A Geek History of Time - Episode 56 - Firefly and the Lost Cause Part II

Episode Date: May 23, 2020

BELLS Blow in her face and she'll follow you anywhere. You are destroying the Constitution of the United States may God have mercy on your souls. Good day. Yes. It's a very sad word. We could be sad if we just elected the right white man to power. That's creepy but that's a different category of creepy. Zizuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuz and find out what the fuckin' truth that man was trying to get at. Like with most episodes I can bring him back to wrestling. Oh, right. Well, he's got other people who work for him who also do things.

And they can get new take-out, human size, into smaller worlds after all. Fuck you. I still don't give a shit about getting fake property in a fantasy game. This is a geek history of time. What are we connected to in the real world? My name is Ed Blaylock. I'm a 45 year old middle school history teacher with one, counted one section of seventh grade English, currently distance teaching here in Northern

California. And I am also a very happily married father of a two-year-old who just recently interrupted one of my distance learning lessons by coming up to me and telling me about a dragon to which I responded well. Go get your sword. You know how we deal with dragons in this household. How very British. That's me, who are you? I'm Damien Harmony. I am a single dad. Thanks for that salt. No, I'm a single dad of two.

Count them two children, one who's ten and one who's almost eight, which is amazing. I just neither of whom have interrupted my distance teaching. I'm also a high school Latin teacher with a section of world history. My daughter recently asked our player to play under pressure by David Bowie afterwards I had her listen to. Now fun fact, did you know that David Bowie signed away all the rights to that song because he didn't like the record label he was working with? Really? Yeah, so he gave all the Queen. I mean, I did not know that. Yeah, story goes, he gave all those rights to Queen because he was like, look, it'll get me exposure, that's fine.

And I'll finish writing bad albums for this record label then I can go be the artist that I want to be. So he did that. Wow. Fun. Yeah. And so then I had her listen to Ice Ice Baby right afterwards. And I explained to her that the guy who sang that song claimed that he came up with that

beat all on his own. And she's seven and she's like, no, he didn't. It's obvious. So I'm like, there you go. There you go. It is, it is, it was pretty obvious, certainly in retrospect. And I have to say, um, I, I, I, I love you in the Aga Payway, a little bit more for hearing that because just earlier today on my Facebook feed a memory came up

Oh From two years ago my son was about three months old We went down to visit my parents in Southern California and My mother and I went to the store to try to find a swimsuit for my son, who at that point was still an infant. And we couldn't find one. And so my wife immediately got on after we got home, my wife immediately got on Amazon

and started looking. And she said, you know me, if there's a problem, I'll solve it. And I made sure to make eye contact with her before I said, check out the hook while your DJ revolves it. Oh my. She gave me a blank stare to which I responded ice, ice, baby. Oh wow. So, I was working on my dad game from like right there. From the moment he was ex-Udaro. Yeah, pretty much. From the moment he was ex-Udaro. Yeah, pretty much. From the moment he was ex-Udoro, and I also want to point out for our audience

that when I posted that on Facebook, you, you, you specifically, were one of the first people to reply with a comment that wasn't what they're line from the song that led to a whole series of our back and forth. Sure. Part of which involved me saying no but she did look like she wanted to throw a harpoon at me. So you know. Well done sir. Well done. So yeah. But so so you know Kismet you you know that shows up on the sporting and now you mentioned that today. That's kind of funny. Yeah

But when when we and in and much less, you know happy fluffy Dead bullshit notes when we left off on our last episode We were talking about Firefly. Yes. We were talking about the universe of Firefly. And I was explaining who the alliance were. And kind of by extension of that, I was explaining who Zoe and Mal were. That of course, the two of them, the captain and the first officer of the serenity. Firefly class, a starship, serenity, were veterans of a war between the invading forces of the alliance and the independence who were trying to fight them off as it's depicted to us by Mal. Mal, of course, is a hard quirk still partisan for the independence. There's an episode that starts with him picking

a bar fight on Unification Day, which is the commemoration of the end of the the Unification War, which he and Zoe fought in on the losing side. The Alliance sought to take control of the independent planets and moons, not previously under its control. And the Alliance is the overarching big bad of the series. They experimented on river. They sent the hunters after the crew of the Serenity because they have river with them. And the Alliance is decried repeatedly by mal as being oppressive and a bunch of invading bullies. And Simon Tam, when we hear about his backstory and the process of You know the kind of kind of the backstory of an episode that he's you know heavily involved in we kind of find out that Life on a coral world looks like something out of a cyberpunk novel and he particularly comes from the privileged class of the Alliance come a society and river river

and of the Alliance kind of society and river. And he gets warned by his parents that you need to stop pushing on this. This is dangerous. You're gonna make people angry, whatever. And that kind of points in a direction of this being, kind of this corporate kind of fascist, kind of weird, kind of surveillance state, etc., etc. But that's kind of the extent to which we get an explanation of who the alliance are. What we see in the series

is the line soldiers wear purple, a very bluish shade of purple. Independence wore brown, which is where the Appalachian of brown coats comes from, that that Mallon Zilli wore brown coats and the fandom are brown coats. In the bits of war backstory that we see in the series, it's clear that the independent military had a military structure, but they were a lot more ad hoc and rag tag than the Alliance Army. Would you call them a loose confederation, if you will? In a way, yes. Can I come back to that brown coat thing?

Yeah, go right ahead. Short version of a coat, maybe less warm might be a shirt. Um, not the vibe I ever picked up. No, certainly not in the writing of the short. But the similarity to that always really did bother me. Brown coats, brown shirts like that. Brown shirts. It was too too close for my comfort. I can okay I can understand that. That was not. Now of course I come from a very different ideological background than you do.

So that was never something that kind of twigged for me. I never picked up on that. But I can see that. I can see that. But the point that I want to make is that the independent army is always portrayed as being, as I said, a lot more ad hoc and ragdag. And they fought a great deal of spirit and determination that they never gave up. And they were fighting against a foe that had a massive material advantage and fought much more mechanistically. And had a lot more stories.

Yeah, they were much more urbanized. They had a great deal of material advantage. They had a great deal of technological advantage. They had a great deal of man-powered advantage. The independent is always outnumbered. Right, and they wore a color very close to a deep blue. Yes. Yeah. And in Bushwack, that's the title of the episode. And we're going to get back to that title in a little bit.

Good. Mal is questioned by an Alliance officer. They've they only wind up getting picked up by an Alliance cruiser. After a raid by the Revers. Right. And they all get picked up. Wait, I thought Rever was the one that they were helping to keep safe. She was, and I don't remember off the top of my head how they managed to pull that off

in the process of doing all this. So how is she doing the raid then? Nice. Nice. Reaver. Reaver. Long. Okay. Fine. You can announce it the way they do in the show. Reaver. Okay. You can't see it, of course, but I'm now flipping Damien the bird. it, of course, but I'm now flipping Damien the bird. So anyway, in this episode, Malangat's questioned by an alliance officer about his bitterness from the war, because the accusation lines up being leveled that, you know, it's not these mythical barbarian reavers that attack this other ship. It's you, you attack the ship, because you're still bitter about

the war, and you're trying to attack these people who are trying to go about their business and whatever their loyalists to the alliance. And he specifically says, you know, you're doing this because you're angry about the fact that you were on the wrong side of the war. Mal's response, Mal's answer is, may have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong side. Yeah. And that was number one, great writing, but it also twigged, as you say, for me as well.

Okay. All right. And I'm going to, before we get into more about how it twigged, I'm going to stop you there because I got more to say. So Mal, so this is, this is kind of, I'm going to draw that together before we get into real world history. Mal and the crew of the Serenity are basically a criminal gang committing multiple heists against the purple uniformed authorities of the Alliance. The captain and his lieutenant are both veterans of the war who still carry their allegiance to their side

years after it has ended. Yes. Okay, nobody can argue any of those points, that's all canon within the series. Yes. Now, let's talk about Missouri. Thank you. There is specifically.

Yep. Missouri was a border state. It had been admitted to the Union in 1821 as a slave state in order to balance out the state of Maine. Important geographical fact for anybody who doesn't have a map in front of them, of course, Missouri is in the Midwest on Cipri River. Maine, of course, is in the very extreme northeast. And so Missouri was accepted as a slave state into the Union. Maine was a free state. And as part of the Missouri compromise, which we all learned about Nayscreen, about an age-grade US history, no slavery was supposed to be legal above latitude 3630.

But now we need to talk about Kansas, because the Kansas-Nebraska Act happened in 1854, and suddenly instead of 3630, the issue became the idea of popular sovereignty right now it should be noted that the first attempt to form a territorial legislature for Kansas was marked by rampant election fraud by pro-slavery border ruffians coming from misery well i'm sure there were there were good people on both sides though at i mean

fuck you and you're good people on both sides, though, Ed. I mean, fuck you. Had your good people on both sides. One side wanted to own people as property, screw that. That's a tradition. It just, you know, that they were brand new to that area with, yeah, heritage not hate, right? Exactly. Okay.

Ever. Fuck you. Yeah. And them with a cattle prod? Exactly. Okay, ever. Fuck you. Yeah. And them. With a cattle prod. Yeah. So, the, the, a, a federal panel of investigators, this is, this is in, I want to say it's

55. A panel of federal regulators, our investigators, ruled that the election would have led to a free state majority if not four of that interference from Missouri and that pro-slavery delegates Ignored all of that and moved the state capital closer to Missouri and started immediately passing pro-slavery laws in the territory So they held an election people from Missouri crossed over the Mississippi River into Kansas in order to vote

fraudulently in that election in favor of pro-slavery candidates for For the legislature Mm-hmm The federal investigators said This is all the load of bullshit. These people should not be part of the government. There needs to be a new election a new election was actually held Oh wait wait wait be part of the government there needs to be a new election. A new election was actually held. Wait, wait, wait, wait.

This federal government though, its capital is in Washington, D.C., which is in a northern state called Virginia. Oh, you sweet summer child. To cross pollinator for another nerd, but no. No? I, okay, here's what I wanna point out, these are federal regulators, and as you say, Washington, D.C. of course, is anybody who looks at Matt knows is located,

you know, is surrounded by Virginia, which is not a Northern state. Oh, no, Robert E. Lee didn't like slavery, and he was from Virginia. I don't. Sideways with a chain saw. No. The fact that federal regulators would say, no, this is bullshit, should, if anything, be that much more telling about what bullshit it was, be that much more telling about what bullshit it was based on the time period. And so the federal panel had explicitly stated these people had no legal authority, but they all just said, no, you know what, we were elected, we're going to do it anyway.

And when abolitionists formed a competing legislature in Topeka. US president Franklin Pierce ruled they were insurrectionists and let the pro slave or legislator carry on without federal intervention. Well, that sounds like a president is abrogating his duty to actually enforce federal law when state law is being made that runs counter to the freedoms and the agreements under a federal system though. I mean, it surely he didn't get away with that. No, he totally did. Oh, I wish I could argue differently, but he totally did.

So this led to the situation that it referred to as bleeding, Kansas. Violence broke out in 18 people with weapons. So this led to the situation that it referred to as bleeding Kansas. Violence broke out in 18 people with weapons. I actually started doing shit in 1855. Competing militias mostly wound up maneuvering against each other. There were not really a whole lot of fatalities. There was not actually a lot of bloodshed. There was destruction of property.

There were towns being laid siege by one militia or another, either either pro-slavery or anti-slavery. But in 1856, the conflict escalated with the sack of Lawrence Kansas. The town of Lawrence was an abolitionist town and an anti-slavery mob led by the pro-slavery sheriff of Douglas County basically sacked the town. Sacked as it took over with guns. Yeah, and then burned parts of it to the ground, looted, destroyed a massive amount of property. God, what did they do in the federal government? What did they do when the US Armed Forces, and therefore, that isn't what

happened, um, in 1950. Really incompetent. Yes. Just letting bad things happen to good people. Yes. Yes. I'm not even. people. Yes, yes, yes, I'm not even.

How could you imagine now? I wish history gone differently in so many ways right now. But so in 1856, this is an event. We may have referenced this before on the show, but in 1856, Senator Sumner of Massachusetts was beaten nearly to death with a cane by a representative from the South. Let me guess, let me guess what state? Let me guess. South Carolina. South. Let me guess. Let me guess what state? Let me guess South Carolina. Yeah. Yeah. Big shock. Yeah. No kidding. Big surprise. Now partly because he was, some nerd was being really mean to everyone. And that's not okay. Yes. Yes. Some nerd, some nerd was deeply in civil. Uncivil in civil. Anyway, which ever prefixed any to attach to it. He was deeply uncivil in civil anyway, which ever prefixed, I need to attach to it. He was deeply uncivil in a speech where he referred to what was going on in Kansas at the time,

and specifically referenced the senator from South Carolina as aiding and abetting the rape of a virgin. I mean, he was overtly sexual in his language regarding the violence being done by the slave power against the anti-slavery abolitionist settlers and so forth in Kansas. I didn't go into it in great detail, but the pro- or anti-slavery, pardon me, the anti-slavery folks in Kansas had actually said, okay, no, you know what, look, we're going to, we have our own legislature and that legislature set itself up and was trying to do the business of governing the territory in the manner of actually representing

the anti-slavery majority of people in the territory. See, that's their mistake, though. Like, you can't represent the majority of people in what they want in a government, because if you do, then like you have the tyranny of the mob, and you need to be able to protect the minorities rights. Jefferson talked about this. So really, if you let them do the anti-slavery thing, that wouldn't have protected the black

people living there because black people are a minority. And therefore, by allowing slavery. Do you want me to point out where the where the breakdown is, your chain of logic. Go for it. It's really fucking easy. But the word sounds alike. The word. And the grammar word.

Talking about is not that yet. Yes, yes, that's one of the one, one of the wonderful magical things about the English language is you can switch a word out like that. And, and pull frankly that kind of bullshit out of your anus without, without, you know, that narrowing up on sweat. Yeah, without even, even so much as a whisper of a fart. But, but no, that's not how that works. And so, so anyway, some sonner gave the speech in which he was frankly incredibly rude to the senator from South Carolina, and then the representative in the House of

Representatives from from South Carolina, who was related to the the senator from South Carolina. Sun and law. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, uh, walked into the Senate chamber with a very heavy hard wood cane and beat the shit out of some there. Almost to the point of death leaving him with with significant neurological damage that actually required that he go to Europe for treatment for a number of years. that actually required that he go to Europe for treatment for a number of years. I don't know if I want to say to their credit, but I kind of want to say to their credit, the people of Massachusetts continued electing some there. For the next, I don't know how many years, while he was still unable to serve. So his seat sat empty because the people of Massachusetts were like, no, no, fuck you. He's our guy.

Yep. So that just gives you an idea of how bad the canning was, but in in Southern newspapers and in pro-slavery newspapers, editorials called for abolitionists in Kansas to all be similarly beaten nearly to the point of death. Right. Uh, because they were a rule in the north about this peculiar institution. Yeah. Yeah. Clearly, like, I mean, obviously, uh, they didn't overreact at all. Um, in a state, no, not in the least, in a state where the property requirement for being a senator meant that you had to own at least 200 slaves. That was a state

point. A state regulation. Yeah. So you had to own at least 200 slaves to become a senator in South Carolina. So. And then they sent the dude so many, so many like cane handles. Yeah. Oh, no, I found out in doing my research for this, for this episode that like other Southern senators actually got pieces of the cane he had used to beat Sumner and they made necklaces out of them to show solidarity. Well like a rational person would. Again, if he had just been polite. How fucking barbaric, I'm sorry, I'm gonna be just unapologetically a California fucking Yankee. Partisan. No, screw that. Yeah, well, yeah. Yeah, you know what? I'm not fine with it because of the two of us,

I was actually talking about the two of us to another group of my friends today. And we were talking about whether you would get along with other friends of mine. And I said, well, Damien isn't actually a full blown Marxist. True. And that's that's kind of as far as I was able to go. And it was like, yeah, no, so, so as the one of us who counts as the right where out of the two of us. And I just say, no, fuck

that. Okay, well, yeah, with a cat, bra. All right. So, so you you support the Republicans from back then. That's fine. The Republicans of that era, it's an important catapura. Yes. Okay. So you agree that the current party that some powers, the party of Lincoln, got it.

All right. Fuck you. I'm sorry. No. I'm sorry. This. I'm sorry. This episode was going to be about one thing. Do we need to make it about another? Because like, I've been locked up in my house for, I don't even know how God damn long anymore.

Like, he really worked out. Okay. So Sumner got beaten damn near to death at the point where he was bellowing like a cow and other guys drew their guns to keep back other people from protecting him from the beating he was receiving. Yeah because because of course you know the Democrats of that era were the hardcore magat Republicans of this era. I'm sorry did I say that out loud? Anyway so now so and again Southern newspapers and pro-slavery newspapers called for all abolitionists to face a similar fate. In May of 1856 John

Brown led the massacre at Potawatami Creek, in which pro-slavery settlers were murdered with broadsords. John Brown might have been the only woke person in the 1800s. He took a fucking broadsord to try to stop slavery. He was a white dude who thought that black dudes would be his equals or should be and he took a broad sword to make his point

Which is frankly the only kind of language that the South seems to understand so good job on him fighting fire with fire What fighting fire with weapons? Yeah, I'm not gonna know Yeah, yeah, he's a fun hero like I all joking that I was just doing aside John Brown is a goddamn hero like he he is absolutely 100% the hero of that era I think I'm I'm I'm I have a hard time arguing with you. I'm going to say that based on modern liberal kind of more social mores. Oh, I'm being very present to us. Yeah, he comes off as an extremist, of course, because you know, because he took a broadsword to people. Yeah.

people. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, you know, the argument, of course, gets made that, you know, at Potawatama Creek, the individuals that were hauled out of their homes and murdered were in that moment unarmed and, you know, you know, and so, so to an extent, we have to recognize it as being in many ways kind of an active terrorism. There is the argument, of course, to be made that, of course, those individuals were owning people as property. Engaging in terrorism. We're, we're themselves engaging in terrorism. And so, I mean, you know, we could, we could get into a back and forth debate about that. But I want to include that just as an example of what was going on in Kansas at the time. Yes.

Back and forth. That's true. Not to say good people on both sides. No, no. But the violence was a tit for tat kind of situation is what I'm trying to say in this case. Now, a congressional commission investigated this is after, so one group first looked at it and said, no, no, this is illegitimate,

these people shouldn't have legislative power. Pierce went, yeah, no, I don't give a shit, whatever. A congressional commission investigated the election of the pro-slavery legislature in April of 56. They concluded that the election was bogus with rampant by voting from non-residents, and it's important for me to note here that those non-residents all came from Missouri. Pierce refused to recognize its conclusions, and in July, federal troops ordered the anti-slavery legislature in Topeka to disband, like they literally pointed cannons at the building in which

the legislature was meeting and lit long fuses. And it should be noted that the officer commanding those federal troops was the cousin of senator Sumner. Can you imagine being the guy having to do that? Wow. Did they have the like that you don't have to follow immoral orders, clause, yet for soldering? That's a relic of the Vietnam era. Okay.

We have that because of Lieutenant Callie. Right. Okay. And, and actually, I mean, I should say we have that as a, as a relic of the, of the Nuremberg Trials, but in a, in a very specifically American sense, right. We have that because of Littin and Cali. Wow Hey, fun fact. Did you know that in Missouri lightning bugs? Aren't are also called devil bugs, but they're not called fireflies

Really? Yeah, fireflies you don't get fireflies until you get West of Kansas Interesting, mm-hmm. That's weird. Yeah, it is. It's weird. Yeah, it's kind of a fun thing. All right. So, um, it's anyway, the the anti-slavery legislature was forced to disband in Kansas in August of 56 at the Battle of Osloatomi, several hundred border ruffians from Missouri fought against the inhabitants of Osloatomi, a majority anti-slavery settlement, and showed up and raided the place, basically. In 1858, border ruffians kidnapped and shot 11 unarmed abolitionist settlers, killing five in the Maraid desiccess massacre. And it's important, I want to point out that I'm using the phrase border ruffians in both

of these cases for an important reason, just to say border roughions, or all Missourians. So people coming across and committing raids and essentially acts of terrorism, if you will. Yeah. So now note the balance of violence. We have one incident that we see carried out by anti-slavery, John Brown. Have multiple incidents carried out by proselyvery forces.

Note the fact that these are all terrorist paramilitary attacks. Right. Note all of that and then keep it in mind. As I now go back to Missouri. Wait, just real quick. You talked about a group of paramilitary folk who sacked the town, correct? A little while back. Yes. Showed up armed at the Capitol essentially, took it over. Yeah. In support of their ideology. Nothing, nothing like it has happened in modern politics.

I'm just glad that we were in our lesson. Except like earlier this week, was it Kentucky? Well, they didn't go into the capital in Kentucky except in January of this last year. They did that as a different part of a different rally. But there were people who stormed several capitals in the recent time because we have a shelter in place basically across all the states.

And people have gone armed and started congregating and threatening to shoot our governor, threatening to lock him up, a constitutionally elected state official. So yeah, it's... Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so I'm wrong. This has actually happened again. Okay. Well, that's depressing and kind of anger making. But this time you have a president who is exactly like Pierce. No, because Pierce had military experience.

Oh, okay. And had competence in several realms. So no, Pierce's balls hit his saddle so hard that he fainted. Um, he was in the military. I had forgotten about that story. He was at his magic restaurant. Yeah, crushed his nuts. Yeah. I had some guy that came after me pretty hard about that

About four years ago Like trying to prove to me that like no, he didn't crush his nuts and bubbly like he was like Picking apart the details of the story instead of recognizing the overarching Mythos that was being used. Yeah, yeah, I was just like, okay, sweetie So yeah, Pierce was an asshole. We've done yeah, so So now I'm getting back to Missouri sure in 1860 a pro-south governor was elected to office who publicly supported the idea Which was a carryover from the pro-Northerin governor who had preceded him

The idea was the state was gonna remain in the union but stay militarily neutral meaning they were not going to send forces to the union, they were not going to send men to the south. It was we're going to remain in the union but we're not going to support the union. We're going to be militarily neutral. Okay. Now behind the scenes, the same asshole worked to funnel money to secession the staffers to arm the Missouri home guard, which was a majority slave holding, slave pro slavery kind of group. Now, when you say money, do you mean like taxpayer money? No, try and get bank funding.

Okay, cool. So, at least it's a private enterprise trying to hold up. Oh boy. Yeah, at least. Yeah, whatever fuck that means. And then also behind closed doors, he was actively campaigning for secession. Wow. In 1861, federal federal troops showed up in the state and tried to take control, took control, of the arsenal at Camp Jackson, which was a federal arsenal. And there's an awful lot of back and forth about this, but that led ultimately to the pro-slavery faction within the state legislature having to flee the capital. And in exile, they all voted to secede. I'm painting with a very broad brush simplifying a great deal here, but this wound up leading to a situation where Missouri had a star on both flags in the Civil War.

And Missouri ultimately, which remember originally, they'd said we're not gonna send troops either direction. Turns out they wound up sending troops both directions. Like letting people choose? Well, it mostly is kind of a regional thing. Most of the unionists in the state came from the region around St. Louis itself, which was kind of a regional thing. Most of the unionists in the state came from the region around St. Louis itself, which was kind of a bastion of union support. And then the Western and Southern and generally more rural parts of the state were where most of the Confederate sympathizers were.

Again, urban versus rural. Okay. Yeah. So the war went, how the war went, an numerically and technologically superior force, ultimately one victory over a little well organized, poorly equipped outnumbered rebel army. Despite all of their A-Lan,

despite however much honor they brought to the fight, they lost all caps. I want to say again, they lost. And after the war, a very great many of the veterans of the Confederacy, along with a very great many of its civilians, were immensely bitter about it. But before we go too far with that, one detail about the war is really important. Bushwackers. Note that Bushwack, or Bushwack, is a title of an episode of our TV series. Both pro-union and pro-confederate irregular military forces.

So we're talking about paramilitaries, being modern partners, we'd call them paramilitaries, operating in Kansas, Arkansas, and Missouri during the war. Union Erregulars were referred to as J-Hawkers. Confederate Erregulars were referred to as Bush Wackers. Kentucky has a university and their mascot is the J-Haul, couldn't it? Yep. Okay. Kentucky was Union border state as well, but kept slaves.

Yep. Okay. Yep. Okay. Worth noting. So in Missouri, the two big names during civil war as far as as paramilitaries on the southern side were James Quantrill, the leader of Quantrill's Raiders, and Bloody Bill and Bloody Bill Anderson. Now Anderson started his, for lack of a better word, his career as a lieutenant

underquantial. And Anderson is the one who eventually had the James brothers, Frank and Jesse, joining his forces. Right. Now, something that struck me while I was doing this research is, you know, you hear about these guys who are these leaders of these paramilitary organizations. You hear about these guys who hold the kind of honorary, kind of semi-official rank of being colonel, you know, quantul, kind of carried around the rank of Colonel, you know, and what's interesting to note is that the time that they started their paramilitary terrorist careers, both of them were in their 20s.

It's a bit young. They, like, I was, when I looked at Bloody Bill Anderson for doing the research for this episode, I was taken aback by the fact that he was 24 years old when he became the leader of this band of rough laws, essentially, roughience. Yeah. And Quattro was only four or five years old. He was under 30. four or five years old, he was under 30. Now, it should also be noted that when Jesse James joined Quantrell's organization under Anderson in 64, he was only 16. So there's a certain era attitude toward age

that's involved in that. But like, you don't think like, you know, you hear a name like, you know, Colonel Quantral, and personally, I picture a guy my own age or a little bit older. Oh, yeah, you know, I'm thinking white hair. When I hear, yeah, not because of Colonel Sanders either, just because like you heard Colonel, like you have to work your way your way up through some kind of an organization and like in order to do that, you've got to be a certain age like you have to have a career behind you. Nope. Nope. You can you can also get a field commission or a family commission or you could be a self named kernel. Anybody back then could have called themselves a kernel one

time over from where they grew up and nobody would have known. Yeah, nobody would have known. Yeah, there's a lot of ways to go about it. And interestingly, the people who illegitimately take over countries will often not award themselves the rank of general, but the rank of Colonel. Kudafi did that. Kudafi, yeah. Yeah. So what's interesting is, Quantrell actually answered to a Confederate

change of command. Like he he had a Confederate a a as legitimate as any Confederate general ever was. Right. But he had a no kidding, you know, recognized by the Confederate government as a general in the Confederate army. Kind of kind of sort of giving him like, well, you know, go cause trouble out here, kind of orders.

Anderson never really did. Anderson never held any kind of, any kind of even semi-official military rank. And all of these guys were irregular. They were all paramilitaries. So when they got captured, when any of their number got captured, they were treated as common criminals. Which they were. Yes, which they were.

And so they were given a summary kind of trial or court martial and they were hanged. As criminals and traders. Yeah. And so, you know, I've got other stuff to go from there, but I think that would be a good time for us to kind of take a moment, take a breath before we get too overheated and maybe talk about our sponsor. before we get too overheated and maybe talk about our sponsor. Yeah, well, it's actually not a sponsor tonight, but it is a commercial that we're, we're very pleased to put on. So Empire Comics Vault in Sacramento, located actually on Fulton Avenue, at 1120 Fulton Avenue, Sacramento, California, 95825,

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All right. And now back to our show. So, and now back to our show. So, yeah, the Union Authority's treated Bushwackers criminals because in the eyes of the law, that's what they were. And so in 1863, Quantrill's group at this point with Anderson acting as one of his lieutenants attacked the town of Loris Kansas, set fire to a significant portion of the town and murdered 164 civilians. Now Quantrill himself said that his motivation for the attack was, quote, to plunder and destroy

the town in retaliation for Asiola, which was a reference to the union's attack on Asiola Missouri in September 1861, led by Senator James Lane, Osceola was plundered and nine men were given a drum-head court partial and executed. Lawrence was purported to be the home base of Union J. Hawker forces who had, it has to be admitted, committed atrocities in the Western plantation counties of Missouri. And they were referred to as red legs, in many cases, or Jayhawkers. In Western Missouri, they had committed raids into that part of the state where there were plantations, where there was slavery going on.

And they had committed torture of unarmed civilians. None of the J-harkers themselves were killed in the raid on Lawrence so far as anybody can tell. The people who were who were the victims of the Lawrence massacre were not paramilitaries. And there were 164 people killed in this raid. Wow. That again, Quantrell argued was revenge for the attack on Ossiola, Missouri. Pretty sure revenge attacks aren't really something that's what's the word I'm looking for, sanctioned in the code of war when you talk about fighting honorably.

Well, yeah, and I, you know, I mean, you know, to play Dell's advocate and, you know, and you will be. And in this case, you know, this is, of course, before the Geneva Convention was even the twinkle in the eye of Diplomat anywhere, but yes, no, you're right. Revenge attacks are not considered legitimate motivation, but that was that was Quantrell's rationale at the time. In 1864, Jesse James joins his brother, Frank, as part of Anderson's group. Now, by this time, Anderson had split from Quantrell. And the reason he'd split from Quantrell's group was because Quantrell had told him he wasn't allowed to get married.

And he wanted to get married because was 1864 by God he needed to get laid. Well, I'm just glad that ideology has really been driving all of these forces. Yeah, hate it, right? Yeah. There's no moral high ground whatsoever with these people. None. No, none. None at all. Even to the point where they start splitting off, it's not because like, well, you're not loyal

enough to the cost. It's, I want pussy. Yeah, well, no, okay. Here's what you need to remember to one extent or another they're all descended from my people my ancestral people that is to say which is to say the scots who essentially are like well you know I didn't like so I'm going and I'm going for my own group and you know fuck you you know and it's and it's part of that you know Celtic Calvin and you know, fuck you. Yeah. And it's part of that, you know, Celtic Calvinist, you know, if your church doesn't believe what I think is right,

then I'm gonna form my own fucking church because I know better than you do. It's the same thing. Oh yeah. And so, just in James and his brother were very likely involved in the Centralia massacre in September of 1984, 1864, in which 24 unarmed Union soldiers were executed by the Bushwackers of Bloody Bill Anderson's forces after, so here's the deal, so Anderson got all of these Union soldiers off of a train in

the train in Centralia, he lined them all up and then he complained loudly about how the union had been treating irregular forces, which is to say bushwackers, that they would treat them like common criminals. And then he murdered all, but one of them had him all, similarly executed. I like the moxie that it takes to put yourself on the same level as an actual army though. Like, you know what I mean? Like, I have a problem with you as equals and it's like, bitch, you're not equals.

Like, you're a terrorist. No, you're a bandit, you're a bandit and a terrorist. And you want to try to claim that, yeah, totally. Right there with you. So then they went up losing the war and Bushwackers turned into outlaws. Missouri, which is where all of these assholes that come from to call all this trouble in Kansas, remained at war with itself. Because again, it, of course, it did. It should, yeah, no, no, it should be. It's, it's important to, to keep in mind,

that demographically speaking. Okay. So, so Missouri became a state in 1821 as part of the Missouri compromise and in 1821 it was majority slave holding. Well between 1821 and 1860 the demographics of the state changed considerably. They had a huge influx of German immigrants first of of all, Irish immigrants after that, and then other European immigrants from other parts of the continent after that. And the majority of those new folks coming into the state were not pro-slavery. Right. So the state had this really significant demographic divide between all of the plantation people out in the rural parts of

the state, especially farther toward the south and especially out west, and then in and around St. Louis, which was mostly published, mostly free labor. And so former Bushwackers started committing violent crimes and acts of terrorism against what was then the Republican Party, the re-constructionist government. Right. And essentially they continued the war by criminal means. So this is after Lincoln is dead. This is after Appomattox. This is after all that.

Yeah, they're keeping it going. Yeah, they're refusing to let the war end. Right. And Jesse James, in particular, became famous for the exploits of the gang, he and his brother Frank led. And this includes multiple bank train and stage coach robberies across the Midwest, notably moving up into Minnesota, which was a very much

union state. Yes. And while he and his gang, this is now in the 1870s, 1860s and 1870s, he wrote repeatedly to newspapers taking responsibility for the gang's crimes and complaining bitterly about the wrongs done to pro-slavery maserians before during and after the war. He specifically painted himself and his family as victims. Of course. Of of of abolitionist and Republican and and reconstructionist officials. And justified his his actions as revenge for the crimes done by the Union Army. So and yet again, this is not a guy driven by ideology, but this is somebody who saw in his lifetime an influx of folks with a different ideology, because you said there was a demographic shift. From statehood to, so okay,

so people coming from cities and invading and bringing their ideology in, if you're living there and you don't believe that change ever should exist, then you would say that. So any fighting that you do thereafter, and you don't believe that change ever should exist, then you would say that. So any fighting that you do thereafter, they have it coming. Yep.

Okay. So now about that lost cause historiography, we've talked about before. Yes. So the South quote unquote fought with honor. Mm-hmm. The South, I must haveissating in your examples. Yeah. So, yeah, well, these are not the best examples if you want to try to forward that argument.

But we've talked about lost class historiography before and we've talked about why it is that it makes me want to, you know, panamine kicking somebody's corpse under the table. Because it's a little bullshit. And this is where kind of we come back to Firefly. Because the thing is during his lifetime, Jesse James specifically, and I've been told about Jesse James for a reason specifically. for reasons specifically. During his lifetime, Jesse James had sympathetic coverage in the press and he gained a great deal of sympathy from the public largely because there were an awful lot of people in the wake of the Civil War who were a former Confederate who were pissed off about the fact that they'd lost and they agreed with him about the fact that they'd lost. And they agreed with him about the fact that he and his family were all victims. And so he became, he wound up

turning into this figure, that he wound up getting romanticized and turned into this kind of Robin Hood figure. And then in the later era, Hollywood picked up on that and there have been close to a dozen movies made about his life in which he is the sympathetic Robin Hood kind of figure. Never mind the fact that he was a fucking terrorist. I remember there's a Brady punch episode

where Peter really liked Jesse James and they had a talk about it and he ended up meeting a guy whose dad was killed by Jesse James and there was this whole thing about how I remember that now to yeah where he would have people turn their back to him so that he didn't have to look at them when he shot them and of course you know in 30, it fixed it all. But I just remember that was, I mean, that's the Brady bunch. So that's what the 70s. Yeah. So, you know, yeah.

Well, and, and that's one of the few times, I think, that anybody in, in mainstream, American popular culture has characterized Jesse James in a negative light. characterized Jesse James in a negative light. He has gotten this kind of, again, romantic outlaw kind of treatment. And in one era, it was overtly because, the people who were paying for movies to be made were Confederate sympathizers. Uh-huh.

And then in later eras, it was because, well, you know, he's an anti-establishment figure. And so if you're looking at anything from the 60s or very early 70s about him, that's probably why he's going to get lionized. And then, and nobody looks at the fact that like, no, no, no, seriously, he was, he was a, a moron criminal. Right. And the, the very first, I mean, the beginnings of his career involved the summary execution of a group of unarmed union soldiers who got hold off of a train in Centrelia, Kansas. So, and nobody's listening about that either, like from from age to age. So it's kind of like in one era out the other Time stamp wait too late in the game, but I've hit with other other shit

Acting like I didn't know this out history Yeah, well, yeah, but I mean as far as literally a pun. That's yeah, well, yeah. But yeah, so, so now what I want to point out, unfortunately, is now this is where we're going to come back to Firefly. Okay. Because in interviews, just waiting has pointed out that people trying to survive in a post kind of civil war kind of environment is kind of what he wanted to look at when he was writing the ideas behind what became Firefly and most Westerns are that slice of life that's post civil warovil war too. Yeah, and certainly what I'm going to say in a group that the stories told by Firefly

Forward and are unfortunately really heavily and I think subconscious. I honestly do think subconsciously are influenced by the lost cause narrative. You know, it's just identifying, identifying with the underdog, identifying with the rebels against the alliance. Again, it's a simplified union. Yeah, it's a simplified underdog, though. I hate the term underdog when you're dealing with the south because they weren't the underdog. They were ranked villains.

They were trying to own people. That's not an underdog thing to do. Like it's such a simplified underdog. Yeah, well, yeah, and historically you're totally correct. And I think the overwhelming majority of Firefly fans would would agree I Think based on what what I know about the fandom for the show I think I think most people who are really dedicated fans of the show would would you know

I mean if you explicitly talk about the Confederacy, I think they'd agree, but I think we need all of us To look at what this story says, and we need to recognize that there is not enough done in the storyline to make it clear that the alliance is not the union, and the independence are not the Confederacy. Because at a passing glance, there's way too many parallels. And if you wanna try to argue that the alliance is like the empire, there's not enough evidence given to us of that. I mean, yes, they did some terrible things,

but we don't know what it was that the independence were fighting for. We don't know what it was that was going on on those planets that the independence were fighting for. We don't know what it was that was going on on those planets that the independence were trying to stay independent. We don't know anything about Mal's background before the war. We don't know anything about Zellie's background before the war. We don't know what it was exactly that sparked the conflict. The only word that we have about it is from Mal and Zoe,

who I hate to be the one talking like, the villain from the series, but they are both very clearly marked by the PTSD that you're still carrying from the Battle of Serenity Valley. And we don't know the extent to which the Alliance is like neo-fascist. We don't know the extent to which they are corporatist, you know, rightist, whatever you want to say. Yeah, I mean, you know, that some element of some functionary element of the alliance was responsible for what happened to River, which is horrible and awful. And clearly those people are terrible, but we don't know

what started the war. We only have Malzo's word for it in the series, not in the film. You know, and I mean. The movie points out that the reavers are somehow the fault of the alliance because they were trying to do some kind of mass mind control kind of experiment. So, if we take that into account, then they're pretty clearly pretty nasty. But within the context of the series itself, we don't know.

And a friend of mine heard my remarks about this on Facebook long before he even started writing down my thesis for this episode. And he said, well, it's pretty clear that Malinzoi are unreliable narrators, because Malin is clearly a petty criminal who's, you know, and, of course, he'd argue with, with being called a petty criminal. He makes a point of that.

Well, I wouldn't say petty, I'd say, Shushi. Shushi means petty, you know? Right. And, and again, scintillating dialogue. It's one of the wonderful things about the series. But you know, there's an unreliable narrator only counts as an unreliable narrator if you pick apart how unreliable they are. Yeah, if you have their narration pulled apart, cool, but if you don't, if it is what guides

you through the whole series, they're not an unreliable narrator unless you've shown that they are in some way deficient as a narrator. That their experience is not verifiable or that their experience is not valid in some way. And I don't think we'd in the course of the 14 episodes of the series. He doesn't do that at all. He doesn't do that. We just the other way. Yeah, I mean Mal is smart. He is smart and he is affable and while he might have some failings as a person by and large, he has the heart of gold. Yeah, you know, and

and the reason this is a problem is we're now operating anybody who comes into this fandom now in the times in which we are living right now is is going to see this narrative where we have this plucky group of outlaws who are operating you know against the oppressive overarching government of the Alliance and it and it it is it is it is entirely a lost cause narrative. Oh yeah. I don't and and again, I go back to that quote, yes, that you said last episode cost you so much, so much, so much trouble in the moment. It may have been losing side. I'm still not convinced it was the wrong one. Right. Like, you know, that's, that's the kind of argument that leads in the direction of heritage, not hate,

that leads in the direction of good people on both sides. And it's like, no, man, historically speaking, the archetypes from which all of this was taken is based on the idea that one side of this comes like wanted to fucking own people. Right. And that that's somehow the moral equivalent to wanting to stop it, or that somehow the moral equivalent to wanting to stop them from leaving so they could go do it. Like, grammatically, those are the same. Morally they are not. Yeah. And for all of the other stuff that just we did in the process of casting the series and the process of defining who the characters were and all of the other stuff that he did,

he did some wonderful, wonderful things. And I don't want to take anything away from all the good stuff he did. But I think it's important that we all take a moment to recognize that if this is not examined, it's troubling. And I mean, part of that is me being a Catholic and the Council of Nicaea having determined that the gospel of Thomas was not acceptable because, okay, look, Council of Nicae, having determined that, you know, the gospel of Thomas was not acceptable because, you know, okay, look, we're not going to put this in the Bible, not because it's actually heretical, but because some of the stuff is, is like, if you don't

know everything else, some of the stuff can be really dangerous. It's kind of the same thing. I would say that it certainly, if you have enough material out there that is sympathetic to the side that was morally bankrupt, then you're going to prime everyone to be sympathetic to the wrong side. And the proof that I would have for that is the first 60 years of cinema. Or frankly, the first from the 1880s forward through the 1960s, basically until black people started getting college degrees in any large numbers from the GI Bill. So once you have that, you stopped having lost cause ideology, be the only flavor that was in the ice cream shop.

And even that, it still sets a tone for plenty of other white historians who are like, no, I don't want to do that kind of history. I want to do this. And they just accept that as being true because it's been true this whole time. And same thing with cinema. So I'd say if you prime it like that, which again, this and they just accept that as being true because it's been true this whole time. And same thing with cinema.

So I'd say if you prime it like that, which again we talked about this with the wrestling episodes, if you prime it like that, you are being grossly irresponsible to history and to the culture. So yeah, I would agree with you that we not only have to look at what Joss Weedon did and where he was coming from on it, but also where it fails to recognize the actual history of what actually happened. Yeah, and again, I want to state this, you know, torches and pitchforks. I want to point out really, really clearly that like, I think the series is excellent TV. I just think that when Whedon was writing it, he was unconsciously because the thing is, we all have been brought up in an

environment where even in a state as liberal, as California, we're still educated in what is way too much a lost cause kind of curriculum in terms of American history. Like, we're not as much as places like Florida or God forbid the Carolinas or Texas. But I mean, still, the emphasis in the textbooks when I was in middle school and high school, the emphasis was on the conflict about states, right? Right. And as we, yeah, as we exhaustively talked about in your magnum opus about wrestling and the lost cause, like if you look at the primary source documentation, no,

motherfucker, it was about slavery. Like, like, yes, the issue was whether or not states could do it, but the thing that motivated them was the issue of whether or not they could own people. Yeah. Yeah. Let's look at what the states were trying to do, not just that states were trying to do something. Yeah. Again, just because there's two opposite sides, doesn't mean that they're equal morally. Yeah, and meeting in the middle does not necessarily mean that that's morally neutral. Right.

No, you know, and so I think I think that moral neutrality is a proper position to take as an historian. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry to interrupt. No, no, not at all. I think it's an important point you made. But, you know, and just the extent to which we've all been kind of, kind of marinating in that from from our youth. You know, we wound up at and might to digress for for a moment. We wound up at my site in my district this year as social studies instructors. We were we're getting new textbooks next year. Oh, what's that always part of? next year. Oh, what's that I was part of? It's awesome. Oh, wow. The process of choosing one is arduous and a pain in the ass, but getting new textbooks is wonderful. So, and then I was part

of the pilot program on my campus for the new, for the new textbooks. And of course, I'm doing world history 100% and I'm dealing with eighth graders, but the The really great wonderful news that I got from the folks who were doing piloting for the eighth grade text Was that the new eighth grade text Doesn't hit on states right so much and it spends a lot more time talking about slavery good That really made me happy. I'm like, okay, good. So we're not buying the same fucking textbook that Texas is. This is a good sign. Right. Um, you know, you know, to be a little bit regionalist there for a moment.

But, you know, um, and the thing is, like, I grew up with my father having been educated in Florida in the 1940s and 1950s. When segregation was still a thing. When I was learning about the Civil War in junior high and then in high school, one of the things that he was asking me about was like, so it you know, it's about states' rights, right? And I'm like, well, yeah. But it's also about slavery. He was like, well, you know, no, you got to admit it was states' rights, because that was how he was educated.

Now, my father is, you know, a boomer from originally from Florida. And so, you know, his outlook on it is, you know, of course very much colored by that, but I would argue that, you know, for somebody of his generation and of his upbringing, he is as non-racist, not gonna say anti-racist, but he's as non-racist as anybody could be based on his background.

But even for him, the narrative of the Civil War was about states, right? And that's the same kind of reason because of his education. That's what that war was about. And I think for the same reason, we wind up seeing Firefly being this series about this plucky band of, you know, people trying to survive going up against this,

this, you know, evil centralized government. Oh, yeah. Without giving any recognition to, okay, look, all of the trappings that you're using for this. Right. They can, are taken straight out of real-world history, and we, we need to have something to give us some separation from that. You know, like if, if you want to make this about the rebellion against the Empire, then

let's, let's find something to make this more about the Machi versus the Nazis. Yeah. It's not like you don't have a built-in bad guy already. Yeah. Like, you know, if you want to be alliance to be that kind of bad guy, then let's let's lean harder on, you know, the national socialist party or the Italian fascists or or Franco for God's sake. Like, you know, I mean, or Franco for God's sake. Like, you know, I mean, and, you know, and then it's like, no, in this universe, these are the people who won, and our, our plucky, you know, independent heroes

are the ones trying to try and live in the universe after those people won. Like, okay, awesome, let's do that. But, you know, for all of the wonderful things that the series does, by leaning so heavily on these tropes that have all been so heavily influenced by the lost cause narrative, you wind up reinforcing the lost cause narrative, which is that fucking we need to have happened right now.

Especially in our sci-fi, which this is Western in space. But yeah, anything where you're telling us what the world is going to be like on some level, and you come back to the idea of like, oh yeah, it's just like it was in the 1880s in Missouri. You're like, why? Why is that compelling? Yeah. Like, why there? Yeah. And I get, you know, I get that he wanted to talk about, you know, what do you do in this world where, you know, the authoritarian power kind of wins. I mean, I understand that. But like, find another metaphor, man. Like, you know, even with all of the Western trappings, you can still do a Western in space and not immediately lean on the obvious post-Civil War U.S. kind of situation. I mean, you know,

so that's that is my problem with this particular series. And of course, then there are other things that we have now found out in the years since Firefly about, you know, Joss Whedon's personal life and his choices and his behavior that are somewhat damaging to his kind of self-promoted idea that he is the woke bay. Yes. That's a quote from an interview with him. By the way, I'm woke bay. Wow. The moment any middle age, the moment any middle age white guy starts using a phrase like I'm woke bay, you really need to look really hard at who that dude is.

Yeah. Well, I'm just going to say. Yeah, he's, well, he's like 55, something like that. So number one, don't use those words unironically. Number two, you know, yeah, it's that, you know, I'm not racist, but I mean, it's that all the time. It gets really, really close to that. Yeah, I don't know if I could go that far as saying it is,

in fact, I'm not racist, but it's way too close for that. Yeah. I don't know if I could go that far as saying it is, in fact, I'm not racist, but it's way too close for comfort. Well, he's literally, he's literally virtue signaling. And people, when they actually virtue signal, it's often too hide their vice. Yeah. Yeah. Not going to, not going to argue with that. Yeah. And, and, you know, the, the remarks that he has, now admittedly, this is all coming out of, you know, anybody who's, who's a fan of his, of course, is familiar with, with the story, and you should not have been, he's probably familiar with, you know, all of the stuff that we were, that we're talking about right now, is coming out of, you know, his divorce. So, you know his divorce. So there's two sides to, especially those kind of stories, but with that being said, there's

a volume of stuff involved that is not a good look for him. Yeah. Put it that way. Well, and you know, we didn't we didn't get to his fetishization of Asian cultures at all. Like, they're, they're, this is at least a multi-part series of what's wrong with Josh Weeden. So I just wanted to put that out there as like we recognize what we didn't get to tonight as far as he goes, because we were just plumbing into this part of him and where the tendrils come out. Yeah, and largely because this is one of the points

that as somebody who has a history educator, this is something that really, really, like, the other stuff is like, okay, yeah, Dan, this guy wants to publicize himself as being, you know, woke bay. Where does that phrase even come out of your fucking mouth? But, you know, he has this kind of self-promoted image

as being this kind of guy. But, you know, for me, the one that like I most personally feel like, no, seriously, I gotta call this out, is this particular issue because, like when we were talking about professional wrestling, we talked about the fact that like this is an insult to historians. Yes.

Like the primary documentation, all points in one direction and the narrative that's been constructed has been consciously built to obfuscate that and to move in a different direction to try to make people look better than they deserve. And like, you know, I understand maybe you aren't educated as the only word that comes to mind, but maybe you weren't schooled enough in historiography to understand this, but like for God's sake, we as a community need to have a conversation about this, because this is deservedly a a beloved series because these are wonderful compelling characters.

And this is a great story. Yes. But like, but like, when we're watching it, we need to keep in mind that like, okay, no, look, they're, they're historical parallels here. We need to be aware of. Mm-hmm. Okay. Are you sure you want to write along those lines?

Yeah. Like, if you're, if you're a writer, is this really the story, to kind of story you want to write along those lines. Yeah, like if you're a writer, is this really the story, to kind of story you want to tell? Is there another way you can tell? Is there another way the same narrative can be served by using a different villain? Is there a way this narrative can be served by characterizing the heroes in a slightly different way?

by characterizing the heroes in a slightly different way. And overuse of these tropes reinforces unfortunate ideas. Mm-hmm. Kind of where I'm gonna go with that. Yeah. And that's basically, I've shot in my wad. I mean, at that point, that's pretty much what I kind of want to try to say is just, I'm not saying nobody can watch Firefly anymore. I'm not trying to say that we all need to hate on Firefly.

I'm not even saying that we all need to hate on Joss Whedon, though I will maybe argue that he doesn't necessarily deserve the amount of credit he got for a long time, for being, you know, progressive. But what I am saying is when we watch this series, when we fall in love with this story, we need to be aware of what it is that we're looking at, and we need to remember the truth behind the tropes that we're looking at, and we need to remember the truth behind the tropes that we're looking at. I would agree.

So there you go. Thank you. Based on that, what's your takeaway here? I need to rewatch Firefly with the new lens. Number one, I forgot in a lot of what happened, like when you were mentioning, I'm like, oh yeah, that was a thing. I, you know, I love Star Wars, as anybody who knows me, will know.

It is highly problematic, highly problematic. I tell you, watch Star Wars with a four year old girl, and you will see how problematic that that that shit is I still love Star Wars But I have to acknowledge its problems. I think this is gonna be the one of those where it is okay to Love a work of fiction But you have to acknowledge from whence it came. You know, just like we did with comic books, like, you know, when I, when I taught comic books

or when we talked about the X-Men and we talked about, you know, the 1970s, and it was, you know, these guys were trying to make an allegory, and they were also two white guys living in New York making an allegory about racism. Like, it's okay because you can contextualize it, but you gotta call it out. And I think the same thing is true as Firefly. Yeah, and when you talked about fantastic form, you know, like from a modern lens,

there's so much stuff that's like, I'm sorry, we need to pause for a moment, talk about that. But you can still, you can still love that. But in the process of loving it, you have to have, you have to, you also have to be intellectually honest. Yeah. What are you loving it for? What are you loving it despite? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, and you know, recognize that. And when you're talking about it with other people, kind of take ownership of that. Yeah, yeah, call it out for them.

So yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, that's, that's, that'll do it for me. I definitely, I'm going to start trying to watch Firefly so awesome. Yeah Then my work here is rapidly approaching a medal Cool well work in people aim their hate for you in their defensive just weeding against this podcast Dear This is the first time I've actually been afraid to say this. You can find me on

the Twitter at EH PlayLock and you can find me on the Instagram at MR PlayLock. And where can they find you either to direct their hate or they're contempt for you not hating it quite as much as I do. Sure. Well, there's a few places. One, on Fridays at 830, they can find me on Twitch.tv forward slash capital puns, as I and my partner, Daniel Humberger, slinging the best puns this side of the verse.

They can also find me on Sundays at twitch.tv. Thank you. They can find me on Sundays at twitch.tv, forward slash calling it in the ring, as I and my partner, Johnny Taylor, are calling some of the best matches seen this side of the verse in pro wrestling. You can also find me at duh harmony, as two H's in there, on the Twitter and on the Insta. So feel free to drop by and tell us what you think. You can find both of us where? At Geek History Time on the Twitter machine.

And yeah, I would say that if you really, really desperately feel the need to sling anything at us, that's probably the best place to do it because one or both of us will respond somehow probably most likely there. If you come after us individually, I might just crawl away and hide. If you really want to have a debate, go to Geek History Time if you want to just, you know, fling something and have me be like, yeah, whatever, I don't care, then find me individually.

But yeah, I'd say Geek History Time is the best place. Definitely. I would also say if you have anything that you want us to advertise, if you have a business that you think needs special recognition, and if you want to sell things through us, through sponsorship, that is also the place contact us at Geek History Time on the Twitter. So for all your love and hate and monetary needs at Geek History Time and for Geek History of Time, I'm Damien Harmony.

And I'm Ed Blalock. And until next time, keep rolling twice. Stay shiny.