http://tspwiki.com/index.php?title=1555
Here are some one liners...
Freedom of Religion... Only for the King -- Everyone agrees that the religion of the King should be the religion of the nation. This will solve some short-term problems but set up the 30 Years' War.
Mad Queen Joanna and Trusting Your Mind to Others -- The Queen dies. She was considered mad but it seems that she might have mistrusted her own mind so I talk about how one can check if your mind is correct with the same mind you are not sure is correct.
The New Antisemitism: Forced Confinement of the Jews -- The Pope calls for rounding up the Jews. This law will last until the 1800s. I talk about the consequences of a law that forces Jews to be confined.
Freedom of Religion... Only for the King
The Peace of Augsburg settles a problem with a King being of a different religion than the majority of his subjects: everyone must become the same religion as the King. In years gone by this wasn't such a problem. Religion was somewhat like rooting for the local sports team. If the King was Christian, the majority of his subjects wanted to be Christian too. That is also the reason why women wear their buttons backwards in the modern day because in the past they wanted to look like the Queen who had her buttons on backwards so that her valet could dress her. But in the Renaissance you must have a principled reason to follow a certain religious sect. This so-called compromise for peace is going to cause a war so severe that modern nations are still doing things in a certain way to prevent another war like the one coming up in a few decades. [1] [2]
My Take by Alex Shrugged
I know what you are thinking... "It's a start for religious freedom." No. This is totally goofing everything up in the long-term in exchange for short-term stability. Imagine what would happen if you were living in a Protestant country with a Protestant King when the King dies. His heir takes the throne and is a Catholic so now you must be a Catholic. Then the Protestant King from another country moves in and annexes your town. Now you are Protestant again, and when your original King takes your town back, you go back to Catholic. After a while the general population is going to get sick of this and do something about it called the 30 Year's War. It was a fight over Protestants rebelling because they were sick of being Catholics. It's going to be horrifying no matter which side you are on. [3]
I know what you are thinking... "It's a start for religious freedom." No. This is totally goofing everything up in the long-term in exchange for short-term stability. Imagine what would happen if you were living in a Protestant country with a Protestant King when the King dies. His heir takes the throne and is a Catholic so now you must be a Catholic. Then the Protestant King from another country moves in and annexes your town. Now you are Protestant again, and when your original King takes your town back, you go back to Catholic. After a while the general population is going to get sick of this and do something about it called the 30 Year's War. It was a fight over Protestants rebelling because they were sick of being Catholics. It's going to be horrifying no matter which side you are on. [3]
Mad Queen Joanna and Trusting Your Mind to Others
Spain is being ruled by the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles the 5th, and has been for years. His mother, Queen Joanna, is known as Joanna the Mad and she has been living in a convent ever since her husband died. It seems that she might have been mentally abused by her husband because once he passed away she lost her mind and was judged mentally unfit to rule Spain. Despite his probable abuse, she loved him and when she passes away this year at the age of 75 she will be buried next to him. [4] [5] [6]
My Take by Alex Shrugged
It is difficult to know whether Queen Joanna was mentally ill or if she was pressured into no longer trusting her own mind. Mental illness is quite real and medicine can help... but ... how can we know if a drug is making our mind better or worse when we are using that same mind to make that evaluation? When we cannot trust our own mind we need to trust someone to help us figure it out. I saw a Mythbusters episode on Blind Driving. They asked the question: "Can a blind man drive a car?" The answer was "yes" as long as he was willing to trust his co-pilot who is giving him instructions. The key to evaluating one's own mental condition in a situation where one cannot trust his own mind is to trust the right people, and resolve to follow their directions. Personally, I follow this advice when looking for a job. When I follow my wife's instructions I usually get the job. It galls me that I cannot trust my own mind in this area but it has been demonstrated to me over and over again that she has the better mind in job hunting. I have come to trust her. Everything else? Well... no one is perfect. [7] [8]
It is difficult to know whether Queen Joanna was mentally ill or if she was pressured into no longer trusting her own mind. Mental illness is quite real and medicine can help... but ... how can we know if a drug is making our mind better or worse when we are using that same mind to make that evaluation? When we cannot trust our own mind we need to trust someone to help us figure it out. I saw a Mythbusters episode on Blind Driving. They asked the question: "Can a blind man drive a car?" The answer was "yes" as long as he was willing to trust his co-pilot who is giving him instructions. The key to evaluating one's own mental condition in a situation where one cannot trust his own mind is to trust the right people, and resolve to follow their directions. Personally, I follow this advice when looking for a job. When I follow my wife's instructions I usually get the job. It galls me that I cannot trust my own mind in this area but it has been demonstrated to me over and over again that she has the better mind in job hunting. I have come to trust her. Everything else? Well... no one is perfect. [7] [8]
The New Anti-Semitism: Forced Confinement of the Jews
With the Protestant Reformation in full swing, Pope Paul the 4th is trying to get a counter-Reformation movement going. He begins by issuing a canon law stating that all Jews shall be confined to ghettos. They shall wear yellow hats to make them easily identifiable, and the only commerce they can engage in is selling food and second-hand clothing. This is the beginning of the forced ghetto-ization of the Jews. These and further restrictions will remain in force throughout Europe until the early 1800s. Essentially, any Jew found outside the ghetto walls after curfew can be murdered with impunity as if he were an escaped serf. [9] [10]
My Take by Alex Shrugged
Jewish ghetto-ization was not like modern day ghettos where people live in poor areas together. It's not "red-lining" where real estate sales to Jews and blacks were restricted to certain areas. It was an area with walls and a gate to keep the Jews in at night. If you couldn't get along with your fellow Jews, you were out... and that meant death. So... every disagreement with your fellows carried an unspoken consequence. This gave Jewish religious leaders a lot of leverage. In the 1800s the Enlightenment intellectuals released the Jews only to find that intellectuals liked Jews in the abstract, but not on the street. The Jews were rounded up again, but it didn't stick. Jews left the ghettos and started coming to the United States in numbers during the 1840s. Charleston and Houston were their primary destinations. [11]
Jewish ghetto-ization was not like modern day ghettos where people live in poor areas together. It's not "red-lining" where real estate sales to Jews and blacks were restricted to certain areas. It was an area with walls and a gate to keep the Jews in at night. If you couldn't get along with your fellow Jews, you were out... and that meant death. So... every disagreement with your fellows carried an unspoken consequence. This gave Jewish religious leaders a lot of leverage. In the 1800s the Enlightenment intellectuals released the Jews only to find that intellectuals liked Jews in the abstract, but not on the street. The Jews were rounded up again, but it didn't stick. Jews left the ghettos and started coming to the United States in numbers during the 1840s. Charleston and Houston were their primary destinations. [11]
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