Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2011 June 9

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June 9

Genealogy in Australia

I wish to grind through free records of birth on the www to see if I can figure in what order my "friends" came to join me on my planet. What site should I searh for?Kittybrewster ☎ 00:19, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Each Australian state maintains a separate Births Deaths and Marriages register, but these registers are not web accessible for recent information. BDM NSW for example offers online "limited information for records from 1788 to: Births (up to 100 years ago); Deaths (up to 30 years ago); Marriages (up to 50 years ago)." This means that anything from 1982 onwards will not be accessible online for NSW BDM. Many Australians weren't born in Australia, and the Federal Government's Immigration files may also be of great use. Your first step would be your State Library, your State Archives and National Archives. These information agencies have guides for genealogists. Australia also has a genealogical community. Once you've tracked down the basics, you can proceed to Church or Union archives—the Union archives are predominantly held at UWA, Adelaide, Melbourne and ANU. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:55, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Palin and Paul Revere

What the hell is this going on [1] and why Palin is so interested in Paul Revere. What will she gain by making edit in that article? --999Zot (talk) 06:05, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

There's some discussion about this on the Misc desk. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 08:57, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

But this is about edits to the Revere article...and it's probably not Palin herself doing it, but some nutjob followers, or people trying to make her look even worse. Adam Bishop (talk) 10:28, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Actually the Paul Revere article has been protected since november 2010, so the "rush of Palin followers" are most likely highly exaggerated. From following the discussion on that article I have not been able to find anyone coming up with a concrete example of political editing following this incident (though of course the page abounds with accusations of it). There was some discussion about inclusion of a "Sarah Palin"-section, which of course led to partisan bickering, but the section was sensible deemed irrelevant for the article and removed. --Saddhiyama (talk) 10:36, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Palin doesn't have anything to gain, but the anti-Republican crowd has a lot to gain by doing all they can to support the "All Republicans are dumber than monkeys" message. -- kainaw™ 12:22, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Please do not start a political discussion here. --Saddhiyama (talk) 13:03, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Kainaw, you are missing the deeper game. This is a common trend: Palin says something wrong. Media reports on it. Palin spins it into a "lame-stream media persecution" story — elites vs. "regular folk," and so on. Followers learn to tune out any voices that don't reinforce their worldview. And so on. It's not a new phenomena — the Bush crowd had a variant of it, and the "look at how stupid this guy is" line backfires as often as it hits — but Palin's gotten very good at it. It's become Palin's primary means of responding to criticism of any form, and it certainly resonates with her "base" (which does not include all Republicans, thank goodness). --Mr.98 (talk) 14:36, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I am basing it on history of Presidential elections that I've followed: Both Bush's were considered monstrous idiots. Reagan was a blubbering idiot. Quayle was such an idiot that he couldn't string two words together. McCain was so senile that he was an idiot. The only exception is Cheney. Instead of being an idiot, he is evil. Looking at elections from before my time, Nixon and Ford were both idiots. So, it is clear to me that the standard anti-Republican cliche is that all Republicans are idiots. -- kainaw™ 14:44, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

"Actually the Paul Revere article has been protected since november 2010". This is the Internet - "hardly a man is now alive who remembers that fateful month and year..." 87.194.221.239 (talk) 15:48, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

And as for FDR, Truman, JFK, Johnson, Carter, Clinton, and Obama? ... All complete idiots! (and don't get me started on Biden!)... Now that we have all expressed our personal political biases and called every President (and most vice-presidents) in the last 75 years an idiot... things are nicely balanced... can we please move on and discuss the issue (if there is one) with some neutrality?

Palin said something stupid off the top of her head, and then got defensive when the media called her on it, and instead of just laughing about it and saying "come on guys... ok, I said it wrong, but you all know what I was trying to say" she got defensive and tried to spin it. It isn't the first time a politician (from either party) has done this, it won't be the last. It really is irrelevant in the context of the Paul Revere article... and I would argue that it is irrelevant in the Sarah Palin article as well. Her mis-statement has a degree of notoriety right now, but it really isn't notable in the long run. In a few weeks, no one is going to care about this. Blueboar (talk) 15:49, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Enough with the politics, please. This is an example of historical revisionism. As semi-vounteers for this thing, it's our job to make sure that silly things like this don't have any lasting impact, so let's all just be vigilant next time someone with a lot of followers makes a silly remark like this. Or let someone else do it, big project after all. =p As for mentioning this thing in any article, we go by WP:RECENT. As Blueboar said, no one is going to care about this in a few weeks. Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie | Say Shalom! 16:57, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Kainaw,As long as you're listing off Republicans who acted like senile idiots, I was amazed by how intelligent, witty, and vibrant Bob Dole seemed in talk show interviews after he lost his election. Why didn't he act like that during the campaign? Perhaps big thinkers in the Republican party have decided that intentionally acting in a way that you and I perceive as "stupid and senile" will win them votes from their base? Or from moderates? There's a similar phenomena with George W. Look at debates he participated in to become governor of Texas. It's difficult to believe you're watching the same person who bumbled his way through the presidential debates. I'll readily admit I'm no expert in these matters, but it's difficult to believe that in this era of carefully crafted media personalities that this isn't being done on purpose for some reason. 76.28.67.181 (talk) 19:43, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Mr 98, In fairness Obama did something similar, if not quite as extreme. His campaign against the news media's "distractions" probably won him as many votes as anything else. If his opponents and detractors had stopped going on and on and on about Obama not wearing a lapel pin, McCain might have won. I don't feel like slogging through article histories to back this up, but it wouldn't surprise me if some Obama supporters were inspired to remove unflattering details from his articles as "distractions". 76.28.67.181 (talk) 19:43, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I don't think Obama makes his own distractions, though. I don't think he didn't wear a pin in order to get attention for it, or have a complicated birth story so that people would get suspicion, and so on. And Palin's campaign against the "lame stream media" has been more forceful than any politician on the national stage that I've seen in my lifetime. --Mr.98 (talk) 20:54, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Total outsider here (non-American), and someone older, who has watched many campaigns in many countries. This incident hardly matters in the individual sense, but it will be remembered cumulatively as part of a long term image that seems to exist for Palin. Many candidates seem to gather collections of "silly" comments around them. At Presidential level, there do seem to be more with that sort of image on the Republican side, but remember I am just saying "image". Given that there have been plenty of Republican Presidents, it's obviously not an insurmountable barrier to election, so maybe it's all just part of the broader game of politics in the USA. HiLo48 (talk) 19:50, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I haven't paid much attention to this story, but when it first broke, I took a glance at the Paul Revere article, and it seemed to me that the media had it backwards. There wasn't a rush of Palin fans trying to change the article, as much as a rush of anti-Palin folks who wanted to highlight her gaffe in the article. Editors who follow the article probably know if my impression is correct or not. Mostly I just heard about the story from friends' Facebook links. I was amused by this anti-Palin blogger, who seems to have a weaker grasp on history than Palin, but doesn't know it. —Kevin Myers 23:52, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Length of sentence: EU vs. US

It's a common belief that in the US you get a longer prison time than in Europe. However, how much longer is that? (if it's the case at all). Is there any reliable comparison between the two systems?2.139.12.164 (talk) 12:57, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I suspect the data is available. However, there is unlikely to be a single convenient comparison - the EU has many different states with different legal systems and traditions. However, I'm not aware about anything like a "three strike" law in any EU state. Likewise, no EU state has the death penalty under normal circumstances (I think some very few have reserved it for war time treason, but I'm not too sure even these holdouts haven't been phased out). I'm most familiar with the German system, and here it's basically unthinkable to try juveniles as adults - on the contrary, for young adults its fairly routine to be found "not fully mature" and tried as juveniles (which affords extra protection and much lower sentences). This paper describes some of the difficulties of comparison (e.g. different distributions and frequencies of various criminal acts), but also concludes that Germany uses lower or no prison sentences compared to higher sentences in the US for similar crimes. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:30, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

About the death penalty, see European Convention on Human Rights protocol 6 and 13 Nil Einne (talk) 17:53, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! I know it was on the way out, but not how far... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 06:13, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

• I can't help you with length of sentence, but I can point to a related variable: incarceration rates. Assuming that everything else is equal (obviously an overly heroic assumption), then longer prison terms should mean higher incarceration rates. And, indeed, see List of countries by incarceration rate (also see Incarceration#Incarceration rates by country). The USA beats everyone on the planet at keeping people in prison, and it isn't even close. --M@rēino 13:58, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Also in Germany, no one under the age of 14 can be held accountable for any crime, a fact that many people take advantage of. I've heard of cases where gangs intentionally recruit 12- and 13-year-olds because they won't be punished, and cases where an honor killing among Middle Eastern immigrants has been assigned to a 12- or 13-year-old for the same reason. Several year ago, there was a Swiss family living in the U.S. whose 11-year-old was arrested on suspicion of raping his younger sister and kept in a reformatory until his trial. I don't think he was going to be tried as an adult, but he did have to wear the orange jumpsuit associated with prisoners. The German press raised a hue and cry over the pictures of him behind the barbed-wire fence in his jumpsuit and being "treated like a criminal". In America, on the other hand, there was no particular media interest in the story at all, except for some reporting on the German press's reaction to it. (In other words "Eleven-year-old rape suspect is held in custody until his trial" was not news in America, but "German press is incensed by the fact that 11-year-old rape suspect is held in custody" was news.) Pais (talk) 14:01, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

The article on United States incarceration rate says, as one example: "the average burglary sentence in the United States is 16 months, compared to 5 months in Canada and 7 months in England." Ghmyrtle (talk) 14:02, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

You really need to compare the sentences given for identical crimes, not average rates. For instance, American burglars may be more likely to carry guns, which would get a more serious sentence (certainly in the UK). --Colapeninsula (talk) 10:02, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Another factor to consider is the actual time spent in prison relative to the sentence. In the UK prisoners typically serve half the "headline" time, though they may be on licence when released and liable to be recalled if they misbehave; this is certainly true for Life sentences. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 14:19, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

In France, suspended prison sentences are very common (impression based on reading the press, but also based on reading of comparative research somewhere). It seems to be a habit among magistrates to give a suspended sentence, on the basis that the convicted person then has an incentive to keep out of further trouble. Of course a proportion subsequently re-offend and are then incarcerated. Itsmejudith (talk) 20:22, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

16th century ports

The year is 1594, two young men wish to travel to Dublin in the English held part of Ireland, only a few miles from north Wales, as it turns out. Coming up from London, they decide the best course would be to take a ship from the northwest of the country, but I am wondering, which port would they sail from? My first guess, with limited knowledge of geography and history in that part of the country, was Liverpool, which I have at least heard of, but it seems that was a village of about 500 people at the time. Recent research suggests the only major settlement in that part of the country, rather out of the way and rural as it was, was Chester, though that was, and still is, situated some miles from the coast itself. So, giving up, I thought to come here and ask if anyone else can provide some better informed information on this problem...

79.66.111.46 (talk) 20:47, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Roads were really poor in Britain before the late 18th century. My guess is that it would have been quicker, safer and cheaper to get on a ship in London and sail round the coast to Dublin. Failing that, Bristol or Cardiff would have been the best bet in my opinion. Alansplodge (talk) 21:48, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

This page says; "Travel (in Tudor England) by road is dirty, tiring, slow and dangerous. A hired horse can cover about 30 miles in a day. Otherwise travel means a slow walk or a bumpy wagon. It takes more than two days to go from London to Oxford by wagon." At that rate London to Bristol (107 miles) would take four days on horseback - Chester (166 miles) is the best part of a week. Alansplodge (talk) 21:57, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Sailing from London was no piece of cake either. If the winds were in the wrong direction at any point, you could easily get hung up for a couple of weeks or more. My guess is that Bristol would have been the most likely spot -- it was the second largest city in England at that time, and a major connecting point for trade with Ireland. Looie496 (talk) 23:37, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree that the least risky and probably the cheapest way would be to walk or ride to Bristol, then sail from there. Although it would take probably five or so days to get to Bristol, the time required to sail from London east, around Kent, and then west (mostly against the wind) through the Channel past Cornwall could easily take as long in less than ideal weather, with the added danger of shipwreck or other accidents at sea. Marco polo (talk) 01:18, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Southampton is another choice of port, an easier sailing route than going from London but not as good as Bristol. Itsmejudith (talk) 07:09, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Just a comment re Chester. The Dee estuary was (and is) very prone to silting up, so that by the 16th century Burton - now a small inland commuter village - was being used as a port for some of Chester's shipping, and later on Parkgate further downstream was developed for the same reason. Ghmyrtle (talk) 07:23, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Besides the lengthy and arduous land travel required from London to Cheshire, another argument against such a route is that sailing from Cheshire to Dublin would typically have taken almost as long as sailing from Bristol, since the entire route from Cheshire would have been against the prevailing winds. While a ship leaving from Bristol would have had to sail nearly as far upwind through the Bristol Channel, the remainder of the trip, from St. George's Channel to Dublin would normally have been a relatively quick course perpendicular to the wind. So, for all of those days spent slogging on muddy roads to the north, your travelers wouldn't gain much advantage in sailing time. Marco polo (talk) 14:45, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Agree with Alansplodge. London was the biggest port in England and ships would have been traveling between London and Dublin regularly so I'm sure the two men would have boarded at London. In many ways it would have been safer as traveling on foot or on horseback would have been very dangerous unless they traveled in a large group. The well off wouldn't think about traveling without armed guards. Outlaws were prevalent and wild and feral animals could be dangerous. The main roads were maintained to a reasonable level by the local landowners and were wide enough to let two wagons pass but off the beaten track they were rutted and could become quagmires after heavy rain. Inns and hostelries were positioned about 20-30 miles apart and that determined the traveling horseback mileage. Roads tended to follow the topography and today's mileage would'nt be all that accurate. A medieval cog could travel around 40-60 miles per day with an unfavourable wind and doesn't stop till it reaches its destination while the road traveler has to stop. All-in-all, better by sea from London. --Bill Reid | (talk) 16:17, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I was about to make a counterargument for the road to Bristol, until, looking for an article on the Great West Road, I found in our article on the A4 that the road was not really laid out until the 17th century, before which travelers would have had to follow one of a number of routes along minor paths between villages. So overland travel could have been difficult. However, so could sea travel. Apart from the danger of shipwreck, Breton pirates were certainly active during the 16th century and ships traveling between London and Dublin would have been targets. All in all, I think the answer would depend partly on the circumstances of the travelers. If we are talking about young men of modest means and appearance, I think that they probably would have chosen to walk to Bristol, the main port involved in Anglo-Irish trade, where a quick and relatively inexpensive passage to Dublin, or even a reduced fare in return for work on board, might have been possible. If we are talking about sons of the monied gentry, mercantile class, or nobility, then I think a sea passage from London would have been more likely. Marco polo (talk) 18:28, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes I agree piracy and shipwreck was an ever present risk but that risk would still have been present from a Bristol embarkation although lessened. Grace O'Malley was a case in point for Irish pirates. Yet, with the cost of animal feed if our travellers were on horseback plus board and lodging at the inns, the longer time to get there, the need to travel in groups, I feel a London embarkation would have been the better option. --Bill Reid | (talk) 18:52, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

What about river travel? Are there any ports further west that could be reached from London by barge? --Nicknack009 (talk) 10:40, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

The River Thames was a very busy river in both goods transportation and for passengers but in the 1500s it wasn't navigable even as far as Oxford but it was almost possible to reach that town when it was deepened by 1620. So our travelers would still have had a considerable land journey to face to reach a west coast port. --Bill Reid | (talk) 11:21, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

• Aside from looking at the lay of the land (one of the Britons who helped carve up Africa said that spending your whole life looking at maps will lead to some very distorted views - and decisions - on geography) it's possible to look at historical records which give some clues as to how people in that era planned long journeys. IIRC, Platt's "The English Medieval town" has a couple of good case studies, if you will, of transport (including a monastery's records of where/how they travelled to buy different supplies). Roads were bad, multimodal journeys were common, and river transport was sometimes used even in circumstances where modern people might consider the river non-navigable. We can even look at historical records of when letters and official documents were sent/received, as these would tell us how long it took a courier to make the journey, although in the cases where it was highly institutionalised, the speed of couriers could differ substantially from the speed of a random travelling member of the public (for instance, delivery of writs got faster when Edward IV stationed riders at regular intervals along a main road).
• There have been hints that the number of relatively high-quality roads in this era may have been underestimated: [2]
• Bear in mind that before the modern era, pirates are not the only people who might threaten sea travellers - you might be at the mercy of the crew, too, or a corrupt customs/port official...

Might be a good idea to check the Gough map. It's pretty inaccurate in terms of physical geography, but it was based on the routes that people actually travelled at that time... bobrayner (talk) 13:12, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Most impressive speech against U.S. Policies

What is the most impressive speech(es) blaming U.S. for post-9/11 policies and crimes in middle-east, inside U.S. and ... . Flakture (talk) 22:05, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

President Obama is credited with becoming President of the United States post-9/11. --188.29.215.73 (talk) 23:20, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I would hardly say that Obama has been critical of the U.S. policies post-9/11. He's been an ardent supporter of the Afghan War, which was a direct response to the 9/11 attacks. He's not necessarily been a strong supporter of the Iraq War, but he's hardly alone in that regard, and I don't know that he's had any impressive speeches regarding it. --Jayron32 00:32, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Actually I don't mean just presidental speeches and high offices. They could be professors, political strategists, social leaders and ... .Flakture (talk) 05:27, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

In the UK, former foreign secretary Robin Cook's speech against the US invasion of Iraq was highly rated.[3] The full text is online.[4]

Some people rate Osama Bin Laden's rhetorical style; his speeches are collected in Messages to the World. --Colapeninsula (talk) 10:06, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Since he himself was responsoble for 9/11, his commentaries on its aftermath are of special interest. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:12, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Hugo Chavez's speech where he called Bush the devil is pretty impressive, at least in its ridiculousness, haha. Adam Bishop (talk) 10:30, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Harold Pinter famously used his lecture upon receiving the 2005 Nobel Prize in Literature to deliver a stinging condemnation of U.S. policies. It can easily be found through a google search. --Xuxl (talk) 15:34, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Oh, I got a pick. Ahmadinejad's Speech to the United Nations General Assembly (22 September 2010). or it's some highlights in this. Flakture (talk) 07:02, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

If when you say "impressive" you mean "fucking ridiculous" then yes, anything by Ahmadinejad would be a shoe in. If instead of wanting speeches that support your point of view... you'd like speeches that perhaps were convincing to free people... you should start a new thread. Shadowjams (talk) 10:03, 13 June 2011 (UTC)