161 points

I love how obsessed some Americans are with their founding fathers, it’s adorably weird. I’ve never ever based any of my decisions or opinions on what our first chancellor did or didn’t do and I don’t see fucking why.

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88 points

It would be adorable if it wasn’t dangerous :/ they use the founding fathers and constitution in the same way they use Jesus and the Bible - as a reason to hurt others and stop progress

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47 points

And it’s funny in the wtf way because the founding fathers were against religion being involved in the governing of the nation. They codified that crap! And yet, these idiots keep trying to claim it’s a Christian nation and we need god back in everything.

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18 points

You’re of course correct and I can only be playful about it because of my privileged position of being outside the US. I get that it fucking sucks from the inside.

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11 points

You have no idea, hombre. They’ve slow boiled us like crabs to the point that 50% of the population is bragging that they have a hot tub while not realizing that they’re already cooked.

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-17 points
*

Just remember if we fail we will bring everyone down with us. So just because you live outside the US doesn’t mean you can make silly jokes about silly Americans because the people who think that sunscreen bad and founding fathers = gods also vote for people who think democracy is bad and fascism good. So when our democracy fails the whole entire planet will suffer, including you

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37 points

The way it was explained to me, it’s because of a lack of history.

Being a new country, they had effectively no history or culture, unlike the rest of the world. It lead to a desire to develop it’s own identity which lead to elevating the founding fathers to a myth like status to match those of other countries.

It made sense to me, since there are myths involving demigods in different part of the world.

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12 points

Yeah its the same way other post-revolutionary countries idolise their revolutionary leaders, like how the soviets idolised Lenin or Trotsky.

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11 points

They were pretty cool enlightenment thinkers who created the first constitutional republic and were able to muscle out the British Empire. It’s pretty remarkable.

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26 points

What they did is remarkable, but they are often treated more like oracles and the constitution like some perfect golden tablets someone dug up in their yard (despite needing significant changes right after it was ratified).

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23 points

Lots of US people will explain to you that the constitution and its amendments are immutable. And when you ask them to repeat that slowly, they’ll just say it louder because you’re the slow one.

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10 points

Yeah, I know. Now if anyone used their actual intellectual accomplishments as arguments instead of the simple fact that they existed, that might be interesting.

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3 points

Their intellectual accomplishments: rad Personal lives : depends who you’re talking about

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6 points

It’s an important part of history. The fact that the ideology of some guys that founded our nation a few years back would be viewed as far left extremists nowadays is astonishing. These guys literally left a country and made their own country with radical stuff like freedom of speech, allowing people to come through the borders if they feel unsafe, democracy for the people and by the people and not corporate dirtbags fucking us every chance they get. Not to mention our freedoms keeping on shrinking little by little from the Patriot Act and more legislation to monitor our communications “foR tHe ChiLdRen”.

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7 points

radical stuff like freedom of speech

…for white men.

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2 points

It wouldn’t’ be so bad if they actually knew anything about their founding fathers. Maybe did a little research on them, but the ones that idolise them the most know almost nothing about them.

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1 point

Because it was a government that was pretty much written up from scratch and went against many of the tenants of European governments at the time, such as a right to free speech, no state religion, etc. It is still based on English Common Law though. It inspired the French revolutionaries though they went in another direction ultimately.

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37 points

Just remember: these people’s vote counts just as much as anyone else’s.

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49 points

these people’s vote counts just as much as anyone else’s.

Not true for Americans. How much your vote counts is based on which state you live in due to the Electoral College

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26 points

Yup. In most cases, these people’s votes count more than the rest of ours.

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3 points
*

It’s devastating. I lived in the US for several years and it’s just so sad to know that there are so many sane and kind and progressive people who are denied their peaceful lives by a loud and armed minority (backed by a lot of money and corporate interests).

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11 points
*

And also the amount of money you can funnel through lobbyists.

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9 points

The first vote on this post was a downvote… they’re everywhere!

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5 points

Are you sure about that? These opinions are overwhelmingly represented in low-population counties, so their vote counts way more than most peoples.

Don’t you know? Democracy is about making sure all land is equally represented, not all citizens.

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2 points

Dumb people like this usually live in lower population red states, so their vote counts for more than mine.

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24 points

Back then, they seemed to just wear a lot more clothes. It’s such an odd stance to think you can’t use an umbrella or clothing to block out the sun. I can understand being skeptical about the side-effects of sunscreen being slathered on your body and absorbed… but it’s pretty common to see depiction of parasols being used in older times.

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9 points

I have lupus and my skin has become really sensitive to the sun as I’ve got older. I think about getting a parasol fairly regularly but I don’t have the confidence or style to pull it off unfortunately!

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15 points

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9 points

No need to worry about pulling off the style because no one can wear these with style anyways

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6 points

You can see the sadness in that guys eyes…

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9 points

I just visited DC a few weeks ago and it was insanely hot and bright. I always carry an umbrella in my day bag so I used it for shade walking around. Even though it looked dorky and wasn’t at all stylish I got a ton of compliments and nods of approval. Just do it, nobody will judge, everyone will think you’re a genius.

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4 points

Screw what everyone else thinks and rock that parasol.

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20 points

People have been using all kinds of stuff for sun screen for centuries. Ancient Greeks used olive oil, for example.

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26 points

And of course clothing. There is a reason that beduins dress like they do, or why stetson type hats became popular in the West.

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17 points

If anyone else is curious and wants to read more:

https://www.mountvernon.org/george-washington/health/cancer/

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10 points

I had no idea they even knew what cancer was back then… fascinating!

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18 points

Cancer was first described in 3000BC! Here you go.

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11 points

Just because people lacked advanced analysis techniques, it doesn’t mean they weren’t observant. There are a huge number of things about the world that ancient people were very tuned into, they just didn’t have the tools to learn more than their senses could tell them.

Just looking at the stars at night and comprehending how long and tedious it must be to track them to the point that you can determine the time of the year or your position on the ocean is a small taste of understanding how much our ancestors noticed about the world.

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Confidently Incorrect

!confidently_incorrect@lemmy.world

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When people are way too smug about their wrong answer.

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