But Why
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Okay, so since @Tez and @TNP asked…
(I will try to keep it short, but blame them.)
#1 - Considering it was the supposed Dark Ages, the Norse were surprisingly clean. We know this not just from artifacts found at archaeological digs, but from writings of others during the time period. Thank John of Wallingford for this particular quote:
“The Danes, thanks to their habit to comb their hair every day, to bathe every Saturday, to change their garments often, and set off their persons by many such frivolous devices. In this manner, they laid siege to the virtue of the married women, and persuaded the daughters even of the nobles to be their concubines.”
We also have grave findings of ear spoons, which were used to clean wax from inside the ears, and kept on chatelaines along with their version tweezers and other grooming items. Some evidence exists that stereotypes of the Norse as blonde relates to use of lye products in their hair. Lighter hair was considered attractive in Norse society, so the lye was used for bleaching, but it also has the added side benefit of killing lice. So this isn’t the modern equivalent of showering every day, but compared to the stereotype we have of Vikings, they were actually pretty clean.
#2 - While we don’t know how often the Tudors bathed, we do know that they had some pretty fancy recipes for both baths and scented soaps of various kinds. Full on baths were highly discouraged because open pores were obviously how infection entered the body, but a daily morning scrub with linen clothes was actively recommended, and we have the writings to prove it. Linen was also used for undergarments (which does a great job of absorbing moisture off the skin) and changed out to be washed regularly. A modern historian has followed guides to Tudor hygiene practices twice as part of a personal experiment, and you can read her thoughts about the practice.
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@De-Villefort said in But Why:
Sci-fi is for the most part a more collectivist endeavor. You don’t take down the mega-corp to replace them, you take them down to collapse a system of oppression. There is a reason to fight. A better future to aim for. I don’t see that happening in a lot of fantasy stories.
I am a literal communist, and I gotta say, this kind of argument feels very misguided to me. It feels like an attempt to police what kind of pretendy-times people are allowed to enjoy because doing so provides the illusion of activism without the risks of doing activism in the real world.
Arguing about an L&L game where people just want to play hot babes whose big dresses have corsets and square-cut necklines isn’t improving the world. It’s just making the community argue with you, which makes them inherently less open to your ideas.
Assuming you’re presenting your ideas in good faith and this isn’t all some extended troll, I mean. I can’t rule that out either. If I’m misreading you and you don’t intend to advocate for a more collectivist mindset, then please carry on as you are, and I’ll make more dumb jokes about the Fellowship smelling bad or whatever.
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@Aria Ooo, documentation. So hot.
she/they
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@De-Villefort said in But Why:
@STD
In those dark dystopias you fight the corporations to make the world a better place for everyone. In the dark ages, it was a struggle to survive just being a human.Think about the fantasy genre and the themes it has.
Lord of the Rings - Take the ring of power, resist it’s call to make you all powerful and destroy it.
Game of Thrones - Kill everyone and take power for yourself.
Beowulf - Kill monsters and take power for yourself.
Robinhood - Kill the nobles and take power for yourself because you think you can do a better job.It’s all about selfishness. It’s an entire genera based on the idea that getting what you want is the only important thing. You are just replacing one self-important jerk with a nicer self-important jerk and nothing ever gets better for anyone else in a dark ages fantasy. Look at Lord of the rings, all those books, all that adventure and the only thing that really changed was 1 ring got destroyed and one human village got roasted by a dragon. Then life pretty much went back to normal.
Sci-fi is for the most part a more collectivist endeavor. You don’t take down the mega-corp to replace them, you take them down to collapse a system of oppression. There is a reason to fight. A better future to aim for. I don’t see that happening in a lot of fantasy stories.
decolonize your bookshelf
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@GF i’m pretty sure that on the game people DON’T just want to play hot babes in costume. but yes, reduction to that is a common tactic used to be dismissive of people who enjoy any particular genre.
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@mietze You’re right. I was trying to be dismissive of the silliness of the concerns, but I came off dismissive of the game and its players. I apologize.
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@De-Villefort said in But Why:
Plus one out of three women survive child birth on average so if you are married you have to live with the fact you might kill your wife every time you have sex.
The Firan compulsion is real, innit?
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i find myself curious as to what is on @De-Villefort’s actual SciFi bookshelf. And I did not think that you really were @GF but i also wanted to point out that this dude kind of came in hot implying just that in many ways. same ‘i don’t play at this place i quit mushing years ago but why would anyone ever want to do this horrific thing that probably most of them actually aren’t doing at all but i need to score some points’, different day.
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this thread kind of made my day, ty
I have been pretty down lately but a ridiculous argument will always cheer me right up
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honestly, same.
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@moth If I could eat popcorn, I would have made popcorn. Somehow, this thread evokes that same kind of ‘things are bad, but at least they aren’t THIS’ as watching Jerry Springer when you were home sick used to inspire…
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Low-magic fantasy games allow you to wear cool outfits and fuck princesses.
Basically, it’s the closest any of us will ever be to being Mario.
As someone who has spent his whole life stomping turtles and hoping to grow a raccoon tail, this is close enough.
love that perfect frown
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I think that might be the one to get through to him. Well done.
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@Aria Anyone who calls Ruth Goodman as backup in a historical daily life argument gets my vote.
The past wasn’t as bad as we’re all led to believe. Sure, it wasn’t a bed of roses, but it wasn’t all bad.
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@Vulgar-Boy said in But Why:
As someone who has spent his whole life stomping turtles and hoping to grow a raccoon tail, this is close enough.
Now this is an answer that I can appreciate.
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@De-Villefort said in But Why:
@STD
In those dark dystopias you fight the corporations to make the world a better place for everyone. In the dark ages, it was a struggle to survive just being a human.Think about the fantasy genre and the themes it has.
Lord of the Rings - Take the ring of power, resist it’s call to make you all powerful and destroy it.
Game of Thrones - Kill everyone and take power for yourself.
Beowulf - Kill monsters and take power for yourself.
Robinhood - Kill the nobles and take power for yourself because you think you can do a better job.It’s all about selfishness. It’s an entire genera based on the idea that getting what you want is the only important thing. You are just replacing one self-important jerk with a nicer self-important jerk and nothing ever gets better for anyone else in a dark ages fantasy. Look at Lord of the rings, all those books, all that adventure and the only thing that really changed was 1 ring got destroyed and one human village got roasted by a dragon. Then life pretty much went back to normal.
If this is what you took away from the fantasy genre, I pity you. If all you see about you is selfishness, then perhaps you should look beyond the mirror.
You know, maybe you really ought to try actually doing some reading, given that Lord of the Rings has no dragons in it and Robin Hood is actually a name attached to a legend which wasn’t actually about taking any power at all. Beowulf isn’t even fantasy, it’s an epic poem told a millennium and more ago, and Game of Thrones was a specific reaction to all the fantasy novels about honourable people with good and selfless endings.
Reading can broaden the mind!
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@Evilgrayson said in But Why:
@Aria Anyone who calls Ruth Goodman as backup in a historical daily life argument gets my vote.
The past wasn’t as bad as we’re all led to believe. Sure, it wasn’t a bed of roses, but it wasn’t all bad.
I have an enormous soft spot for enthusiastic nerds who are just really enamoured with their area of interest and who want to share it with people in a fun and accessible way.
I also recommend Ben Crystal for Shakespeare lectures, Albert Lin for real life Indiana Jones-ing but with technology (with bonus representation for both the Asian and the disabled communities), and Sister Wendy for adorably wholesome art history. They are all just the cutest and I want to pinch their cheeks.
