The Golden One - May 08, 2020


Viking Mentality. Assassin's Creed： Valhalla. The Last Kingdom.


Episode Stats

Length

11 minutes

Words per Minute

141.59651

Word Count

1,626

Sentence Count

136

Misogynist Sentences

9

Hate Speech Sentences

8


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Hello lads! I'm checking in from a verdant forest in the primordial heartlands of Scandinavia.
00:00:09.000 I thought to talk a bit about Viking mentality. I've mentioned some of these things before but
00:00:15.000 I saw the newest Assassin's Creed trailer where you have a Viking fighting against some Saxons.
00:00:25.000 And I also have seen The Last Kingdom, the two first seasons at least.
00:00:31.000 And I have read Bernard Cornwell's books about Uthred and I can definitely recommend them.
00:00:38.000 They are very good books and the series thus far is also recommended.
00:00:44.000 Now I will say though, I will start off by talking about the series The Last Kingdom.
00:00:49.000 It is much better than Vikings. Vikings is a bit silly if we're being honest with ourselves.
00:00:56.000 But The Last Kingdom is good, I can recommend it.
00:01:00.000 But there are a few things I would like to just present to you before I can recommend it.
00:01:06.000 First and foremost we have to understand Viking mentality or Scandinavian mentality.
00:01:14.000 And what kind of perspective you have on things.
00:01:18.000 So, the two things that bothered me with The Last Kingdom.
00:01:23.000 First, there was a torture scene in the first episode and I have never seen any evidence whatsoever for Vikings or Scandinavians torturing anyone.
00:01:35.000 That's simply not incongruence with Scandinavian nature.
00:01:40.000 If you want to understand Scandinavians, Scandinavian men in particular, you have to look at us from the most pragmatic of perspectives.
00:01:50.000 Torturing someone at a victory feast, it doesn't serve any purpose.
00:01:55.000 Scandinavians are not a particularly cruel people.
00:02:00.000 It's just not in inner spirit to behave in that sort of manner.
00:02:04.000 It was only one scene, but I wanted to say it anyway because I thought it was a bit unnecessary to portray Vikings in that way.
00:02:11.000 Now, I'm not saying that Vikings were good boys who did nothing wrong.
00:02:15.000 They definitely killed and pillaged and took people into slavery, etc.
00:02:20.000 But that's at least something you can understand pragmatically.
00:02:24.000 Why they would do it.
00:02:26.000 Yeah, to make money, etc.
00:02:28.000 Then also, when it comes to Vikings raping, and I will tip my pickle hub to survive the jive who pointed this out.
00:02:35.000 That there aren't any sources that state that Vikings ever raped.
00:02:42.000 There is a term called rapine, if I pronounce it correctly, rapine.
00:02:48.000 It's to take someone else's belongings with force.
00:02:50.000 Now, of course, that is something the Vikings did plunder.
00:02:54.000 But rape, not so much.
00:02:56.000 And this is also something not in line with Swedish sexual morals.
00:03:04.000 Or Scandinavian sexual morals.
00:03:07.000 It used to be very moral people, the Scandinavians.
00:03:11.000 Not so any longer, but that's a topic for another video.
00:03:16.000 So anyway, first and foremost about the torture scene.
00:03:20.000 It has no bearing in history whatsoever.
00:03:23.000 It was an unnecessary scene, but you know, just one scene so you can look past it.
00:03:29.000 Secondly, also a very Scandinavian thing, is that the Vikings were very vain.
00:03:37.000 They took great pride in their appearance.
00:03:39.000 The Vikings in the Lost Kingdom are quite grubby, quite dirty, etc.
00:03:45.000 Very historically inaccurate.
00:03:47.000 The Vikings took great care to look at their best.
00:03:52.000 Not a big deal.
00:03:54.000 You know, you can't choose the perfect actors for every role.
00:03:57.000 But you can at least make them a bit more historically accurate and a bit cleaner.
00:04:02.000 So, except for that, I can recommend the series, The Last Kingdom.
00:04:07.000 Now, on to another note.
00:04:10.000 I've talked about it before.
00:04:11.000 I can talk about it again, since we are on the topic.
00:04:14.000 Viking shieldmaidens.
00:04:16.000 Were there Viking women who partook in combat?
00:04:22.000 Yes.
00:04:23.000 Was it a common sight to see a woman standing in a shield wall?
00:04:27.000 No.
00:04:28.000 The only source I have seen is from good old Vinland, that's America,
00:04:35.000 where a settlement was attacked by the Amerindians, by the Native Americans,
00:04:43.000 who attacked a settlement and they were met by a ferocious Viking woman who came at them with a sword and managed to drive them off.
00:04:53.000 That's the only source.
00:04:54.000 And it's congruent with the relationship between men and women at the time.
00:05:00.000 Viking women had a high standing in society because they had to take a lot of responsibility.
00:05:08.000 But that did not mean that they were seen as equal warriors.
00:05:12.000 That did not mean that they could decide over their own sexuality.
00:05:16.000 These are liberal misconceptions about Viking women.
00:05:22.000 Basically what happened was that when the man went out for a season of raiding etc.
00:05:29.000 He left the keys to his wife.
00:05:32.000 The wife was then the leader of the household, of the farm, until he got back.
00:05:38.000 So you can see females having a high standing in society.
00:05:43.000 But that does not mean that they could partake in the male raiding party etc.
00:05:51.000 You know, different thing if a village got attacked or something.
00:05:55.000 Or when they settled in England, it was a different kind of social structure.
00:06:02.000 But when you see these mixed war bands, it's very far from reality.
00:06:08.000 Something else that is not a unique thing for Vikings or Scandinavians.
00:06:13.000 It's also that young men go out in the world to prove themselves.
00:06:17.000 Then they come back as men and can take a place among the other men.
00:06:23.000 And you know, can get a wife etc.
00:06:26.000 So if you want to make a game or a film or a TV series.
00:06:30.000 Yeah sure, you can include a female warrior here and there.
00:06:35.000 But it's not a common sight.
00:06:36.000 And also, I'm just gonna throw in a note on physiology.
00:06:41.000 A well trained woman can with good technique, you know, knock out a man or choke a man or stab a man with a sword.
00:06:50.000 But no woman can ragdoll several much bigger men at once.
00:06:57.000 And this is something I saw a comment long ago when I posted on Facebook something about Vikings.
00:07:03.000 And it was an English guy who said, you know what, I find it a bit disrespectful that this small Viking shield maiden can ragdoll these big Saxon warriors.
00:07:12.000 And yeah, I agree. It is a bit silly.
00:07:16.000 So that's something to keep in mind also for all filmmakers.
00:07:20.000 Yeah, you can have women utilizing violence but at least make it realistic.
00:07:25.000 Now also a note on Viking sexuality and Viking sexual morals.
00:07:31.000 It's an absolute liberal misconception that the Vikings were tolerant of, you know, deviant sexual behavior.
00:07:40.000 They simply weren't.
00:07:42.000 They were driven by honor and shame.
00:07:45.000 You could not bring shame upon yourself.
00:07:48.000 As a woman you could absolutely not decide over, you know, you couldn't be promiscuous.
00:07:55.000 You might have had a, you know, you had a say in who you got to marry.
00:08:01.000 But that didn't imply that you could sleep around before marriage basically.
00:08:06.000 And this brings me to my next point.
00:08:08.000 I wanted to talk a bit about the Assassin's Creed trailer.
00:08:12.000 I have the feel, I will see, I can't say too much before the game is released.
00:08:19.000 But the Saxons are being portrayed in the trailer at least as the bad guys and the Vikings as the good guys.
00:08:26.000 Even though the Saxons are defending their land.
00:08:29.000 And the Saxons are then being portrayed as, you know, intolerant Christians versus the liberal Viking pagans.
00:08:39.000 I think this will be the angle of the Assassin's Creed game because you've seen quite a bit of anti-Christian sentiments in previous games.
00:08:47.000 So they're trying to take the Vikings, making them into some hippie pagans who are tolerant and liberal.
00:08:55.000 And then they're fighting off against the intolerant Christians who impose their morals on them.
00:09:04.000 But the Vikings were also intolerant. They took slaves.
00:09:07.000 It's not something I endorse even.
00:09:09.000 So there is an interesting aspect to that.
00:09:12.000 But anyway, I will talk more about that when I actually play the game.
00:09:16.000 To see if you have those tendencies that you're using Vikings as a battering ram against, you know, traditional morals.
00:09:26.000 I'm afraid, I'm worried that they will use Vikings as a, you know, they see these big aesthetic muscular Viking men as champions of liberal values.
00:09:38.000 I'm a bit worried actually. But we'll see how it turns out.
00:09:42.000 Now also a note on trading etc.
00:09:46.000 Certain liberals always like to point out how tolerant the Vikings were because they traded with a lot of people.
00:09:55.000 Again, Scandinavians, very practical people. If you can trade with someone, you do it.
00:10:00.000 It doesn't mean that you hold them in high esteem or anything.
00:10:03.000 So if you see they traded goods with the Arabic world, it didn't mean that they were good friends with them.
00:10:11.000 But, you know, it's the same thing today. You can have good trading relationships with people outside of your civilization.
00:10:18.000 It doesn't mean anything bad.
00:10:20.000 And of course I don't. I try to keep everything within my civilization.
00:10:25.000 But that's a topic for another video.
00:10:28.000 But I just wanted to mention that because you might see some liberal using that as an argument to, you know, reinforce the notion that the Vikings were the original good boy liberals.
00:10:42.000 But, you know, absolutely not the case. And I'm not a Christian myself. So I'm not necessarily defending Christianity.
00:10:49.000 But the argument that the Vikings became more intolerant when they became Christian doesn't really hold up.
00:10:59.000 You know, tolerance is something you can afford when you have a lot of money, like Sweden has had for the last 50 years.
00:11:08.000 Then you can be tolerant of a lot of deviant behavior. But when times get tough, tolerance goes out the window.
00:11:15.000 So it's more a matter of material wealth in regards to tolerance, not necessarily your religion.
00:11:24.000 So anyway, that was just an additional point.
00:11:27.000 So, thank you for watching. Hex-hex-o. Boom!