A Geek History of Time - Episode 06- The Lost Cause and Professional Wrestling

Episode Date: May 11, 2019

In this episode, Damian lays the groundwork for his thesis with a summary of the root causes of the Civil War (spoiler- it was about slavery). Quotes from the Confederate version of a constitution abound.

And we begin with good day, sir. Geeks come in all shapes and sizes and that they come into all kinds of things. I was thinking more about the satanic panic. Buy the scholar Gary Guy-Gak's. Well, wait, hold on. I said good day, sir. Not defending Roman slavery by any stretch. No, but that's bad.

Let him vote. Fuck off. When historians, and especially British historians, want to get cute, it's in there. OK. It is not worth the journey. This is a geek history of time. Where we bring nursery into the real world. I'm Ed Blalock.

I'm a world history teacher at the seventh grade level. I'm a father of a nine-month-old little boy now and I've been a geek since I was young enough that I don't even remember how old I was. I'm Damien Harmony. I'm a high school Latin teacher, formerly a history teacher. I am a father of a eight, almost nine-year-old. He informed me yesterday and a six-year-old,

raising them to be geeks and more importantly, decent geeks at that. I've been a geek since I was at least five as far as I can recall. And yeah, any books that you're reading right now Ed? Right now I am working my way through home, a history of domesticity by Bill Bryson. I am simultaneously also working my way through several other books. The one that immediately jumps out at me, is an apologetic by

one of the founders of Distributism, and I'll remember it later. Okay. We'll jump out at me. Go ahead. Sure. I actually, I'm not reading any new books lately. I've kind of stalled on the reading the new books thing. However, I have taken to reading comic books again. And I am now reading, I decided to go back to the beginning,

and I'm now reading the Fantastic Four from publication date, Spider-Man from publication date, Avengers and X-Men when I get to them, and probably Daredevil. So I'm gonna start reading everything as it came out because I have it. Oh, yeah, all right. So there's there's that kind of historicity, historiography, kind of thing going on. That's a neat

process. It's neat. It's it's disappointing. Well, yeah, well because you know I'm not a child in the six. Yeah, well, yeah, it's not new to me. Yeah, well, it's not new to you. And I know you just see and stuff that gets you know posted from those old comic books online all the time. Yeah, language, it's not new to you. And I know you just see and stuff that gets posted from those old comic books online all the time. Yeah. Language has changed, attitudes have changed dramatically. I have to be saved some of the best pictures from these. It is hilarious.

And some will prove a few points that I plan to make in another podcast in the near future. So, speaking of podcasts, we are doing this one today. It's part one of a multi-part series originally I'd intended it to be a two parter and then it exploded into at least a four-parter. And the fact that I'm talking with somebody who knows stuff about this stuff, it'll probably be a much larger one. So those of you who've been listening know my propensity to your rant anyway. So it was almost doomed from the start.

So what is it that I know something about that we're going to be talking about? Well, before I get to that, I would like to point out that geeks come in all shapes and sizes, and that they come into all kinds of things that you might not recognize as Geekry at first. Okay. But I have, since I was four, been a professional wrestling nerd. I loves me, the professional wrestling. I adore the professional wrestling.

And when I lived in San Francisco, I watched the local KOFY TV 20 where they used to show the u-log. That channel had wrestling on it. It had at first just the garbageist wrestling. There was, it was Northern California independent wrestling. And then they got a pipe in from a Minneapolis company called the AWA, which that will figure in. So that's one half of what this podcast of it is about. The other half is something you and I both know Fair amount about you probably will be able to carry more on this tag team if you will You will be the Jim Knight heart to my bread heart. Oh nice. So not just because of the beard

But this this episode is this series is called the Lost Cause how it saved wrestling and ruin professional wrestling just like our country Oh wow, yeah, okay, so this okay, just one of my buttons. Yeah, you know from conversation that we've had oh yeah, okay Yeah, all right, so I I want to I want to hear about this. Yeah, so'm already stoked. I, and put this out there. Sorry, sorry, pardon me. Woo! Woo! Wow, that was, I'm gonna have to adjust the level. Yeah, and I have babies, but I had to. Yeah, and it's funny that you choose Ric Flair's thing

because he is part of the group that is most tied to lost cause, but he doesn't represent the lost cause. He represents the antagonist to the lost cause. We'll get there. All right. But the intrigue already. Oh, yeah, yeah. And I would just point out, when I taught history,

I used to teach US imperialism. And I would show them a wrestling match ahead of time. As metaphor. Yeah, as the overarching look, this is the thing. I would show them that. And then I would show that when we got to the Cuban American War Spanish American War specifically in Cuba. I'd show them the the famous Short animated short God's Elevations Bambi

And so The kids got the visuals. Yeah, I like like by the way Your pet a good I'm hot for your pet a good. Oh, I like that. By the way, you're petigote. I'm hot for your petigote. Oh, I just got to say, that's amazing. As a fellow teacher. I love doing what I do. That's brilliant. I'm trying to find some way to put wrestling into Latin, but so far, which you would think it'd be easier than it is. Yeah, well, you know, it's not.

His classical wrestling was. Right. Well, I've done it with a certain- It was a completely different creature. Yeah, and I've done it with a certain satire. Like there's this guy in the Catera con who's like, and on my tombstone I want to have all the matches of patiates and he knows his famous rest.

So I said, that would be like in my will saying, put all of John Cena's greatest hits on my tombstone. So, and the kids get that. Yeah, it's good. So we got to start with the Civil War. Okay. That's a starter. Yeah, it happens. It's a hell of a starter. Yeah, boy, good. So we got to start with the Civil War Okay That's yeah, that's a starter. Yeah, it happens a hell of a starter. Yeah boy. Howdy It was America's bloodiest conflict in history. Well, yeah

Because everybody involved was an American yeah, yeah, it still was an American So that's kind of mathematically the way that we're right And so and that is a bit of a misnomer because it is US risk and federal they're all Americans Technically, they declared themselves a separate country, but they did so by the way based on slavery. And one could argue that every, sorry, yeah, before we go any further. This is one of the things that chaps my ass on a regular basis. Online, here's the deal. The Confederate flag, first of all, did not represent the Confederacy at any point. It represented the Army of Northern Virginia for a very brief period of time during

the conflict. Number one, number two, the articles of succession, the Constitution of the Confederacy, and when I say articles of succession, sorry, when I say articles of secession i mean the articles of secession of like all of the confederate states specifically mentioned mhm slavery the the confederate equivalent of the federalist papers and the confederate equivalent of the letters written by the founding fathers that we

use to look at what what how should we interpret this part of the constitution all of them explicitly stated we need to preserve slavery as an institution. Yes. So anybody who tries to say that the civil war was about states' rights is either misinformed and only effectively half-tied or they're lying. Because it was about states' rights, specifically states' rights, to maintain the institution of chattel slavery. Yes. As a world history teacher, I also want to take just a moment to point out right here that

the way chattel slavery worked in the United States and the founding of this country up until 1865 was completely different and completely apparent from the way slavery worked in other civilizations throughout human history. It was the Romans, the Romans. Some of the nastiest, meanest people in all of history. These are people who watched blood sports for fun, who thought that going to a public education was a good day out and a barrel of laughs, those people did not have race-based slavery.

No. And slave, there was a potential for slaves to actually be able to buy their own freedom. It wasn't exactly common, but it was also... It was enough that there were laws about it. It was enough that there were laws about it, and we know that it happened often enough that it was remarked upon, but not miraculous.

Right. And further on that point, because I teach Latin, so I know something of Roman slavery slaves were to be Pitted not looked down upon yeah the idea that Someone was a slave was a reminder that you two could suffer a fall as great But also that they could climb their way back up. Yeah. And that was a very normal thing. In fact, they had a word for a freed slave. And a freed slave would have to wear a pelae,

a felt cap for a little while. And he would be attached to the household that he'd left. Transitioning wheels. Yeah, in a lot of ways. But what that meant was that he was cared for. There was a welfare state for these people. Yeah. Taking care of these people. Yeah. Taking care of these folks.

Now this is not all slaves. This is not all slavery. If you were a slave in the salt mines or any mines or on a galley. At any kind of hard labor, it was. You, your life expectancy was about four years or less. But if you were a house slave or even a farm slave, you could live a fairly long life, depending on your master,

not defending Roman slavery by any stretch, but it was not as brutal and irreversible. Yeah, yeah, repressive kind of thing that slavery was in this country. Yeah. So now that we've gotten that off of our collective chat. Sure. So they separated themselves from the United States based on slavery. Yeah. You could technically argue that every Johnny Red killed wasn't an American, but honestly we see them as Americans, which means it virtually every casualty of war was an American since it was Americans killing Americans. And before we get too far into the weeds, I kind of want to do what you just did was

adjust the fact that this war was absolutely 100% about slavery. And any desire to remove that from the equation or make it less central, because that's another thing you see happening, is part of what we're talking about today. Confederate states were born when Abraham Lincoln was elected to office November 6th of 1860. They began to secede almost immediately. First in flight was South Carolina on December 20th. Thank you. Here's a quote, we the people of the state of South Carolina in a convention assembled

do declare and ordained and it is hereby declared and ordained that this ordinance adopted by us in convention on the 23rd day of May in the year of our Lord 1,788, whereby the Constitution of the United States of America was ratified, and also at all acts and parts of acts of the General Assembly of this state ratifying amendments of the said Constitution are hereby repealed. And that the union now subsisting between South Carolina and other states under the name of the United States of America is hereby dissolved. Now that was done at Charleston in the 20th day of December and the year of our Lord, 1,860.

So they decided right away. Right away. Oh well, and then he gets elected in November. Yeah. They're out December 20th. Yeah, a month, a month and a half later. And when you take into account the lack of speed with which news traveled that they had this in their pocket.

They were, yeah, I mean, the whole time the Republican party was even forming. Yeah. The Southern Wigs and the Southern Democrats were united. I mean, the Wigs had basically fallen apart. But Southern politicians, anybody who was a political, anybody in the South was working toward, okay, look, the Wigs have fallen apart.

They're all going into this new fangled, yanky party up north. Right. Free labor, free soil, free labor. Free labor, what are you talking about? And even though the Republican Party and Lincoln specifically said they were not abolitionists, the very fact that they were saying they wanted to limit the spread of slavery was seen as an existential threat. Yes. And so, yeah, they had been scheming about this for months over a year.

Most definitely. Yeah. In fact, they even said if he gets elected, we're out. Yeah. That was essentially it. That was the whistle they blew. Yeah. So, the two senators from South Carolina, they tendered their resignations.

Other states held hastily assembled but very well organized, which again tells me that they'd have this plan for a while. Oh, yeah. Con conventions. There's letters and correspondence that we have that shows us. By February 1st, Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, and Florida had left the union. He doesn't take office until March, because back then inaugurations happened in March. Okay, because the thought. February 4th, except for Texas, all of these states send delegates to Montgomery, Alabama. I love that Texas is just like, no. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, States of America. Now there was even an attempted amendment to make this not so, giving federal protection to slavery in the South. So the Republicans in the Senate and other senators not from South Carolina, from the South were trying to keep the Union together, even as this has happened.

Even as it was falling apart, there were efforts to try to try to find a way right to modify but can we can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together

can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together

can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together can we keep this marriage together ratify it. By the way Lincoln was totally cool with that. Maybe not totally cool but like he okay I can't I can't get everything I want I want Union above all else. Yeah if I could save the Union without setting a single slave free I would do it. Right. If I remember. Yeah now here's here's a quote by Abraham Lincoln. I understand a proposed amendment to the Constitution, which amendment, however, I have not seen, has passed Congress to the effect that the federal government shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the states, including that of persons held to service.

Holding such provision to now be implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made, express, and irrevocable. He was willing to sell people down the river. Yeah. So I just like to put that out there. Also, I do like the fact that he doesn't ever say slavery. There are so many, yeah, so many euphemisms. There are so many euphemisms.

There are so many euphemisms that have used throughout the United States. Yeah, mental and verbal gymnastics. Yeah, because at the end of the day, everybody knew it was morally reprehensible, but they were convinced it was necessary and if it was eliminated, there would just be absolute energy. And nobody has a plan about what we're gonna do

if we get rid of it. Well, if anybody comes up with a plan, you could easily poke a hole in it and say, what about this? And then the absence of perfect means not good enough, and therefore, so March 4th Lincoln gets inaugurated as president. And almost as a response, Confederate vice president

Alexander Stevens gave what is now called the, quote, cornerstone speech, because he cited white supremacy and black enslavement as a great truth and a cornerstone of the Confederacy. Here's what he says. It's foundations are laid. It's cornerstone rests upon a great truth and a cornerstone of the Confederacy. Here's what he says. Its foundations are laid. Its cornerstone rests upon the great truth that the Negro is not equal to the white man. That slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition.

This our new government is the first in the history of the world based upon this great physical, philosophical and moral truth. He then goes on to use the Bible and claims, our Confederacy is founded upon principles, in strict conformity with these laws. This stone which was rejected by the first builders is become the chief of the corner, the real cornerstone in our new edifice. I'm sorry. I know that you have a very profound

and a very profound difference. I was going to make a remark before you quoted that part of that speech, which I have not read in its entirety before. I was about to say, you know, I've never wanted to go back in time grab somebody went back by the back of their head and slam their face into a table So badly in all my life, and then you read that quote Which which is part of Easter mass as a cat the whole Jesus and And and to hear some pecker wood redneck Fucking I don't remember what state Stevens was from I don't care Oh Fucking I don't remember what state Stevens was from I don't care

See this is the kind of thing that makes me want to go find a circo and and grab and declare crusade just no Deus volt You know I I would point out he probably wasn't a Parker would given that in South Carolina the the property requirement to become a senator Yeah, was you had to own, I believe, 200 slaves. Okay. So, men who espoused this kind of stuff is your upper, upper class. Yeah. Well. And write this kind of way and having read this way.

I'm talking about actual, like, you know, very classic. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. No, no, no, no. Okay. Yeah. I didn't say trailer trash. Yeah. I mean, he was the aristocracy.

Yeah. Oh, okay. Yeah. Let me change my language. Not Parker would prick. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, Constitution, oh he must. The new Constitution has put it rest forever. All the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institutions, African slavery as it exists among us, the proper status of the Negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson in his forecast has anticipated this as the rock upon which the old Union would be split. He was right. What was conjecture with him is now a realized fact, but whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands may be doubted.

The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the alleding statesmen, if you're going to keep panimining beating the shit out of this guy, it's going to be really hard to read this. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, it's hard not to. Okay, so the prevailing idea is entertained by him and most of the Aleting Statesman at this time of the formation of the old Constitution were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature, that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically. It was an evil that they knew not well how to deal with.

But the general opinion of the men of that day was that somehow or another, in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away. Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of the races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the idea of a government of the races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation and the idea of a government built upon it when the storm came and the wind blew, it fell. So Ed, as a man of religion.

What's the problem? What's the problem? Oh, heresy, heresy, heresy, dark, bloody, heresy. But at the time, how many people were saying that that was heresy? Well, not nearly enough. Not nearly enough. And the ones who were were considered crazy. Yeah, and what I, you know, history, historiographically, what I find most remarkable is one of the things... Oh, and we're going to get into the story, aren't we?

Oh, yeah. Well, this is all about history. You know, we're talking about lost cost. That's what all this is. Yeah. What I wind up being at pains to explain to my students, because I teach in a predominantly lower income, a very significant proportion of people of color kind of setting. A significant number of African American students from lower income levels.

And I am a prototypical middle class white guy. And so when the issue of race comes up, I'm teaching seven-square-world history. We're going back to the fall of the Roman Empire and everything. Sure. And everything came up from there until the French Revolution. One of the things that I point out is the idea that we have of race is a modern invention. Yes. I just gave the speech to my kids like a week and a half ago. Nice. Talking about slavery and Rome.

Sure. Because they were saying, well, you know, we're the slaves of black people. And I said, well, some of them were, if they were captured and enslaved in North Africa. Sure. Because they were saying, well, you know, we're the slaves black people. And I said, well, some of them were if they were captured and enslaved in North Africa. Right. But to the Romans, it didn't matter. They didn't have an idea of race like we have it today. The idea that we have of race was invented to justify the peculiar institution of American race-based channel slavery because West Africa was where you could get the slaves from because of the colonizing efforts of the Portuguese and the way those kingdoms were dealing with things. One of the reasons you were able to do that was because Bernard Nicasas gives his treatise on why it's better to use African slaves instead of Native American slaves because God likes that.

Yes. Fuck him. better to use African slaves instead of Native American slaves because God likes that. Yes. Fuck him. Sorry. That's okay. You get that. Not sorry. No, not sorry at all.

And so, you know, that the whole, like every, every racial, racial, quote, racial problem that we're dealing with today is because a group of white people had to find a way to morally and in their own way of looking at it scientifically justify keeping a whole different group of people in bondage and oppression strictly based on a set of physical differences. Well, because the religion that they believed in did not endorse slavery. No, no, like straight up Christianity and Islam do not. There is no difference between Greek or slave, Muhammad, who I'm going to confess I have a number of problems with, but Muhammad himself said, if you own slaves, set them free, right? You know, you should. He said,

you should set them free. You know, and the only circumstances in early Islam under which it was like, no, no, you can have slaves was, you know, conquest of non-monotheistic peoples. Right. And then, even then, you were supposed to, you know, inculcate them, kind of bring them up to speed. Bring them up to speed, and then set them free. Right. You know, and the problem is that people suck, like throughout history, humans have found one way or another

to, you know, do what they want to do and find ways to justify it. And, you know, ISIS used that example of, you know, Korean polytheists to try to justify widespread slavery in their territory, you know, and it was all women being slaves for horrible, you know. And Boko Haram, first and foremost. Yeah, well, yeah, Boko Haram as well, you know, and, and then, you know, in the states and in Great Britain before they abolished slavery. Yep. It was used race Mm-hmm. Like this whole pseudoscientific

Science of race studies it showed up so funny you bring up pseudoscience because the next quote I have is by the same man Yeah, pseudoscience, which was really big the 18800s back then it was called science Well done our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite ideas its foundations are laid It's cornerstone rests upon the great truth that the Negro is talking about cornerstones That the Negro is not equal to the white man that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition this our new government is the first in the history of the world based upon this great physical philosophical moral truth the truth has been slow in the process of his development like all other

truths in the various departments of science he's like a more racist Thomas Jefferson and which is hard to credit. Yeah, he's claiming. Like you have a hard time imagining Jefferson. Yeah. Being more of a racist. Right, but this guy, he distills it. Yeah, oh, oh, he completely distills it.

And then you take away all of the intellectual. Good qualities. Like you know, you take away Jefferson's engineering expertise, his creativity, his airy addition, his culture, and you wind it with this prick. He claims natural law to back up biblical law. And it's really weird to me that the people who make these arguments are so frequently ending up on the more profitable side of the debate. Of course. You know, but it's just that. So weird. Like, these are universal truths.

You can't argue with them. They just happen to put me in the drive. They just just happen to put me on top. Yeah. So here's more. Oh, God. Look with confidence to the ultimate universal acknowledgement of the truths upon which our systems rest.

It is the first government ever instituted upon the principles, strict conformity to nature, and the ordination of providence, in furnishing the materials of human society. Many governments have been founded upon the principle of the subordination and surfdom of certain classes of the same race. Such were and are in violation of the laws of nature. Our system commits no such violation of nature's laws. Wow. End quote. That's so yeah. So yeah. So I don't want

totally not about slavery. It was it was really just economic. Oh yeah it's totally yeah no. No it's all it's all it's all about tariffs. It's all about tariffs. Yeah. Oh yeah. Understand. My father. Yeah. Grew up in yeah, understand. My father grew up in Florida. Okay, went to high school in Florida. What most people don't know about Florida is the further north you go, the further south it becomes. Yeah, like at Florida, North is Alabama, Jr. Yeah, it really is. Yeah, oh yeah, but some parts of it are Mississippi. Yeah, mean like yeah. My dad actually, like an Arkansas fucked a Mississippi. Sheds and there you go. And their brothers.

Yeah, so not even sisters. Wow, yeah, yeah. No, so he grew up in Coral Gables, which is just outside Miami. So that's, that's way. Pretty far south. Pretty far south. But it was Miami in the 50s and early 60s

before, before, the cocaine made into a city. Hey, yeah, nice. Yeah, before the burial about Lyft, It was Miami in the 50s and early 60s before Before cocaine made into a city. Yeah, yeah, yeah before the burial about left before Cuba and the influx of Cubans I mean there were there were Cubans there But you know what he remembers from his childhood is the biggest minority group were Jewish people right you know And so it was still very waspy when it was actually Protestant and much more Southern in many ways than it is today. Yeah. You know, today Miami is its own dimension. It's not even, you know, it's it's it's it's it doesn't even count as the South like you

were saying really. It's the New York of Florida. Yeah, New York South. Back then, no Florida was, it was still a Confederate state. He grew up as a child, it was still segregated. And so what he learned in school was that Civil War was about states rights and it was about tariffs. And when I was in high school in California, reading California textbooks back in the 90s. He had a certain level of cognitive dissonance seeing me doing my American history homework,

and he was like, well, you know, that's revisionism, whatever all. Because, I mean, the story he had learned, they understand. Did he, he was canon? Yeah, my grandfather was from Iowa, my grandmother was from Long Island. So neither one of them were southerners. They had emigrated to Florida for different reasons, early in their lives. But my dad grew up in Florida as the son of these ex-pats from other parts of the country. And so, you know, he, that's what he learned in school, that's what he carried with him. And because he was telling me that at the same time I was reading the textbooks from California

which still are bought from the same companies that published textbooks for, say, Texas. But back then it was a lot more modular. It really was like the textbook industry wasn't as centralized in Texas based. But they still soft-pened them. Oh yeah. They still soft did people in California were okis and arkis. I mean let's yeah well you know you're talking about your mom side of the generation back in my mom's side of the family which you know I don't have a problem with but apparently okis is slur. Like I learned that in

I learned that I shouldn't be saying. You saying it. And teaching in San Benito high school and outside of, I forget, now Gilroy, the very first year I was teaching, I talked about, I've used the word okay and I had kids in my classroom. Tense up. Tense up, like I had just used the N word. And I'm like, oh, okay.

Sorry. Sorry, you know, because those tensions were still very real. But, you know, and so yeah, so they soft-pedaled it, but it was still more explicit that, no, this slavery was a central thing. I mean, they pushed the states rights,

was an overarching thing, and now when I go on to teach American History, I'm going to be like, no, here are the primary source documents. Read the primary sources. Right. Read this, Pecklewood Stevens. Yeah. Read this.

It's going to piss you off. If you read this and you don't want to pay them, I'm kicking the shit out of this guy. Like, you're in the wrong history class, because, you know. Well, I went to school in Florida as well okay for fifth and sixth grade okay and I was a history nerd braunsen so did you ever see the movie Rosewood okay so there's a scene where all of the KKK are like they finished killing as many of the black people as they wanted in Rosewood wiped out the whole town now they're going on a rampage and they go down the road

and there's 13 white guys with shotguns standing in the middle of the road and the sheriff is in front of them and he tells them, you know, basically our black folk are law-abiding citizens and they're like, no, we know that there's some people in there that need justice and he has them draw their guns. And he says, you go away, Bronson is a good town. It was that town.

Now, to give you some perspective, I think that actually happened. I also would point out that Bronson had about 804 people in it when I lived there. 800 when we left. It had two separate cemeteries so that blacks and whites wouldn't rot together. Yeah.

Like it was. Yeah, that was just that was. Yeah, the white side of town were single wide trailers and sometimes double wide if they were really rich. The black side of town were lean two shacks. It was as segregated as it gets. While we were in school together, it was not segregated, but it was real quick. But at the moment the bell rang together.

You go to your set parts and you might even have a bus route go through both places but by and large i mean it was it was a tremendously so the kids that i was in school with would they found out of the huge history nerd because you know i was from San Francisco which automatically made me gay um and so and because i was a huge history nerd uh... that also gave me troubles and so they would bring their civil war History books and they'd be like you see right there. It says the South succeeds. I'm like that's a seeds And they they're like well, why should I it's been three years in fifth grade? I don't need to start now. I'm not joking. Oh, we had a field we had a field day where like six graders go against six

Orders and fifth graders go against fifth graders We lost the tug of war because the other team of fifth graders drove to the show. They drove themselves. I kid you not. I kid you not. What? Yeah. Wow.

Yeah. So. Yes. So having gone to school and stuff. Slavery was not mentioned, and that's the thing that so often happens is that you get away with a big lie by just hiding it amongst the weeds. You don't even say that. No, it wasn't. You just downplayed some importance, which is what our textbooks were doing in California. So, on April 12th, Fort Sumter gets fired upon.

Yes. It was 1861. Virginia and Arkansas almost immediately succeed. Tennessee and North Carolina quickly follow. Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri stayed with the Union, but also stayed slave states. Missouri would follow eventually, but it was a state that had two competing legislatures, one for each side because it's Missouri.

Yeah, well, yeah. It's such a weird place. It's it, boy. It really, like their most hated food is the final bite of a hot dog. Like that's how weird they are. Like that's a thing. It's a very weird state. Kentucky had a similar thing going, but it was a little less obvious.

Like Missouri was like, yeah, this is what we do. Yeah, two different legislatures West Virginia wanted to stay in the Union but Virginia yanked them along because West Virginia was in a state yet yeah now I'm spending a lot of time on these specific states because it's all gonna come out later when we talk about wrestling okay so like I said civil war happened lots of blood spilled largely over um slavery yeah they didn't mean this this doesn't mean that the North is overly fond of black people. By the way, really it doesn't. It just means that they don't want to compete with free black labor. Well, yeah. Like that's and you had more of a foothold of a particular

kind of moralistic religion. Well, I'm going to weigh in here. Do we talk about that? Because upon the altar of the nation is a great study about this and I don't remember the author's name right now, it's the top of my head, but one of the things that's really a remarkable part of the divide regionally is the nature of northern American mainline Christianity and southern American mainline Protestant Christianity. And the thing is in the north it was Presbyterianism and that worked its way into the Midwest too including those states that I mentioned that stayed borders. Yeah but it was it was Presbyterianism.

It was not Methodism, but the brother of Methodism, I can't think of it, Episcopalianism. Okay. Episcopalian, Harry S. Stout. Okay, thank you. Great book, by the way, for those of you listening, like one, an amazing read.

But it was Episcopalianism and Presbyterianism both very British very well well yeah very committee oriented very very very very committed oriented very and and the nature of the spirituality of them is very much, you know, orderly. Is the word that comes to mind for me right now. Yeah. It's been a long week and I don't. No, that's a very Yankee way of looking at it actually was social position.

Yeah, yeah, it's, and whereas in the South, both amongst slaves and amongst the people that owned them and the rest of white society, the Christianity that you had was cathartic. Yeah. It was revival meetings. Bloodlettings. Yeah. On sometimes the physical level and always the spiritual level.

But focused on the suffering of Christ. Focus this well, well not the reason why he did it, but the actual visceral. They would like Mel Gibson. Yeah, yeah, focused focus Just it yeah, yeah for a variety of reasons, but Focus focused on the suffering of Christ and then focused on Because it was it was his baptism and it's it's a very very Calvinist very Yeah, you're second grade awakening. Yeah, I blame the second grade awakening for so many things in this country But but the second grade awakening, I blame the second grade awakening for so many things in this country, but the second grade awakening, idea of this epiphany moment of sudden enlightenment and sudden

realization of whether or not you were one of the elect and whether or not we're going to go to heaven and they still talk about you still hear it in, you know, televangials and that kind of stuff, talking about that moment when you are saved. Right. You know, and it was this... A catastrophic Christianity. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And it was all, it was this deeply,

emotionally cathartic kind of ritual. It was screaming and hollering and handling snakes in some places. And, you know, this is... The further west you get, the stranger gets. Yeah, yeah. But I mean, it really is a Catholic, stranger it gets. Like I know one of the things I love about my faith

is how weird parts of it are. And I'm just saying, wow. Yeah. So now saying that, just real quick, the that fits perfectly with a Southern society, where it's a landed gentry. The elect, the elite, you, I mean, it absolutely fits into that, elitism. And if you look to the north, the north was much more cosmopolitan.

It was much more, you had to take into account a lot of different people. A lot more town council, very, I mean, Salem falls all the way back to the period and it's all the way back to the very foundationsans, all the way back to the very foundations, it's still council-eat, not you are chosen, you are not. It was a world-dammed, so let's figure out how to make this work. Yeah, well, if you go to the very founding of the different colonies, you look at who founded and how they worked. The Puritans showed up as a collective to build the city of God and the Rhono colony showed up to make money for

second sons of Landed Gentry. And that basically is the pattern kind of all the way down in terms of the differences in social structure. And I mean, you know, the two of us like to just kind of beat up on, you know, Southern institutions, Southern culture. And I genuinely want everybody who's listening to understand, I'm not trying to be pejorative when I describe it that way. I'm just saying that that is a key component in the different outlooks that these two parts the country has. Absolutely. And when you're talking about the differences in religion,

the one of them was social cohesion in the North. It was all about, you know, having to live close with the other cities. You have to live close with the other cities. A lot of places, yeah. And in the South, it was at least one theory I've read, which I put some credence into, was the violence and oppression and guilt associated with the day-to-day operation of slavery in their society was something that meant

that white southerners needed revival meetings and needed this catharsis as the way to deal with the pressure of sinning essentially of doing that all the time. Absolutely. And at the emphasis on sin and redemption, you don't hear Presbyterians or the Piscopalians. Piscopalians, I keep having trouble thinking of it. It's because of your Catholic. Yeah, well, rivals cross on. It's like it's like, you know, brother John, you know, it's like, hey, just come over here.

Just, you know, just admit Francis is a nice guy. You know, and it's a kind of relationship I actually had with Methodist friends of mine, tongue in cheek, like just come on. But, you know, and they don't have that same level of catharsis in services. I mean, it can be a very powerful spiritual experience But it's different, but it's but it's very different and the catharsis they have is not corporate It's well in the north. It's corporate. It's not individual. Yeah, it's not Revealed. Yeah, it's not one person coming up in front of the prayer meeting to testify. It's secular quite honestly

It's in a great. Yeah, we're creating a Norwu No-Wu's Ordo. You know, we are creating a new world. And God won't come until we get the shit right. Whereas in the South, rapture's coming. You better act the right way, because he'll pluck you up and the rest of them will burn. On an individual way.

Yep. So, meaningful insight on it. Which is interesting because the civil rights movement in the 1960s absolutely adopted that northern Belief structure about social justice, but kept but kept all of the passion. Yep And the you know column response and yeah, and yet where they got the most racism hurled against them was in Chicago in the North like yeah Yeah, at least according to King Yeah, I would say Dan Nash would have a different story against them was in Chicago in the North. Like, like, yeah. At least according to King, a Grand Marlowe King,

I would say Dan Nash would have a different story, having stayed mostly in the Southward. So, certain derivations, like you said, of Christianity were more against slavery than others, and largely those were housed in the North. Yeah. Because it's easy to resist other people's temptations too. Let's be real.

Well, it's easy to resist other people's temptations, and there is something to be said for the fact that in the North, the whole social structure and the economy were built around industry by this time. The nascent beginnings of American industry are established in the North. And you had a system where it was the individual free laborer who was the backbone of the industrial economy. Yeah.

And so it's really easy to not so much look down on somebody else's temptations as to condemn a sin that you're not depending on. Yeah. And one that you're competing against. Yes. That's a big thing. And like I said before, like free soil, free labor, free men. Yeah.

It was an economic policy. Oh yeah. And as much as it was moral. Yeah. And part of the moralism that drove the 90-day men who showed up as soon as all those states seceded, as soon as Fort Sumter got fired on, the militia of Massachusetts, Vermont, all of those, all the Northeast states, I mean, they had been

preparing too, they did, because they knew that the southerners were talking about seceding. And some Northern states wanted to secede to get away from slavery. Yeah, that was also the thing. Yeah, and so- And are you states' rights as a foundation of that? We shouldn't have to enforce your slavery up here. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's a remarkable conflation of stuff going on between both sides. But the 90-day men basically responded almost instantaneously with all the young men in a town showing up to sign up on a dotted line.

And the thing is, the South seceded over slavery. The North fought them over preservation of the Union. Yes. Because at the time they signed up up those young men did not care about the plight of slaves in Mississippi or any place down there. Many of them changed their minds after they got into the south. So the way these people were being forced to live, but that's a topic for another time. But you know they signed up, it was we are a union, right? We are a nation and by leaving, you are traders and we are not going to let you do it.

We're not going to let you kill the country. And it's this remarkable dichotomy of motivation. So for the South, it was about slavery for the North, it wasn't. And this is where you can hide the idea of slavery. Yeah. Innessal it so nobody pays attention to it. Because you could say, oh, for the north it was, yeah. It was, yeah.

So I keep pointing out, and you do too, that it was about slavery. For reasons that'll become clear soon. But you know what I like, primary source documents, I like Confederate Constitution. First, it's specifically because it is such a self-damning thing. The first thing I love about it, it specifically prohibits foreigners from voting in all states, instead of leaving it up to the states. You know, states, right?

I also found Article I, Section 9 fascinating, because I like parallelism and Article 1, Section 8 is fascinating in our Constitution. So here's what they said. All bills appropriating money shall spell says, shall, wow, try again. Shall specify in federal currency the exact amount of each appropriation and the purposes for which it is made. In Congress, shall grant no extra compensation to any public contractor officer, agent or servant, after such contract shall have been made or such service rendered. So in other words, if you're going to pass a bill of spending, you have to say exactly what that money is going toward.

Huh. That actually makes a lot of goddamn sense. It does. It also gives a president and the vice president six year terms But no re-elections. So yeah, we want to be different You know also South America was had done the same later on probably just to be a little bit less of a copycat Presidents had to have lived in the Confederate States of America for 14 years. So naturalization The CSA Constitution actually addressed slavery which was was different than the U.S. Constitution,

the U.S. Constitution kept doing weird verbal gymnastics, persons held in service to labor and so on. The CSA Constitution says, the importation of Negroes of the African race from any foreign country other than the slave holding states or territories of the United States of America is hereby forbidden. And Congress is required to pass such laws as shall effectively prevent the same. No bill of a tinder, exposed fact of law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in Negro slaves shall be passed. So there's two things going on there.

You don't get to bring in imports of black people to make them slaves. They can only be homegrown or bought from the United States, which basically means it's not like they got a saw out and like tried to sever their ties. It means you can go kidnap black people. That's what that is. On top of that, you don't get to bring them in from anywhere else because we don't want our money going elsewhere. So it's like a tariff on slaves. And then you can't pass any law stopping this. In Article 4, the citizens of each state shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several states.

And shall have the right of transit and sojourn in any state of this Confederacy with their slaves and other property. And the right of property in said slaves shall not be thereby impaired. Which they already had in the Dred Scott case. Like that was a big failing of this Remcord. And the Northwest Territory ordinance of 1887 had said, no, you can't do that. Dred Scott kind of said fuck you to that. But I mean, so they're specifically naming Slate or We. Well, because if they're splitting off from the United States,

Drescott decision no longer has any more marriage. So here's how to make a constitutional. So here's how to make a constitutional, yeah. But again. And they're explicitly saying Slate or We. Slate or We. Yeah. Here's more.

The Confederate States may acquire new territory because they want to make sure they can go fight and take other shit from people. And Congress shall have power to legislate and provide governments for the inhabitants of all territory belonging to the Confederate states, lying without the limits of the several states, and may permit them at such time and in such manner as it may by law Provide to form states to be admitted into Confederacy. Okay, so here's how you expand which our Constitution didn't quite have and became my statue Cool in all such territory the institution of Negro slavery as it now exists in the Confederate states Shall be recognized and protected by Congress

as it now exists in the Confederate States, shall be recognized and protected by Congress. Slavery was mentioning it, just in case people didn't. Yes, throw that out. And by the territorial government, and the inhabitants of the several Confederate states and territories, shall have the right to take such territory any slaves lawfully held by them in any of the states or territories of the Confederate states.

So as you can see, they were really big on protecting slavery. Yeah. All right, loss cause. Yeah. Now we're onto the loss cause. Yeah. This is definitely going to be more than one episode. Oh, yeah, already.

Yeah. But we're going to start with the loss cause and then the next episode we'll pick back up with the loss cause. So, loss cause. It's just really important to recognize the Civil War was founded over slavery. I just want to, I don't know if I made that clear. Just like, you know, in case anybody has been asleep for the last 50 minutes, you want to make sure you understand. And, and slavery was key. In all fairness, there's been a lot of

income paper spent on minimizing that fact for the last 150 years. Yeah. But it's pretty goddamn clear that it's about slavery. If you actually take the time to go back to look at the primary source documents, it is, it can't be argued. So like if you read the history. Yes, yes. Yeah. Yeah. All right, so.

The tough said. Lost cause. Dead horse. And this is the crux of what you're going to hear later about wrestling. Yeah. The lost cause is the ideology that the South was fighting valiantly and honorably for Southern Honor Pride, despite being tied to a regrettable but really minimal sin of slavery.

The fuck these people. That's what the lost cause was like. They're saying, you can't kill a broad. But that's what they're claiming. They're saying, look. Heritage not hate. Right. Straight up.

Right. That pisses me off. The lost causers claim that prior to the 1950s, nobody really cared much about the slave ratio. The only reason people care about it in the 1950s is because these black people are, you know, one to city. Yeah. I didn't want to vote.

What the hell is that? Yeah, or sit at counters. Yeah. You know, Taint Natural. Taint Natural. Taint right, Taint Natural. And nobody put much stock in it. And it was really just a tragic issue of honor

that had to play out. There were these two ways of life. Blue and gray. There were cousins that just couldn't reconcile their differences. Well, they couldn't reconcile their differences because one side wanted to own people. I think you're nitpicking here. I think really it's just, it's a pretty god damn big nit, man. So they literally lied about history to make history more palatable. That's what they did. Yeah, well, yeah. Yeah. So I want to see if these phrases

sound familiar to you given where your dad went to school. I know what they sound like to me given where I went. Yeah. Okay. I'm less than the war of Northern aggression. The war between the states. The war for Southern independence. The second American rebellion see that one You know the thing you know so so the war of Northern aggression I've I've always heard like I always heard that tongue in cheek I just heard that is like you know the war of Northern aggression You know like in like a class that you know she'll be foot. Yeah, you know kind of accent. Yeah, you know And you just you have to laugh because yeah, you know, kind of accent. Yeah. You know, and you just, you have to laugh.

Yeah. Yeah. You know, because in the insidious thing about it is, from a literal standpoint, from a totally literal standpoint, from a military history standpoint, literally, it's not incorrect. Because time out, for Sumter, was the first thing to get shelled, and that was in the south, and Southern is attacking federal troops. Did, yes, was the first thing to get shelled and that was in the South and the Southern is attacking Federal troops. So, however, hold on. Okay, the rest of the war. Okay, what's fought was was fought in the South with the North having to march in and invade in order to enforce Union.

So there is there, yeah, you can you can say that one with a straight face and I won't necessarily want to kick you in the nuts. How about the war between the states? That one I heard. The first time I heard that bugs bunny and you have somebody say, yes, yes. And the thing is the war between the states again is not inaccurate. Not inaccurate. It is a it is a massive whitewash of what was I mean it yeah it takes it takes all the all the color and blood out of it and turns it into this you know it can burns is it yeah yeah it really does yeah I love Ken Burns but civil war, like if you watch it now, it's buying in way too much.

Yeah, no, it is. It's the cousins, it's a tragedy, these cousins will fight it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And yeah. How about the war for Southern Independence? Fuck me, I'm like, Cal, broad.

That's bullshit. But how is this conceptually that different than the American Revolution now? And I'm not saying that ironically. I know I know. I genuinely because you have one group of people saying we don't want to do it your way we're out. Yeah. That's what's going on. Yes. The thing is I don't I'm gonna say that I don't think there was a single enlightenment thinker. That's true. Who would have looked at the two conflicts

and seen him as more like willing? That's a very good point. Neither, neither Locke nor Hobbes, who are my two, but you know, you're guys from the Enlightenment. Neither were I. Even Jefferson Wooden of Sennhell. Jefferson would have looked at it and gone, no, no look.

Okay, no, look. ours was about representation. Sure. You have representation. You are overrepresented. You are, you are in every way. I made sure. Yeah.

I bet it didn't. Jackass is, I'm one of you. I made sure for you. I cooked the book, I guess. I waited for you. You get to. I guess I would it for you Yeah, you get to claim three fists of every black person because they don't get a vote They don't have you just mean super citizens out of the white people who own them own that yeah Yeah, you know because I was one of them which is gonna want to make sure that which is gonna keep it going longer

Yeah, by the way. Yeah, so you're welcome. Yeah, so you're welcome. So okay, so it is fundamentally different So so it is yeah and and again, it's technically true, but so fundamentally different that it's it's not just a difference of degree, it is a difference in time. Yeah, it is, it is, it is, what's insidious about so much of the kind of stuff that that lost cause historians do is that it is that that drop of truth in the middle of the lie. And they hide behind that. Yeah, it's that one little fig leaf they can use and use that to cover up the elephant in the room.

And yeah, it's not something you can just look at and say, no, pre-mphasia, that's completely wrong. Right, you have to address it. You have to address it, which then allows them to have a conversation. Right, which allows them to legitimize their very, yeah, just. So I take it, we't even want to go over the

second American rebellion uh here's some people who called it the Civil War these amateurs Jefferson Davis Ulysses S. Grant Robert E. Lee William T. Sherman P.T. Beauregard Nathan Bedford Forest Abraham Lincoln all called it the Civil War yeah you know the guys who fought and led the Confederacy called it the Civil War. So lost cause, it really attaches itself to how the war was fought. That's what it's really. That's where they had any kind of a leg to stand on at all. And so they created a mythos out of that rather than looking at why. If you eliminate the why, you can make heroes out of traitors. Yeah. And you can make it

so your neighbors and your own relatives were merely misguided, not men trying to wreck a country to keep other people in chains. Yeah. The best part of Alexander Stephen's speech is that he doesn't stick to it at all. By the way, once the Civil War ends, he tries to backpettle. Of course he does. He makes the speech, it's all about slavery, and then he claims it's not about slavery. It was about economics. And since the North was attacking them for their use of black people as labor, people

who want to simplify and just like, oh, I just don't like political nastiness. We're able to hang with them. I know both sides are equally. Exactly. Well, and that comes into the idea of memory because when you get to the 50th anniversary, and I'm gonna get into it a bit, you get to the 50th anniversary of Gettysburg,

the North also wants to say, okay, cool, because then we can all get back together. And there's a wonderful picture of people who fought and shot at each other. Oh, yeah, sure. You can really see, I know, and moving in its way when you think about the individual men doing that. But, yeah.

Of course, you know, the amount of black people who suffered as a result of that is astounding. So it's about different ideas on the Constitution. Since it was really about whether or not states had the right to leave the union, it's about different ideas on the Constitution. Yeah. Since it was really about whether or not states had the right to leave the union. It's about culture clash. Since the South had a culture of honor and the North had a culture of making money. I'm getting flipped off here. You're not. You're not. You're not.

You're just the one across the table. Yeah. Now, and somebody's got to gonna get flipped off here's the best part all of this is gonna tie into wrestling very soon Yeah, yeah, so But for right now We've run into just about an hour So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna stop us here and we will come back to reconvene for the next part of the lost cause and we will come back to reconvene for the next part of the Lost Cause because it really

deserves several of its own podcasts. So for a geek history of time, I'd like to point out to you folks that Geek History of Time has its own Twitter now. We're up to two followers. More people should click follow. It's at Geek History Time. If you also want, you could follow me at At The Harmony. And you can follow me at E.H. Blalock.

I'm neither as air you die nor as cutting as day and is, but I have my moments. Also I spend less time shouting directly at the present. I do like to shout at a person who is in power. It's a hobby. So I promise it will get geekier, but we just need to set the stage. Really set the stage. So we will see you all in the next episode. For Geek History of Time, I'm Damien Harmony.

I'm Ed Blalock. true time, I'm Damien Harmony. I'm Ed Blaylock.