Historical Highlights: The Czech Legion

Today, instead of highlighting an individual person as usual, we're going to be talking about what I think is one of the greatest untold stories of World War One: the adventures of the Czech Legion!

Ever since 1526, the land that is now the Czech Republic had been under the rule of the Austrian Empire, but by the time World War One broke out in 1914, many Czechs wanted freedom and independence from Austrian rule. As such, many Czechs joined the armies of the Entente Powers fighting against Austria, including France, Italy, and, most importantly, Russia. 

The Czech Legion serving under Russian command served bravely throughout the war, most notably in 1917 at the Battle of Zborov in Ukraine, where they inflicted a severe defeat on the Austrians and Germans. However, despite the valiant efforts of the Russian and Czech armies, the Bolshevik Revolution broke out in October of 1917, dividing the Russians between communist and anti-communist factions, and crippling their war effort against the Germans. The Czechs on the other hand, were determined to continue the fight, and decided to try and fight their way across Russia (a pretty tall order, what with Russia being the largest country on Earth and all) and then sail to France to fight on the Western Front. And so, in May, 1918, the Czechs fought off several German assaults in the Ukraine and started their epic quest across Russia.

Although the Russian Communists promised not to interfere with the Czechs' journey, tensions were on the rise between them and the Czechs as they headed towards Russia's Pacific port at Vladivostok, until, on May 14, the Russians attempted to arrest the Czechs at Chelyabinsk. The Czechs refused to surrender, leading to outright war between them and the Russian Communists. They continued to fight along the Siberian railway throughout the rest of May 1918, with the Czechs winning most of the battles despite being severely outnumbered (including one battle in which they allegedly managed to make off with most of the communists' gold), and by the end of the month, the Czechs had reached Vladivostok and overthrew the local communist government. The Soviets were so terrified of the Czechs that they executed the Tsar and his family so the Czechs couldn't rescue them. It's a shame that the Czechs didn't arrive in time to save them too, since if the Tsar's family had lived the movie Anastasia wouldn't have been made, which would be a net gain for humanity.

Throughout their journey through Russia the Czechs escorted a number of Russian refugees from the communists (mostly women and children) to safety in the Western countries.

Although the war had ended by the time the Czechs made it home in 1920, the Entente powers of Britain, France, America, and Italy were so impressed by the Czechs' bravery that they agreed to create an independent Czech nation, whose army was mostly made up of veterans of the Legion. 

In conclusion, I think it's a shame that this, one of the coolest epics of World War One, has been largely forgotten, (except among Czechs and Slovaks of course) and all I have to say to the people who forgot about it is... Czech your privilege!...

...I'm sorry...

Why Jar Jar Binks Needs To Die A Painful Death

As anyone who has seen the Star Wars prequels knows, Jar Jar Binks is the Devil. Ok, I may be exaggerating, but only slightly really. Maybe only most people know. But what makes Jar Jar such an abomination exactly? Well besides his annoying voice and character design that makes me want to vomit, there's the fact that he's possibly a racist stereotype.

What am I talking about, you ask? Well, many people have suggested that his odd speaking patterns, (you know, "MEESA YOU'RE HUMBLE SERVENT!" "MEESA BACK!" "MEESA THE REINCARNATION OF ADOLF HITLER!"... I made up one of these quotes, can you guess which one?) is similar to those old blackface characters from old timey minstrel shows. So there's that. To be perfectly honest, that probably wasn't George Lucas's intention, but that's how it came across to a lot of people.

Also, Jar Jar Binks was voiced by some guy named Ahmed Best, which despite the last name, is the worst name ever.

Brexit and Texit: Two Great Tastes That Taste Great Together

As you've presumably already heard unless you live in the farthest reaches of the globe (AKA West Virginia) Britain has just voted to leave the European Union, and I for one wholeheartedly support their decision. As far as I'm concerned, the Brits have let the unelected bureaucrats in Brussels push them around for far too long at this point, but now the dog is finally biting back. Hopefully other countries will follow suit soon.

And that brings me to something a little closer to home. According to a reliable source my Dad, there are quite a few Texans who think that their state should secede from the United States before it becomes the property of Trump Enterprises. (All Rights Reserved, please don't sue me Mr. Trump.) Sure, there have always been jokes about Texas being a nation unto itself (and back in 1836 of course, it actually was) but they seem to be serious this time. And I'll be completely honest with you. If Clinton or Trump win this year's election, I might think seriously about heading west...

Or maybe even campaigning for my home state of South Carolina to do the same. Because no matter how many Confederate flags the Yankees make us get rid of, we DO have the right to do that.

In conclusion, I've got one thing to say to y'all Texans: if you don't call your secession campaign "Texit", there's something serious wrong with you.

P.S.: On an unrelated note, Bashar al-Assad, the dictator of Syria has started an Instagram account. I look forward to seeing pictures of his victims with crummy Tumblr filters soon.

Why Moffat Needs To Stop It

Let me get this out of the way right off the bat. I like Doctor Who. A lot. I like the 2005- present revival of the show. A lot. But I dislike Steven Moffat. A lot.

Don't get me wrong, when it comes to things like casting, he's great. Matt Smith and Peter Capaldi have both made great Doctors (In fact, Matt Smith is my favorite Doctor), and Amy and Rory are easily my favorite companions. I even liked Clara... At first. But then Moffat just had to go and ruin it.

You see, Clara started out as a bit of a level headed but somewhat feisty counterpart to the 11th Doctor, and back then she was a fun character. Maybe not quite as well developed as Amy and Rory had been, but it was early on in her run, so that was to be expected. In any case, she was definitely better than River Song by a long shot. (Shudders violently.)

But then, after Matt Smith left and Peter Capaldi replaced him, things changed. Clara became whinier, bossier, more of a control freak, and just generally a much less likable character. Peter Capaldi's great acting makes up for it a little, but not enough to save the newer episodes, especially since the show focused so much on Clara that the new Doctor barely got any development. And don't even get me started an how they brought She That Must Not Be Named River Song back.

So yeah, overall, the newer episodes of Doctor Who just haven't really impressed me, and I honestly don't have very high hopes for Season 10. I hope I'm wrong. I desperately want to like Doctor Who again. But if things keep going the way they are, I won't get my hopes up.

Free Speech on the Internet

Sorry to follow up a serious post with another serious one, but this is just something I need to get off my chest. You see, recently a YouTuber called "Evalion" was kicked off the site. "But why?" I hear all of my loyal minions (that's you by the way) ask. Well, because she was making a bunch of racist videos about how the Jews are supposedly evil, how Hitler supposedly wasn't evil, you know, the usual Neo-Nazi garbage. All of this broke YouTube's anti hate speech rules, so off she went.

Seems like an open and shut case, right?...

Right?...

RIGHT?!...

Nope. Now there's apparently an entire hashtag movement called #FreeSpeechForEvalion calling for her YouTube account to be restored because supposedly her free speech rights are being violated. (As a side note, it's pretty rich to see wannabe Nazis stepping up to defend freedom of speech, considering that their precious Fuhrer had no qualms about destroying it in Germany.) But let's get one thing straight here: YouTube is a privately owned business, not a government institution. If it were a government run website, then yes, it would have to allow everyone's opinion to be heard, no matter how vile, because the government is (at least in theory) run by constitutional principles. But a privately owned website has every right to not allow hate speech on it's site, in the same way that you would have every right to kick someone out of your house if they started spouting out vile racist statements. Or if ISIS were suddenly spamming the comments section on my blog, I would have every right to ban them.

So no, Evalion doesn't get to pull the "Oh, muh free speech!111" card here. She broke a website's rules, and is paying the price for it. It's not like she couldn't just start up her own blog to spout her cancerous verbal diarrhea on.

In conclusion, I'd like to point out that, if anything, YouTube is being far too lax here. Sure, Evalion got kicked off, but there are still plenty of other racist  or otherwise hateful channels and videos on YouTube that have yet to be dealt with. Seriously YouTube, step up your game!

Historical Highlights: Golda Meir

I've been wanting to do a woman for Historical Highlights for a while now, and I've finally found someone who's perfect for it: Golda Meir.

She was born Golda Mabovitch in Kiev, Ukraine (then part of the Russian Empire) on May 3, 1898 to a Jewish family. She would later write that her earliest memories were of her father barricading the door in case of a pogrom.

Her family moved to America in 1906. While there, Golda was exposed to ideas like women's suffrage, trade unionism, and (most importantly for her) Zionism, which was a movement that supported a Jewish return to the Holy Land, then under the rule of the Turkish Ottoman Empire. In 1917 she married Morris Meyerson, and in 1921 they moved to the Holy Land, which was now under the control of the British, who supported Zionism.

In the Holy Land the Meyersons joined a kibbutz, or Jewish collective farm. During the 1930s she served as a representative of the Zionist movement in America, where she lobbied largely unsuccessfully for Jews fleeing Nazi Germany to be allowed into the country. By 1948 she was buying weapons in the US to prepare for the war she believed would soon break out between the Jews and the Arabs in the Holy Land. Just before the war broke out she met with King Abdullah of Jordan, who urged the Jews not to hurry in establishing an independent state. She replied by saying "We've been waiting for 2,000 years. Is that hurrying?"

On May 14, 1948 she was one of the people who signed the Israeli Declaration of Independence, which led to Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon invading the new country. Despite being thoroughly outnumbered the Israelis managed to defend themselves and even capture some territory from the enemy, largely thanks to the weapons Golda had obtained in America.

After briefly serving as the Israeli ambassador to the Soviet Union from late 1948- 1949, the Israeli Government appointed her as it's labor minister, a position she served in until 1956, during which time she began a number of housing and road building projects. After this she served as foreign minister, during which time she changed her last name to the more Hebrew sounding "Meir". In 1969 she was elected Prime Minister of Israel. After the 1972 Olympic Games attacks in Munich, Germany, in which Arab terrorists killed several Israeli athletes, she ordered the Mossad to hunt down the killers, which they succeeded in doing.

In October of 1973, Meir received reports that Syria and Egypt were preparing for another invasion of Israel. Some Israeli generals suggested they she mobilize the entire military and launch a preemptive attack against the Arab states, but she decided that doing so would lead to Israel being perceived as the aggressor abroad, making it harder to get foreign aid, so she decided on a compromise solution: Israel would not attack the Arabs first, but would put the military on high alert just in case. When the Yom Kippur War broke out a few days later, Israel was prepared largely thanks to her. After the war she resigned in 1974, and died on December 8, 1978.

I really admire Mrs. Meir, and I definitely think she earned the nickname "Israel's Iron Lady".

Meme Hipsters

I'm here to talk about a disease that is slowly (or not so slowly) killing the internet: Hipsters. And not just any kind of hipsters... Meme hipsters.

You see, it has come to my ever so wise attention that one meme that was known as Pepe the Frog that was doing the rounds on the infamous website 4chan (home of the lowest scum of the internet, and that's certainly saying something at this point.) For whatever reason (presumably because of his hilariously smug face) the meme caught on with the mainstream internet.

Cue the meme hipsters.

These... Delightful people on 4chan decided that if they couldn't have Pepe to themelves, no one could. So they started releasing a bunch of offensive themed Pepe memes, showing him as everything from a Nazi to Donald Trump, all in an effort to make the Pepe meme so disgusting to the general public that they'd never want to use it again.

But it didn't work for me.

You see, I'll take any chance to tick hipsters off. So here, have a Pepe meme!

CSI: HGTV

So apparently, the Property Brothers nearly faced criminal charges recently, after getting into a bar fight like the first class twits they are. They really should have known better. If there's one thing I've learned from movies, it's that if you walk into a bar, there can only be two results: a bar fight or a punch line, possibly involving a rabbi.

If you don't know who the Property Tools Brothers are, there a couple of gay dudes on HGTV who improve people's homes or something. But here's the catch: their incredibly irritating. I just think it's a shame that they got away with all of this.

Oh well. Hopefully, the Love it or List it folks will be next.

...WHAT?!!!

So apparently Captain America has been a Nazi the whole time!...

...Yes, seriously.

Recently, the guy who wrote the Captain America comics decided to reveal that Captain America has been working for HYDRA the whole time. He even tweeted "Heil Hitler" on Twitter. Seriously, that's like revealing that your character is in the KKK and then tweeting "Don't you just hate black People?" Don't get me wrong, he was probably kidding, but still.

This is by far the worst plot twist I've ever heard. For one thing, it implies that the symbol of America is a Nazi, which is kind of troubling. For another, it means that the kind and heroic personality Cap has had for decades now has all been an act. and finally, we all know that this is going to be retconned later, so what's even the point?

Even Chris Evans hates this plot twist, and I definitely agree with him on this.

Monster In Paris Movie Review

Where do I even begin with this... This... THING?! It's plot is confusing, it's characters are one dimensional, the animation is stiff and awkward, and perhaps worst of all, the voice acting is hilariously atrocious, which may actually be this movie's saving grace.

So what is this train wreck about? Well, normally in these move reviews I try to avoid spoilers, but let's be real here. None of you are actually gonna watch this, so what the heck. Basically, Raoul the Invincible messes around with some potions and accidentally creates a giant flea monster who can sing for some reason. Oh, and other people are involved too I guess, but who cares about them? THIS IS RAOUL'S STORY, DAD GUM IT!!!

Really, the only things that make this movie worth watching are Raoul the Amazing, and the hilariously bad voice acting. I recommend avoiding this, unless you have some time and brain cells to kill.