General statistics
List of Youtube channels
Youtube commenter search
Distinguished comments
About

Evan
Metatron
comments

Comments by "Evan" (@MrEvanfriend) on "Metatron" channel.

Metatron No problem. I was in the US Marine Corps. Also, leave means vacation, when you leave the military for good, that's a discharge.
36
The P and S at the end of Corps are silent.
35
Pineapple on pizza is completely inexcusable.
21
Iceland to Greenland, not Greenland to Iceland.
17
Don't talk shit about R. Lee Ermey. He may not know swords, but so what? It wasn't his job to know swords. And he is a former Marine.
17
+ Riceball01 Anyone who has no problem with women in combat arms has clearly never been in combat arms himself. It's not only the matter of physical strength (most women could not physically do any of the roles in a basic infantry fireteam), but it's also a matter of conditions and culture. Privacy isn't exactly a thing in the field, which would cause far more problems in coed units than it does in all male units. In Iraq, I lived in a hooch with about half a platoon's worth of guys. Let's say a 42 man platoon has a single female. What are they going to do, put the 38 guys (minus platoon Sgt and Lt) in one room and give the lone woman her own? This is a great way to create resentment. Same with any other facilities, like the rare times we had showers. Then there's also the way we interact with one another. It's obviously a dynamic that only works in an all male environment. Much of not most of the culture of a Marine infantry unit would be grossly inappropriate with women involved, and I would argue that our culture helps create as good a fighting force as has ever existed, and should not be tampered with. The way men ought to treat women and the way a fighting unit treats each other are mutually exclusive.
8
Riceball01 This is an amazingly bad analogy. A black man is no less capable than a white man is at any of the basic tasks required of an infantryman. He can carry the same load, run as fast, etc. He has the same testosterone levels, and is capable of the same amount of aggression. His being there causes no sexual tension of any type, and creates none of the privacy issues a woman would. He gets no special treatment because he's black. No massive cultural shift is required to accommodate him. None of the above can be said of a woman. Sex is only similar to race in that it is an immutable characteristic.
7
Riceball01 You're comparing an arbitrary reason for segregation (race) to one based on actual characteristics (sex). Anyone who thought blacks would make inferior soldiers could have easily looked at the Zulus and learned otherwise. Sex is not the same as race. It is a foolish and indefensible position to claim it is. A woman cannot carry the load that a man can. A 140lb woman is relatively large, and significantly weaker than a 140lb man, who will generally be the smallest and weakest guy in his platoon. You're deliberately choosing to ignore eons of relations between men and women to categorically state that women could be integrated into what has been an all male culture for the entirety of its existence based on...nothing. You have not made a single argument for your position based on anything other than pure conjecture, and most of it involves ignoring any and all a priori knowledge of any of the issues involved. You even admit that introducing women into combat units would take "major adjustment". This in and of itself is reason not to do so. The culture in combat units works wonderfully, and to drastically change that culture so as to include people who are physically incapable of performing the basic tasks those units are required to do is insane.
7
ChaoticButterfly The Kurdish units you're talking about are all female, I've never heard of female Spetsnaz units and would like to see some documentation on that one, Chinese special forces aren't exactly good, and I've never heard of the other things you've mentioned. That being said, a soldier is something that one becomes. People are men or women because they were conceived as such. Your argument there holds no water. And what about corporal punishment? It's technically not allowed, but it certainly exists (or at least did 10 years ago when I was in). You cool with a senior hitting a female boot when she fucks up? Of course, you made no argument against the issues that a lack of privacy in the field causes in coed units. Basically everyone who was in my company has seen me take a dump. That's just how it happens. You don't think that it would somehow be the same if a woman had to drop trou in front of 150-odd horny, undersexed men, do you?
6
Riceball01 What you're talking about is introducing change that even you admit would hurt morale and readiness, and to what end? To have a watered down unit with members incapable of meeting the floor-level strength and aggression expected? A unit that teaches men to treat women the way grunts treat each other? It's detrimental any way you look at it. The only upside is the vague political notion of "equality". The very real and very obvious multitude of downsides on every level far outweigh this theoretical upside. Combat units exist to fight and win. There's a reason that war has been exclusively the domain of men for all of history. Why change this? It isn't "progress", it's idiotic social experimentation for its own sake.
6
ChaoticButterfly The Celts and Vikings did not have women fighting, and the idea of "shieldmaidens" is pure fantasy detached from any actual historical evidence, either archeological or written. Try actually researching your "points" before making them. As for samurai, women would take up arms in defense of the home (just like any women anywhere throughout history). This is not the same as being an actual warrior on campaign, something you seem to have trouble understanding. Yes, there are exceptional women in the world. The key word being exceptional. You don't make policy based on exceptions, and exceptional people, male or female, can find success in any number of fields. Putting a single woman into the one job where she is least suited, and where her presence is a problem, isn't taking advantage of her talents, it's making her into a problem. I've heard of that woman, whose name I don't remember, who dressed as a man to fight in the Revolution. If I remember, it all ended poorly. Then there's the more modern record...women like Jessica Lynch, who disgraced herself and the US Army with her cowardice and unpreparedness. Good men died rescuing her. Then there's these "lionesses" in Afghanistan, the female engagement teams who go out and talk to local women. They're an utter waste of resources for no gain. You're taking admin clerks, giving them an infantry escort that could be better used on a real mission, and sending them to talk to...people who have zero agency, thereby gaining nothing useful and annoying their fathers and husbands, who are the ones we're theoretically trying to win over. Your analogy about Rome is incoherent. If the Celtic women had fought, it would have been mentioned by people like Caesar, who fought the Celts. It's notably absent. Furthermore, the Celts were conquered as Rome was ascending, not declining. And then there's the whole thing about not having women in combat makes them "weak". Um, no. Women not being men doesn't make them weak. It makes them women. A society that fails to understand the difference between men and women is a weakened one; as is a society that has women - people who are biologically unsuited for the task - in combat. You seem hung up on the fact that some women can be as strong as a man. Noted. That isn't relevant. A woman's body is less durable than that of a man of equal strength. She has less testosterone, and thus cannot have the propensity for aggression and violence that a man has. And the very fact that she's a woman in an all-male culture creates massive problems with unit cohesion, morale, logistics, and literally everything else that matters to a combat unit.
6
All these stereotypes are from New York Italians. And they're certainly true in New York. New York Italians eat all the above mentioned foods and talk with ridiculous accents. They also tend to mention their Italian heritage constantly, wear pinky rings, and get tattoos of either the Italian flag or the map of Italy (sometimes in the colors of the Italian flag).
4
Kami Nana No, they won't. They don't have the muscle mass or density of men, or the capacity to develop it.
4
Ian M Finally, someone else who actually served in a combat unit and isn't just shouting nonsense based in "social justice" instead of fact.
4
ChaoticButterfly Because her presence would be detrimental to the unit, and her body, hormonal makeup, etc, are not designed for the task.
4
ChaoticButterfly Yes, women have testosterone. At very low levels compared to men. Even of she can make it through the training, her body is not nearly as robust as that of a man. She can carry about half of what a man can without serious risk of injury. She lacks the potential to achieve the upper body strength, speed, and stamina. This is a massive problem in and of itself. More disqualifying than the physical issues are the social ones. Your absurd notions aside, a woman can never be "one of the guys". The idea of a "sister in arms" is frankly laughable, as anyone who has actually served in a combat unit would tell you. The culture of an infantry unit is very testosterone driven and aggressive, and a woman in the mix would throw it all off. As I have previously said, there is no advantage to be gained, and massive disadvantages, to attempting to integrate women into combat units. Letting feminists feel good about themselves isn't worth the harm to military readiness, morale, and unit cohesion. I'm saying this as a former Marine rifleman, and unlike all you "social justice" types, I actually know what I'm talking about.
4
ChaoticButterfly If you're for "fairness", tell me, how is it fair to force a combat unit to accept someone who will drag the unit down because she is biologically unsuited to her job? Someone who can't physically perform with the rest of the unit, and whose very presence is a distraction? Should men sacrifice their lives to your version of "fairness"? Your anecdotal nonsense is entirely pointless. I've known tough girls too, but none who would make an adequate infantryman. As for warrior cultures accepting women AS PART OF THE WARRIOR BAND, who, besides maybe the Scythians? The Chinese emperor who made an "army" of his concubines as a demonstration of discipline? They never fought. The Japanese? No. A woman picking up a spear to defend her home is one thing, a woman going on campaign is something else, and didn't happen. The Vikings? Settlers aren't raiders. Joan of Arc? She dressed up in armor and carried a banner, she didn't actually fight. There is a reason that female warriors are such an anomaly throughout history. You wanna talk about Rome? How is maintaining a fighting force consisting solely of those best qualified to fight anything like the decline of the Roman empire? Bad analogy there.
4
Kami Nana UFC isn't war. These UFC women fight each other, with trainers and medical staff present, for brief, timed matches that they train specifically for. In combat, you're fighting men, for prolonged periods without all that specific attention, while doing sustained strenuous physical activity and carrying heavy loads of weapons, armor, and equipment. UFC is a sport. Combat is deadly real.
4
Kami Nana What they'd be in actual combat is useless, for all the reasons I've mentioned above. A woman shouldn't carry more than 25% of her body weight, because she's virtually guaranteed to hurt herself if she does. This has nothing to do with how conditioned she is, this is based on things like skeletal structure and bone density. An average infantryman carries 60-80lbs of gear. Just because women's UFC is a thing doesn't mean that women in combat is anything other than an atrocious idea that would be beneficial to nobody but the enemy.
4
Fheed Pexx The sagas don't put Ragnar Lodbrok, whose name the show gets consistently wrong, and who was probably mythical, with Hrolf the Walker, who they call by his Latinized name "Rollo" and who was the man who took Normandy as tribute. Nor do they connect either of them with the Lindisfarne raid. The sagas don't put 8th-9th century Scandinavia in a feudal system, because that's retarded. And they don't claim that before Lindisfarne, nobody in Scandinavia knew of the British Isles, because this is also retarded. Basically, nothing in that show is even remotely accurate or authentic other than the ships, which are done wonderfully.
4
Nobody in America calls it that. I don't know about any other English speaking countries, but here it's always called the Czech Republic.
4
***** No, I'm basically saying that women cannot be effective combat soldiers, for all of the above listed reasons. There are very narrow and limited exceptions to this (namely female Soviet snipers in WWII), but as a general rule, women have no place on the battlefield.
3
Oliver Eddy Strength is only ONE of the reasons why women are unfit for combat. Not even the biggest one.
3
TheHornedOne81 That 2707 yd kill you were talking about was with a .338 Lapua, not a 7.62 NATO. And yes, modern firearms are far more accurate than Wild West era black powder weapons. Saying otherwise is somewhat absurd.
3
Then there's also the basic fact that almost no women at any point in history would have worn armor at all...
3
Cornered Fox His show was mostly about guns, which he does know.
3
Of course I haven't read every saga, but I do know that in English (what with me being a native English speaker and all) Ragnar Lodbrok is ALWAYS spelled and pronounced with the D, not the TH. And Hrolf is either referred to in English as Hrolf the Walker or Gangahrolf. It would be nice if they were speaking Old Norse, but as half-assed as that show is, I can see why they're not. It would also be nice if they managed just a little historical accuracy on a couple things, but they don't seem to be going for that, either. I haven't watched the show past the first half of the first season, after that I became too disgusted and gave it up. In the first episode they're acting like there's nothing to the West of Scandinavia, and "Ragnar Lothbrok" has this "revolutionary" idea that there is land, ie the British Isles, to the West. This is ridiculous. You claimed that this moronic show is based on Icelandic sagas, I was pointing out how taking a couple characters from them and a couple unrelated historic events and throwing them all in one jumble is neither true to history (which I know quite a bit about) nor true to the sagas. And they got almost no details right, especially about society. They put these people in a feudal system first and foremost, which is every bit as anachronistic as putting them in the Roman Republic. Then, they make the feudal system such that if you kill the Jarl, you become Jarl yourself, which is just pure fiction. Then they have shieldmaidens, for which there is zero historic evidence, and it is HIGHLY unlikely that such a thing ever existed, because it's an incredibly bad idea on every level. Then they have these ridiculous monstrous priest-demon things, which is also completely false. Oh, and explaining how the guy getting executed is going to Valhalla, which isn't how Norse paganism worked. And of course the whole "my slaves are my equals" thing which was clearly designed more to appeal to modern sensibilities than to give any air of authenticity whatsoever. If you think they got details right, I'd suggest reading some history books on the period, because that shit is no more accurate than Game of Thrones, which at least admits that it's fantasy. I don't remember any jewelry off hand, but the weapons aren't particularly accurate (I recall some rather ridiculous axes and swords slung over shoulders and a conspicuous lack of spears), the "armor" and costumes are by no means accurate, and the ships are really the one redeeming feature of the show. They're done beautifully.
3
Don't chicken wing when shooting rifles/muskets. It's very bad form.
3
***** They're not actually Italians as in "people from Italy who actually speak Italian". They're guys named D'Amato who pepper their speech with occasional Italian words, especially profanity.
2
ShieldWife To be fair, Rome defeated the Celts not because of the individual strength of the Roman legionary vs the Celtic warrior. The Roman army was well trained, disciplined, and used far superior tactics compared to the Celtic combat style of individual warriors not fighting in any cohesive manner. The rest of what you said is all true though.
2
Bart Van Riel Nope, Belgian is the best. After that, American - not the Budweiser crap that most Europeans are familiar with, but the wide variety of beers developed over the past 30 years.
2
You do not have an English accent. Your accent is clearly Continental European, but it's hard to place. You don't necessarily sound Italian per se - there was a man at my university who was the veteran's coordinator or some such who was from Italy, and had a very thick accent, and you don't sound like him, but you don't sound British either.
2
Jason32Bourne Yeah, they do manage to make an M16 look an awful lot like a flamethrower
2
I think this is way cooler than HEMA. HEMA is essentially Renaissance-era unarmored fighting, which isn't particularly exciting. I imagine that guys in armor trying to bash each other with weapons is not only more fun, but far more similar to actual medieval combat than HEMA. Is it perfectly accurate? Of course not. Still cool though.
2
Cornered Fox I don't remember him saying that the 7.62X39 gets better penetration than the 5.56, but then again I haven't seen his show in years. He had a couple episodes about swords and shit to change it up, but that doesn't make him an expert. In the end, he's a celebrity known for being a Marine, and so the History Channel or whoever it was had him in a show about weapons. In this case, he was out of his element. I imagine most of what's wrong there is on the producers and this "Bob" guy.
2
I've never done any reenacting myself, because I've seen WWII reenactors do their thing, and they looked ridiculous. People with no military training attempting tactical maneuvers and whatnot just look like clowns. I was in a real war, and have never felt the need as an adult to play at war. Obviously Roman legionary reenactors have no actual training and will be doing it wrong. That being said, the general lack of armor for the right arm specifically strikes me as odd to say the least. I can think of two possible solutions: First, that the Romans figured it wasn't worth the logistical hassle of having another piece of gear to give to troops who would probably just lose it or break it anyway (at least if Roman legionaries were anything like US Marines, and I suspect they were). Second, they may have decided that armor on the arm was an encumbrance, that any protective value it may have had was offset by reduced effectiveness at throwing a pilum, or something to that effect. All armor is a compromise, and armor that protects you but prevents you from fighting effectively is not a good one. It would be interesting to see statistics from Roman campaigns about where on the body most wounds were taken, and I suspect that it would be the right arm/hand, but I don't think any such data exists.
2
As an American, I can say that learning about firearms at a young age is generally a good thing. I grew up in New York City, which has draconian gun laws, but most of my friends were given a .22 rifle for their 7th birthday. Any children I have will be given a .22 rifle for their 7th birthdays as well. In this case, it was very unfortunate that this girl was handed a weapon that she could not physically use safely. However, bad judgment on behalf of a very few people is a terrible reason to restrict ANY rights, including gun rights. I recently was at a "machine gun tourism" spot in Tennessee. I got to shoot on full auto for the first time since I got out of the Marine Corps 10 years ago. I shot a G36 on full auto. Granted, I have actual military training, but I don't think that that matters. I have no children, but I wouldn't be likely to let my hypothetical 9-year-old daughter shoot an Uzi. That is not to say, by any means, that if some parents have a nine-year-old girl, and decide that it is safe for her to shoot an Uzi, and that properly trained range authorities concur that it is safe, that this hypothetical girl shouldn't be allowed to shoot (on an aside, I don't like the Uzi, because I'm left-handed and I tend to accidentally engage the safety catch as I try to press the trigger). An accident, no matter how horrific, is by no means an excuse for additional infractions on basic rights like gun ownership.
2
I've never been to Italy, so I can't speak to what people in Italy actually do, but Americans of Italian descent sure like getting Italian flag tattoos. And I don't speak Italian other than a couple swear words. I know shit like capo de cazzo, but not what you just said.
1
So that guy dressed in what is presumably an Italian army uniform brings up a question - what are Italian gun laws like? All I know is that you are not allowed to own guns in "military" calibers, hence the 9x21mm pistol caliber, but, as I know Italian shotguns are a (wonderful) thing, does "military calibers" include 12gauge? Because in the Marine Corps, we had Benelli shotguns in 12gauge. Do you own any guns? And what are you allowed to own?
1
I saw that video. According to it, knights were essentially modern bums. They don't attempt to back any of it up with any actual information, and it seems to be just iconoclasm for its own sake with some shock value thrown in.
1
Bart Van Riel Heineken and Amstel Lite are available worldwide. Both are terrible. Beyond that, Dutch beer is hard to come by. But I can find Saison DuPont and Rodenbach and Rochefort at most decent beer stores in the US.
1
GIOVANNI THE NEAPOLITAN Both of those beers are terrible. I've had a decent beer from Italy before, it was some kind of Belgian style dubbel. I don't remember what it was called.
1
stoffel Belgium actually has the most breweries per capita of any country, and far more diverse styles than Germany. German beers are all pretty similar and in very few styles. Belgian beer you have everything from a wit to a lambic to an oude bruin to a blonde to an abbey quad.
1
stoffel I've never had Westvleteren, because the one time they sold it in the US, it sold out immediately, and I haven't been able to get to Belgium, much less go through the whole song and dance required to actually buy some. I brewed a clone though, which should be ready to drink in a few months.
1
stoffel Yup, I'm very familiar with St Bernardus Abt 12. One of my favorite beers. And I think you're right about the relationship with Westvleteren, I know they had one but don't remember the details. Esen I'm not at all familiar with, but I'll be sure to try and check it out.
1
Bart Van Riel Heineken is what is usually available outside the Netherlands. The only other Dutch beer I've ever had was La Trappe Quadruple, which is a Trappist beer that was quite good, but not as good as some of the similar ones I've had from Belgium, like Rochefort 10 or St Bernardus Abt 12.
1
Bart Van Riel I've never even heard of that.
1
GIOVANNI THE NEAPOLITAN Coming from a guy who likes Heineken and Peroni, that doesn't mean much. Especially when Belgian beers are consistently rated the best in the world.
1
GIOVANNI THE NEAPOLITAN Yeah, but objectively, it sucks.
1
Bart Van Riel Oh yeah, I forgot about Grolsch. Not a fan at all.
1
stoffel American beer has gotten quite good over the last 20 years or so. We now have something like 4000 breweries across the country brewing every style of beer imaginable. Homebrewing is a growing hobby as well.
1
Nazdreg1 I've had a beer in Ireland once. On my way back from Iraq, we stopped at the Shannon airport. I had a Beamish Red. I hadn't had a beer in seven months, and so it was the best beer I'd ever had. Objectively though, Irish beer isn't that great. I much prefer Belgian, English, and German beer.
1
Jonathan Banchetti Beer is better than wine though, and good beer is gonna be expensive anywhere. I've spent over $30 on a bottle of beer a number of times.
1
Piroclanidis Nobody cares about kids in Africa. If you do care about kids in Africa, you're wrong.
1
+Bart Van Riel Homebrewer or professional? I just brewed a saison today
1
Bart Van Riel Oh ok. I got into home brewing about a year ago, and I quite enjoy it.
1
TadRaunch Tastes like it too. Baltika is pretty awful.
1
TadRaunch That isn't something to brag about. I like a drink as much as anyone, but I either make my own or buy the good stuff.
1
I could kill a knight quite easily. A guy on a horse wearing shiny stuff and bright colors makes a rather easy target. And remember, the fully armored knight faded from history with the invention and improvement of gunpowder weapons. With modern autoloading rifles, spitzer bullets, and smokeless powders, it wouldn't be much of a contest.
1
He is quite often wrong when he attempts to talk about modern military stuff, and especially guns, which he is almost always wrong about.
1
I spent a year and a half in Okinawa, and my Japanese was limited to my phone number, a few pleasantries, and a few swear words/insults. I spent seven months in Iraq, and I could at least carry on a conversation in broken Arabic (though a rifle sure helps when you're trying to make yourself understood). I speak a little German, not as much as I used to, because I never get a chance to use it, and I've taught myself to read Russian, but the only words I know are profanity and whatever I can figure out from similarity to words in English or some other language I have whatever minor familiarity with.
1
Post offices are as fucked up as a football bat practically everywhere. In the US, when you move, the post office is where you go to get a voter registration form. When I moved to Queens, I got mine in Chinese, which I don't read, nor am I even remotely mistakable for a chinaman. That post office also just stopped delivering my mail for about six months for no good reason. In Philadelphia, I once went to the post office to get a stamp and an envelope to mail off a check or something. After spending 30 seconds looking at one sheet of stamps, and another minute or so looking at a separate sheet of stamps, and comparing the two (which were identical), the postal worker informed me that they didn't sell stamps. They also lost a camera full of pictures from Iraq, which I had mailed to my girlfriend to get the pictures developed. It never got there.
1
Cocking/taking the safety off of Glocks. That's one of my favorites. Ridiculous flamethrower muzzle blasts. Pistol hits throwing people across rooms. Suppressors going onto non-threaded barrels - including revolvers.
1
No, no, no, no no! NEVER shoot for the legs, you always aim center mass. You have no business shooting at anyone you aren't willing to kill in the first place, and a shot to the chest is FAR more likely to stop the fight, and is an easier target to hit. Aim center mass, this is what every organization in the world that trains people to use firearms in combat or self-defense will tell you.
1
Naval personnel are sailors, not soldiers. And the word "corps" is pronounced as "core", the ps at the end is silent. That being said, having to wear your uniform while on liberty must suck. And a 10PM curfew also sounds horrid. In the US military, once you secure for the day, you can put on civilian attire and do basically whatever you want (within some basic limits) so long as you're back by formation the next morning.
1
***** I can't speak for the Italian military, but the English word "soldier" does not apply to naval sailors.
1
***** But since it doesn't work in English, use of the English word "soldier" is incorrect. I don't speak Italian and as such can't tell you what the Italian words are, but, if you're gonna speak English, the proper word to use for naval personnel is "sailor".
1
***** It's incorrect. A soldier in a navy implies naval infantry, like the US/Royal Marines. Naval personnel are sailors.
1
***** It does matter, and I would imagine that as a non-native English speaker, he would welcome the correction. When I say something wrong in my imperfect German or my horrendous Russian, I welcome corrections.
1
***** As a former US Marine, I prefer the title that I earned, but I don't mind being referred to as a soldier when it comes down to it, as I was engaged in ground combat. I don't care what Thelonius has to say, or what the correct term in Italian is, the fact remains that in English, a sailor and a soldier are two different things, and to call a sailor a soldier is every bit as incorrect as calling a soldier a sailor.
1
***** It is a fact. A navy is not an army. Naval personnel are sailors, army personnel are soldiers.
1
***** I understand the origins of the word, however, the language has evolved to the point where soldier and sailor mean different things. You wouldn't call a soldier a sailor, and by the same token, you wouldn't call a sailor a soldier.
1
Get a haircut.
1
Celtic Noble Ever been in a fight? The formal moves tend to go out the window, and there's a lot of swinging.
1
Celtic Noble What makes you say that? The concept makes perfect sense, but that doesn't change the fact that actual fights don't look like Bruce Lee movies.
1
You can't really talk about American pizza. There's too much difference. You have that nasty Pizza Hut shit that's prevalent in most of the country, then the Chicago style deep dish, which is also weird and wrong, and then you have New York pizza, which can essentially be divided into Neopolitan (thin and round) and Sicilian (thick and square). New York pizza is the only one that's any good, and it can be hard to find outside of the Greater New York area (though I have found decent examples in Pennsylvania and in North Carolina). That being said, you may think you want to visit New York, but you don't. I grew up there, and have spent over half my life there, and I refuse to go there anymore. It's an absolutely disgusting city in every way. The pizza and the New York Mets are really the only worthwhile things in the entire city. And Gray's Papaya, which are the world's best hot dogs, hands down.
1
As far as faith as a battlefield attribute goes, the people I fought in Iraq were fighting for nothing other than their demonic god and false prophet. Their faith didn't help them much.
1
Not only is the physical strength difference important, and the fact mentioned by others that men are far more expendable than women, but there's another factor as well: Testosterone, the male sex hormone, causes aggression - which is a useful thing for a fight. Men are naturally more prone to and capable of violence. Going into a fight, you want larger, stronger, and meaner people to do your fighting. In every case, this means men.
1
The money one is done in America as well.
1
I don't get why those two jousting helmets were even there. Nothing particularly spectacular about them.
1
Isn't it primus pilus, with the masculine "us" ending as opposed to the neuter "um"?
1
You make valid points, but the big picture here is that virtually any English speaker - at least a native English speaker - can tell an American from a Briton. And with mass media, accents are becoming more generic. In the Marine Corps, I knew Utahns, Texans, and Floridians. Most of them spoke with a general non-regional American accent. Myself, I am a native of New York, but my mother is from Tennessee. To my own ear, my accent sounds very generic American. In the Corps, I found that some people thought I had a thick New York accent - which was occasionally mistaken for a Boston accent (I sound nothing like a Bostonian). When I left the Marines and moved back to New York, people thought I had a southern accent. In Pennsylvania, where I live now, nobody notices any particular accent of mine - though I plainly don't speak with the Pennsylvania accent where "home" is pronounced "h'yome" and "water" is pronounced "wudder". Nobody hearing me speak has ever thought I was anything but American, except for one German guy who I had a brief conversation in German with at a bar in Queens, NY, who thought I was German mostly because I had ordered a beer that apparently isn't well known outside of Bamberg. Certainly nobody has ever mistaken me for an Englishman.
1
Even in modern armies, women are horribly unsuited for combat. It's not just a matter of shooting a rifle (though a Marine Corps study said that men were about 50% better at that as well). A modern soldier carries quite a bit of armor, weapons, ammunition, and other equipment. Something like 60-80lbs. That shit gets heavy. A man can generally carry up to half of his body weight in gear for an extended period without hurting himself. For women, it's 25% of body weight, any more than that and they become increasingly likely to suffer injuries. Furthermore, the very basic issue that makes men far better suited to combat - testosterone - remains. Women are simply not capable of the levels of strength and aggression, two very necessary attributes for a successful soldier, that men are. Sure, the majority of modern armies consist of support roles, and sure, women make fine administrators and logisticians. I don't think anyone contests that (though there is the effect of women integrated into units that is troublesome even there - prostitution, STDs, pregnancies, real and imagined sexual assaults, and the general discord that comes from having a very small female minority amongst a large number of young, undersexed men), but support troops are not combat troops, and the dichotomy there is very real. A woman who might be excellent at making sure I get paid, probably far better at it than I could ever be, would not be able to keep up kicking down doors. Case in point: When the Obama administration made its disastrous attempt to integrate women into combat units, 36 women went to the Marine Corps' School of Infantry at Camp Lejeune. Three passed. I had not previously heard of ANYONE failing SOI.
1
Is there any evidence of legionaries wearing any type of armor on their right arm? Because based on what I know about Roman legionary combat, it seems to me like the right arm is really the only bit of the body that spends any significant time not behind a shield, and as such, seems very vulnerable without any armor at all.
1
Metatron How widespread was this?
1
When I was about eleven years old, my mother had a family friend, a retired Latin professor, attempt to teach me Latin. At the time, I had zero interest, and spent these lessons making up my own "Latin" words like "crotus" and "bortobullus" and similar nonsense. Twenty years later, I really regret gaffing this opportunity off. The man who was attempting to teach me died in 1999, and basically all I remember was that V is pronounced as W, as in "EVANVS, (you have a) VACVVM MENTE". As an adult, I know a very few phrases/prayers in Latin, my favorite being BENEDICTVS DOMINVS DEVS MEVS QVI DOCET MANVS MEVS AD PRAELIVM ET DIGITOS MEVS AD BELLVM. Hindsight being 20/20, I would have payed attention, but at the time I just wanted to fool around with my friends. Right now, I can't remember a single name of the kids I gaffed off Latin to go play with. What a waste.
1
Legionaries would lose all of these. They were soldiers who were trained to fight as a unit, and their training and equipment was not geared towards one on one combat. So yeah, one on one, the legionary would be likely to lose against most other historical warriors. For these who can beat who things, you'd need units. A century against a Viking raid? Interesting. A duel? Not so much.
1
I imagine that the gladius was better against armored opponents than a spear would for one simple reason - it can be aimed with more precision. Fighting an opponent in some form of mail armor, I'd rather be able to close with him behind the shield wall and aim at the gaps in his armor with a short sword than try to hit him with a spear from six feet (more or less two meters) out. With the gladius you can it an unarmored arm, leg, or neck far better than you could with a spear, for the simple fact that it's shorter. Therefore my conclusion is essentially the opposite of yours - that the gladius was more effective against armored opponents than a spear is, for the simple reason that you can use it more precisely. Against unarmored opponents, there is no need to use a short sword when any strike will kill/disable your enemy at a longer distance. Against an armored opponent, a spear may be deflected, whereas a thrust from a short sword at face-to-face distance can be stuck in an armpit or a thigh or a neck or some other uncovered body part.
1
I thought that the source of Caligula's nickname was common knowledge. Apparently, he was not particularly fond of this nickname as an adult. And I can't really blame him either. If I was the most powerful man in the world, I wouldn't want to go by "Bootsie" or anything like that, it isn't exactly dignified. And caligae were indeed sandals. A sandal is "A light shoe with either an openwork upper or straps attaching the sole to the foot." The thick soles and high ankles of caligae don't foreclose any part of that definition. They may be boot sandals or military sandals or what have you, but they are sandals. Ox and cow are both cattle - they're the same species, the difference is what they're used for. Thus ox leather and cow leather are the exact same thing. Infantry is infantry. If you live on your feet, you learn the importance of taking care of them. That means if your boots are worn out, it's time to get a new pair. This is true whether you're a legionary or a lance corporal, whether your TO weapon is a gladius or an M27 IAR, whether those boots are caligae or Danners.
1
The word Corps in English is pronounced as "core", not as "corpse". Your English is incredibly good, if accented, but as a former member of the United States Marine Corps, that mispronunciation really gets at me. Then again, my Italian is limited to "capo di cazzo" and various other New York Sicilianisms that I can't even imagine how they're spelled (all profane of course), so I guess I'm not in much of a position to speak on the topic.
1
Modern British soldiers are still forced to fight right-handed. This is because the L85/L86 rifle/light machine gun are not usable by lefties. And I don't know this for a fact, but I imagine that in the age of bolt action rifles, many if not most armies forced their soldiers to fight right handed. This is because as a lefty myself, I find that manipulating the bolt on bolt action rifles is far harder than it is for right handers. I personally own a Lee-Enfield No. III, and I find that left handed, I cannot come anywhere close to replicating the famous "mad minute", as the time it takes me to cycle the bolt with my left hand is far longer, and involves far more movement than it does for a right handed person. In the age of flintlock muskets, soldiers were forced to fight right handed as well, because the flash in the pan of a flintlock can take out a lefty's eye. The fact is that about 85% of the human population is right handed, and weapons and tactics tend to be designed for that 85%, with lefties either relegated to an afterthought or not thought of at all. I'm sure this has led to countless examples of right hand specific weapons and combat tactics, that lefties had to learn to adjust to.
1
War is often just. It all depends on the cause. In WWII, for instance, the United States were never under serious direct threat from either Germany or Japan. However, I do not think it can be reasonably argued that the Marine on Guadalcanal battling the Japanese, malaria, malnutrition, and the generally horrible circumstances on that island were unjust in what they were doing. Nor can the soldier freezing in the Bois Jaques, holding the line against a vastly superior German force. Their cause was just, and therefore their actions were. When I was 19, I went to war in Iraq, a war that was unpopular then and is even more so now. I remain convinced that my fight was a just one. While the experience was one I'm glad to have behind me, I am very glad that I fought Islam on the streets of Fallujah rather than the streets of Philadelphia. There are men and ideologies that need to be stopped, and words do not always work to stop them. When that is the case, the mailed fist is the only option, and it is a righteous one. This is why the warrior is revered. Because war is truly the highest calling of man, as horrible as it is for the warrior himself. That a man is willing to put himself through hell to attain a result that he may well not live to see is everything that should be honored. This is not to say that war, just or not, does not have innocent victims. The tens of thousands of civilians who died in the respective firebombings of Dresden and Tokyo were, for the most part, decent people who had the bad luck of being from the wrong place, and they suffered and died for it. As cruel as it sounds, their deaths were worth it. The Third Reich and the Empire of Japan needed to be stopped at all costs, and if immolating tens of thousands of their people was what it took to batter these regimes to their knees, then so be it. In many situations, someone ends up on the short end of the stick, this is unavoidable. And in some situations, such as war, this can be for the greater good. 100,000 Tokyo civilians is a small price to pay for the billions of people today who live without the Imperial Japanese boot on their necks.
1
There is FAR more wrong with that retarded show than just the costumes and armor. First, they can't even get the names of the primary characters right. Ragnar LODBROK (not "Lothbrok") is a well known probably mythical figure. Gangahrolf, or Hrolf the Walker, had his name Latinized as Rollo, but certainly didn't call himself that. Second, they're putting 8th-9th century Scandinavians in a feudal system. No, not at all. And to make it worse, you become Jarl by killing the old Jarl, which is the way that no feudal system ever has worked. Then there's the claim that before Lindisfarne, the Norse had no idea that the British Isles existed. Again, no. Then, they have executed people going to Valhalla, when Valhalla was only for those slain in battle, and not even all of them. Then, they add to the historical confusion and popular false imagine of women being on raids. Again, THIS DIDN'T HAPPEN FOR ANY NUMBER OF BIOLOGICAL AND CULTURAL REASONS. I can't emphasize that strongly enough. Then you have the main character with the ridiculous haircut whose name they couldn't even be bothered to get right treating his slaves as equals, because a modern audience generally tends to be against slavery, so they feel the need to soften that reality to appeal to them. No, slaves were not treated as equals there or anywhere else. And this was all just from the first half of the first season, after which I was too disgusted to keep watching, since they'd already gotten basically everything wrong. Also, Ragnar Lodbrok was probably mythical, but even so he is in no way connected with the Lindisfarne raid, or, for that matter, with Hrolf the Walker. Basically, the only thing that show did a decent job on was the ships. They look good. Everything else is pretty much terrible. They should have just gone ahead and put them in the horned helmets, because the lack of horned helmets seems to be the only concession to authenticity that they made.
1
Who the hell still calls it Bohemia? And I believe Bohemia is just a region within the Czech Republic and not the whole country, but I don't know enough about the place to be sure.
1
Hearing those two passages, it's somewhat understandable how Rome ruled the world while modern day Italy is kind of a third rate power whose politics can be somewhat of an international laughingstock (no offense to Italians).
1
Latin is used for Mass, not for Liturgy. While the differences may seem mainly semantic, they did manage to cause a rift between the Western and Eastern Churches that has lasted for over a millenium. We Catholics (I'm assuming you're Catholic because you're Italian) hear Mass , which used to be in Latin but has been in vernacular my whole life; in Greece or Russia or the few left alive in Egypt or Syria hear the Liturgy in their vernacular. The differences between Western and Eastern Christianity are actually quite interesting. They all seem incredibly minor to the layman, but the consequences of these differences shaped history. And half of them seem to be over the Latin word "FILIOQVE"
1
Knight wins, no doubt. The Roman Legions were effective because the legionaries fought as a unit, they weren't trained for individual combat, whereas knights were trained specifically for that. The legionary would be out of his element, regardless of the weapons the knight used.
1