Lying to People about History Doesn't Help Them

The Neo-Ciceronian Times ^ | January 04, 2017 | Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus

[Jeff Chandler]

; )

[DiogenesLamp]

Account suspended?

It is a great article. What is going on there???

A lot of people use joke "account suspended" messages on their about page.

It's a joke.

[Greetings_Puny_Humans]

LOL, I just looked at your profile.

[Jeff Chandler]

Any movie, and I don't care which one you name, that says it was "Based of a true story" is actually very, very loosely based on a true story.

Yep. When a movie set in Missouri says it was "Based on a true story" the "true" part is often the fact that there does exist a state named Missouri.

[xp38]

If you had to select one person responsible for the US space program this would be him. Katherine Johnson was part of it as were thousands of others and many other countries also helped out but this was the face of the space program for decades.

[rlmorel]

Ahhhh. I get it. See, been around for a while, but never ran into that one...:)

Thanks!

[DiogenesLamp]

They put unqualified people in positions of great authority

Obama.

[DiogenesLamp]

I rest my case.

That modern Democrats rewrite history does not prove your case. In the past, these big city titans of finance and globalism were called "Republicans."

Only the names have changed. The people doing these things still pretty much live in the big coastal cities, same as in 1861.

[rlmorel]

I learned that the hard way...

If I see “this is a true story”, I now read it very differently than “this is based on a true story”.

Based on a true story means the hole of non-truth can be so big you could fly an airplane through it. And they do.

[DoodleDawg]

So please let me know what history-based movie you believe was totally accurate, start to finish?

[steve8714]

The Babe Ruth Story. Word for word. Frame for frame.

[Fraxinus]

Sub-saharan Africa wasn’t stuck in the stone age because its inhabitants were largely nomadic, nor because they tended to have lower average IQs than most other people groups. No, it was because the white man stole all their technology and learning and left them in the stone age (which, in and of itself, grossly miscomprehends how knowledge and technique spread across the ancient world).

I really dilike the claim that subsaharan Africans have lower IQs, as it may or may not actually be true and is nearly irrelevant. IQ tests have a severe problem with mis-use as those trying to use them often can make no case for how they are relevant or what they actually test for (I suspect just being literate could get you over 50).

Much of Sub-saharan Africa did not have advanced civilization for three reinforcing reasons: 1> The pre-colonial crops did not lend themselves to storage and transport. 2> Very limited ability to use water transport (I believe the Incas were the only civilization that did not use water transport both intensively and extensively). 3> Once you did travel in most of tropical Africa, you had a high likely-hood of getting very ill.

[upchuck]

You mean some FReepers have the brazen audacity to ban and suspend themselves? The very idea! You must be joking!

[imardmd1]

This is all well and good regarding "modern" history, near history, but whant about history further bacK? What if we are lying to our children about "evolution"? That is, as compared to Biblical history, eh?

The telling of history always needs some component of faith in the raconteur, doesn't one?

[prof.h.mandingo]

You are confusing a documentary film and even then they can be inaccurate. There are varying degrees of truthfulness in these “based on” movies. In my opinion “Tora,Tora,Tora,” was quite good, for the most part. “Midway” without Chuck Heston and the stupid love story was another.

As a child what killed the “Battle of the Bulge” was the fact both sides used M-48 Patton's instead of Shermans and Tigers. Even at that young age we all knew what a Tiger looked like.
Even movies like Gladiator were quite good in the initial battle scenes. I even used the first sequence in class as an example of how the later Roman Army fought. They were the U.S. Army of their day.
It always come down to a matter of degree. When a movie tries to encourage an agenda it needs to be pointed out.

[DoodleDawg]

The Babe Ruth Story. Word for word. Frame for frame.

The 1948 version? There are quite a few errors in that.

[DoodleDawg]

No, I think the author is confusing feature films with documentaries. Hidden Figures is a feature film. It's meant for entertainment. It isn't meant to be a documentary, so for someone to get upset because they take some liberties with the truth is idiotic.

[Reily]

What killed the “Battle of the Bulge” movie for me was the effort to make the battle hinge around a fuel dump - a gasoline fuel dump! German tanks used diesel! I knew that even as a kid. Also as I remember the movie it gave little mention of Bastogne.

[CardCarryingMember.VastRightWC]

Yes, this historical-rewrite propaganda movie will fail in the theaters, like all the rest of them do.

BUT SO WHAT?

That fact is irrelevant.

The true impact of this kind of garbage is that it will be required viewing for your kids & grandkids. Longterm, your local taxes will ensure that this film will turn a profit for its makers & a debit for its viewers.

[Reily]

You’re using the argument my wife uses when these types of pseudo-history movies are on. The thing is people believe this stuff as ACTUAL HISTORY! She says, “No they don’t!”, to which I reply, “You should get out more!”.

The best example was all the nonsense I heard about the “Red Tails” squadron when that film came out. Did you know we wouldn’t have won the air war in Europe without them? They alone swept the skies of the Luftwaffe!

I heard stuff like that from people at work. Supposedly highly educated people. If I pointed out that it wasn’t quite that way, I could see the ‘he (meaning me!) most be a racist’ gears grinding in their heads.