It's not unreasonable for someone to greatly exaggerate, talk confidently about stuff they're actually very unsure about and even straight up lie in such a situation.
I understand calling him pompous, or an ass, and he had that period where he basically was a part of gamergate for a minute (maybe he still believes those kinds of things, I'm not in his head). He definitely will take a "debunking" that should take two minutes of math, and spends 20 minutes basically reveling in "just how wrong" the supposed Bad Man is.
But when has he been wrong, in a way that would cause you to call his credibility "dubious"? When has he called out an Infinite energy machine, or a "pull water out of the air in a desert" machine, or an Elon project, and been wrong?
Well, IIRC, he said there was no economic or technical advantage to reusing rockets, and predicted the demise of SpaceX. That Tesla would never produce a semi-truck, then when it did he significantly misrepresented the details so he could "bust" it. And probably others. I try not to waste much brain space storing his BS.
This is why I bounce hard off of anything that could be labelled "historical fiction".
I don't know enough about, e.g., the JFK assassination, to be sure that a dramatization of it isn't going to fill in the gaps and make me think I do know something that turns out to be serving the agenda of others, or simply wrong.
And yes I recognize that "history" is just the consensus version of "historical fiction", and that consensus is local at best, and often also serving an agenda!
Lol history absolutely hasn't been written by Victors. Not always at least. As an example, most "folk knowledge" that is widely spread about WW2 come from post war books by German generals. They spread tons and tons of myths and outright lies that permeated WW2 discussions for like 70 years now. Slowly we are starting to see that disappear but for the most part, allied narratives have taken a back seat in comparison. Especially on anything related to equipment, performance, troop competence etc.
> They spread tons and tons of myths and outright lies that permeated WW2 discussions for like 70 years now. Slowly we are starting to see that disappear but for the most part, allied narratives have taken a back seat in comparison. Especially on anything related to equipment, performance, troop competence etc.
Do you have examples? Does that include whole memeplex about the Nazis being somehow far better at advanced technology than the Allies?
Pretty much everything about the Nazis, about Germany, about the war in general, is written by the not victors. If you grew up watching the Discovery Channel, everything you know about WWII was written about former Wehrmacht generals in semi-autobiographical stories. Things like "If it hadn't been for Hitler being such a terrible leader, we would have won" or "The King Tiger was an Uber tank that could have won the war" to "That flying wing Heinkel made was a STEALTH BOMBER", or "Those damn Soviets were sending meat waves at us armed only with a single shovel!"
Don't forget the entirety of the "Clean Wehrmacht" myth, that the whole Nazism thing was mostly contained to Hitler and the SS and the normal German army was mostly clean from the desire to gas all the jews.
I get what you are saying - but there are also elements of truth in the examples you cite. Yes, much of OKW were synchophants, but there were plenty of competent generals and opportunities that were missed because of meddling. The Tiger had major technical challenges (as did much of German armor) but it had elements of superiority over US armor. That Heinkel was certainly interesting - like so many German weapons programs, they had fascinating ideas, but they were short on resources to make them functional. And on and on - so you aren't "wrong" but I think to say all of these things are propaganda written by the losers is also not really the whole story either...
> Pretty much everything about the Nazis, about Germany, about the war in general, is written by the not victors. If you grew up watching the Discovery Channel, everything you know about WWII was written about former Wehrmacht generals in semi-autobiographical stories.
> ...
> Don't forget the entirety of the "Clean Wehrmacht" myth, that the whole Nazism thing was mostly contained to Hitler and the SS and the normal German army was mostly clean from the desire to gas all the jews.
Thinking about this a bit more, couldn't that even be thought of as history being written by the victors? In this case the victors (Allies) wanting to write history to rehabilitate the losers (Germany) to fight the next enemy (the Soviets), and allowing defeated elements of the German forces (former Wehrmacht generals) to do so?
IIRC, there was an period where the Allied consensus was to reduce Germany to a nation of disarmed farmers, but that was quickly reversed once the Americans realized they needed a reasonably powerful Germany to oppose the Soviets.
"Written by victors" is not really accurate, but there is bias in who it was written by (not least, for most of history, the fact that it is somewhat tautologically written by the literate). Historians are well aware of this and will generally try to account for it by looking to corroborate accounts, but of course it's very easy to project one's own biases onto any such analysis, especially when evidence is thin.
There are many, many biblical texts from various centuries that agree with each other. The New Testament has twice as many ancient copies as any contemporary works. The Dead Sea scrolls are a good example of older copies being found… and they are no different from later copies.
> In general, I'll turn it around. Atheism is a group of people like any other. Do you believe that atheists alone are able to withstand the human inclination to favor their in group and hate their out groups?
This is the difference.
I don't view "atheists" as a group of people with in and out groups. Any more than "pasta eaters" or "brown-eyed people".
But some atheists (I would call them "militant atheists") do. Of course I'd argue that militant atheists are largely reacting to the militant theism of others, which is more popularly accepted and gets way more air time (and also is responsible for horrible things in the world). But both are silly.
> But some atheists (I would call them "militant atheists") do. Of course I'd argue that militant atheists are largely reacting to the militant theism of others, which is more popularly accepted and gets way more air time (and also is responsible for horrible things in the world). But both are silly.
Do you believe this is not true of other religions as well?
Ah. You've got me all wrong. And my error was in propagating your capital-A "Atheism".
The sins committed against groups of humans in the name of any belief system are not the topic I was asking about. They're all terrible. Choose your idol or lack thereof.
And FWIW I think that's generally not a product of the system, it's a product of people and power and resource contention.
But I was asking about the historical fiction of atheism. Lots of people live without a Christian or other god, with no particular concern for how others believe or any need for a mythology to support or define their views.
> The sins committed against groups of humans in the name of any belief system are not the topic I was asking about. They're all terrible. Choose your idol or lack thereof.
This is a Dodge.
> Lots of people live without a Christian or other god, with no particular concern for how others believe or any need for a mythology to support or define their views.
So you believe this is unique to atheists? Even ignoring the obvious "mythology" which rightfully can extend to common atheistic beliefs.
When I use the word "mythology", I mean it to apply to any set of correlated beliefs. All religions have their mythologies, yes. But so do cultures and nations and corporations and universities and friend groups.
I think I see your agenda here though. Atheists have done terrible things. Adolf, Joseph, Pol. If you choose these folks as representatives of atheism (or, of what happens when you don't have a supreme accountability) then sure. They constructed a non-Christian(etc) mythology that was not competitive with their own supremacy, and did bad things with the power derived. I think we agree here.
But I don't view "atheism" as an organization or a correlated set of beliefs. You can choose to argue about "Atheism" and disagree. But we're talking about different things.
See also "[Dd]emocratic", "[Ll]iberal", "[Ll]ibertarian", etc.
My agenda is to make you (and those reading the thread) consider your own movement critically, instead of perpetuating your own mythology.
> Atheists have done terrible things. Adolf, Joseph, Pol. If you choose these folks as representatives of atheism (or, of what happens when you don't have a supreme accountability) then sure. They constructed a non-Christian(etc) mythology that was not competitive with their own supremacy, and did bad things with the power derived. I think we agree here.
So, by that logic, Christianity cannot be blamed for the inquisition and atrocities committed during the crusades, since it's on those in command of those movements (the Pope) and not based on christianity itself.
> But I don't view "atheism" as an organization or a correlated set of beliefs.
That strikes me as deliberately obtuse.
> You can choose to argue about "Atheism" and disagree. But we're talking about different things.
Again, you're not being intellectually honest here. You're defining terms so that you don't have to admit that atheism (and sects thereof) have their own mythologies and revisionist histories.
Your efforts above to extricate atheism from the atrocities committed by sects of atheism, even those committed those to convert the heretics, rather highlight that fact.
There is no "atheist movement", nor is it something about "the left" (like you mentioned earlier). There are, of course, rightwing atheists.
Atheist do not self-organize as "a movement". Yes, there is the "Brights" thing and other such nonsense with little to no traction. And it's just a marginal group of people who think they are better, anyway.
Atheism is not a religion or movement "opposed" to traditional mainstream religions like Christianity, Islam, etc.
It is, quite simply, the lack of belief in the existence of a god and usually anything supernatural. There is no "fiction" to it, no mythologies that go with it. There's no innate belief with "the movement of atheism" that being an atheist makes you a good person, for example; or that being religious makes you a bad person.
The condemnation of the crimes committed in the name of organized religion do not require one to be an atheist -- plenty of religious people condemn the Inquisition. Likewise, it's perfectly common to be atheist and acknowledge the crimes committed by non-religious against religious people.
There's no mythology and no movement to go with it. There are as many kinds of atheists as there are people who do not believe in a god. And no, it's not "the same" with religious people, because unlike religious people atheists do not recognize a source of "atheist" authority -- there's no scripture, no Pope, no Rabbi, no Imam, no person or object of unquestionable authority.
In order to be an atheist, you just have to not believe in gods. There's no "atheist" path to living a good life, no guideline, no set of rules.
> Yes, there is the "Brights" thing and other such nonsense with little to no traction. And it's just a marginal group of people who think they are better, anyway.
Huh. Sounds like almost any other religion.
> [Atheism] is, quite simply, the lack of belief in the existence of a god
This is incorrect. Agnosticism is the lack of belief in a god. Contrast this with atheism, which is the belief in the lack of a god.
> There's no movement.
There's as much an Atheism movement as there is a Christian, Muslim, Hindu, etc.
I'm going to be level with you here: it sounds as if you're being dishonest.
> Huh. Sounds like almost any other religion.
I preempted this comment and you ignored it. No, it's not like any other religion, because "Brights" is not a "movement" of atheism (unlike say Catholicism for Christianity) because the Brights just happen to be a group of people who happen to be atheists, and have no major influence on atheism nor are they any kind of authority over even a fraction of atheists (nor do they claim to be). They don't prescribe anything over atheism nor do they hold any authority over it, not even a tiny fraction of it.
More importantly, atheism is not even a religion. Yes, I know you are going to claim this (it's your angle, and it's best if you admit it early on. No point hiding it. It's been attempted and refuted thousands of times before, so let's get on with it).
> This is incorrect. Agnosticism is the lack of belief in a god. Contrast this with atheism, which is the belief in the lack of a god.
You are wrong, but that's splitting hairs anyway. Before we go down this rabbit hole though, best get back on track and examine your assertion that there's an atheist "historical fiction". You haven't spoken one word about this, and instead got sidetracked into pointless distractions.
> There's as much an Atheism movement as there is a Christian, Muslim, Hindu, etc.
Do you want to argue honestly? I know you don't believe this. You can make a (mistaken, in my opinion) argument about atheism as a secular religion, or about atheist "beliefs", but no-one will seriously consider atheism a movement similar to Christianity, Islam, etc.
If you want to be taken seriously, make serious arguments. Otherwise you just come across as dishonest.
I agree, your incorrectness on this point is likely leading you both to incorrect conclusions, even before we get to the "is an empty set a set?" that you would apparently need to argue against.
You have me all wrong. I am a part of no movement. I have never once been in a group of people (more than two) where the discussion was about religion and where agreement (with me) was had. It's just not a part of my life.
I do not think there is a mythology around atheism. This was my question to you, effectively. Atheism is literally the lack of belief in a god. Yes there are people who have constructed belief systems around that lack of belief, but those are not necessary to meet the definition. There is no complex set of beliefs necessary to be an atheist. Just one lack of belief. Anything on top of that is something other than atheism.
There are no sects of atheism. But maybe of Atheism-as-you-understand-it. You claim I'm being intellectually dishonest here, but I maintain that we are talking about different things.
I'm still curious about the "historical fiction" of any version of (your) "Atheism", but I don't think I'm going to get a conversation about that at this point. If you're talking about the mythologies created by our friends Adolf, Joseph, and Pol -- then you are really stretching. They used anti-religionism (which is not atheism) as a vehicle for their own crazy/evil. I also do not blame Christianity for the Inquisition, although I do blame (bad) Christians for it!
It seems that you feel attacked in your beliefs by a vocal minority of atheists. That sucks, absolutely.
But militant Theists have far more power in this world than militant atheists. The latter are just rabble-rousers.
I am fully aware that tolerant Christians exist. But as intolerants go, the atheists have nothing on the Christians. At least not in terms of numbers or influence.
I wish we could ignore the militant Christians as easily as we can ignore the militant atheists.
The real monsters, and with the most dangerous beliefs and mythology, which are just as much beliefs and mythology as the religious despite their protests that claiming they have beliefs or mythology or even are anything is nonsensical, are the [whatever the word is for not believing in the reality of Russell's Teapot]-ists. You'd be shocked how many horrible people were part of that movement!
Nazi germany had a weird relationship with Christianity; the country was overwhelmingly religious, the party had some rabid anti-Christian views at the top and seemed to view it as a competing power structure incompatible with their plans, but seems to have decided to put off that fight for later.
> In public speeches, he portrayed himself and the Nazi movement as faithful Christians.[42][43] In 1928 Hitler said in a speech: "We tolerate no one in our ranks who attacks the ideas of Christianity... in fact our movement is Christian."[44] But, according to the Goebbels Diaries, Hitler hated Christianity. In an 8 April 1941 entry, Goebbels wrote "He hates Christianity, because it has crippled all that is noble in humanity."
I mean, if his public speeches describe it as a Christian movement and his right hand man’s private journals describe him as a secret atheist… I dunno, I think it is just typical Nazi incoherence on topics not related to racial hatred.
In general I think it is hard to work out whether a historical figure believes in anything other than power. I’m not sure it makes sense to attribute the evil actions of individual leaders to particular religious belief systems without some pretty deep scrutiny. If you just go by the beliefs they profess, you get a list of which belief systems were popular, because those are the belief systems they went to co-opt.
> For one, science and Christianity are not the enemies many on the Left seem to believe.
Christianity isn't a monolith, so it depends on which flavor of Christianity we're talking about. If we're talking about fundamentalists that interpret the Bible literally (this is a large and politically influential group in the US), then yes, science and those beliefs are incompatible.
I tried! My search came up with *The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" topping the list which, while an amazing book, doesn't feel like what you had in mind...
Getting to watch things like Mormonism (and, to some extent, Scientology, though that's a bit of a different beast) develop under conditions that provide pretty good records and a variety of disinterested accounts, has definitely been instructive for interpreting plausible courses of development of older religions. "Why would all these people lie?" "Why would so many people attest to having seen something that was actually bullshit? It must have happened!"
Well... I mean, you'd think so, but not so much, it turns out.
In today’s world, how much of Netflix “documentaries” are rigorously researched and how much just made up, to save time and money? It is not like Netflix is going to get in trouble, legally or in public opinion…