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Your Sunday Funnies, from 1927: Introducing Our Film Stars!

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In the late 1920s, cartoonist Ed. Wheelan came up with an amazing conceit: create his own fictional silent screen motion picture studio, with a galaxy of fictional film stars, and present his own made-up movies, riffing on the trends of the day, comedies, early animated shorts, crime noir and melodramas. His presentation was both cartoonish and straightforward, and his presentation seems remarkably contemporary when viewed from the 21st century. He called his strip, “Minute Movies”.

This week we introduce you to some of Wheelan’s most popular stars (in his imagination) and next week begin the first of six “soul-stirring episodes” of his “Romance of Rose” motion picture.

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Audere Magazine publishes an old or new comic strip many Sundays. Read more here.

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Anti-Viet War march from sundial to SIA; 2021-04-17 at 9.28.17 AM

Jeff Schnader: Revisiting Columbia’s Vietnam War Protests In A New Novel

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The book I wrote, which has just been published, The Serpent Papers, is a historical novel about J-Bee, a Southern boy from a military family. He arrives at Columbia University in 1971 and is immediately thrust into its anti-war atmosphere, becoming ideologically trapped between supporting his best friend, who is fighting overseas in Vietnam, and the anti-war cauldron of culture and protest at Columbia. In this way, J-Bee straddles both sides of the Vietnam question, enabling The Serpent Papers to address the healing of this one young man as a paradigm for the healing his generation, my generation. In the book, as the moral quandary of the escalating Vietnam War comes to a head, ratcheting tensions and bullhorns incite students to protest, and pro-war and anti-war factions collide in campus riots, forcing J-Bee to make the decision that defines his life.

For the Vietnam War generation (the Baby Boomers), the Vietnam War is still the defining event of their lives; it created a generational rift between those who fought and supported the war on the one hand and those who protested against it on the other. The American political atmosphere was polarized in the extreme, much like it is today over different issues.

Yet the rift within the Vietnam War generation persists and is still as evident and intense today as it ever was. My Facebook author page is an example of the passions which still run high over Vietnam: the page features a posting with a photo of the Columbia student demonstrations of 1972, and it has reached over 245,000 people, has engaged 74,000 and has been liked and shared thousands of times. It has also stirred a debate with over 1300 comments for and against the Vietnam War, many of which are vitriolic, filled with enmity, aimed either at those who protested or at those who fought the Vietnam War, depending upon which side the commentor favors. This Facebook posting is a battlefield, and I have had to ban those with the most hateful comments while contributing to the most constructive points on both sides.

I have been haunted by the Vietnam War for fifty years. As a teenager, I marched and demonstrated against the war, especially against its escalation by then President Nixon. In 1972, he increased the draft of young men sent to fight, reinitiated the bombing of Hanoi after promising never to do that and widened the theatre of war into the officially non-combatant nations of Cambodia and Laos.

As an eighteen-year-old freshman college student at Columbia, I was present at the protest-turned-riot, fifty years ago on April 25th, in front of Hamilton Hall on Columbia’s campus. The university president called in the New York Tactical Patrol Force (the TPF, the riot police) to disperse a crowd of a thousand peaceable—but vociferous—protesting students on the grassy Van Am Quad. Hundreds of police, with jackboots, helmets and some with plastic battle shields, surrounded us on three sides, trapping us against buildings on the fourth side, and charged us down, swinging nightsticks and dragging some of us, bloodied, to the paddy wagons. It was a riot on campus, an event that was hushed up and played down in the New York press, but it was a day neither I nor my fellow protestors will ever forget.

Yet in spite of the fact that I actively protested the war, I have always felt that the boys my age, who fought the war, were patriots, and I was horrified and have been haunted for my entire life by the vilification of those boy-veterans by some of my fellow protestors. In those days, the entire nation watched live on television as teenagers fought in jungle fire-fights against the Vietcong. We watched as American boys killed and were killed themselves, shot to death and dragged away by their compatriots, limp-bodied, from the line of fire. It was heartbreaking.

Perhaps what haunted me the most was that some of those boys, who were sent 12,000 miles overseas to a strange land to sacrifice their lives, were—if they survived to return—spat upon by those who protested against the war. My feelings have always been that this war was a complex political problem and could not be simplified into black and white. Yes, I protested against the war, but there was a history behind this war which made it complex.

To be specific about the backdrop behind Vietnam, there had been World War II, in which America had fought monsters who were bent on world domination and genocide. World War II was an unquestionably righteous war (I hesitate to call it “good;” it is hard to call any war “good”), and Americans felt morally superior in their world position because of this righteousness. It was a pervasive feeling at the time; patriotism ran high.

Then came the Cold War in which there was an active competition between the US and the Soviet Union over global economic and political spheres of influence, one sphere of which was Southeast Asia. There was also a space race and a terrifying arms race, including a competition over the stockpiling and deadliness of nuclear arms. After the atomic bomb came the hydrogen bomb. This backdrop to the Vietnam War led to a game of high stakes brinksmanship in the rivalry between the US and the Soviet Union, an example of which was the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis in which President Kennedy threatened war with the Soviets, causing Soviet Chairman Khrushchev to back down. Americans spent millions of dollars—out of fear—on bomb shelters, none of which would have worked in the event of nuclear war. I remember descending a hundred steps into a bunker below my grade school, practicing drills in the event of nuclear war. We were all affected; it was terrifying.

In sum, a series of US presidents toed the line in the Cold War, and Southeast Asia was part of their agenda. When the French left in 1954 and North Vietnam chose communism, the Americans increased their presence in South Vietnam, beginning under Eisenhower and continuing with Kennedy, LBJ and Nixon. All four presidents, democrats and republicans alike, supported the Domino Theory, originally espoused by Eisenhower’s Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles. These were the underpinnings which mapped our involvement in Vietnam for close to 20 years. The Cold War fueled America’s Domino Theory philosophy in that region. In conclusion, there was both an overarching rationale and support from our elected leaders to fight in Vietnam, and the American people were generally supportive, especially early on.

However, by the time 1972 arrived, we had lost over 50,000 boys and were losing the war. Nixon had promised peace, and our perspectives changed. The nation now waited in expectation of this promised peace, but instead Nixon began escalating the war in order to win concessions from North Vietnam at the Paris Peace Talks. More boys were going to die. I realized that the war and its escalation were not the fault of the soldiers who were fighting the war, and so, as I protested, I was simultaneously haunted by a nation which would not uniformly honor its veterans.

I eventually became an ICU physician and a professor of medicine. My own path led me to serve the veterans in the US Veterans Hospital system for twenty-two years, giving back to veterans in the way I was able, saving lives. I was honored to serve them. And the passion that I have always felt about the Vietnam War, along with the painful rift that I have witnessed in my generation over this war, has driven me to write the novel, The Serpent Papers. In the book, I have set about to confront the complex issues surrounding the war and to make sense of how I, and many others, remember the stateside issues of the times.

In the end, I have discovered that my personality is one of peacemaker. In The Serpent Papers, I have written a story of one man’s struggle with the issues surrounding the Vietnam War, all on a backdrop of 1970s New York City, portraying the culture of the times: drugs, sexual revolution and murder. The book is my plea to America to find tolerance and peaceful coexistence over the divisive issue of Vietnam that, like so many problems causing division and intolerance today, still faces American society.

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Jeff Schnader was at Columbia University in 1972 where he participated in sit-ins, marches and protests against the Vietnam War. He took part in marches and demonstrations, including a protest in front of Hamilton Hall where students were beaten by the New York Tactical Police in full battle regalia. Scenes in his novel are authentic because he was there. His short story, “The Champion,” won first prize in the 2020 Annual Quills Contest, and he was a short- listed finalist in the 2021 Blue Moon Novel Competition for his novel, The Serpent Papers. After graduating from Columbia with a BA in physics, he received his medical degree (MD, CM) from McGill University with further work at Johns Hopkins. He recently retired as full Professor of Medicine after authoring over 50 scientific publications and chairing & speaking at over 130 national medical conferences. He was a frequent guest on NPR’s “Sound Health” and has been awarded for teaching and for editing a medical journal. He worked full-time in the Department of Veteran’s Affairs for 22 years, serving American war veterans, including those who served in The Vietnam War. See his author webpage; or follow him on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn.  

Book cover photo: Columbia Daily Spectator/John Taylor Lewis and Andrew Farber. Photo above: Columbia Daily Spectator/Bob Friedman.

brown and white stallions running in a field

The tale of the domesticated horse

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By Amber Dance

5.4.2022

They say dogs are man’s best friend, but horses could also claim that title.

Horses gave us a way to transport people and goods — literal horsepower. They changed warfare: drawing chariots, carrying the cavalry. They’ve inspired artists from Stone Age cave painters to the makers of “My Little Pony.” Their role in industry may have waned in favor of machines, but they still maintain a place in sport, in leisure and in our collective hearts. Horses have been intertwined with human culture since at least 2000 B.C.E. and were associated with certain human groups even earlier.

“Horses are the animal that has changed history,” says Ludovic Orlando, a molecular archaeologist at the University of Toulouse III-Paul Sabatier in France.

Today, horse breeds number in the hundreds, from the high-stepping Lipizzan horses of Austria to the Clydesdale draft horses of  Budweiser commercials to the thoroughbreds of the  Kentucky Derby. Despite their differences, these animals are all  Equus caballus, joined in the modern equid family by donkeys, zebras and the  wild Przewalski’s horses (pronounced shuh-VAL-skees) of Central Asia (though some taxonomists prefer the name  Equus ferus for wild horses, and classification of Przewalski’s horses can vary).

The evolutionary path leading up to Equus is a  classic model of evolution — a thoroughly documented history that graces textbooks and museum exhibits. But until lately, the route to domestication by people has been a black box. The bones of  E. caballus all look pretty much the same, whether wild or domestic, so they couldn’t answer a longstanding question: Where and when did humans first domesticate horses, linking the two species on a road that would lead to horse-drawn carriages, horse-racing and so much more?

Today, a revolution in the study of DNA, from both ancient and modern creatures, is providing answers. Applying the same approach used in a landmark 2010 study of Neanderthal DNA, scientists have learned  much about the history of  Equus caballus. They have tracked how ancient wild horses shared genes across the Bering Strait between Asia and North America, and revealed the surprising history of Przewalski’s horse. And working with more modern samples, they have observed how recent management by people has undone much of the diversity in horse genomes, while adding a host of breed-specific features.

But there has never been quite enough ancient DNA to answer the question of domestication — until late 2021, when scientists reported their analysis of more than 250 ancient horse genomes.

“It’s great to have this big piece filled in, in the puzzle of where horses actually came from,” says Jessica Petersen, an animal geneticist at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln who wasn’t involved with that particular mystery. But, she adds, the domestication process was a complex series of events, and more intricate details will be difficult to uncover.

Evolution of the horse

Sifting through fossil bones and teeth, paleontologists have traced the ancestry of horses back roughly 50 million years to a dog-sized, hoofed animal called  Hyracotherium — aka eohippus, the “dawn horse.” The genus  Equus, as we know it, probably emerged  between 4 million and 4.5 million years ago in the continent that would become North America. (That’s well before the  Homo lineage, which wouldn’t hit the scene for at least another million years.)

Fast forward to the late Pleistocene, 11,700 to 129,000 years ago, and horses were trotting back and forth between Asia and the Americas on the Bering Land Bridge. The line leading to modern-day domestic horses and wild Przewalski’s horses split sometime in the middle of that epoch, between 35,000 and 50,000 years ago.

But about 11,000 years ago, around the time the Bering Land Bridge submerged for the last time, the North American horses went extinct, along with many other large species such as mammoths and giant beavers. While it’s hard to pinpoint a reason, climate, hunting or a combination of the two might have been a factor, says Alisa Vershinina, a geneticist at LifeMine Therapeutics in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who investigated the Bering crossings while working as a researcher at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Early humans would have seen horses around, and they were clearly interested in the majestic animals: Horses are the top animal depicted in Stone Age, Western European cave art. But there’s a big difference between observing the animals for artistic inspiration and harnessing them for horsepower, transport and sport. When, and where, did the relationship between human and beast undergo a dramatic change?

Horses were a late addition to the barnyard. Dogs were domesticated 15,000 years ago; sheep, pigs and cattle, about 8,000 to 11,000 years ago. But clear evidence of horse domestication doesn’t appear in the archaeological record until about 5,500 years ago.

Horse remains from across Eurasia gave scientists several candidates for the first domestication event. For example: In 2018, scientists found a frozen, mummified horse in modern-day Siberia. It was dated to about 4,600 years ago. Might it have been one of the first workhorses?

Iberia, the peninsula containing modern-day Spain and Portugal, seemed promising because horses have continuously inhabited the region for the past 50,000 years, and would have been available for potential domestication.

And in the part of Eastern Europe around the Caspian Sea, archaeologists noticed horse remains appearing alongside those of other domestic animals. Human burials about 6,000 years ago began to contain maces decorated with horse heads, perhaps indicating some change in human-horse relations. This area also got attention because of long-term horse presence in the area.

But the archaeological site that captivated many horse-domestication researchers was the 3500 B.C.E. settlement at Botai, about 1,000 miles northwest of the Caspian, in modern-day Kazakhstan.

The diet of the people in Botai seems to have been “entirely focused on horses,” says Alan Outram, a zooarchaeologist at the University of Exeter in England. Aside from a few dog bones, those of horses make up the majority of non-human remains on the site. There’s evidence of fenced yards that might have held herds. Some skulls hint at slaughter by an axlike tool, and some horse teeth exhibit “bit wear,” as if they’d been bridled.  Pottery shards contain chemical traces of mare’s milk, which Outram says might have been consumed as butter, yogurt or cheese.

Nonetheless, the site’s importance has been hotly debated. There’s no way to confirm that Botai inhabitants fully domesticated horses. Outram suspects that the Botai peoples treated the horses somewhat like how modern reindeer herders use their animals: They may have kept the horses near at hand for meat and milk, and maybe even have ridden a few of them to herd others. But they probably weren’t managing breeding or using the animals extensively as pack or transport animals.

And without enough ancient DNA, there was no way to be sure these were the horses that spread around the world as human-managed livestock.

Then Orlando, Outram and colleagues analyzed a broad set of horse genomes, from as far back as about 42,800 years ago all the way up to 18 modern breeds, publishing the findings in the journal Science in 2018. The result: Today’s ponies, draft horses and their ilk have  little in common with the Botai horse bones. “They’re not the genetic origin for modern domestic horses,” says Outram.

The Botai lineage does live on, though. Unexpectedly, the researchers were able to draw a direct line between those 5,500-year-old bones and modern Przewalski’s horses. These stocky animals with short, bristly manes live on the steppes of Mongolia, where they’re called takhi, or “spirit,” and considered a national symbol.

In other words, Przewalski’s horses, once considered the remnants of an eternally wild population, may not be completely wild after all. Rather, they seem to be the feral descendants of horses that people at Botai might have managed, to some extent, but later lost control of. They’d have that in common with other feral populations such as the mustangs of the American West and  Australian brumbies.

Przewalski’s horses aren’t much good for riding, notes Arne Ludwig, an evolutionary geneticist at the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research in Germany. Perhaps, he speculates, that’s why they fell out of use.

Whatever happened after Botai, Przewalski’s horses had a rough go of it. They nearly went extinct, with the last wild animal disappearing in 1969. Today’s population, all descendants of a handful of animals that persisted in captivity, now number around 2,000 individuals in captivity or natural reserves. There are also a few modern domestic horses in their family tree.

Domestication rising

Despite these advances, when Orlando documented genomic studies of horse domestication for the  Annual Review of Genetics in 2020, he was forced to conclude, “The geographic origin of modern domestic horses is presently unknown.”

But the clues were building up. Scientists had already nixed the Iberia and Siberia candidates: When researchers looked at ancient DNA, they found that those horse populations withered away, contributing little to the modern domestic lineage.

Getting to the true domestication site was a numbers game, says lead author Orlando. “We built the answer by narrowing down the evidence, little by little.” The more than 150 collaborating scientists, including Outram and Ludwig, kept adding more horse genomes, from across Eurasia and spanning about 50,000 to 200 B.C.E.

With 264 ancient horse genomes in hand, the answer was undeniable: The homeland of modern domestic horses was the part of Western Eurasia between and north of the Black and Caspian seas, more specifically known as the lower Volga-Don region. The team reported their results in  Nature in October 2021.

While the data point to a clear answer, there’s still plenty of room for interpretation and speculation. Pinpointing that spot near the Caspian doesn’t mean it was the only place — and time — that people bent horses to the bridle. The genomic and paleontological evidence from the other candidate regions suggests horses may have been domesticated multiple times, at Botai and elsewhere, without leading to widespread horsemanship.

“It shows how important horses were to people, that so many groups of people independently domesticated them,” says Beth Shapiro, an evolutionary biologist at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and a coauthor of the Nature study.

The 2021 analysis does suggest that the domestication in the Volga-Don was the only one that “took,” the only one that spread like horse-drawn wildfire. Why were horses one of the last animals to be domesticated, and why these horses in particular?

While it’s impossible to be certain, ancient genomes suggest tantalizing hypotheses. The lineage leading to modern domestic horses included a change near a gene called  GSDMC. In people, alterations to this gene are  linked to back problems. It’s possible that the domestic horse version gave the animals stronger backs, suitable for long-distance riding.

The domestic horse line also includes a change near a gene called ZFPM1. This gene is  important in mood regulation. Perhaps some domestic version of  ZFPM1 made the animals in the region more docile, easier to tame. These changes could have been the key to long-term horse domestication — but that’s all speculation, says Shapiro.

As for who did the domesticating, it hasn’t been possible to narrow it down to one culture, says Orlando. Diverse people from the region may have started experimenting with these horses about 4,200 years ago. Domestic horses spread a bit from that point on, but things didn’t really take off until about 2000 B.C.E.

The scientists tentatively attribute the explosion in horse-based transport and technology to the warlike Sintashta culture, which inhabited the north Eurasian steppes between 2100 and 1800 B.C.E. The Sintashta traveled back and forth between Asia and Europe, Outram says, and presumably picked up horses on one of these journeys. Later, they got around by riding, or via the horse-drawn chariots found in their graves.

This was during the Bronze Age, and it’s thought that horses carried the people of these steppes far and wide, along with cultural accessories like advanced metal working, lightweight spoked wheels and Indo-European languages. Anthropologist David W. Anthony of Hartwick College in New York suggested in a 2007 book, “The Horse, the Wheel, and Language,” that steppe dwellers invented the spoked wheel that made their horses useful for carting cargo and chariot-based warfare. The prestige of the horses and metal goods, along with the chariots for raiding, would have helped these elements of steppe culture, and the Proto-Indo-European language, to spread.

The result was that in later centuries, horsepower and spoked wheels become commonplace, and languages as diverse as Punjabi, Polish and Welsh can be traced back to the same root.

Horse genes and human intervention

That domestication event was just the beginning of a relationship between people and horses — and between people and the horses’ DNA. Human management can do striking things to animal genomes over millennia.

For example, all the Y chromosomes of modern domestic horses — passed only through the male line — are nearly identical. To track how this happened, Ludwig, Orlando and colleagues examined the Y chromosomes of 96 Eurasian stallions from the past 5,000 years. While Y chromosomes started out rather diverse, they became more similar with time, with big changes starting about 1,500 years ago. This corresponds to when certain bloodlines, such as Oriental horses, became popular for breeding, says Orlando.

But even that level of breeding is mild compared with what’s happened in the last 200 years. The diversity of the horse genome has dropped further since, even as specific breeds acquired genes that create their defining characteristics.

Petersen, of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, has studied modern breeds to identify regions of the genome associated with color, speed, gait and size. For example, changes to the gene for the muscle protein myostatin are known to occur in racing breeds  such as thoroughbreds. Petersen also looked at the “gaited breeds”  with unusual styles of locomotion — in her words, “horses that move funny” — which are often more comfortable to ride. These breeds typically possess DNA changes in a particular spot, which acts as a sort of “master switch” for gait. That spot contains a gene called  DMRT3; a shortened version of the protein it encodes has been  linked to horse gait. And mice lacking the gene altogether have problems with how their spinal nerves function.

Genomes aside, there’s undoubtedly something special about the horse-human connection, says Orlando, who took up riding lessons in 2019.

“You have the feeling, when you ride, that this animal understands you and you understand this animal,” he says. “You also have this feeling of mastering this big animal — it makes you feel powerful.”

With that opportunity, how could our human ancestors possibly resist making horses their best friend, in peace and war, in work and leisure? It was a match for the ages.

10.1146/knowable-050422-1

Amber Dance, a freelance science journalist in Los Angeles, is really more of a cat person.

This article originally appeared in Knowable Magazine, an independent journalistic endeavor from Annual Reviews. Sign up for the newsletter.

Knowable Magazine | Annual Reviews
soldiers in line to get in a plane

Will We Ever See An End to War?

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War is one of the most common and enduring themes in human history, and despite centuries of attempts to end it, we are still plagued by conflict today. Is there any hope that we will ever see an end to war, or is war an inevitable part of human nature?

There are many theories as to why wars occur – some people argue that wars are inevitable, the result of legitimate security concerns. However, others believe that war is the result of human nature, and that we are naturally inclined towards aggression.

The truth is, there is no single answer to this question. It is possible that we will see an end to war one day, but it is also possible that war will always be a part of human life. What we can say for sure is that wars will continue to occur as long as there are people in the world who are willing to fight them.

Think about the last time someone cut in front of you in line at the post office. Or that guy at work who disparages you, to his advantage. Or that time your friend borrowed something valuable, and never brought it back.

At heart, humans are competitive beings. We seek to get ahead of others and we fear losing out to them. This can lead us to engage in conflict – whether as casual “microaggressions” against those around us or full-blown battles on a massive scale.

In fact, the existence of war can be traced back thousands of years to our earliest human ancestors. Even though there have been countless attempts over the centuries to end war – including today’s global peace movements – it still continues to plague our society.

But is war inevitable? Or will we ever see an end to it? The truth is that there is no single cause to war — other than the basic, evolutionary nature of the human species. After all, humans are not the only animals that engage in conflict – even ants and bees wage war against each other.

Red State versus Blue State; Shiite versus Sunni. These conflicts do not seem to make any sense, they seem to be fights over nothing. There is something deep in the human psyche that demands that we fight. So to answer the question as to whether wars will ever end, we need to ask: Is it possible to change human nature itself?

Human nature is the result of millions of years of evolutionary development. And while we have evolved in many ways since the days of our earliest ancestors, some aspects of human nature remain the same. This includes our basic instinct for self-preservation and our tendency to compete with others.

As long as these instincts exist, there will always be a potential for war. However, that does not mean that war is inevitable – after all, we have also evolved to develop empathy and cooperation. It is possible that, as we continue to evolve, we will eventually find a way to overcome our aggressive tendencies and live in peace.

Only time will tell whether we will ever see an end to war. In the meantime, all we can do is continue to work towards peace and hope that one day, our efforts will finally succeed.

So, while it’s possible that we may one day see an end to war, it’s also possible that it will always be a part of human life.

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Article by Audere Magazine. Image by Pexels

colosseum rome italy

Are Today’s Conflicts a Vestige of Caesar’s Legacy?

Russian President Vladimir Putin invades a neighboring nation, on no pretext other than the desire for empire. Former President Donald Trump lays the groundwork for an anti-democratic revolution.

What is the origin of this historic impulse?

Many have argued that it can be traced back to the Roman Empire, and specifically to Julius Caesar. Caesar was a brilliant general and politician, who expanded the reach of Rome through military conquest. He also enacted a series of reforms that made Rome a more efficient and just society.

However, his legacy is fraught with controversy. For some, he was an imperialistic tyrant, whose actions led directly to the decline and fall of Rome. For others, he was a good-hearted reformer, whose vision for Rome was ultimately betrayed by his successors.

Caesar certainly continues to fascinate. However, it is important to remember that this fascination stems in part from the fact that his actions were so influential. The modern world continues to grapple with many of the same problems and tensions that faced Rome — tyranny versus democracy. And today, as a result, both Putin and Trump are compared to Julius Caesar.

Should we view him as a villain or a hero?

The truth is likely somewhere in between. Caesar was a complex figure, whose actions had both positive and negative consequences. What is certain is that his legacy continues to shape the world in which we live.

Pro-Caesar: He inherited a nation torn by violence and division, and he wished to guide his country to peace.

Under this theory, through a series of reforms, he made Rome more just and efficient, laying the groundwork for its later prosperity. For example, he reformed the tax code, making it more equitable. He also established a professional army, which made Rome more secure.

Indeed, we must take into account the positive aspects of his legacy. In pursuing peace through reform, Caesar helped to lay the groundwork for greater justice and equality in the world. And in resisting this impulse towards tyranny, perhaps our modern nations can learn from Rome’s mistakes and triumph over oppression once more.

Anti-Caesar: Caesar was motivated by a desire for power and glory.

His military campaigns were motivated not by a desire to protect Rome, but by a desire to conquer new territory. This led to the decline of Rome, as it became overextended and unable to govern its vast empire. Additionally, Caesar’s reforms undermined the traditional institutions of Rome, paving the way for later emperors to usurp power. For example, his establishment of a professional army made it easier for later rulers to control the populace.

Pro-Caesar: He brought reform and equality to other nations

Some argue that Caesar reformed and improved the nations that he conquered. For example, in Egypt, he demanded that the Jews be treated fairly, and even undertook economic reforms to improve the lives of Egyptians.

In fact, some have argued that Caesar was an early champion of democracy and equality. He paved the way for later revolutionaries like Napoleon and Martin Luther King Jr., who sought to bring these ideals to societies around the world. While that may be an overstatement, it is clear that Caesar’s legacy over conquered populations contains positive aspects.

Anti-Caesar: He Destroyed Rome

Some say that, while his reforms improved Rome in some ways, they also strengthened his own position as emperor, leading to an imperialistic streak that would eventually bring down the empire. Under this argument, he not only destroyed Rome’s democracy, but, furthermore, by extending Roman rule through military conquest, he set a precedent for foreign powers to dominate other countries at will.

In our modern world, many observers would argue that we are seeing echoes of this legacy today. Powerful leaders around the world continue to use military strength and political prowess to expand their power. They create, in the words of Caesar himself, a ‘throne supported by both arms.’

What Would Caesar Have Accomplished Had He Lived?

In spite of his accomplishments, Caesar’s reign was incomplete. In many ways he died just when he was getting started. What would his reign have been like, had it lasted another ten years?

Some have argued that, given more time, Caesar would have eventually become a tyrant.

As he consolidated power, he would have continued to centralize decision-making in his own hands. He would have suppressed dissent and clamped down on opposition. In short, he would have become the very thing that he claimed to be fighting against.

Others believe that, given more time, Caesar would have transformed Rome into a utopia.

He would have continued his reforms, making Rome an even more just and efficient society. Additionally, he would have expanded Roman territory even further, creating a vast empire that spanned the globe. Under this theory, it was only his untimely death that prevented him from achieving this vision.

The Debate Continues

While it is fair to debate the merits of Caesar’s legacy, what is undeniable is that he continues to shape our modern world. Through his actions – both good and bad – he continues to inspire leaders around the globe, as they struggle to find balance between justice and empire.

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Article by Audere Magazine. Image by Pexels

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The “Floy Floy” Matzah Ball Mystery

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The meaning of “floy floy” is a mystery that has baffled experts for years.

The word appeared in the Slim Gaillard ditty, “Flat-Foot Floogie,” back in the 1930s, a song that referred ambiguously to a “flat foot floogie with a floy floy.” Despite its popularity, no one really knew what “floy floy” meant at the time.

The song was so popular that no less a celebrity that Mary Livingstone, of the Jack Benny radio show, referred to herself proudly as Flat-Foot Mary with (yes) floy floy.

While “floogie” is clearly a euphemism for “floozie” (Bowdlerized to make the song palatable for 1930s radio audiences) “floy floy” remains a mystery.

What exactly is this “floy floy,” which the song appears to make so much fun of?

It turns out that there are three popular theories, based on slang from the 1930s. The most widespread theory is that it means venereal disease, either syphilis or gonorrhea.

But even this is dubious.

Tom Samuels, who is writing a biography of Slim Gaillard, stated recently on the internet that “I haven’t found any proof that ‘floy floy’ means venereal disease. It’s probably a myth.” Samuels points out the speculation seems have to originated with Robert Hendrickson, who wrote about slang in popular word origin books, and who “conveyed uncertainty over the definition of ‘floy floy’.”

All these theories seem far-fetched in terms of historical evidence but have been offered as serious explanations for the word by etymologists.

The most commonly agreed upon explanation seems to be that it was simply a nonsense word invented by Slim Gaillard, who used many made-up words in his songs as “filler” (the equivalent of modern rap artists talking over their beats).

The floy floy mystery might never be solved, but it’s a great example of the way language can evolve and change over time, with words taking on new meanings that even the people who use them don’t always understand.

And come to think of it, who was Slim Gaillard?

He was a self-taught musician and comedian who came to prominence in the 1930s and 1940s with his clever wordplay, scat singing and innovative guitar playing. He was part of the “Swing” or “Jazz” scene in New York City and Los Angeles and recorded with some of the biggest names in Jazz. He continued to perform and record into the 1970s, long after his heyday, and his influence can still be heard in modern music. He gained new popularity in the 1980s through his appearance in Absolute Beginners , a film about the British Mod movement.

During his Depression/WW2-era heyday, he frequently sang about matzah balls and gefilte fish. Why? No one knows for sure. Gaillard claimed variously to be an afro-Cuban, and also half-Jewish. His birthplace might have been Detroit, Cuba or New York City; no one is sure. And was he really Jewish? His jokes about Jewish food were probably just part of his overall routine, but no one knows for sure.

But at the end of the day, it’s not really important to know exactly what floy floy means or how Slim Gaillard ended up singing about matzah balls and gefilte fish. What matters is that he was a musical innovator who helped shape modern music in significant ways and continues to be relevant today. But even as we try to understand him, there’s something mysterious and unknown at the core of his story — the “Floy Floy”/gefilte fish/matzah ball mysteries.

So there you have it: the “floy floy” mystery remains unsolved. But Slim Gaillard was a fascinating musician and comedian who left a lasting mark on American culture.

In any case, the next time you hear someone use the word “floy floy,” remember: it might not mean what they think it means. And that’s part of the fun.

^^^

Article by the staff of Audere Magazine. Image, Slim Gaillard, by Phil Wright, CC 2.0

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