Fun & Games with Western History:

[bellatrys]

Charlemagne was poly, a remarried divorcé, and a child-molester.

Who slaughtered POWs and gave people the choice of joining his religion or being killed.

But he was a European Christian and a folk-hero from whom many (some of whom are certainly entitled) proudly claim descent today, so it's not to be mentioned, any of this

Comments

[fledgist]

I, for one, am descended from him. But I'm hardly surprised.

I get a kick out of all the people who are Proud To Be An American

[bellatrys]

Cause At Least I Know I'm Free™ (rah rah democracy &c) - and if you give them the least opening, they will whip out the information that they have a Family Crest and a Family Tree that proves they're descended from umpteen kings and queens and princes, all the way back to King Arthur Charlemagne.

(But of course, Asian folks being proud of being descended from Genghis Khan is totally incomprehensible.)

Re: I get a kick out of all the people who are Proud To Be An American

[fledgist]

Well, you know, I'm not exactly Amurrican (being born in London of Jamaican and Spanish parents makes that difficult).

I know, and I didn't expect you had one from the mall, either

[bellatrys]

I just have run across it so many times from the "We Don't Have Royalty, We're All EQUAL Cause It's a DEMOCRACY and that means WE RULE!!!1!" crowd that it isn't surprising any more, but it still is funny though I never point out the irony to them. (I'm sure CMOT Dibbler has a great sideline in selling them to greengrocers and chambermaids...)

[cbpotts]

But it's not hypocrisy when *we* do it. Only when other people do it.

*head desk*

You've got it in one--

[bellatrys]

Clay? What clay? We don't know what you're talking about, we don't notice anything--

Re: You've got it in one--

[lyorn]

Now that I'm thinking about it, history is a lot like clay...

Re: You've got it in one--

[fledgist]

Sticky and brown?

[voxwoman]

yes, but... *everyone* was doing that back then... That makes it OK, doesn't it? (do I need the sarcasm tags?)

Only if you're white and/or Christian

[bellatrys]

That makes it OK, doesn't it?

Not if you're brown or yellow (and not a Copt.)

Re: Only if you're white and/or Christian

[tekanji]

Only if you're white and/or Christian

That's what voxwoman said... everyone.

Just in case someone doesn't know I'm being sarcastic... I'm being sarcastic.

Sarcasm?

[bellatrys]

What is this 'sarcasm' you speak of? Is it some inscrutable foreign thing you have picked up Out East?

[ann_leckie]

Everyone of European descent is probably descended from Charlemagne one way or another. We just don't all know the steps that go back to him.

This makes it even more certain that he Did No Wrong, of course.

(And in one of those weird coincidences, I was thinking of the Song of Roland just yesterday. Or at least, thinking of the class I read it in.)

Ironically,

[bellatrys]

I didn't plan it this way, but it turns out I'm significantly less than ten degrees from the author (Dr. Diane Moczar) cited in the blog post I linked to. That just happened via googledowsing, happened to be the first hagiographical fawning over Charlemagne that I ran across...

It's a small internets, too.

[tlachtga]

Ah, the Song of Roland--where medieval revisionists turn the original Christian Basque enemies into evil Saracens.

It's just so... appropriate.

[lyorn]

This makes it even more certain that he Did No Wrong, of course.

Considering the shitty stuff my grandfather did, I don't exactly feel a lot of inherited guilt from a guy who died 1200 years ago.

[wordweaverlynn]

This is why we have to decide who are the Good Guys and who are the Bad Guys. You can tell the Bad Guys because they're against freedom, so they go around invading countries, toppling democratically elected governments, arresting people and locking them away for years without trial, torturing prisoners, spreading lies and propaganda, and shooting people.

We're fighting for freedom, so we're the Good Guys. That's why real Americans cheer when we protect freedom by invading countries, toppling democratically elected governments, arresting people and locking them away for years without trial, torturing prisoners, spreading lies and propaganda, and shooting people.

Factoid: Everybody with European blood is descended from Charlemagne.

Ah, I see you have clearly grasped

[bellatrys]

the essentials of Exceptionalism and Willful Ignorance that are required for the Good Triumphalist to sleep o' nights!

[voxwoman]

I love the subheader everyone of European ancestry is descended from Muhammad and Charlemagne - I didn't even know Muhammad and Charlemagne were dating, much less had any offspring.

Does any or all of this count for the Jews (who are all descended from King David *and* the Bal Shem Tov)?

*wiping liquid off keyboard*

[deiseach]

"I didn't even know Muhammad and Charlemagne were dating"

Oh dear - now I want someone to write that story! In suitably overwrought Purple Prose of Angst with Song Lyrics (of course, because how else can the proper emotional resonance be expressed save through the lyrics from teenage bands I've never heard of?) and Author's Own Poetry.

Like, Charlie totally breaks Mo's heart when he dumps him at Roncesvalles! And he didn't even do it face-to-face, but he got his pal Rollie to tell him!