Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter
this post was submitted on 22 Nov 2025
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They asked for false or exaggerated stories...
On a similar note, Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter
NASA spending millions to develop a zero-gravity pen while the USSR used a pencil. It's funny, believable, and false.
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The Boston Massacre.
9 officers were surrounded by like 300 angry Bostonians who were wielding clubs and other weapons and goading them to fire their weapons while throwing shit at them. The fact that the only punishment for the officers who killed five people following their trial (in colonial court defended by John Adams) was that two had their thumbs branded indicated how two-sided the situation was.
Paul Revere's famous engraving depicting the incident was intentional anti-British propaganda used to advance the cause of the revolution.
There was a gap in [some military capability] during the Cold War, and the USA was losing it. Almost anything you stick in there, Russia was behind. They sometimes implied otherwise, but it's rare that they ever were. Occasionally, they used everything they had to just about match.
By the 1960s, their navy was pretty good, though. Don't let anyone tell you they were just a bunch of vodka drunk idiots. Not at that time, anyway.
At the opposite end of what this thread is about, Dr Strangelove is far more correct than it should be.
I like the part where we saw the MiG-25, freaked out because it looked very capable, built the F-15 to actually exceed those capabilities, and then only found out after the fact that the MiG-25 wasn't nearly as good as we thought.
Similar to the Strangelove example - although not about history - know what medical professionals consistently say is the TV show which not only had the most accurate medicine, but also best depicts the social paradigm of working in the medical sector? Scrubs.
The cruiser gap as an example. Was never real, it only existed because of the US Navy classification system of time.
The US Navy would call ships frigate or destroyer leader when they had the size and capabilities of a cruiser in the Soviet navy. The 1975 Ship reclassification cleared it up and also made organization much easier than the dozens of confusing hull designation.
While Wojtek serving in the Polish army during the invasion of Italy is true, a lot of his exploits are exaggerated. I still love it though.
Him helping out is confirmed, and if I remember correctly, the story of him carrying artillery shells is among the confirmed ones. And yes, he did in fact drink beer. But no, he didn't smoke cigarettes, on the account of being a bear. He ate them, though.
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So many apocryphal stories are just the best...
At a dinner party, someone accused Winston Churchill of being drunk.
"That may be, madam, but you're ugly, and I'll be sober in the morning."
Likely never happened.
But the one that breaks my heart is that there is no evidence Carthage was salted after being destroyed.
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Marie Antoinette saying let them eat bread or something
From her point of view it sounds incredibly based, it would probably have just been ignorance though. I'm still glad she died because of that patronising comment that she kind of didn't actually say
The quote is "let them eat cake". It's true, she probably never actually said that but it makes a good quote to use when rich people say out of touch things. For instance, when Trump said something about kids getting one doll for Christmas instead of two.
I had a French teacher who claimed that "let them eat cake" was a bit of a mistranslation and that "cake" was just a different, maybe fancier, type of bread.
Like the situation was more like someone said "Marie, the people don't have any baguettes to eat." And she replied "Well then let them eat brioche"
Still probably apocryphal, but I think maybe a little more believable if it were true while still showing the tone-deafness.
It also just feels very French to me.
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The quote in the original french version is, at least iirc, let them eat brioche, so cake isn't even a good translation. More something like "let them eat sweet bread".
But translating brioche as cake instead makes the quote sound even more tone deaf and outrageous.
Someone else said it when Marie Antoinette was only a little girl. Can't remember who it was.
Rousseau, one of the architects of the Revolution.
The home secretary in my country said during Covid that everyone will have to be more financially conservative during Covid-related lock-downs. She said that then three ball gowns are enough, you don't need more than that.
That's so funny. I feel ridiculous enough owning one (the reason I own it was because I went to a weird university where fancy white-tie events were common and most students probably went to at least one of those in their time there. )
Reminds me of a story I heard where McDonald's or some other fast food company was giving their workers tips on saving money and their tips assumed their workers were rich enough to have servants
The Androleteirai, destroyers of men, aka The Amazons.
Jesus, Jews, Jerusalem, January, June, July...
The letter J wasn't invented until the year 1524...
There have and will probably be letters used in the future to pronounce certain letters we use differently in words. To make things easier and legible. Caesar for example was written "GAIVS IVLIVS CAESAR". The J and U were not used, yet they were pronounced.
So, while technically correct, it did exist in some form.
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