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Last Conformist
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of Calakmul
Jul 2003
time: 06:33
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quote:
Originally posted by mrmitchell
I'm not from Europe, so I can't explain their half.
Most Americans know that Europe exists, know minor history about it, and know typical tourist destinations of it plus major cities. The knowledge comes to a grinding halt when between Italy and Russia, but what can I say? Can EUROS name all those countries? |
I can, but I might not be representative - I can name all countries of Africa as well as most American states and, I think, all Canadian provinces, which definitively is more than most Europeans can.
I suspect most Western Europeans would be challenged to name all the countries of east-central Europe and of the Balkans. I recently found out that a Spanish friend of me was unaware of the existance of Belarus, which isn't exactly tiny.
quote:
The small minority of Americans that actually sneer back at Europeans are exactly that: small. They seem more because they all have big mouths 
There is an extremely small minority of Americans that creates the "Europeans are asshats" garbage, and actually believe it. They're typically conservative and see anyone who's successful (AND disagrees with them) as an elitist *******. |
Well, outright America-bashers are not too common in Europe either. Most people have better things to do than whining about the country who gave them Seinfeld, unenthusiastic as they might be about Dubyah or the Iraq war if you ask them.
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Wernazuma III
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Decolonize!
Aug 2000
time: 06:33
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quote:
Originally posted by Azazel
Yes, but by that Wernazuma, you make the assumption that people who go to the Opera are superior, a simple choice of aesthetics. You could argue that americans are too individualist, or loud and annoying , or inconsiderate, or any other thing that regards to how they behave to other people, but saying that they're inferior, or cultureless because they don't like operah is very snobbish. haven't heard of "different strokes for different folks"? |
That's why I put "high culture" under "". I, for my part, don't like going to the opera too much myself. But I consider the existance of an opera and theaters as vital elements in a culturally interested environment. Like a decent jazz event in a city is vital. If you read more closely, at the beginning of my post I expressed clearly that I consider the US to be the leader of modern music culture. Yet rich cultural life needs a broad variety of choice and offers, just because of what you said: It's not possible to establish a linear ranking of better and worse when it comes to aestetics.
Although accepting a complete aesthetical relativism can't be a solution either. For sure, Austrian "folcloroid music" (as I don't want to use an American example, I'm sure everyone is able to find one for his own nation) with it's endlessly repeating harmonies without any interesting kick and its completely unoriginal and primitive texts is inferior to other types of music even though surely more people here in Austria like that crap than estimate Bach. Aesthetically relative or cultural ignorance?
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molly bloom
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Lundenwic
Oct 2001
time: 15:33
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quote:
Originally posted by Kidicious
The Europeans never really wanted us in their countries in the first place. It's no wonder they look down on us. |
Not true in every instance.
The English Puritans left because they couldn't turn the Anglican Church into a purer, less 'Catholic' version of what it was- there wasn't any notable exodus from the Americas back to Great Britain after Cromwell's triumph in the English Civil Wars, and some of them had also left safe haven in the United Provinces, whose Calvinist rulers could hardly have been said to have been unfriendly towards them.
The truth is that, in many of their writings, you see their desire to establish a theocratic state, which they were never going to be able to impose on Great Britain- thank goodness.
Other English settlers left to make money, and set out to become the landed gentry in a country where there was room to expand.
In any case there is truth in both that there was some sneering at the provincials (just in the same way big city folk look down at cow country dwellers) and there was also frank admiration- for people like Franklin, Cotton Mather, Edgar Allan Poe, and of course for American money- the avidity with which cash poor European aristos snapped up newly rich American husbands and wives has to seen to be believed- and the enthusiasm with which some Americans trace their lineage back to some minor European duke is bizarre in such a supposedly democratic nation.
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Kidicious
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Diety of Kidiverse
Mar 2003
time: 21:33
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quote:
Originally posted by molly bloom
The English Puritans left because they couldn't turn the Anglican Church into a purer, less 'Catholic' version of what it was- there wasn't any notable exodus from the Americas back to Great Britain after Cromwell's triumph in the English Civil Wars, and some of them had also left safe haven in the United Provinces, whose Calvinist rulers could hardly have been said to have been unfriendly towards them.
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Why would they return after the Civil War? Life was good in the colonies. That doesn't mean that most of them were wanted by the establishment when they left.
quote:
Originally posted by molly bloom
The truth is that, in many of their writings, you see their desire to establish a theocratic state, which they were never going to be able to impose on Great Britain- thank goodness.
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Some of them were intolerant, but in general the colonists shared a desire for religious tolerance.
quote:
Originally posted by molly bloom
Other English settlers left to make money, and set out to become the landed gentry in a country where there was room to expand.
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And they largly couldn't inheret land like many of the English who stayed could.
quote:
Originally posted by molly bloom
In any case there is truth in both that there was some sneering at the provincials (just in the same way big city folk look down at cow country dwellers) and there was also frank admiration- for people like Franklin, Cotton Mather, Edgar Allan Poe, and of course for American money- the avidity with which cash poor European aristos snapped up newly rich American husbands and wives has to seen to be believed- and the enthusiasm with which some Americans trace their lineage back to some minor European duke is bizarre in such a supposedly democratic nation. |
True Dat
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molly bloom
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Lundenwic
Oct 2001
time: 15:33
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quote:
Originally posted by Kidicious
Some of them were intolerant, but in general the colonists shared a desire for religious tolerance.
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They shared nothing of the sort. Religious 'tolerance' was the furthest thing from their minds.
Familiarize yourself with the execution of the Quakers, John Winthrop and the Antinomian affair, and the expulsion of Anne Hutchinson.
It's one of those great American myths that the Puritans were at all interested in religious liberty or toleration (they were, but for themselves alone) or democracy (they governed through a religious intellectual elite).
John Winthrop, Governor Masschusetts Bay Colony:
'He was—with the possible exception of John Cotton—the most distinguished citizen of Massachusetts Bay colony, serving as governor some 12 times. He helped to shape the theocratic policy of the colony and opposed broad democracy. It was while he was deputy governor and Sir Henry Vane (1613–62) was governor that Winthrop bitterly and successfully opposed the antinomian beliefs of Anne Hutchinson and her followers, who were supported by Vane. '
http://www.bartleby.com/65/wi/WinthrpJ1.html
Anne Hutchinson:
"Denied any legal advice or counsel and pregnant for the 16th time, this first female defendant in the New World was called to stand before 40 magistrates for two days of relentless questioning and condemnation. She defended herself with alternating wit, humility, and defiance, parrying every Bible verse thrust at her with references of her own.
She was expelled (to Rhode Island) because her spiritual claims threatened a fledgling government that took spiritual claims seriously."
http://www.christiansciencemonitor....14s01-bogn.html
Mary Dyer and the Quaker martyrs of Boston Common:
"Among the women skilled in midwifery who attended Mary Dyer's last labor was Ann Hutchinson, friend and troublemaker. A year later, Hutchinson, who had organized intellectual and theological salons for Boston's women and believed God spoke directly to individuals--not through the intervention of the clergy--was put on trial for what amounted to subversion of male authority in church and state.
Hutchinson left those proceedings excommunicated from the Puritan church. Mary Dyer rose and walked out with her. Both rebellious women moved with their families to the more tolerant Rhode Island colony, leaving behind a vicious campaign against them led by Governor John Winthrop. A chance remark had brought news of Mary Dyer's stillborn infant to the governor's attention and he had the body dug up.
Winthrop used the body to demonize Dyer and her friends, including Hutchinson, as "unnatural" women. "Monster child," he declared in broadsides loaded with lurid details, "talons instead of toes!"
Dyer heard ideas from George Fox, founder of the Religious Society of Friends, that reminded her of Ann Hutchinson's ideas. The Quakers believed not only in the primacy of individual conscience, but in gender equality.
Mary Dyer later became a Quaker preacher and minister. But Massachusetts was off limits. As Quakers were arrested and threatened with death in that increasingly repressive colony, Dyer returned from Rhode Island several times to plead for their lives. In 1658, she was arrested and sentenced to die herself. As she stood on the gallows with two fellow Quakers, noose around her neck, a last-minute reprieve came through.
She was, however, once again, banished. And once again, she returned, determined to be a witness for freedom of conscience. This time--June 1, 1660--there was no reprieve. Surrounded by drummers to drown out anything she might say, she was marched to the giant elm on the Boston Common and hanged.
Today, two statues stand near the site--one of Ann Hutchinson, one of Mary Dyer--martyrs to freedom of belief."
http://www.womensenews.org/article....context/archive
In 1681 a community of Anabaptists who had been living in Charlestown published an attack on the repressive government of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. This attack they justified by comparing themselves with the first settlers whom they saw as fellow nonconformists who had sought to establish a haven for those persecuted for their religious beliefs.
Here's what a dyed in the wool Puritan minister had to say about that erroneous notion:
'I perceive they are mistaken in the design of our first Planters, whose business was not Toleration; but were professed Enemies of it, and could leave the World professing they died no Libertines. Their business was to settle, and (as much as as in them lay) secure Religion to Posterity, according to that way which they believed was of God.'
That's the charming sounding Samuel Willard, minister of the Third Church in Boston in his tract, 'Ne Sutor Ultra Crepidam' published in Boston in 1681.
They weren't exceptional in this religious intolerance by any means, but there grew to be a shrill note in the excessive zeal (other than the numerous fines, whippings, brandings and judicial executions of course)- fining a sea captain who had returned home after a lengthy period at sea, because he had the rashness to kiss his wife on the Sabbath day.
One of the reasons (other than the fact as you also note that life was proving rather good in the colonies) that there wasn't a mass exodus after Cromwell's victory was that the Puritan establishment was actually baffled by the growing religious tolerance in Great Britain (certainly in comparison with the New England) because they of course were assured that they alone knew what the true word of God was- to allow no dissent from their view of the Bible was why they had emigrated.
You can see their descendants today, in the likes of Falwell and Robertson and the Jehovah's Witnesses.
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molly bloom
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Lundenwic
Oct 2001
time: 15:33
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quote:
Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Which I suppose extended to the Catholics, eh? |
In the same way it didn't in New England?
I'm tired of always giving you history lessons.
Who were perceived as the major threats to Great Britain?
Catholic France and Catholic Spain- Great Britain took its first steps towards empire under Cromwell with the capture of Jamaica from Spain (1655), and the defeat of Spain at the Battle of the Dunes (1658).
So intolerant was Cromwell, that at a time of the exiling from and torture of Jews in Catholic countries, he decreed they should be allowed to return to Great Britain.
There had been Catholic assassination attempts and plots against Elizabeth I, and the Pope had declared her deposed and that anyone who killed her would receive forgiveness.
Her successor James I and VI had survived an assassination attempt by Catholics in which it had been hoped not only he but also a great deal of the membership of the House of Commons would be killed.
King Charles I's Lord Lieutenant in Ireland, Thomas Wentworth, had raised a force of Catholics, which it was feared, would be used to support Charles Stuart's attempts at personal rule.
Then in 1641 there was the massacre of Protestants in Ireland by Catholics, an estimated 12 000 out of a population of 40 000 Protestants.
Along with this in Europe there had been the tyranny of the Catholic Duke of Alva's rule in the Low Countries (during the United Provinces' Eighty Years' War with Spain), the slaughter of the Sack of Magdeburg by Catholic forces, the expulsion of Jews and Muslim converts from Spain, France's Wars of Religion, and the Massacre of the French Protestant Huguenots on St. Bartholomew's Day (for which the Pope delightfully had a 'Te Deum sung', and a medal wrought to commemorate the event).
I wonder if English Protestants felt they had any reason to distrust Catholicism in Europe and at home, then, associated as it was with several assassination attempts against the head of state, a general slaughter in Ireland and in Europe, and several invasion attempts?
In any case, the fact that there were laws discriminating against one group of sectaries does not disprove what I stated, that there was a growing difference between the New England colonies and Great Britain when it came to toleration of dissenters, and that that this was perceived by the Puritan establishment in the New World with puzzlement.
"In developing Protestant theories of persecution and toleration, Coffey argues that there was a strong continuity of desire for uniformity, and the will to achieve it, from before the Reformation. Like true converts, Protestants zealously rooted out schismatics and heretics. Protestant emphasis on access to the scriptures equipped them with plenty of Biblical examples of cruelty. But the Protestant belief in a "Godly community" drove their consciences to be troubled by those who would not conform. This framework had the benefit for monarchs of imposing political as well as religious conformity; and the concept of adiaphora ("things indifferent or inconsequential") relied on the regulation of such things by the monarch. Coffey traces Protestant ideas of toleration to Milton, Walwyn, Robinson and Williams who broke with Augustinian attitudes to coercion and, in contrast to the continent, developed a patchwork of tolerant values: civil, political and theological.
Having thus established a framework for early modern toleration and persecution, Coffey takes a chronological tour through the Elizabethan, Early Stuart, Puritan and Restoration regimes. Coffey argues inter alia that Elizabethan persecution was every bit as brutal as the Marian variant, that James's succession simply substituted Calvinist for Anglican intolerance, and that the severest punishments were reserved for anti-Trinitarians. Paradoxically it was in Puritanism that persecution formed an alliance with toleration: Cromwell was both a bigot and a promoter of toleration, who re-admitted Jews to England. Charles II continued this curious and complex mixture. Charles was a Catholic (at least by his death), who made the Declaration of Breda granting liberties, but sought to marginalise Dissent with the "Clarendon code." Persecution became largely an economic force (with the ejection of the nonconformist ministers from parishes) and a political one (with the passing of the Test Act). Imprisonment of Dissenters existed but torture and executions were rare. "
http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showre...=14374985726040
Unlike in Catholic France, there was no British equivalent of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes.
The Toleration Act, 1689:
'The Glorious Revolution and the adoption of William of Orange as King marked the end, not only of Stuart autocracy, but also of religious persecution in England.
The Toleration Act of 1689 granted nonconformist congregations a measure of legal recognition, and dissenters were henceforth able to worship freely in their own meeting houses, provided that they were registered with either civil or diocesan authorities, with the majority of registrations, not surprisingly, made to the courts of Quarter Sessions.
...for between 1754 and 1837 all marriages except those of Jews and Quakers had to be solemnised in the Anglican Church. Similarly, nonconformist burials are generally found in Anglican registers, as the parish burial ground was usually the only one available. Most nonconformist registers were surrendered to the Registrar General for authentication in 1837, although few Catholic and no Jewish congregations did so.'
http://www.devon.gov.uk/index/commu...onformity-2.htm
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Ben Kenobi
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McGregornobi!
Oct 2002
time: 21:33
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And don't forget the Test acts in your whole lecture Molly.
This act was followed by the Test Act of 1672 (25 Charles II. C. 2). The immediate cause of the Test Act (the full title of which is 'An act for preventing dangers which may happen from popish recusants') was the king's declaration of indulgence, dispensing with laws inflicting disabilities on Nonconformists. This act enforced upon all persons filling any office, civil or military, the obligation of taking the oaths of supremacy and allegiance and subscribing a declaration against transubstantiation, and also of receiving the sacrament within three months after admittance to office. The oath was:
I, N, profess, testify, and declare, that I do believe that in the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper there is not any Transubstantiation of the elements of bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ at or after the consecration thereof by any person whatsoever: and that the invocation or adoration of the Virgin Mary or any other Saint, and the Sacrifice of the Mass, as they are now used in the Church of Rome, are superstitious and idolatrous...
The act did not extend to peers; but in 1678 30 Charles II. ft. 2 enacted that all peers and members of the House of Commons should make a declaration against transubstantiation, invocation of saints, and the sacrifice of the mass-a special exception being made in favour of the duke of York.
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molly bloom
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Lundenwic
Oct 2001
time: 15:33
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quote:
Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Do you justify their persecution of the Catholics in England because the Catholics abroad were perceived as hostile?
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I don't 'justify' anything, I simply look at what the situation in Europe was at the time.
You were suggesting that because Catholics were discriminated against in Great Britain, my statement that there was a growing toleration for dissenters in Great Britain which confused Puritan colonists in the Americas, was somehow incorrect.
You were wrong, as you usually are, when it comes to arguing history with me.
And in case you had missed it, the Babington Plot, the massacre in Ireland and the Gunpowder Plot were undertakings of ENGLISH Catholics, or subjects of the ENGLISH monarch.
The Babington Plot:
"In December 1585, Gilbert Clifford was arrested in Sussex. While being interviewed, Clifford confessed that he had been involved in a Catholic plot to overthrow Elizabeth I. The man in charge of protecting Elizabeth was Francis Walsingham. He offered to release Clifford if he was willing to work as a double-agent. Clifford agreed and went to his contact in the French embassy telling him that he knew how to smuggle letters to and from Mary Stuart. He explained that every week a barrel of beer was sent from Burton to where Mary was imprisoned. Clifford arranged to have letters placed in a waterproof package inside the stopper of the barrel.
Another double-agent, Thomas Philips, who was inside the prison, told Mary how she would be receiving letters in her beer barrel. However, before they were placed inside the beer barrel, they were read by Walsingham. More importantly, Francis Walsingham was also able to read the letters that Mary sent to her Catholic friends in France and Spain. In these letters Mary explained how she wanted France and Spain to help her become queen by invading England.
Walsingham allowed the letters to continue to be sent because he wanted to discover who else was involved in this plot to overthrow Elizabeth. Eventually, on 25 June 1586, Mary wrote a letter to Anthony Babington. In his reply, Babington told Mary that he and a group of six friends were planning to murder Elizabeth."
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/TUDbabingtonP.htm
The Gunpowder Plot:
'....when the Pope had excommunicated Elizabeth, releasing her subjects from their allegiance to her. The Spanish Armada of 1588 had made matters worse. To the Tudor State, all Catholics were potential traitors. They were forbidden to hear Mass, forced instead to attend Anglican services, with steep fines for those recusants who persistently refused.
Yet rumours suggested James was more warmly disposed to Catholics than the dying Queen Elizabeth. His wife, Queen Anne of Denmark, was a Catholic, and James himself was making sympathetic noises. The crypto-Catholic Earl of Northumberland sent one of his staff, Thomas Percy, to act as his agent in Scotland. Percy's reports back optimistically suggested that Catholics might enjoy protection in James' England.
The early signs were encouraging. Upon his accession as James I of England (VI of Scotland), the new king ended recusancy fines and awarded important posts to the Earl of Northumberland and Henry Howard, another Catholic sympathiser. This relaxation led to considerable growth in the number of visible Catholics.
Trying to juggle different religious demands, James was displeased at their increasing strength. The discovery in July 1603 of two small Catholic plots did not help. Although most Catholics were horrified, all were tainted by the threat of treason.'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/state/...binson_01.shtml
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JimmyCracksCorn
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Macedonia - Sovereign country north of Greece.
Dec 2002
time: 05:33
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Damn, Molly. How do you pump this stuff out, with sources, so quick?
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molly bloom
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Lundenwic
Oct 2001
time: 15:33
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quote:
Originally posted by JimmyCracksCorn
Damn, Molly. How do you pump this stuff out, with sources, so quick? |
Unlike Obi Gyn, I studied history in depth and broadly- and I hold on to my books zealously.
Knowledge is power. 
'And even if two Catholics were involved in plots'
Obi Gyn
Not too familiar with the minutiae of Tudor and Stuart history then, eh?
Anyway, Jimmycracks, the difference between American and European history (from a Eurocentric American view, which is what I was familiar with when I lived in Great Britain) is that 'everything is so old over here!'
Said to me by a lovely woman from Brooklyn outside Coventry Cathedral.
When we talk about recent history in Great Britain, we mean 1588 and the Spanish Armada. In America, it's the O.J. trial and Monica Lewinsky.
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