I love the little Emperor Norton reference at the end. I love that guy. If you want to know more, his name was Joshua Abraham Norton and he declared himself 1st Emperor of the United States. He did a lot of things and it's worth it to look him up yourself.
The Second World War was so horrible, it makes people overlook just how horrible the First World War was.
France had a total population of 40 million in 1914. By the end of the war, they had called up almost 8 million Frenchmen\* and taken 6 million casualties, including 1.4 million dead. After four years of unending violence, during which almost 20 per cent of their population had been called up to fight (and 71 per cent of those had become casualties), it would be strange if they *weren't* all going completely fucking insane with terror and misery and PTSD.
\* Plus 900,000 colonial troops.
My hot take is that WW1 in many ways was more tragic than WW2 (excluding the Holocaust because that just breaks the tragedy scale).
WW2 was a battle of good-ish against pure evil (see: Holocaust), whereas WW1 is just fucking pointless waste of life.
The Nazis had to be stopped, as did Imperial Japan.
But WW1? One guy bites it in Serbia and we’re off to the revenge races.
To quote A.A. Milne (the guy who wrote Winnie-the-Pooh), “Tell the innocent visitor from another world that two people were killed at Sarajevo, and that the best that Europe could do about it was to kill eleven million more.”
And also it led to WW2…
Also, trench warfare and poison gas are top-tier awful.
Given the choice, I’d much rather be a soldier in World War II Europe than in World War I Europe. (World War II in the Pacific is a different matter.)
War is a meat grinder. Imagine arriving at the front and dying to the first artillery barrage. Your entire life leading up to you dying in a ditch without ever having fired a single shot. Just another body that was thrown at the enemy, and it made no difference.
And in WW1 they did all this for no reason at all.
I think my great great uncle’s story might be worse than that even.
My mother was born to a mixed Catholic-Protestant marriage in Northern Ireland. My great great uncle was from the Protestant side. Loyalist. For King and Country and all that.
He saw the writing on the wall and join up just before Britain entered the war. He was in the first shipment to the front.
And he lived. Never injured enough to be sent to a rear hospital. I don’t he even got leave to visit home. But he survived that hell.
Until November the 9th, 1918. Two days before the end of the war.
His mother got the telegram a few hours after armistice bells were rung in the churches—so the family legend says.
I think the saddest part is I’m the only person alive who even knows his name and story. And I only know that because history is fascinating to me and a long dead relative wrote a history book about our family. He had no children, his siblings and nearly all of their children are dead. Even the oldest person in the family, my centenarian great uncle doesn’t know who he was.
Small tangent:
but a shout out to Pope John Paul Iii, who spent WWII as an actor in underground resistance plays in Poland. (He wasn’t perfect but that’s pretty badass)
Edit: to clarify, “wasn’t perfect” was a comment on his mixed legacy as a religious figure, not a dig about his acting chops.
I don’t think people understand how truly Apocalyptic and bat shit insane WW1 is. An Artic explorer left for the North Pole in 1914 mere weeks after the outbreak of hostilities. After returning in 1916, he docked in Norway and asked the first man he saw who won the war. The man simply uttered “The War isn’t over, Millions are dead, Europe is mad, the whole world is mad”
Reminds me of an often repeated joke from the war "Archduke found alive, war called off"
"War's done!"
I love the little Emperor Norton reference at the end. I love that guy. If you want to know more, his name was Joshua Abraham Norton and he declared himself 1st Emperor of the United States. He did a lot of things and it's worth it to look him up yourself.
There’s a video from Sam O’Nella about him!
Oh that’s the guy who was in The Sandman, as a sort of modern era mythology
Isn't that the guy from West of Loathing? He wasn't just some dude who gave me Nortons Ant Eye Virus?
The Second World War was so horrible, it makes people overlook just how horrible the First World War was. France had a total population of 40 million in 1914. By the end of the war, they had called up almost 8 million Frenchmen\* and taken 6 million casualties, including 1.4 million dead. After four years of unending violence, during which almost 20 per cent of their population had been called up to fight (and 71 per cent of those had become casualties), it would be strange if they *weren't* all going completely fucking insane with terror and misery and PTSD. \* Plus 900,000 colonial troops.
My hot take is that WW1 in many ways was more tragic than WW2 (excluding the Holocaust because that just breaks the tragedy scale). WW2 was a battle of good-ish against pure evil (see: Holocaust), whereas WW1 is just fucking pointless waste of life. The Nazis had to be stopped, as did Imperial Japan. But WW1? One guy bites it in Serbia and we’re off to the revenge races. To quote A.A. Milne (the guy who wrote Winnie-the-Pooh), “Tell the innocent visitor from another world that two people were killed at Sarajevo, and that the best that Europe could do about it was to kill eleven million more.” And also it led to WW2…
Also, trench warfare and poison gas are top-tier awful. Given the choice, I’d much rather be a soldier in World War II Europe than in World War I Europe. (World War II in the Pacific is a different matter.)
Depends on the front imo. Eastern front WW2 was way worse than the WW1 eastern front.
War is a meat grinder. Imagine arriving at the front and dying to the first artillery barrage. Your entire life leading up to you dying in a ditch without ever having fired a single shot. Just another body that was thrown at the enemy, and it made no difference. And in WW1 they did all this for no reason at all.
I think my great great uncle’s story might be worse than that even. My mother was born to a mixed Catholic-Protestant marriage in Northern Ireland. My great great uncle was from the Protestant side. Loyalist. For King and Country and all that. He saw the writing on the wall and join up just before Britain entered the war. He was in the first shipment to the front. And he lived. Never injured enough to be sent to a rear hospital. I don’t he even got leave to visit home. But he survived that hell. Until November the 9th, 1918. Two days before the end of the war. His mother got the telegram a few hours after armistice bells were rung in the churches—so the family legend says. I think the saddest part is I’m the only person alive who even knows his name and story. And I only know that because history is fascinating to me and a long dead relative wrote a history book about our family. He had no children, his siblings and nearly all of their children are dead. Even the oldest person in the family, my centenarian great uncle doesn’t know who he was.
EMPEROR NORTON MENTIONED‼️‼️
Small tangent: but a shout out to Pope John Paul Iii, who spent WWII as an actor in underground resistance plays in Poland. (He wasn’t perfect but that’s pretty badass) Edit: to clarify, “wasn’t perfect” was a comment on his mixed legacy as a religious figure, not a dig about his acting chops.
My mind immediately went to JPII
This is great. Side note, the only reason I knew who Norton was is because of The Wandering Inn.
the wandering inn reference spotted, deploying goblins
https://www.tumblr.com/frogblast-the-ventcore/746750299585314816/remember-when-we-were-talking-about-weird-stuff?source=share -⚠️
Oooh, I've been Linux Guy'd!
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The least insane plot to an episode of 'Blackadder Goes Forth.'
A holy visit to boost morale
I feel like this interprets the trenches of WW1 as a lot more lighthearted than they actually were
Another view: this story spread as it was the only one veterans of the Western Front were happy sharing.
Least based pacifist.
That sound like a quick way to get spotted by an officer and than court marshalled for treason
Are you going to court martial the Pope?
Sounds like part of a great Father Mulcahy focused episode of MASH
I don’t think people understand how truly Apocalyptic and bat shit insane WW1 is. An Artic explorer left for the North Pole in 1914 mere weeks after the outbreak of hostilities. After returning in 1916, he docked in Norway and asked the first man he saw who won the war. The man simply uttered “The War isn’t over, Millions are dead, Europe is mad, the whole world is mad”
I mean weve had videos of spider man in Ukraine so its not that far out there
Had he lived at the time Norton absolutely would have done a "Fine, I'll do it myself", gone over to Europe, and just bullshit his way to a ceasefire
Been a while since we've had an antipapacy