PBS SECRETS OF THE DEAD, WERE THERE WOMEN GLADIATORS? MISSED AN IMPORTANT QUESTION

 I watched the PBS program, Secrets of the Dead, which asked the question, were there any women gladiators in the Roman Empire?  I found it interesting, BUT GREW MORE ANNOYED AS THE PROGRAM CONTINUED.  IT FAILED TO ASK A MAJOR QUESTION.

The Roman Empire lasted several centuries, and was quite large.  How does one attempt to find the answer?  The program did a good job, showing a statue of a woman athlete, which they contended was really a gladiator instead.  The program distinguished between female athletes, more for fun, leisure, and no stigmas attached, compared to gladiators, male or female.  The program did find female gladiator who fought animals, and some may have been part of the program doing what the men did.

I was annoyed because the program never mentioned Galen.  Galen was a physician to the gladiators for a number of years, so he had considerable experience with the wounds suffered by the contenders.  It is one reason his work was cherished long after his death, into the transformed Christian empire, and also into the rising empire of Islam.  Galen had not only been doctor to gladiators, after all many of them were slaves, but he was physician to some Emperors too.

I asked GoogleAI if he had ever serviced a woman gladiator.  The AI reply, in his writings Galen refers to a;ll of his patients as masculine.  This does NOT PROVE that there were no women gladiators.  But if the AI had answered the reverse, it would have proven that there were women gladiators.  By neglecting perhaps the most renowned physician of the Roman Empire, I thought they ignored a major source, one who, if his writings had included women gladiators, would have settled the question   As it turns out, Galen did not mention women gladiators at all, so the program did provide the other evidence they had compiled.  BUT THEY SHOU;D HAVE ASKED GALEN.   Hugh Murray

MORE TO CONSIDER.  I mention the transition of the Roman Empire to a Christian one, and imply Christian Europe, a common association.  But the Roman Empire was Britain and some of Western Europe and the Balkans, all of North Africa, and Turkey and parts of the Middle east.  Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Empire, and the new capitol, Constantinople, was not even in Europe!  Not part of the Roman Empire - much of Germany, Poland, Scandinavia, H7ngary, Scotland, Ireland.  Still, it was a vast empire.  In this empire, Jews and pagans were now 2nd class citizens, and pagan priests no longer paid by the state.  In Egypt, the priests of Amon and the other gods and goddesses lost their income.  Time to get new jobs.  One result, those who read and wrote the pictures on the walls, now did other things, and people forgot how to read the ancient script and pictures.  Not until the early 1800s with discovery of the Rosetta Stone, did the modern world discover a key to the ancient writings.

     Next, as Christianity dominated the Roman Empire, it was not limited to Europe.  One of the most important figures of the early church, Augustine was from Hippo, near old Carthage in North Africa.  Turkey, Judea, Palestine, Syria, Egypt, all became Christian, as did all of North Africa.  In the 400s. though connected to the Library of Alexandria, the female mathematician Hypatia, was killed by fanatical Christian mob.  Her crime; she was a pagan.  (As a child growing up in New Orleans, warm weather, we kids often went barefoot.  When we wanted to cross the street, there was a problem - the street was paved with oyster shells.  Sharp shells.  We crossed slowly and gingerly, trying to avoid a cut.  In high school, I was showing a few Canadian visitors around and took them for a short trip to my neighborhood.  We got out the car, and one remarked, "You pave your streets in souvenirs of the sea?"  He made it sound wo exotic.  I should have suggested he remove his shoes and socks and cross the street, and it would seem far less exotic.)  Hypatia was pulled from her carriage and taken to a church, where she was stripped of her clothing and the used oyster shells to remove her skin, before butchering her to death.  Of course, during the pagan Roman Empire, there were times when in the Arena, Christians were fed to the lions and other animals.  

    In the 600s the new religion of Islam began to expand in a warlike way.  From the Arabian Peninsular is spread, conquering Judea, Syria, Egypt, Libya, Tunis Algeria, Morocco, and on into Europe, most of Spain and Portugal, and even a battle inside France.  The Muslims in power gave tax and other advantages to their co-religionists, and the number of Muslims expanded.  They did not occupy Ethiopia, which remained Christian.  It took until the 1450s, but then the Muslims even conquered Constantinople, renamed it Istanbul, and Turkey became Muslim too.  /the Balkans became mixed, while northern Europe joined the Christians.  In 1492 the last of the Muslim states fell, Spain (and Portugal were free).  That same year the Spanish monarchs issued a decree, all Jews and Muslims in Spain had to convert to Christianity or leave the kingdom.  Some left; some converted, Jews became Moranos; Muslims, Moriscos.  To insure they were true converts. the Grand Inquisitor became a prominent figure in Spain.

AMERICAN COUP; WILIMINGTONTON 1898 -- MY REVIEW

PBS presented a 2-hour history program on the violent overthrow of government in Wilmington, NC. My main complaint is that it takes the Wilmington insurrection out of context; it fails to show that the fall of Negro power in Wilmington was the final chapter of what had been a 33-year long Second Civil War. When Republican Abraham Lincoln was elected President of the US, in late 1860, not even receiving a full 40% of the popular vote, Southern states began to secede. When Louisiana withdrew, and called for volunteers, among them volunteering were the informal militia of the Free People of Color (FPC). The Confederacy did not think that wise, and they were rejected. True, there were black slave owners in the state, one woman an owner of many slaves; but these were the exceptions, and arming blacks might lead to problems in the war.

 Early in the war, the largest city of the Confederacy, New Orleans, fell to the Yanks headed by Farragut, a Southerner, fighting for the Northerners. When local women in the city showed what they thought of the Yankee soldiers by spitting on them and insulting them, Union Gen. Ben Butler ordered that such women were then to be treated as women of ? (whores), an order that caused international outrage in Europe, and Lincoln had to countermand Butler's order. Meanwhile, many of the FPCs now sought to join the Union army, and they did. So some people of Louisiana were now joining the "foreign" occupiers. 

 The American Civil War continued, and tho our population was then much smaller, the casualty rate was higher than those lost in WWI, or WWII, or any war since. By early 1864 many wanted the killing to end, have peace again. The Democrats' party program of 1864 essential promised a 2-state solution; the North would go it alone and free, the South would retain slavery and be independent as the CSA. The Democrats were so popular, that Lincoln dumped his vice-president Hamlin of Maine, and replaced him with a war Democrat from Tennessee, Andrew Johnson. They did not run as Republicans but as the Union ticket. With Yankee victories and the 2nd half of 1864, more voters turned to Lincoln's plan for victory over the rebels, and he won decisively.

 At his inauguration in 1865 Lincoln did not sound vindictive, with charity toward all," and after the band played the national anthem, Lincoln requested that it next play Dixie.  Earlier, Gen. Grant had allowed the defeated Lee's army to keep their side arms in defeat. Shortly after the inauguration, Booth made Johnson President. Lincoln had toyed with letting educated blacks (men) vote, but he had also toyed with sending the large black population to Africa or some islands. 

 By this time thousands of blacks in the North and black slaves in the south had joined the Union Army. (n 1866 in New Orleans a meeting of hundreds mainly blacks to demand the vote. The Mayor, and police, Democrats and pro Confederates, raid the gathering and murder a large number, including Dr. Dotsie, a white, and they shot a German-born newspaper man, Michael Hahn, who survived and would be one of the few Republican elected leaders at war's end.  Elected as governor, the General running New Orleans was transferred, and Hahn was given little power; then elected to the US Senate, with Lincoln's murder, the national Congress refused to seat any elected from the South.  Hahn had a bumpy political career, as would any Republican in the South.  Also in 1866 a massacre of blacks in Memphis. These were well publicized and helped the Radical Republicans win Congress. The Freedmen's Bureau was aiding the freed slaves to adjust.

 White planters had lost their work force and their Confed. money was worthless. 

Think of the trauma for some Southerners - not only had they lost their valuable property in the largest confiscation of private property in American history, but soon after their former property might be wearing the blue uniform of the enemy and aiming a gun at them! A large number of blacks had fought in the army of the Northern enemy. Blacks thought, the white South fought to keep them enslaved. WHAT HAPPENED NEXT? 

     We should understand, not only was the South defeated, not only was there much destruction of property, burnt buildings, stolen cattle, chickens, whatever, but THE ABOLITION OF SLAVERY SIGNALED A SOCIAL REVOLUTION.  Millions of blacks, illiterates (there had been laws forbidding teaching them to read) and everything uncertain.  Thay had lived in slave quarters, but who would now own those dwellings?  Did freedom mean they had to work?  Everything was uncertain.  Of course many whites were illiterate too; and in the north, new immigrants might not even speak English.  But the South was entering unknown terrirory.

     WHAT WOULD HAPPEN NEXT?  A 2nd civil war. So long as Norther troops remained to occupy the South, there was some protection for blacks. But the Johny Reb's were forming new organizations to prevent black rule. Red shirts, knights of the white camellia, the white league, and the ku klux klan, all set to oppose black rule. When Grant was elected President, he pushed for civil rights for blacks, and enforced anti-KKK laws. Yes, there were national civil rights laws passed in the 1860s and 70s.

   But the crunch came in the Presidential election of 1876; Democrat Tilden clearly had a majority of votes, but not Electoral Votes, and the Dems had intimidated blacks in many southern states, including the disputes ones. A DEAL, The Republican would win the White House, but remove the Yankee troops from the south. Soon, Dems are winning big in elections in Louisiana, Mississippi, etc. and black cries of intimidation or lynching go un-noticed.  The cavalry is no longer there.

 By early 1890s, Louisiana had a new voting law that essentially prevented most blacks from registering. And this was happening in other Southern states too. In 1895 the great Atlanta Exposition, at which Booker Washington, leader of Tuskegee Institute in Alabama gave a major speech. In some things, the races can be like the finger, separate and doing separate functions, but on other issues the races can unite in strength as a fist. He basically said blacks should not prioritize politics. That was national news, what whites north and south wanted to hear. End the race problems.  Or rather, end of hearing about them.

 In the 1890s a case had been percolating up from New Orleans to the US Supreme Court, which finally ruled 8-1, that separate and equal facilities were legal in Plessy v. Ferguson; segregation was the law of the land. In 1892 Ida Wells went north and while away her newpaper was destroyed by segregationists, and she was threatened with lynching if she continued. My point, by early 1898 NEARLY ALL of the South had basically succumbed to white supremacy and the Democratic Party, often by intimidation and murder. Aside from 1 or 2 Appalachian areas that had supported the Yanks during the war, there were no Republicans left in the national Congress from the South, they had all been wiped out. All but the one in Wilmington.  But Wilmington should not be studied in isolation, for it was the last battle in the 2nd Civil War.

      Hugh Murray  I wrote this mainly from memory.  Alas, I have not taught history for 55 years.  I'll try to fill in the blanks later.

    This period in history is called the era of Reconstruction, and there was much to be rebuilt after the war's destruction.  But the social revolution promised by Northern victory depended on Yankee soldiers.  True, many locals still had weapons, former Confederate soldiers on one side, former slaves who had joined the Union army might have theirs on the other.  Local police and sheriffs were still Democrats (white supremacists).  Early large-scale massacres caused reaction in the North, determination to punish the South, and passage of anti-KKK laws and pro-black civil rights laws. So an alternative strategy was adopted.  Instead, of mass murders, the South planned to kill Radical Reconstruct with a thousand cuts, a guerilla war, throughout the South, targeting this militant here, another black voter there, a slow 2nd Civil War which engulfed the entire South.  The 2nd Civil War was a guerilla war fought mainly in the South,  The Southern whites generally sought to avoid major killings, for that might rouse the North to intervene.  In the South, it was also mainly a racial war, whites against blacks, while the Northerners residing there were generally intimated either to go North, or change their views.  When the Yanks withdrew the Union troops after the 1876 Compromise, the Southern offence hastened.  Wilmington was the last major battle of that war.  No more blacks in Congress from the South until the 1960s.  The "solid South" was solidly Democratic, and solidly white supremacist.

     For a modern analogy, after WWII there were 2 reconstructions in Germany, one conservative, one radical.  The radical one, in the east, the German Democratic Republic, sought to build a "socialist" society.  But how long would it last without Soviet troops?  1876 and 1990 provide somewhat similar answers.

     Back to the tv program: it is like a Shakespearean play in which the director cut Act I, cut Act II, cut Act III, etc. and only the final act was staged.  That is not good enough. 

FCC Critical information Needs, and Tyranny

     Hugh Murray

      There are reports that the US Federal Communication Commission may send monitors to news reporters, to the human resources divisions, and to the managers of radio and tv stations to inquire about how they determine and report news stories.  They are seeking to insure that all stations report the "critical information needs," as determined by the federal government.  Basically, they are seeking to censor American news.  They want it to reflect the values of the Obama Administration, global warming, Obamacare, white privilege, Black over representation in prisons, etc.  Many conservatives view this not as news, but as propaganda and lies. What global warming?  White privileged?  To be robbed, beaten, and possibly killed by roving Black racist gangs?  Obamacare!
    Actually, the government has outlets in media where it might insure its own version of "critical information needs."  In the 1950s there was a halt in granting tv licenses to new stations, which meant that the largest city in the South at the time, New Orleans, had only one television station.  I think Pittsburgh was also quite restricted.  The freeze was imposed by the FCC to insure that there would be room for educational television stations.  And once room was made for them, the freeze melted, and many new stations were allowed to telecast.  Today, the education television stations in each major city  and the Public Broadcasting System can provide the "critical information needs" that the Feds deem are neglected by private tv stations.  There is no need for FCC reps to visit and intimidate the private media.  No need, except to propel the Obama Democrats to victory by preventing any opposition from being heard.
     Obama complains about Rush Limbaugh and talk radio.  I assume Obama's FCC commissars will be visiting the radio stations that broadcast Rush.  But again, there is National Public Radio, with its left-wing news casts.  The Obama Administration's notion of "critical information needs" is readily available on NPR.  The problem for Obama and the Democrats: many more people listen to Rush than to NPR.  So they seek to muzzle Rush, to destroy free speech, and allow only the left-wing views on the media.
     Obama has used the tax authority of the Federal Government to punish those who disagree with him.  He has used the Department of Justice to openly discriminate against whites in favor of Blacks.  He has used the environmental laws as a club to over-regulate and curtail capitalism (except those capitalists who contribute to the Democratic Party).  He has sought to restrict the Americans' right to own weapons.  And now Obama attacks freedom of speech and the press.  Americans critically need information about how we are losing our freedoms!
     Under President Obama, America is sliding toward tyranny.

PBS FRONTLINE (OFFICIAL LINE): LEE HARVEY OSWALD, 2013

Some Reflections about the program--------Hugh Murray

            There are some obvious questions that rise after viewing the PBS Frontline special on Oswald.  For example, Oswald was arrested in downtown New Orleans in 1963 when several anti-Castroites surrounded him as he distributed his pro-Castro Fair Play for Cuba Committee leaflets.  The program interviewed several NOPD officers who handled Oswald.  They wondered why he simply did not pay the $25 and leave.  Instead, he wanted to be finger-printed and booked.  What the program did not show, is that he also requested to be interviewed by the FBI.  That occurred.  Yet, there is no record in the files of what he said.

            Frontline interviewed Dallas FBI Agent Hosty a number of times on the program.  Yet, no one asked Hosty about the time in November 1963 when Oswald visited and left a note at the Dallas FBI office.  After Oswald’s arrest on November 22, J. Edgar Hoover ordered that all such records be destroyed, and Agent Hosty dutifly flushed Oswald’s note down the toilet.

            Another authority interviewed by Frontline was staunch supporter of the Warren Commission’s basic thesis, Gerald Posner, author of Case Closed.  In that book, Posner showed that because of the different dates of activities, David Ferrie could not have been active in the Civil Air Patrol when Oswald was active.  With the photograph showing Oswald and Ferrie, and testimony of former members, it is clear that Posner can be wrong on some things.  Missing were questions about Ferrie as a powerful influence on some youngsters.  The isolation of the young Oswald in New York (discussed by social workers), may have ceased once the teen joined the CAP in NO.  I knew someone who believed his whole life had been turned around for the better because of Ferrie.  Ferrie was gay, but my friend was quite straight.  Still, Ferrie helped to mold him so he would become a success, and today there is a building named after my old friend.  Might Ferrie’s patriotism have inspired the young Oswald to quit Warren Easton High to join the Marines.

            When Oswald left for the USSR, others have noted he was allegedly going to a university in Europe, he flew to Finland on a plane when there were no commercial flights, and so on.  Yet, the CIA asserts he was not an agent.  Of course, some of the files still under wraps are those of the CIA re Oswald.

            Frontline showed Oswald distributing FPCC leaflets in NO.  He was not alone.  He was paying some to leaflet with him.  How many leftists PAY to have others leaflet?  It is absurd.  Just like religious people distribute literature on the street, the point is also to speak and convert the passers-by.  A church would not have an atheist leafleting.  A leftist, who believes in the cause, would want other believers to leaflet, not simply neutrals.  And where did Oswald get the money for the fellow leafleters?  Why were they not interviewed?  Or, were they possibly some of the gay Latinos who accompanied Oswald to the office of Attorney Dean Andrews?  (The attorney who spoke about a Clem Bertrand, whom some think was Clay Shaw).  And some of the leafleting pictured on Frontline just happens to be in front of the old International Trade Mart, whose leader just happened to be Clay Shaw – not mentioned on Frontline.

            There was no discussion of the possibility that Oswald was at a training camp in 1963 in Louisiana for those planning another invasion of Cuba to oust Castro.

            Once Oswald was arrested, he was paraded occasionally before the reporters.  When someone mistakenly linked Oswald by mistake, not with the FPCC, but with a group that was anti-Castro, who corrected the error?  Jack Ruby, in the police station knew the politics of the Cuban groups, and immediately corrected the speaker, that Oswald was not in the anti-Castro group, but was pro-Castro.

            For much of the proof of Oswald’s guilt, Frontline relied on the words of Priscilla McMillan.  After the assassination, when Marina Oswald was probably one of the most hated women in America, McMillan spent much time with her.  McMillan had been in the Soviet Union, too.  There are many who believe she was CIA.  Marina did not partake in the program, but on other programs, she has stated that Oswald was innocent.  Immediately after the assassination, she may have been so frightened she told McMillan what McMillan and the US government wanted to hear.  Marina’s absence should be considered.

            The grassy knoll hardly exists in Frontline.  When people rushed up the hill, they were met by a Secret Service Agent, showing his credentials.  Later, the Secret Service denied having any agent there.  The autopsy questions were sloughed over; NO District Attorney Jim Garrison’s trial placed one of the autopsy doctors, Pierre Finck, under oath, and he admitted when he went to probe the path of a bullet in Kennedy, he was ordered not to do so by the big brass in the room at Bethesda Hospital.

            Frontline, with its emphasis on the defenders of the official line – Posner, Hosty, McMillan, has produced one more defense of the lone-nut theory.  It ignored most of the major critics.  It was a disappointing program.

PBS - The West and the Rest, or the West in Decline

Niall Ferguson presented an interesting program on PBS TV – The West and the Rest,  22 May 2012, which asked the question of how the West came to dominate the globe during the past few centuries.  Ferguson wonders if that dominance will continue.  He mentions various topics that he thinks led to Western dominance.  However, by discussing the Turks in one topic area, and the topic of competition, more with the Chinese, and never mentioning the taboo topic of affirmative action in the US, Ferguson plays it safe.  He had better not offend the Left that makes the decisions about programming on PBS.  I went to the PBS web site and posted the following comment.  One wonders if my comment will remain or be removed.-------Hugh Murray

Hugh 

Ferguson also stresses the importance of competition later in the program, when he notes that when the Ottoman Turks were ascending, they used a merit system for the civil service. Later, the service was opened to Turks, merit abandoned, corruption flourished, and the empire declined. The US once had merit as the basis for advancement in its civil service and in industry. The merit system, however, was abandoned as affirmative action preferences were awarded to pet groups, while better qualified candidates experienced the negative action of being white males. Merit has been abandoned in the US for 50 years. Instead of hiring the best, one is hired because they are this minority or that. No wonder America is in decline. No wonder other nations may rise to dominate the 21st century.
A reply:
The comments of “Hugh” provide a glowing example of how Ferguson’s hackery and BS ahistory appeal to racists in bThe comments of “Hugh” provide a glowing example of how Ferguson’s hackery and BS ahistory appeal to racists in both the US and Europe. The US is failing because of affirmative action….Wait! didn’t Ferguson claim that segregation had to do with the rise of US prosperity? He did…but slavery had EVERYTHING to do with it.

Reply ↓

·         Hughon May 23, 2012 at 2:16 am said:

If slavery had everything to do with it, why did not the other slave areas prosper? North Africans raided Italy, France, Spain, even on occasion up to Iceland, taking slaves. The sub-Saharan Africans sold to the New World had been slaves in the Old. It is America that sent ships to Tripoli to end the Arab piracy and taking slaves of Western seamen.

Merit was once part of the American system. The Left elite used affirmative action to destroy it. The Left elite knows it will cause the destruction of America and the West; but the Left elite hates the West, and is overjoyed to see our demise. Recall the chant at Stanford, “Hey, Hey! Ho, Ho! Western Civ. has got to go.”oth the US and Europe. The US is failing because of affirmative action….Wait! didn’t Ferguson claim that segregation had to do with the rise of US prosperity? He did…but slavery had EVERYTHING to do with it.

T