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How to signal you are a Random Layperson*: wear some f#@king history!


I’m with Mary. And Milo!



*How do you know that you are a Random Layperson? You read Fencing Bear!


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Once upon a time, there was a colony that revolted against its ancestral kings and established itself as a republic.  The people of the former colony constituted a government in which the men of the republic voted for their administrative officials by tribe, each of which was determined geographically, not ethnically or by kinship groups. Having established a government, the new state began extending its authority by conquest and trade, until eventually it controlled a vast region previously occupied by multiple peoples, including several older empires.  Although citizenship was initially limited to the members of the founding tribes, over the centuries, as more and more nations were absorbed (or coerced) into the empire, the franchise was extended even to those whose ancestors had no association whatsoever with the founding of the state. These new citizens saw themselves as fully “native,” regardless of where they came from, within or without the empire. They adopted the language and
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I miss the good old days. You remember. Back when the only thing people knew about the Middle Ages is that they were Dark and filled with evil barons wresting a living off the back of their serfs, not to mention lecherous clergy imprisoning young maidens so as to rape them and then accuse them of witchcraft. You remember, right? What it was like when the Middle Ages were Dark? The Roman Catholic Church made slaves of everyone, stripped them of their sense of dignity and independence and made social status a matter not of achievement, but birth. The Church hated science and industry and did everything in its power to keep people in chains. It guarded its authority with the sword and the stake, stifled all innovation, and fed the common people lies. And why were these Ages so Dark? There were no universities, no towns, only castles with dungeons. Monks huddled in their cells thinking dark thoughts about sin, while Vikings stormed across the countryside, raping and pillaging and ca
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