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Joel

@storywonker.bsky.social

380 followers 240 following 6.4K posts

A serious person who does big things

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Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 56m

My understanding is you can make a good archaeological case for moderate-to-severe economic contraction and loss of specialisation - which reflects and causes a period of quite sharp human misery - in much of the former Western Empire, but the extent depends on where you are

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 59m

I do think 330 is an iffy start point - the late imperial state clearly starts with Diocletian, not Constantine - but I get why it's used given the significance of Constantinople and Christianity

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 1h

Given the department I did my degrees in this one's actually Shadow Harris

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 1h

Or I guess 847 if you go from 330 to 1204

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 1h

Plus, yknow. By a conservative estimate it lasted about 1100 years, which is good going for any state.

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 1h

But the Roman Imperial army doesn't just need to win, it needs to win /convincingly/ to avoid being over-attritted and locally out-mobilised and the narrowing of their tactical edge does for them even if their record in battles is still roughly even

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 1h

I do somewhat disagree with your take here in that it seems to be the logistical and state systems' breakdown that causes the atrophy of the Western army, not the other way around - although the gap has massively narrowed compared to Augustus' day, Roman soldiers seem to acquit themselves well.

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 1h

Like if anyone *introduced* that idea to German culture then the most likely culprit is Attila the Hun

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 1h

The idea that Germans needed Americans to give them the idea of genocidal imperialism is very funny given they'd been doing it since Big Karl's time

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 1h

In the West, yes; the East still has quite a few professional soldiers but they are mostly manning fortresses on the Persian border

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 5h

I think you can read the way the idea just doesn't compute for a lot of Americans into the reactions across the political spectrum to Canada's quite mild form of economic retaliation

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 6h

(I admit this is partially aimed at @dov.bsky.social)

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 6h

Not sure what to do with this; any Big Mushroom recipe recs?

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 7h

Dad has come home with this absolutely massive mushroom

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 7h

Dad has come home with this absolutely massive mushroom

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 9h

I would describe myself as an atlanto-skeptic, viz. an atlanticist who has been mugged by reality

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 9h

The good thing is that our lad Paul here has managed to do both

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 9h

Even if Erdoğan is more of the Putinist-Trumpist disposition

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 9h

More broadly if we conceive of the struggle between liberal democrats (small l, small d) and reactionary authoritarians as the defining struggle of the coming half-century, then it is vital to the European and Middle-Eastern theatres of that struggle that Turkey stay on our side

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 9h

Tbh I think Polanski is wrong on means here but the ends make sense.

The "European alliance", if such a thing is to exist, should morally include Canada and probably Mexico, and strategically likely needs to include Turkey. Working within NATO structures accomplishes 2/3.

Reposted by Joel

Marie Le Conte @youngvulgarian.marieleconte.com · 10h

@mitildide.bsky.social

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 10h

I think it's an attempt to say "not wearing underwear" without sounding declassé

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 10h

Or, yknow. Maurice Glasman

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 10h

Also, uh. I would describe the Livin Marxism crew as ideologically rooted in a left-wing tradition, and look at them now

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 10h

Especially since those are not descriptions I think it is at all reasonable to use of either woman; here we have a man who eroticises women by imagining them to look more like children than they do

Joel @storywonker.bsky.social · 10h

"Half girl, half woman", and "pedomorphic" from the previous passage are, uh, painting a picture of a psyche