Citation Needed - Taiping Rebellion

Episode Date: December 27, 2017

The Taiping Rebellion or the Taiping Civil War was a massive rebellion or civil war in China fought between the established Manchu-led Qing dynasty and the Christian millenarian moveme...nt of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom between 1850 to 1864. Our theme song was written and performed by Anna Bosnick. If you’d like to support the show on a per episode basis, you can find our Patreon page here.  Be sure to check our website for more details.  

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 So you just taste a bunch of cakes? Yeah, I don't understand what you don't understand about this. I just, I feel like you'd be going like, well, I want to taste like cake. Oh, that one tastes like cake. Cake is cake, how do you choose a cake? What the fuck do you mean cake is cake? No! Root and now I'm making me plime!
Starting point is 00:00:21 Root, root and alive! God damn it, I forgot it was Monday I He lie he's what the fuck are you guys doing? What do you mean what are we doing? We're doing our before the show shenanigans. We do our before show Yeah, we we you know when somebody else writes the lines for you and then you repeat them and we do a little shenanigans and shenanigans.
Starting point is 00:00:49 I don't understand what you guys, my essay is on the Typing Rebellion this week. Yeah, well, you kind of walked in the middle side already thrown the typewriter at Heath. God damn it. I see, guys, you know the Typing Rebellion was a civil war fought in China between two kingdoms, right? One of which was called Typing. I told you. Oh, yeah. So that's exactly what I said. So there were no typewriter fights. No, no typewriter fights.
Starting point is 00:01:21 But I can keep the makeup. No, you cannot. No, you cannot. No, I quit. I'm not going to say racism. I quit before that happens. You actually did quit it. You delivered that goddamn Fuck you! Party partner? And welcome to Citation Needed! The podcast rejuices a subject, read a single article about it on Wikipedia and pretend we're the experts. Because this is the internet, and that's how it works now. I'm Tom and I'll be thrusting deep into your ear canal today, but I won't be the only one inside you. First act to men whose exponential beard growth threatens to overtake all the Arab
Starting point is 00:02:27 land on Earth by 2026, Atheon Seasal. Actually started mining the spice when I trim it. It's a pretty addictive. Predictive. The old spice must flow. And also joining us are the two people that belong in restaurants, even less than the dogs from Lady in the Tramp, Noah and Eli. Just saying, Patreon goal, me and Cecil will noodle kiss.
Starting point is 00:02:55 The audience literally doesn't have enough liquid capital to make that happen. Here in the last nurse, Cecil just issued you a challenge. Well, I'm gonna throw up. Cecil just issued you a challenge. Well, I'm gonna throw up. But before we get started, I want to remind everybody who just got $5 from grandma and thought, what the fuck can I buy with that? And we'd be happy to take it. We'll take more if you insist. Yeah, if you'd like to learn how to give us your money, be sure to stick around to the end of the show.
Starting point is 00:03:23 That out of the way, Eli, what person place thing, concept phenomenon or event? Will we be talking about today? Today, we'll be talking about the Thai Ping Rebellion, which after the opening sketch, I assume is a broad noodle, the flat ones. No, that are spicy, right? Very unlikely.
Starting point is 00:03:42 No, you earned your BS in the subject over the weekend. Are you ready to enlighten the subject over the weekend. Are you ready to enlighten the masses? I am, Tom. This is actually a topic I've wanted to cover since we started the show. That's because you're boring as hell. So no one is surprised. What was the typing of that? It was a rebellion fought in China in the mid 19th century between the ruling dynasty and a guy who thought he was Jesus' little brother. Noah. Is there? I'm gonna laugh at the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people tonight, aren't we? No, no. This is China. So millions, thousands of millions of people. So
Starting point is 00:04:19 must have been as high as a hundred million, actually. Do you guys think we need to like get some kind of Holocaust video system for the show? Oh, not overruled. That's actually my next essay. You're just saying. No. Okay. So when does the typing rebellion start? Actually, it started on January 1st.
Starting point is 00:04:38 So this is topical of 1851, but I'm going to start a little earlier than that. Yeah. Of course you are. Yeah. So you have to understand about China in 1851 is that you've got a culture that's spent the last several thousand years pretty sure they were the greatest civilization on the planet. And most of the time they were right. But throughout the 18th and into the 19th century, they were hard at work
Starting point is 00:05:01 learning that best culture doesn't matter if it doesn't come with biggest guns. Yeah, turns out it's really easy to pry someone's culture out of their cold dead hands. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, right. Case in point, M&M, right? Greatest rapper of all time. Greatest rapper of all time. So, here you've got,'t you mean laces the brilliant thing
Starting point is 00:05:25 I wrote the end of my sketch that you ruined because they're not reading our fucking skits Don't you mean laces teeth? No, he didn't no so here we've got a once great nation the tangen on by a thread Series it defeats at the hand of various Western powers, long-term economic problems, a population explosion, series of natural disasters, and a British mandated blight of opium addiction had left the ruling king dynasty with a pretty slippery grip on power.
Starting point is 00:05:56 Now you couldn't have that big of population explosion. We had an invented diesel fuel and fertilizer yet. So, yeah. That dude ruined Invictus, am I right? So, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so's so. Yeah. That dude ruined Invictus, am I right? No, at the same time that all of this shits going on, overtax farmers are abandoning their farms to become bandits, because that's more profitable at this point. And the weak central government can't do shit about the banditry, so local villages and
Starting point is 00:06:21 cities are starting to form their own armies to fend off the bandits. And you just wind up with small- scale wars popping up all over the country. Basically, the whole fucking country was a kung fu movie premise by 1830 or so. This whole story is just missing a white guy that fights alongside him to show what it means to be really Chinese. All right. So the broad noodle guy created a hybrid of all the fighting styles and took over China with use of, the go with five floors, he got to the boss's top one, took to over China,
Starting point is 00:06:52 so that one happened. This is very, very close. Yeah, so into this environment is born one, the Hengji Kuan. He's a poor kid from a mountain town in Southern China. Now back then, China had a system of imperial exams that you could take to advance your way through society. Right, so basically if you could pass these exams, it was the equivalent of having an advanced degree
Starting point is 00:07:12 and it meant you could work as a government official or you could get a well-paying job. So passing those exams was the best way for a destitute kid to advance in life. And Hongji Kuan quickly showed himself to be amazingly good at failing these exams. Huh, I guess you can't just copy off the Asian kid in China. It's right, some of them have to be stupid, right?
Starting point is 00:07:33 So are there stupid Chinese people? He's got to be some. He's trying to make up for the latest thing earlier, yeah. So, after one of his many failures, HONG went home to be all but heard about it for a few days. And during that time, he experienced a series of mystical visions. You see, years earlier,
Starting point is 00:07:54 some Christian asshole had stuffed a pamphlet in his hand and for lack of a nearby bin, he'd held onto it. And based on no understanding of Christianity beyond what was written in that pamphlet, he declared himself not only to be Christian, but also to be the younger brother of Jesus. Motherfucking Craig Christ. Interesting. Interesting. It's different mother, I guess. So gods, you know, God's racially pretty cool. The Jews didn't even have a pamphlet to work off of this guy must have killed it.
Starting point is 00:08:26 Right? Hell yeah. I gotta say though, it does seem like an odd way to try to gain power, right? Like, oh, what, oh, what was Jesus like as a kid? He was cool, really down to earth. Anyway, back to me. He's back to me. Now, see, generally speaking, when you start calling yourself Jesus's brother, you don't
Starting point is 00:08:45 attract a lot of followers, especially in non-Christian countries, but included in Hongs' religious awakenings was a direct order from God to kill the fuck out of the much-hated government, which was a far more palatable message than my dad is God. Is it weird that Trump is going with both messages, though? Yes, it is. Honestly, I would just be relieved if he announced he was the son of God tomorrow. It'd be like finally getting broken up with him. You stop fucking.
Starting point is 00:09:12 Yeah. One second, I got a playlist that I've been working on for the last month and a half while we had awkward brunches with your friends and you smiled at me with all your eyes. Everybody's. awkward brunches with your friends and you smile at me with your eyes. Everybody. All right. So Hwang is set to get some Christian crap. And he starts off studying under a Baptist missionary named Isaac Hard.
Starting point is 00:09:36 J. Cox Roberts. J. Cox, right? But yeah, the Cox, I almost missed that. But Roberts refused to baptize him and later said that hog and his followers were quote bent on making their burlesque religious pretensions serve their political purpose and quote oh, okay, so a Religion who's we have a word that it's religion. Yeah He also what I'm telling the guy come back when you're white. And Jack
Starting point is 00:10:08 Wax Roberts eventually became Michael Jackson. So, but under undunked, Jack Wax. Hong went out to preach his weird perversion to the gospel. And in 1844, he founded the God Worshiping Society, a society dedicated to worshipping God. And also, yeah, to a fervent believe in whatever the fuck Heng Ji Kwan was on about that day. Soon after it's founding though, they got a bunch of bandits and pirates on board. And once the bandits and pirates are with you,
Starting point is 00:10:38 everybody pretty much assumes your cool, I think. Yeah, and the baptisms are way cooler when you walk the plank. Yeah, go get some. It's like, yeah. I'm not at all religious, but like bandits and pirates, I could be convinced. I could. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:10:50 This is my right. What's the difference between a bandit and a pirate? Like, if a pirate goes far enough inland, are they a bandit? A boat to that to change clothes. It's boats. Yeah, that's the boats. Yeah, it's boat-related. Now, needless to say, the emperor didn't like the idea of a society dedicated to overthrowing
Starting point is 00:11:07 him one way or the other, but it was even worse when said group also taught that you and your entire ethnic group were literally demons from hell. So he sent around some folks to deal with the God worshiping society in 1851 and they were repulsed by a small force of God worshipers and the bloodiest civil war in history was on. To be fair, I generally find God worshipers repulsed. So I'm just picturing a nerd from like the old timey Chinese FFRF showing up with a letter and getting just beheaded by a Christian ninja.
Starting point is 00:11:42 How is that not a David airwide movie? All right. That's perfect. And it's on pure black. I just said just. But in this case, it's the FF L F. Yes. That's great joke.
Starting point is 00:11:55 That I wish we could all appreciate Lee Lijan. The war ramps up slowly from here. You tricked him into it. You tricked him into it. It's like in mix-up look to say his name backwards. Well done Eli. Yeah. Trout the racism. So the war ramps up slowly from here as civil war so often do. But shit really hits the fan in 1853 when the rebels took Nanjing. They renamed it Tianjing, which means heavenly capital. So they're not even fucking trying for creativity. And that would remain the typing capital until the end of the rebellion and Hong's death in 1860, spoiler alert, those two things are related.
Starting point is 00:12:34 Heavenly capital isn't that what Joe lost in rights on his taxes. A lot of zeros. He doesn't pay. Yeah. So once they got their new capital, the first thing they have to do is kill all the Manchu men on, on account of them being demons. Okay. What a question. What if you were only half Manchu?
Starting point is 00:12:53 Did they kill you if you were full Manchu? I mean, is that full? Full Manchu, is that what you're, is that what that is? Yeah. Full Manchu. I love that joke. I love that that what that is? Yeah. So long. I love that joke. I love that joke.
Starting point is 00:13:07 I was waiting for that all script. I love that joke. I thought it was full man, too. Honestly, I thought they were pronounced in it weird, because, you know, jingle jingles. That always comes back to the L's, doesn't it? Jingle jingles. jangle jangle comes back to the L's doesn't it? Now it's important not to undersell the ethnic end of this. And by that, I mean the story, not this episode.
Starting point is 00:13:35 For centuries, the hand Chinese were in charge of things in China. But the current dynasty at this time was ruled by the man choose. And a big part of Hong's appeal was his bit about them all being demons. So as little as his interpretation of Christianity had in common with the Western traditions, at least they could both agree that you should use it to make people hate those that they perceive as different. The keys were still the same. And they all took their teaky torches and they stood around the statue.
Starting point is 00:14:04 Yeah. I remember this. There's good men on both sides. And they went to Jewish bakeries asking for swastika cakes. It's a very complicated thing. Jewish. Jewish. So, anyway, Jewish. Anyway, from there they launched multiple expeditions
Starting point is 00:14:22 to gain territory nearby and hung, having pretty much won in his mind, decided to get about the business of being Jesus' little brother. At that business, apparently, by the way, included a very luxurious lifestyle, random written proclamations, and a lot of young women in his inner chamber. And then his wife defended him by pointing out
Starting point is 00:14:41 that they have a lawyer who's a chew. That's not true. That's not true. The press conference. Let's say they're trading who was going to come into who's in her chamber too. You know what they say? It's good to be Nanjing. So as you might imagine, it's about now that Hong's inner circle is starting to question his ambitions, right? People sign out of this rebellion because they hated the ruling class.
Starting point is 00:15:05 But now that they were actually being governed by a dude who thought he was God's kid and Manchu's were demons, they were starting to have second thoughts. So shortly after this, we have a series of purges where Hong has everybody with any claim to power executed along with their families. Those purge movies would have been so much better in 1850s. They were talking about. So many. This is the problem.
Starting point is 00:15:28 Yeah, those people didn't know right from long. Just long. Long. See you like that. That's how it's done. That's how it's done. How dare you. How dare you.
Starting point is 00:15:37 How dare you. But. This is. Now, of course, it wasn't just the inner circle that was starting to chafe under Hong's rule. And traditionalists in the Chinese society weren't big on the whole kill all the people in charge message in general, especially if they were in charge, but the ideology of typing Christianity was also just bad shit fucking crazy even compared to Christianity. Right.
Starting point is 00:16:01 So included in their social reforms were strict separation of the sexes, land socialization, suppression of private trade, and of course the destruction of Buddhist temples and libraries. And as if that wasn't enough to piss off all the Buddhists, slant owners, and merchants, they also came out against foot binding. What's more, they weren't even worse at governing than the government. And Wikipedia described their rule as, quote, remarkably ineffective, haphazard and brutal. And quote, remarkably ineffective, haphazard and brutal. And quote, remarkably ineffective, haphazard and brutal. That is my managerial style described perfectly. I love it.
Starting point is 00:16:34 So Wikipedia in my head, there's a guy who foot binding was the final straw for just like, yuck, seriously, women walking around in size sevens, we got to kill this guy. The demons are none. Well, that's already taken. We need to think of a new tagline for the show. So what we parted at, we're gonna take a quick break for a little apropos of nothing. People of Typing. I, your new ruler. Hold on, wait a minute.
Starting point is 00:17:11 Why don't you have a Chinese accent? Well we try to do that, but then Heath quit. It was, it was, it was, it was, it got uncomfortable in here. Yeah, that's really something only my character can get away with. Cool. Okay. Sorry. Um, yeah, no, go ahead. Right. Yeah. Anyway, now that we've
Starting point is 00:17:25 risen up, there will be some changes. First, we kill everyone who has any power. Second, um, just, no, sorry. Um, I feel like I'm being that guy. Well, then, um, stop being that guy. Yeah. For example, not going to do that. But, um, so does that include us? Cause we have power now. So that's actually a good question. Yeah, no, no, I'm not telling you to kill yourself. Just the people who used to have power. Okay, got it, got it. Used to have power.
Starting point is 00:18:00 Also, no more Buddhists or free trade or tiny little feet. Okay, yeah, just sorry one last thing. I've got my mind man. It's so close to lunch and if you could stop asking questions. Just one other question. So, those make sense. Just why the, why the no small feet thing though? That one.
Starting point is 00:18:21 It's weird. It's personal. This guy gets it. Okay, and we're back from that culturally sensitive reenactment. Well done, guys. Well done, I'm not at all embarrassed. I have children that I hope never find this.
Starting point is 00:18:40 Now Noah, when we last, I shmoop! I have so many children, I hope don't find this. No, I was the best man at your dad's wedding. I'm in a scene. Maybe you're busy April 20th. All right. Now when we last left off, I believe you were making light of one of the deadliest
Starting point is 00:19:06 wars in human history. I was, Tom. And so were you. So don't act so fucking high in mighty about it. I don't want to ask that way. I'll just sit here and feel superior than fun because I'm better than you. Before the break, the type of thing rebels had taken at Nanjing as their capital and the populace was starting to
Starting point is 00:19:25 shave under their rule. So what happened next? Well, Tom, I'll get to that. But before I do, I think it's important to broaden our scope and talk a bit about the global context of this. Oh my fucking God. Of course you do. This is the part everybody where no
Starting point is 00:19:40 it takes us on a world tour of every culture ever. They're proud history. They're conflicts, cultural traditions. While the rest of us sit here and browse new submissions on porn hub. All right, we'll have fun with that Tom. See, Britain had just fought a whole war to secure their right to a dick this country to opium and their internal war was fucking up the trade. So they were tempted to enter the war on the side of the King dynasty. Ah, the old CIA, when the crypts and the bloods were fighting conundrum because you know
Starting point is 00:20:07 the CIA introduced crack cocaine to the black population in the 1980s. Oh, no, we discussed this already recently. Nope. No, it wasn't the 70s or the 80s. No, great. Also, no, not agreeing to that. We already talked about it. So, now, because they were horrible and white, the British also had sympathies for Hengji Kwan.
Starting point is 00:20:27 Wow, this is dumb, it's stealing money from foreigners or Christianity. It's like a Sophie's choice of white history. Exactly, exactly. See, he might have been crazy, dangerous, revolutionary, and proto-communist, but he was Christian and how bad could Jesus' little brother really be?
Starting point is 00:20:49 Plus, plus, hung was racist against Chinese people. So he and the Brits were a natural fit, like born allies. But because of this, the Brits and the Western powers in general officially remain neutral through the entire war. Yeah, the Brits have always been kind of the Switzerland of colonial genocide. So, you gotta always have a Brexit strategy. Yeah. They should have saved more of that Chinese Nazi gold though.
Starting point is 00:21:15 Maybe pounds wouldn't be wampum at this point. At a certain point, everybody had to admit that Hong was a fucking nut. So there were some unofficial European military adviser stepping into how about the king dynasty at this point. And while that probably helped militarily, it didn't help him win any popular sports since one of the main grievances hung was tapping into was frustration with the manchew government being in the pockets of the western powers. Okay, but here's what I don't get. They're a bellion is led by a crazy person and the people are turning against that. Why can't the central government just roll
Starting point is 00:21:49 over it? Oh, I'm guessing the national really big sword association made sure everybody's well armed to prevent tyranny like that. Safer. You know what they say? The only way to defeat a bad guy with a sword is with a gun. This fellow part, I'm sorry, I'm still reeling about Garrison killer. That's just a lot going on. Still rich. Just saying, Garrison, calm. No, actually, it's, it's because the central government was possibly even more incompetent than the typing army. Basically, since the typing took Nanjing, the central government had bogged itself down in a bloody siege to retake that city and managed to go nowhere with that for years. No matter how unsuccessful that was, they just kept pouring more people into it.
Starting point is 00:22:31 I get it. It's like the New York public subwaces. Oh, lots of public masturbation. Yeah. I mean, both. So keep in mind, too, that the country was fractured before this rebellion ever started. And they were huge swans of China that were under the control of regional warlords uh... will far more so than the central government anyway so it's not like they had a solid political
Starting point is 00:22:52 base to draw from here and all britain had to do is get some weapons to the chinese isis and the problem sols itself you know what the king of england actually had a plan to defeat uh... r rice in 30 days. But everyone's being mean. So he had to see if we could have taken out rice is really easy. Oh, but the, but the, but the fucking quit the racism was too bad for you. I didn't say lysis. That would have been racist. So luckily for people who wanted other people
Starting point is 00:23:27 to stop dying by the millions, I guess. Okay, we're called Jews. Noah, we're called. Well then why do you start all the wars, Eli? Well, that's right. You start all those wars. Eventually, anyway, eventually one competent army did show up on the field.
Starting point is 00:23:41 The typing army had been spreading east from their southwestern stronghold, and eventually they were barren down on Shanghai from two directions. That is fucking hot. You have no idea. So losing Shanghai would have been a major blow to the ruling dynasty. Two directions. Might have cost them their last pinch of grip on power.
Starting point is 00:23:59 I just got it. So they invested heavily in the defense of Shanghai. This is where the ever victorious army enters the picture. Losing Shanghai is also the name of a rom com starring Emma Stone as the native. But her roommate is a pirate who thinks he's Jesus coming this far to fact. Right after black. You surprised. Now I feel like the ever victorious army sort of is its own spoiler, but I'm also guessing there's a little bit of bias in the Wikipedia retelling here because the only army they portray as at all for middle is the only one that's led by white dudes.
Starting point is 00:24:42 Right. And this is a war that killed tens of millions of people. So there were definitely more than a couple of good people killers involved in this thing. But anyway, the honky led army repulsed the typing attack on Shanghai in 1860 and then rebuffed a second attack in 1862. I love white history is the best. Apparently, the stay puffed marshmallow man, just beat the shit out of millions. This guy is different times.
Starting point is 00:25:09 He then I actually went to that bar in Japan though. It was sensual. It was and sneaky. So this fluffer nutter is not what you think of it. You can order one, but you got to fucking mean it. You need to do that. It's the whole time your cock is pixelated. It's amazing how they can do that on the fly.
Starting point is 00:25:35 The technology here is amazing. Weird. So anyway, should this defeat, I hope it goes back. You leave, you start rearranging the top One of those like one of those slides that you have to move around You gotta blow on it you gotta blow on it Not true Back when I was talking about this Chinese war, there was a turning point.
Starting point is 00:26:09 And from there on, pixelated penis. If the king's forces, I'm saying that the king's forces, the king forces, uh, worked their way down the Yangtze River and gobble up all the layers that the rebels tenuously controlled. And by 1864, there were only a couple of small, strong holes left, most notably, of course, in Nanjing. Hengji Kuan declared that Nanjing would be fine on a kind of God's protection, but ultimately God turned out to be wrong. Yeah, but in 1862, God was busy protecting slavery in the United States. Well, no, right, right. Yeah. God wasn't wrong. He was just distracted. It's not like he's I'm nip it. Oh, yeah.
Starting point is 00:26:45 Yeah. All falls apart when you I'm just picturing him lying in bed ignoring honks calls. Who was that? Nothing. Sherman. Come back to bed. I want to cuddle. I don't want breakfast. I want some cuddles from my friend. When are we going to get brunch with my friends, Charmagne. When are we gonna get brunch with my friends? Friends of the worst. Now, I could tell you from experience, younger brothers never get the coolest anything. So, Hong didn't get to die on a cross
Starting point is 00:27:16 with a spear wound in his guts or anything. Instead, he would die of food poisoning that he got from eating raw vegetables while the city was running out of food. And apparently it wasn't like a quick into the wild type of poisoning. He apparently hung on for 20 days before he got around a dying here.
Starting point is 00:27:35 We must have been so fun to watch, really? The AIDS, you three weeks of some guy preaching about God's plan while he's having projectile diaries and dying. And for am afraid for that. And if that, you're like, well, that'd be fun. You can watch. Yeah, guys, just like, and I say unto you, oh boy, here we go.
Starting point is 00:27:53 Let the Lord know that sweet baby Jesus is hot. It's hot. It burns. I just feel like the lesson to take away here is no vegetables. No, I got the no Right. That's the important thing if you take anything from this essay and while there were skirmishes and outright battles for almost a decade to come, the rebellion pretty much died with Jesus' little brother. Of course, Dad or not the rulers wanted to punish him. So once they took the city, they had his
Starting point is 00:28:20 body exhumed and cremated, then they put his ashes in a cannon and fired them off because fuck that guy. That's awesome. That's going in my will. I just want to say on the record, that's it. If any, none of you will outlive me, but if you did, that's it. I should note, by the way, that China didn't return to like peace and stability after this or anything.
Starting point is 00:28:44 Basically, they'd taken a nation that was divided and factioned and poorly governed and turn it into one of those full of weapons and war, hard and veterans. So the next decade or two of Triton's history is filled with army groups that just like turned to banditry after the war and there's like minor upstart kingdoms started by popular military leaders. Basically, we start and and with a Kung Fu movie premise. Right. But then Jet Li gets within 10 steps of the guy who all over the map on this one and there weren't great records
Starting point is 00:29:23 or censuses at the time, but the most widely cited sources put the total number of civilian and military deaths up between 20 and 30 million, most of them through famine and plague. That would make it on the low end, the fifth deadliest conflict in human history after only World War II, the Mongol conquest, the King conquest that put the incompetent fuxxing charge in the first place, and the Spanish conquest of the Aztec empire. Now, some historians believe the number to be closer to a hundred million, which would make this a legitimate contender for the single deadliest arm conflict in human history. Yeah, but what's three fifths of a hundred million, though?
Starting point is 00:29:58 Jesus Christ. Eli, if you get this right, I'll buy you a house. You have five seconds. Uh, 350 million. Oh, so close. Not that close because negative numbers, they were losing negative numbers. I wanted a house. It's one of the house.
Starting point is 00:30:15 Explain the neck. What? No, it's, it's they were dying. No, no, no, no, it's not. No, well, his next ass, they'll be on negative numbers. So it's, well, that Chinese attitudes on this war have shifted quite a bit over the centuries or over the decades I should say. The history's written immediately after it treated the typing rebels as nothing more
Starting point is 00:30:34 than power hungry zealots, but modern China looks back at a lot more sympathetically what with all the proto communism that they were trying to enforce. In fact, about the only thing that Chinese historians seem to agree on about this war over the last 150 years or so is that it would be a terribly inappropriate subject for a lighthearted dig show show Chinese historian angrily taken out his ear buds. Your damn right it is. Unsub. Scribe. Scribe. You sent your dancehall. I didn't know if you had to summarize what you've learned in one sentence. What would it be? You can't keep Eli away from the racist jokes.
Starting point is 00:31:14 You can try. But what I originally wrote was everybody was kung fu fighting was based on actual historical events. I did not know that. All right. Well, since you made it all the way through a two decade war, only mentioning one actual fighting was based on actual historical events. I did not know that. All right, well, since you made it all the way through a two-decade war, only mentioning one actual battle and two place names. It's fair to say that you're an expert now.
Starting point is 00:31:33 Are you ready to put that expertise to test with questions from our panel? I believe I am ready, sir. All right, let me get started. Throughout history, religious leaders have been persecuted for some innocuous events, which of the following is one of those events? A, the Jonestown Cool Aid Naptime and Story Hour. That's such a shitty thing to say. B, the Heaven's Gate Meteor Bridal Shower.
Starting point is 00:32:00 C, the branch Davidians' first annual family reunion in barbecue or D the Manson family emergency happened up to me. Well, you know, if the answer wasn't A, no person of good consciousness could have even said that. So I'm going to say it must be because otherwise you would have had to make that up and that would make you a fuck. That would be a. That would be a. That would be a. the Joe sound cool a nap time and story.
Starting point is 00:32:28 Absolutely true. Thanks so much for not making me a horrible person. No, I know which of the following is the best title for the biography of Hengji Kwan, the Chinese white supremacist. Is it a Uncle Heng's cabin Is it B? The Gong curve? That's a great joke. That's a great joke. Such a good joke. Or is it C? Low main comfort. I'm not okay. That works better on the page. So, um, everybody imagine the page. I'm gonna, I'm gonna go with, I'm gonna go with B. That was a thinker.
Starting point is 00:33:10 That is correct. Yeah. All right. Noah, white people generally don't know any of this happened. A million people. We had no idea. Why? Hey, because there's no oil in China.
Starting point is 00:33:31 It's being, if it didn't happen here, it might not have happened. See, we think all these people look alike. It doesn't help that all their names sound the same. Tom's ex-racist and all the rest of us now. There was still enough Chinese guys around to build our railroads, so no harm, no foul. Two white people, no harm, no foul to the white people. I feel like we have a racist sorting hat.
Starting point is 00:33:56 We just keep passing around. All right, let's see. China's the fourth leading oil producer, it's not A. Come here, any of these all of the three. From the very bottom of my heart, buddy. I'm gonna go with C because otherwise, Tom would have had to make that up and say that on purpose. And that's a must be. Yeah, racist.
Starting point is 00:34:30 No, so it must be C, must be the answer. Sure, let's go with that. Okay, so obviously Ty Ping Rebellion doesn't really describe the conflict super well. Lots of very not racist people could get confused, do hilarious opening sketch that a lot of people would interpret the wrong way. Some people were chicken out of. So what's a better name for the Typing Rebellion? Is it A, the Tanjing Typing Yankeying murder thing?
Starting point is 00:34:59 And B, the rise and fall of Rises, sorry, I just needed to use the Rises fall of rice. This is sorry. I just needed to use the rice to get it to good to just a reminder to everybody. Rice is he's choked or see the great wall of cost. Still starting that day. Still a star. Not a lot of people know that. All right, based on the spelling alone, I have to go with the drenching typing, nanking
Starting point is 00:35:24 murder thing based on the spelling you could I have to go with the drenching typing, nanking murder thing. He's done the spelling. You could have gone with any of them. Yeah. All right. Well, nobody managed to stump, know or however any of this works. He wins, I guess. And that means he picks who does next week's essay for reasons that I just, I don't understand
Starting point is 00:35:41 it all. Well, thank you, Tom. I'm glad my victory could fix you. And I choose Eli to do next week's essay. Just so the Tom has to try to decipher his high-roglyphic on the monopia-based language scrollings. Oh, it isn't just Tom. That's great.
Starting point is 00:35:58 Setting off back right in and this plane sure will show me. So, all right. Before we go, I'll toss this over to Sarah for her last week's Twitter answer. And this week's Twitter question. Thanks Tom. Last week's question was, what band substance would actually be worth writing for? The winner was Jim sweatpants on Twitter with this answer. Eli's citation pod episode on Jambane Ramsey. You say that, but you haven't seen the diagram, Jim.
Starting point is 00:36:25 This week's question is, what kind of fights did Jesus and his little brother have when they were kids? Just retweet or face book share this episode with your answer for a chance to be next week's winner. Back to you, Tom. All right, well, for Cecil Eli Heath and Noah, I'm Tom, thank you for hanging out with us today. We'll be back next week, and by then,
Starting point is 00:36:44 Eli will be an expert on something else. Between now and then, you can hear more from Cecil and me on Call of your descendants, and if you still need something to listen to, once you've exhausted our backlogs, maybe you can listen to more of Noah, Heath, and Eli on the Skating Atheist, God awful movies, and the Skepticrat. And if you'd like to help keep this show going, you can make a per episode donation at patreon.com-slash-litation-pod or leave us a five star review everywhere you can make a per episode donation to patreon.com slash citation pod or leave us a five star review everywhere you can't I have you like to get in touch with us check out past episodes connect to this on social media or check the show notes be sure to check out citation pod dot com
Starting point is 00:37:18 I quit the skid ahead of time get ahead of time. Hahaha. Does anybody else want to take the red? Nope. Nope. I've got the screen that I was going to, I was going to, I was going to do the green. I get two lines.
Starting point is 00:37:32 So I'm good. You want to do that? You want to switch yellow red? No, it wouldn't be appropriate. No, sorry. Yeah, that doesn't make sense. It's like taking your Beth math student off the math problem. You got to keep the racist on the racist stuff
Starting point is 00:37:45 That's cute. I like Asian people. It's not reasonable. Bookers are not people. Oh shit. I know that's you get through them.

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