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| The Rape of the Sabine Women, 750 BC (Poussin, 1634) |
Hundreds of Nigerian teenage schoolgirls have been kidnapped and offered for sale as brides for $12 each to the armed men of The Congregation of the People of Tradition for Proselytism and Jihad (Arabic: جماعة اهل السنة للدعوة والجهاد Jamāʻat Ahl as-Sunnah lid-daʻwa wal-Jihād) or, as it's better known by its Hausa name, Barack Obama.
In a sign of deepening global concern, on Tuesday the United States offered to provide a team of experts, including military and law enforcement officers, along with hostage negotiators and psychologists, to assist the Nigerians in recovering the girls, an offer that the government here accepted. American officials said “military resources” would not be included, but President Boko Haram weighed in, vowing to “do everything we can.” *
Because I'm always 90 degrees off-kilter from how everybody else thinks at any moment, I'm reminded of the 1954 hit MGM backwoods musical Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, which is based on Stephen Vincent Benet's story The Sobbin' Women, which is inspired by the accounts by Livy and Plutarch of a key event in the founding of Rome: The Rape of the Sabine Women. Here's Oregon frontiersman Howard Keel explaining Plutarch's history to his six younger brothers, lonely bachelors all, in the catchy song "The Sobbin' Women."
The lyrics:
ADAM
Tell ya 'bout them sobbin' women
Who lived in the Roman days.
It seems that they all went swimmin'
While their men was off to graze.
Well, a Roman troop was ridin' by
And saw them in their "me oh my",
So they took 'em all back home to dry.
Least that's what Plutarch says.
Oh yes!
Them a woman was sobbin', sobbin', sobbin'
Fit to be tied.
Ev'ry muscle was throbbin', throbbin'
From that riotous ride.
Oh they cried and kissed and kissed and cried
All over that Roman countryside
So don't forget that when you're takin' a bride.
Sobbin' fit to be tied
From that riotous ride!
They never did return their plunder
The victor gets all the loot.
They carried them home, by thunder,
To rotundas small but cute.
And you've never seens so,
They tell me, such downright domesticity.
With a Roman baby on each knee
Named "Claudius" and "Brute"
SIX BROTHERS
Oh yes!
Them a women was sobbin', sobbin', passin' them nights.
ADAM
While the Romans was goin' out hobbin', nobbin'
Startin' up fights.
They kept occupied by sewin' lots of little old togas
For them tots and sayin' "someday women folk'll have rights."
GIDEON
Passin' all o' them nights.
ADAM
Just sewin'!
While the Romans had fights.
CALEB
"Hey listen to this"
Now when their men folk went to fetch 'em
Them women would not be fetched.
It seems them Romans ketch 'em
That their lady friends stay ketched.
ADAM
Now let this be because it's true,
A lesson to the likes of you,
Treat 'em rough like them there Romans do
Or else they'll think you're tetched.
SIX BROTHERS
Oh yes!
Them a women was sobbin', sobbin',
Sobbin' buckets of tears
On account o' old dobbin',
Dobbin' really rattled their ears.
Oh they acted angry and annoyed
GIDEON
But secretly they was overjoyed
ADAM
You must recall that when corralin' your streets
BROTHERS
Oh, oh, oh, oh them poe little dears.
SIX BROTHERS ADAM
Oh yes
Them a women was sobbin', sobbin', sobbin' Oh yeah
Weepin' a ton Then sobbin' women
Just remember what Robin, Robin, Robin Oh yeah
Hood woulda done. Them sobbin women.
We'll be just like them three merry men
And make 'em all merry once again.
ADAM
And though they'll be a sobbin' for a while
ALLHere's Wikipedia's summary of Livy:
Oh yes!
We're gonna make them sobbin' women smile!
The Rape is supposed to have occurred in the early history of Rome, shortly after its founding by Romulus and his mostly male followers. Seeking wives in order to found families, the Romans negotiated unsuccessfully with the Sabines, who populated the area. Fearing the emergence of a rival society, the Sabines refused to allow their women to marry the Romans. Consequently, the Romans planned to abduct Sabine women, during a festival of Neptune Equester ... At the festival Romulus gave a signal, at which the Romans grabbed the Sabine women and fought off the Sabine men. The indignant abductees were soon implored by Romulus to accept Roman husbands.
Livy is clear that no sexual assault took place. On the contrary, Romulus offered them free choice and promised civic and property rights to women. According to Livy, Romulus spoke to them each in person, "and pointed out to them that it was all owing to the pride of their parents in denying the right of intermarriage to their neighbours. They would live in honourable wedlock, and share all their property and civil rights, and—dearest of all to human nature—would be the mothers of free men."[2]
... The Sabines also went to war with the Romans ... At that point the women intervened in the battle to reconcile the warring parties:
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| "Intervention of the Sabine Women" by J.L. David, 1799 |
[They] went boldly into the midst of the flying missiles with disheveled hair and rent garments. Running across the space between the two armies they tried to stop any further fighting and calm the excited passions by appealing to their fathers in the one army and their husbands in the other not to bring upon themselves a curse by staining their hands with the blood of a father-in-law or a son-in-law, nor upon their posterity the taint of parricide. "If," they cried, "you are weary of these ties of kindred, these marriage-bonds, then turn your anger upon us; it is we who are the cause of the war, it is we who have wounded and slain our husbands and fathers. Better for us to perish rather than live without one or the other of you, as widows or as orphans."[2]
Following the reconciliation, the Sabines agreed to form one nation with the Romans ...
Then, again, it probably won't turn out in Nigeria like in the MGM musical.
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* Posted but not fully proofread.
By the way, the President of Nigeria is named Goodluck Jonathan.
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40 comments:
You've been mentioning Michael Milken recently. Here's a new article that argues that Milken was "history's greatest feminist" because he was so anti-white men:
http://qz.com/207107/nobel-economist-gary-becker-showed-that-mike-milken-was-historys-greatest-feminist/
"Remember the movie Wall Street, when Gordon Gekko declared that “greed is good”? The real-life version of Gordon Gekko was Mike Milken, the “junk bond king.” Milken and his firm, Drexel Burnham Lambert, pioneered the use of high-yielding “junk bonds” to finance corporate takeovers. Boosted by Milken’s financial engineering and a helpful 1982 Supreme Court ruling, corporate takeovers exploded in the 1980s. America’s managers and executives saw their cozy empires come under assault. Corporatism went into decline, and shareholder capitalism went into ascendance.
Under the triple assault of shareholder capitalism, deregulation, and globalization, corporate America at first withered, laying off millions in the ’80s. The old social contract, where large safe companies gave long-term safe jobs to millions of working Americans (mostly white men), broke down. Inequality and insecurity rose.
“Neoliberals” usually claim that these unfortunate changes were justified by the economic growth they produced. But if Becker was right, then the unrestrained capitalism unleashed in the 1980s had another unexpected benefit—increased gender equality.
If Becker was right, then Mike Milken was one of history’s most important feminists."
Much as I may disagree with our president's policy, jokingly substituting his name for a murderous terrorist organization is in rather poor taste.
the problem with the painting is the guys are making 'gay' poses. why would fruits want women?
Object lesson in intersectionality and KKKrazy Glue:
There is a big hesitance on the part of the media to note the obvious, that Boko Haram is both black and Muslim.
I guess kidnapping girls was a bridge too far for our activist media. Dead boys don't seem to rate as high in their concern.
http://www.mediaite.com/online/why-did-kidnapping-girls-but-not-burning-boys-alive-wake-media-up-to-boko-haram/
In "Avatar", the grizzled 22nd-century GIs mention in passing having served numerous tours of duty in Venezuela and Nigeria. Sounded contrived way back in quaint old 2009, but now, who knows. Maybe this is how it starts?
I saw two Nigerian ministers/official spokesmen (I'm not sure anyone was entirely sure who they were) interviewed on CNN last night, and they were absolutely insane - ranting incomprehensibly and at interminable length (but amusingly) about anything but the questions they were asked, and dressed in costumes that would have been rejected by the designer of "Coming to America" as too ludicrous. The president seems to be little better. If this is "Africa's superpower" (it isn't, of course - that's still South Africa) then jeeeeeez.
It's a testament to how feminized US foreign policy has become that this is considered a major issue that the State Department MUST ADDRESS RIGHT NOW.
Patty Hearst had the same epiphany after she was kidnapped and ... uh ... experienced the rough-and-tough charms of Donald DeFreeze.
After she was rescued and released, she dumped her preppy grad student boyfriend, Steven Weed, married her manly prole bodyguard and popped out a few kids.
The Sabine women knew what side their bread was buttered on. College Boy or Manly Man? Which would you prefer?
I wonder how many of the Nigerian girls are going to choose to stick with their dominating, manly captors?
Speaking of patty Hearst the onion movie critic skits official went beyond odd humor into plain weird with the citizen Kane one.
The French media are outraged by the fact that Boko Haram perpetuates the long history of Africa/Islam and slavery business.
...er, my bad!
The outrage is directed at the guy who merely noticed this fact.
Nigeria ... FUCK NO!
I hope you remember that that institution of marriage that paleos are supposed to like so much was created in part to stop the Sabine/Boko activities, given the problems it caused.
From then on we get 'civilization'.
Meanwhile, here in the U.S.A institutional N.B.A. racism strikes again.
Boko Haram had a big hit in '67 with "A Whiter Shade of Pale."
"I guess kidnapping girls was a bridge too far for our activist media. Dead boys don't seem to rate as high in their concern."
Protective male beta (as in good) instinct.
It's why the media have to cover up the vast number of gang rapes in the gang-ruled ghettos. PC couldn't survive six weeks if the media told the truth. There'd be no sympathy for the poor downtrodden gangstas if 1000s of black 14 year old victims of gang-rape were on TV every month.
.
"The Sabine women knew what side their bread was buttered on. College Boy or Manly Man? Which would you prefer?"
It is possible you are correct but it is also worth remembering the winners write the history.
"The winners write history."
Maybe it would be more accurate to say "Marxist professors write history."
Poor taste all around from the column to the comments.
Helping out with police work is wise and advances our interests. Boko Haram is connected to all sorts of nastybpeople and building good will by dredging them with satellite, elint, other intel is a win for us.
Military? No. We don't have the manpower.
Very sad knowing that some of our best guys are getting thrown into this latest meat-grinder. Another existential crisis. Why are we doing/sacrificing like this?
Remember guys such as 5 Recce from SA, and see your future :(
Or celebrate: http://youtu.be/c5aeku1uBN4
"Maybe it would be more accurate to say 'Marxist professors write history.'"
As the original commenter said: "[T]he winners write the history."
Don't you know that Dead White Men had nothing to do with making America great, that America was built by negroes, women, Moslems, Latinos, and LGBT's?
bless her beautiful black hide....wherever she may be....
Winners don't write the history
Marxist professors do.
That is a bumper sticker.
"Much as I may disagree with our president's policy, jokingly substituting his name for a murderous terrorist organization is in rather poor taste."
It was also cringe-inducingly unfunny.
That out of the way, I just heard Sheila Jackson Lee refer to the gals as "our daughters." I'm not kidding.
I hope we don't get involved in this, because some poor shmuck has to do the dirty work. But it would be hilarious.
The story of the kidnapped Nigerian girls was prominent on the TV news this morning (CBS). Frowny-faced First Lady, Sect'y of State thundering, serious reporterette on the scene in Abuja, etc.
Yet a curious, typical absence of certain facts.
The girls were abducted from a boarding school. Nigeria is split, half Muslim and half Christian. So -- which are these girls? Nobody's asking. Even though this is the key for Boku Haram. Per Mao, "The guerrilla must move amongst the people as a fish swims in the sea."
Tribal identity is also essential (recall Hausa defeat of the Ibos in the civil war of the 1960s). What about the abductees? The talking heads don't know or care.
So Boku Haram is hiding hundreds of teenaged girls... in an era of cell phones. How does an extremist terrorist group conceal its hostages from an unsympathetic populace? The question answers itself, many or most people in that part of northern Nigeria are not hostile to Boku Haram. Um, could that possibly pose a slight problem?
Team America World Police springs into action, indeed. Boldly going where no man has given the slightest thought to whatever-it-is that TAWP is gonna do to rescue the situation.
By the way, the President of Nigeria is named Goodluck Jonathan.
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This sounds funny mostly because the first name is in english. A lot of given names traditionally have meanings like "god's good luck", "god's gift", "great day", "lucky gift" etc.
I haven't yet read what he thinks but I'm betting that one person with an extremely interesting point of view on this business is the french historian Bernard Lugan. He'd say probably that Hausas like Boko Haram are going back to their traditional role as oppressors and enslavers of those other blacks who surround them and that they have always despised.
Slightly OT; I'm amused that Hollywood movies of the past would feature jokes about rustics reading Plutarch and puns on the name Sabine. Can't imagine such a thing today.
Koney stuff was ahead of its time.
Save white women from black rapists.
'Racist'!
Save black women from 'Muslim' slavers.
Noble cause!!
Taken!
Searchers!
But them Muslim men only wanna lead Barack Obama Sr.'s polygamous lifestyle.
Rambo!
http://180degreesnews.com/2013/06/13/procol-harum-insist-they-are-not-to-blame-for-terrorism-in-nigeria/
RamBRO!
Funny I'm currently reading Plutarch's Parallel Lives. But I only have Volume I. The Sabine story is in Volume II. So I have nothing much to say.
Maybe Steve you should recruit a 'Wise Latina' for those times when your regular commenters like Whiskey and I have nothing to say. Surely there must be some minorities out there who also read Plutarch.
Pat Boyle
Check out this hilarious article by the Nigerian Raptors GM explaining why it's our job to rescue Nigeria's damsels in distress.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-debate/nigerias-missing-daughters-need-the-worlds-help/article18550765/
"I am also asking you to ask yourselves – ‘ Is there anything I can do to help them?’
I am asking you to help save Nigeria’s daughters."
Oh come on Masai, it's your country! You get billions of dollars a year in oil revenue, and you're supposedly the rising power of Africa. If you want them back, go get them yourself.
Yet it made me smile
I've noticed that the Globe & Mail has become obsessed with saving the world over the last few years.
Reading that paper on Saturday morning was becoming so irritating I had to cancel my subscription.
Fox and other media were getting record ratings at the time of the Natalee Holloway case. Their liberal media rivals made much (basically created the concept) of a supposed missing white woman syndrome . So now they want to show that they really care.
In western countries dark skinned black women might as well be part of the woodwork (especially at university). Hearing about black men going crazy for black girls makes a nice change for everyone.
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/117175/battle-san-pietro-what-makes-war-documentary-true
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/117431/ida-reviewed-david-thomson
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