Recent comments in /f/todayilearned

20Characters_orless t1_j6mjbz9 wrote

Reply to TIL When a cow has opposite sex twins, the female twin is usually born intersex and infertile. This happens because the twins blood supplies are linked, which exposes the female to male sex hormones. by awawe

Growing in up we would occasionally have what we called Bullers, steers that the other steers would ride constantly. We had to separate them from the rest of the herd early on, or they would be rode to death.

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Danhuangmao t1_j6mj1r3 wrote

Reply to comment by rugbat in TIL That the character who first said the phrase "fortune favours the bold" - Turnus, in the Aeneid, spends the rest of the story suffering military defeats before he's killed and heads to the underworld, miserable, at the end of the last book. by Equal_Caregiver_4909

Not sure about that. He was basing the work closely on The Odyssey and The Illiad, neither of which tells massive multi-generational tales (in fact, The Illiad doesn’t even cover the whole Trojan war - just the 9th year of it, of 10).

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1945BestYear t1_j6miv7x wrote

Reply to comment by AloofCommencement in TIL that between 1895 and 1908 the population of the Belgian Congo declined by between 2 and 13 million due to colonial brutality and diseases caused by colonialism. by hetkleinezusje

I would've defined "redeeming" as specifically not being a mere point in the good column, there has to be a relationship between it and the person's bad qualities. If you redeem a debt, you are paying it back, you are "making it good", it's not as if the debt you owe is redeemed if other people are also indebted to you.

If you want to see any quality in Hitler that could barely, arguably be categorized as "redeeming" in the light of his monstrous crimes, then it would be that he had a, very limited and specific, idea of "the German People" that he thought he was leading to a better future in a world he considered to be one of unending racial conflict. That's something at least, "As big as I am, the People is even bigger than me", we can agree that Hitler was wrong and also say that he subscribed to propositions that at least make it understandable why he'd consider himself a selfless hero. Leopold didn't even have that, he owned the Congo as his personal estate, legally the Belgian people and government had nothing to do with it, and he was under no obligation to enrich them or anybody else for it, it literally just existed only to make Leopold, already the constitutional monarch of a nation, even more rich and powerful.

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R4G OP t1_j6miey4 wrote

Reply to TIL Jackie Robinson served in the first black tank unit to see action in WW2, but missed deployment due to his court-martial for refusing to move to the back of a bus. by R4G

> After receiving his commission, Robinson was reassigned to Fort Hood, Texas, where he joined the 761st "Black Panthers" Tank Battalion. While at Fort Hood, Robinson often used his weekend leave to visit the Rev. Karl Downs, President of Sam Huston College (now Huston–Tillotson University) in nearby Austin, Texas; in California, Downs had been Robinson's pastor at Scott United Methodist Church while Robinson attended PJC. > > An event on July 6, 1944, derailed Robinson's military career. While awaiting results of hospital tests on the ankle he had injured in junior college, Robinson boarded an Army bus with a fellow officer's wife; although the Army had commissioned its own unsegregated bus line, the bus driver ordered Robinson to move to the back of the bus. Robinson refused. The driver backed down, but after reaching the end of the line, summoned the military police, who took Robinson into custody. When Robinson later confronted the investigating duty officer about racist questioning by the officer and his assistant, the officer recommended Robinson be court-martialed. > > After Robinson's commander in the 761st, Paul L. Bates, refused to authorize the legal action, Robinson was summarily transferred to the 758th Battalion—where the commander quickly consented to charge Robinson with multiple offenses, including, among other charges, public drunkenness, even though Robinson did not drink. > > By the time of the court-martial in August 1944, the charges against Robinson had been reduced to two counts of insubordination during questioning. Robinson was acquitted by an all-white panel of nine officers. > > Although his former unit, the 761st Tank Battalion, became the first black tank unit to see combat in World War II, Robinson's court-martial proceedings prohibited him from being deployed overseas; thus, he never saw combat action. > > After his acquittal, he was transferred to Camp Breckinridge, Kentucky, where he served as a coach for army athletics until receiving an honorable discharge in November 1944. While there, Robinson met a former player for the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro American League, who encouraged Robinson to write the Monarchs and ask for a tryout. Robinson took the former player's advice and wrote to Monarchs co-owner Thomas Baird.

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Pay08 t1_j6mhtap wrote

Reply to comment by BrownMan65 in TIL that between 1895 and 1908 the population of the Belgian Congo declined by between 2 and 13 million due to colonial brutality and diseases caused by colonialism. by hetkleinezusje

It's almost like communism is impossible to sustain on a scale that involves more than 50 people. Especially if these people are forced into it. The USSR destroyed itself, it had nothing to do with any other country.

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Pay08 t1_j6mhkgr wrote

Reply to comment by stefantalpalaru in TIL that between 1895 and 1908 the population of the Belgian Congo declined by between 2 and 13 million due to colonial brutality and diseases caused by colonialism. by hetkleinezusje

Saying the Belgian government was complicit because they gave him a loan is just idiotic. By all accounts, the Congo Free State was Leopold's personal property. The Belgian parliament not only had no influence or authority there, they had no insight at all to its affairs. This is like saying I'm a murderer if I buy food from South America.

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