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Re: XX Questions, Game LXII

Posted: Sat Dec 10, 2022 9:01 am
by Hamish
Just shows that you tend to overestimate people's celebrity when they are closer to you. I mean, to me Sergey Bubka is infinitely better known than this dude. But I am Dutch and have an interest in sports. I guess pole-vault is a lot closer to me than the American civil war.

Re: XX Questions, Game LXII

Posted: Sat Dec 10, 2022 8:22 pm
by dargorygel
I once heard an unconfirmed story that Johann Straus invented the sport of poke vaulting.

Re: XX Questions, Game LXII

Posted: Sat Dec 10, 2022 10:23 pm
by JECE
Can you imagine vaulting with chopsticks over raw fish? Epic

Re: XX Questions, Game LXII

Posted: Sun Dec 11, 2022 4:26 pm
by DougJoe
Hamish wrote:
Sat Dec 10, 2022 9:01 am
Just shows that you tend to overestimate people's celebrity when they are closer to you. I mean, to me Sergey Bubka is infinitely better known than this dude. But I am Dutch and have an interest in sports. I guess pole-vault is a lot closer to me than the American civil war.
I think this is the case. One of the people I was previously thinking about using in this game was the Native American Tecumseh, who played a large part in the (US/UK) War of 1812 in the Great Lakes area in the US and Canada - he united several tribes into a confederacy that fought on the side of the UK in that war, among other things. Now, it's pretty hard to grow up in SE Michigan/NW Ohio without being exposed to Tecumseh at some point in school, but I'd guess if you were studying the War of 1812 in, say, a school system in most of the other US states, exposure to that part of the war might have been minimal - maybe a line or two in a book and maybe one question on a test - and certainly anyone outside the US (not sure about the UK) would probably have never heard of him.

Re: XX Questions, Game LXII

Posted: Sun Dec 11, 2022 4:38 pm
by dargorygel
JECE wrote:
Sat Dec 10, 2022 10:23 pm
Can you imagine vaulting with chopsticks over raw fish? Epic
Ah the joy of typos... :-)

Re: XX Questions, Game LXII

Posted: Mon Dec 12, 2022 3:55 pm
by Jamiet99uk
DougJoe wrote:
Sun Dec 11, 2022 4:26 pm
Hamish wrote:
Sat Dec 10, 2022 9:01 am
Just shows that you tend to overestimate people's celebrity when they are closer to you. I mean, to me Sergey Bubka is infinitely better known than this dude. But I am Dutch and have an interest in sports. I guess pole-vault is a lot closer to me than the American civil war.
I think this is the case. One of the people I was previously thinking about using in this game was the Native American Tecumseh, who played a large part in the (US/UK) War of 1812 in the Great Lakes area in the US and Canada - he united several tribes into a confederacy that fought on the side of the UK in that war, among other things. Now, it's pretty hard to grow up in SE Michigan/NW Ohio without being exposed to Tecumseh at some point in school, but I'd guess if you were studying the War of 1812 in, say, a school system in most of the other US states, exposure to that part of the war might have been minimal - maybe a line or two in a book and maybe one question on a test - and certainly anyone outside the US (not sure about the UK) would probably have never heard of him.
I have heard about Tecumseh, but only because I wondered why the even-more-famous American Civil War General, Sherman, had such an unusual middle name, so I looked it up a few years ago. I don't think a normal, reasonably well-educated British person would know about Chief Tecumseh.

Re: XX Questions, Game LXII

Posted: Mon Dec 12, 2022 5:14 pm
by damo666
Jamiet99uk wrote:
Mon Dec 12, 2022 3:55 pm
DougJoe wrote:
Sun Dec 11, 2022 4:26 pm
Hamish wrote:
Sat Dec 10, 2022 9:01 am
Just shows that you tend to overestimate people's celebrity when they are closer to you. I mean, to me Sergey Bubka is infinitely better known than this dude. But I am Dutch and have an interest in sports. I guess pole-vault is a lot closer to me than the American civil war.
I think this is the case. One of the people I was previously thinking about using in this game was the Native American Tecumseh, who played a large part in the (US/UK) War of 1812 in the Great Lakes area in the US and Canada - he united several tribes into a confederacy that fought on the side of the UK in that war, among other things. Now, it's pretty hard to grow up in SE Michigan/NW Ohio without being exposed to Tecumseh at some point in school, but I'd guess if you were studying the War of 1812 in, say, a school system in most of the other US states, exposure to that part of the war might have been minimal - maybe a line or two in a book and maybe one question on a test - and certainly anyone outside the US (not sure about the UK) would probably have never heard of him.
I have heard about Tecumseh, but only because I wondered why the even-more-famous American Civil War General, Sherman, had such an unusual middle name, so I looked it up a few years ago. I don't think a normal, reasonably well-educated British person would know about Chief Tecumseh.
I hadn't and am probably a good litmus test.

Re: XX Questions, Game LXII

Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2022 4:07 pm
by Jamiet99uk
Damo, the British Everyman, the Joe Bloggs of Britannia.

Re: XX Questions, Game LXII

Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2022 4:08 pm
by Jamiet99uk
The Damo on the Clapham omnibus, for the legally-inclined amongst us.

Re: XX Questions, Game LXII

Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2022 9:28 pm
by Bonatogether
maybe the english education system should spend less time on king james and more time on american indians...

Re: XX Questions, Game LXII

Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2022 9:47 pm
by Octavious
Bonatogether wrote:
Wed Dec 14, 2022 9:28 pm
maybe the english education system should spend less time on king james and more time on american indians...
I think spending less time on King James would take some doing. Outside of enthusiastic historians he is known for being "the Bible one" or not known at all.

What you have to consider is that the war of 1812 is a pretty minor war in the grand scheme of things, and one of a great many wars over the centuries. Most Brits haven't heard of it, and virtually none will be aware of the players. There's a vague notion that we might have burned down the White House at some point, but what the war was about and who won is very much minority knowledge.