*The following article contains discussion of suicide/self-harm and rape.
Look too deep into history and you'll find all sorts of things you never wanted to know.
Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on how you look at it, the world has a way of burying these things, making sure they're never talked about again.
At least, until the internet was invented.
Reddit user, User45888, wanted to know what we should be learning from history when they asked:
"What historical fact does no one like to talk about?"
There's a lot you can say for what people will do to try to make things better.
Most of the time, it ends up being worse than the problem they were trying to fix.
I AM The Senate!
"The emergency powers granted after 9/11 are still being renewed"
1-800-Hamburger
"I think Chancellor Palpatine is a Sith Lord."
UncleIrohsPimpHand
"Surveilling and cataloging all of your data. This was done before September 11 but all of the data was anonymous, after that date they pushed for making that data trackable and identifiable and succeeded. Remember Edward Snowden?"
MadMattt
"The younger generations have no idea that privacy used to be an expectation. And they never will, because the government isn't going to just give it back without the public raising a huge stink to make it happen."
1block
All For Tests
"Between the 1930s and the 1970s, about 1/3 of the female population of Puerto Rico was sterilized."
sfmchgn99
"Ahhh this! This was due to the testing of “the contraceptive pill” They basically picked the most over populated island and began testing it there."
Kallyanna
2
Get Your Fix Somehow
"During the battle of Waterloo, one of the most treasured pieces of "loot" was the teeth of the deceased soldiers. ~200 years ago, it was rather common to use the teeth of dead people in the creation of dentures"
GrandpaJoeSloth
Test All You Want
"Gandhi used to sleep naked with young girls in the same bed."
"He did it to test his chastity or something along those lines"
i-need-blinker-fluid
"And IIRC his reasoning for this was because he was off having sex when a family member died and he could’ve helped or something. So thereafter he had a reeeeaaally unhealthy view of sex."
pourthebubbly
We're Not Even In The Right Year, Are We?
"45BC was the longest year in history with 445 days."
Vexonte
"What ? Why's that ?"
Notnad20
"The Romans previously allowed the Senate to control the calendar and they'd used that to expand their own terms or contract others terms as they could. Basically the calendar got super messed up so they had an extra long year to correct it so that summer lined up with the actual summer etc."
Raddatatta
Terrible people.
Just the most terrible people doing the most terrible things to one another. That's all we can expect.
Oh Yeah, Cortez. Crazy Guy.
"That the siege and sacking of Tenochtitlan was done almost explicitly by neighboring tribes. Who hated Aztecs for the blatant crimes against humanity that they pursued on a regular basis. Kidnappings, human sacrifice, etc. Spanish accounts of the sacking of the city are unbelievably graphic."
"Edit: The entirety of Cortez and his conquistadors is a particularly interesting bit of history. My favorite fact in particular is this."
"Cortez wasn't even supposed to go to "The New World "in the first place. A relative of his was supposed to go, but had prior engagements. He sent Cortez with a handful of men and horses and the explicit order to "not do anything crazy"
Saint_Circa
Not So Long Ago
"The 2nd Congo War. This was the deadliest conflict since World War 2 with over 5 million people killed. Most people have never heard of it despite it ending less than 20 years ago."
Spanglertastic
"ELI5? Never heard about it but would like to."
nielssk
"Oh its incredibly complicated with 25 military groups between 9 countries, and went from 1998-2003. But, even after the war, people were dying by the thousands from preventable diseases and malnutrition, not to mention the many thousands surviving the same conditions. There was assassinations, plane hijacking, rebellions, massacres of civilians that also of course came along with thousands of victims of rape."
"It involved a lot of ethnic group conflict (the Tutsi group is among the most well-known, however its probably not as well known as it should be because it didn’t involve any great powers/nuclear powers (looking at the US, China and Russia who love to get involved in proxy wars). There are still ongoing tensions and of course we have seen an environmental impact on wildlife and the beautiful forests, and many thousands of peoples have been displaced to this day"
syngoniumkings
How Do You Possibly Move On?
"Comfort women"
"During WW2, the Japanese military kidnapped women from the Asian countries they invaded and forced those women to be sex slaves to please countless Japanese soldiers."
Kbdiggity
"The Japanese were also bayoneting pregnant women and children to death in the Philippines, and even the Germans told them to cool it several times. The Japanese were absolute insane psychopaths back then."
silver_lotus1553
"I read a survivor's story."
"She was abducted from Korea at 15 ans spent four years as a "comfort woman"."
"Her work day was 12 hours, 6 days per week with "rest breaks" several hours apart. Soldiers were allowed 15 minutes with the girl and provided with a condom. Preference was given to soldiers going to the front line."
"Apparently, many used less than 5 minutes of their allocated time so more of their comrades could have their time too."
"Officers got 30 - 60 minutes depending on rank."
"The women were examined by a Doctor weekly for signs of venereal diseases."
"How do you punish someone sufficiently for subjecting women and girls to years of this?"
redgums2588
History was a terrible place and we should all be thankful we're not there anymore.
Want to "know" more?
Sign up for the Knowable newsletter here.
Never miss another big, odd, funny, or heartbreaking moment again.
@elektrotimmy/X
