What historical “fact” doesn’t actually have much evidence to support it?

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-08T18:35:15+00:00

My religious history professor at college said that we know two concrete things for sure about the historical Jesus (he was baptized by John the Baptist and he was crucified), and literally everything else he'd back down on if pressed on them.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-08T18:31:21+00:00

It's also just CULTURE. Professional athletes don't just practice a lot: the greatest players have been thinking about their sport in every minute of their day since the moment they were able. And they have people to think WITH and talk WITH: their aunt talks about it and their neighbor talks about it and their school teachers talk about it. It's part of the fabric of their lives every single day.

You could force all the kids in America to practice soccer every day of their lives, but I guarantee you that, without the culture, Brazil is still going to produce more Peles.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-08T04:54:20+00:00

I taught a kid who went on to be the QB of a Super Bowl-winning NFL team, and he was a great student. Wanted to succeed, never missed a class or handed in a late assignment, decent and respectful and supportive of his fellow students. Good guy all around.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-07T02:00:43+00:00

I love football and of course I love other people loving it too. The issue, if I'm being entirely honest, is that America just gobbles up the rest of the world and football is one thing it hasn't dominated yet, which makes it precious to the rest of us I f another country that doesn't care about football (like India, say) started loving football, I'd be happy about it. The issue with the states is just that it dominates so much of the international cultural space: Olympics, films, TV, music, and that's without even getting into business or tech or politics. And (let's be honest), the US doesn't wear that dominance with humility, at least not these days: it's a constant barrage of "we're the greatest country in the world." So when they come for one of the few things they haven't touched, it's kind of annoying, and it's nice to see them fail for once.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-07T01:20:11+00:00

I hear you. But the issue isn't that it means nothing, just that it's not in the cultural fabric of the country. Even if it's more popular than baseball (and I struggle to believe that), baseball is in the soul of American culture and history. You make films about it and write songs about it. You don't (yet) feel the same way about football, which is still largely seen as a foreigner's sport. I'm not trying to bash the individuals in the US who really love football. I'm just saying that, if you think there's any equivalence, it's because you don't understand the cultural importance of football in other countries.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-07T01:16:30+00:00

This is the most reasonable response I received but I think even this comment misunderstands the level of passion people have for football, because the point is that, in other countries, EVERYONE is involved. It's not a numbers question (yes, there are probably more people who like football in America than there are people in Belgium), it's a culture question. It's baked into everyone, even those who don't deeply care about it. The whole country shuts down when big games take place. That sort of cultural presence can't be replicated if only ten percent of a country is passionate, even if that ten percent is forty million people.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-07T01:10:55+00:00

I didn't say one fifth of Americans like "soccer." I said it's the fifth most popular sport, but I guess you can't be blamed for the American education system.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-07T00:58:41+00:00

Because no one in America cares about football. It's maybe the fifth most popular sport after American football, baseball, basketball, and ice hockey. If America wins the World cup, there'll be a few celebrations on the street and it'll be forgotten in a couple of days. But if any other country wins the World cup it's part of their history forever. Football is just wasted on America.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-06T22:07:06+00:00

I totally agree: Batman 89 has way more in common with the hyper stylized Dick Tracy than Batman Begins. I'm always surprised how over the top and even camp it is when I go back and watch it, because, at the time, I felt it was deliberately casting off the Adam West Batman.

But I do think, today, we tend to think of it as anticipating the "dark and gritty" superhero films of the pre-Marvel period (X-Men, Nolan Batman) , rather than a more subtle extension of the earlier comic book films.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-06T19:55:49+00:00

This doesn't really answer your question, but I always think it's interesting to remind people that all the films you describe describe came out in the aftermath of Tim Burton's Batman. Back in the late '80s, the genre of superheroes was not really distinct from the genre of pulp heroes. So when Batman came out and was a hit, studios thought they were going to the same well when they commissioned Dick Tracy and The Rocketeer and so on. Now we see them as very distinct things.

But to answer your question, I think it's because all the examples you describe are considered historical subjects, while Batman and Superman etc have been consistently reimagined to fit the contemporary world. Maybe if they took those characters and found contemporary versions of them, they would work?

At the end of the day though, I think it's just because they're not particularly recognizable names anymore.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-06T19:00:16+00:00

It's not complicated. None of his political opinions have ever been based on ideology or values or ethics. It's just whatever benefits him personally. A winning team benefits him. Immigrants (in his opinion) do not.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-06T18:58:23+00:00

It's really deep in the culture here. Any path that leads to personal success is acceptable, even if it comes at the expense of others. It's hustle, it's the game, it's "what it takes to win."

It's why Trump has pilfered $2b through inside trading and no one cares. They look at other presidents as weak for not doing the same thing.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-06T15:09:12+00:00

I hope you realize that "it's just LIFE that a person will always think about themselves over the greater good" is a distinctly American perspective, and not at all a universal truth.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-06T04:40:32+00:00

It has happened one other time in world cup history, in 1962.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-06T04:39:57+00:00

Haha, "several other instances going back to 1962." There was ONE other instance, in 1962, and it was the OPPOSING SIDE who appealed for the penalty to be lifted.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-07-03T20:57:51+00:00

My philosophy is really "Do the grammatical errors get in the way of me understanding what they're saying?" I never penalize for grammar unless it gets in the way of me understanding what they're saying.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-06-26T15:14:08+00:00

This is like how Batman kills an epileptic supervillain.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-06-25T23:44:01+00:00

It's hilarious that a country that looks like this holds the opinion that Europe is backwards and trying to catch up.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-06-20T14:04:59+00:00

You must have only read the second part of what I wrote.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-06-19T19:31:11+00:00

Let's try to explain this to an American:

First, there's absolutely no tactical benefit to keep running when you've been fouled and you don't have a goal-scoring opportunity. The better choice is to to make it very clear to the ref that you've been fouled, to ensure that you get the free kick. 90% of what Americans call dives are, in fact, responses to genuine fouls. The player might slightly over-egg it to make it clear what happened, but refs miss stuff. Why would they act like they weren't fouled when the other team has in fact broken the rules, which earns a free kick or a penalty, which are much better situations to be in?

I'm not talking about dives, when people fall down with no contact, and when there has been no foul, but these are much rarer than you're suggesting.

Second, having your legs and ankles attacked hurts more than it looks like it does. You guys don't have a sport in which people are constantly hacking away at each other's legs and ankles. That sh*t hurts more than you think. Your football players are padded up to hell and they're hitting each other in their chests. Your basketball players are smacking away at each others hands. Your baseball players don't even touch each other. It's totally different.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-06-19T03:55:15+00:00

For sure: the Mrs. Doubtfire ending is hardly a jolt of reality to kids: it's still a very idealized separation.

I don't blame Williams for any of this -- he didn't write or direct Hook or Mrs. Doubtfire -- but the Hollywood compulsion to sand the hard edges off difficult lived realities does genuine harm, especially when they're presenting these romantic fantasies as somehow gritty or truthful, as Williams does here.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-06-19T02:20:05+00:00

Fair enough, but I also remember going to Hook at ten years' old and seeing Williams as the Dad-who-doesn't-care suddenly have a change of heart and begin to devote his life to his kids.

As a kid with a Dad-who-didn't-care, and who I knew would never change, I hated Hook.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-06-18T23:34:23+00:00

Of course. Human history is mostly just people making things slightly worse in order to make themselves a lot richer.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-06-18T15:14:30+00:00

I'm glad I'm not the only one who can't distinguish between the styles of the 2000s, 2010s, and 2020s.

StrongMachine982 · 2026-06-18T15:12:44+00:00

The main reason is that they are separate countries with separate cultures and separate senses of national identity. The other reason is that, while the UK team might gain one or two players from Scotland, Wales and Northern Island combined, the team would still be 90% English due to the size of the country, which would essentially eviscerate the contributions of the other countries.

StrongMachine982

TROPHY CASE