Month: April 2022

Rambling Thoughts: The Habsburgs, the United States, and Identity

If you waste too much time among various political and historical parts of social media like I do, you have almost certainly encountered the Byzantineboo. This is a kind of person who seems to take an incredible interest in the Byzantine Empire. They will often loudly, annoyingly insist that you not call it the Byzantine Empire instead of the Roman Empire, and will talk about what a great, wonderful state it was. Perhaps most concerningly of all, I notice that sometimes like to pretend that Istanbul is still Constantinople, and there are not a few of these people who act like the West should launch some crusade to re-Christianize the city.

Byzantineboos, in my estimation, were more popular a few years ago, but there seems to have been a bit of a backlash like there was with their linguistic predecessor, Wehraboos. But as of late, I do think that this phenomenon has been transferred to the Austrian/Habsburg Empires. And I find this phenomenon much more interesting because I am concerned about what the US might learn from the Habsburg Empire.

(more…)