The Monarchy

[Alinestra Covelia]

There was an Alexei Sayle comedy film about an Ozzie motorcyclist who wanted to redesign the Australian flag so it replaced the Union Jack with the outline of a kangaroo instead. Every time the Oz drove his bike to a new location and parked it, a piece would fall off it.

This thread reminded me of that film, which was otherwise unremarkable.

[bc1871]

I would think that any new flag for New Zealand should retain in some way the Union Jack. Though the flag itself carries a lot of political baggage, an interesting example of combining different nations flags, into its own was the flag of the "Union of South Africa".

[Alinestra Covelia]

Mozambique has an awesome flag. It's got an AK-47 in it. Booyah!

[RGBVideo]

Though the flag itself carries a lot of political baggage

how so?

[bc1871]

Many people have in this day and age, come to associate the flag of the Union of South Africa with Apartheid and Racism. The same morons who scream about how "offensive" the "Confederate Battle Jack" is, also hurl the same remarks against the pre-1994 flag of South Africa.

[KrazyHorse]

Everyone believes that their culture is the "real" one.

?

Not really much of a point.

[The Mad Monk]

Not really much of a thread.

[KrazyHorse]

Neither's this one, really.

[chequita guevara]

Not shoot them and bury them under a road, like Czar Nicholas?

They weren't under a road. It was in a field. You're probably thinking of Che Guevara, who was buried under an airstrip.

killing royalty

killing Che

[chequita guevara]

Many people have in this day and age, come to associate the flag of the Union of South Africa with Apartheid and Racism. The same morons who scream about how "offensive" the "Confederate Battle Jack" is, also hurl the same remarks against the pre-1994 flag of South Africa.

You are a moron.

[The Mad Monk]

On the night of 16/17 July 1918, the royal family was awakened around 2:00 am, told to dress, and led down into a half-basement room at the back of the Ipatiev house; the pretext for this move was the family's safety - that anti-Bolshevik forces were approaching Ekaterinberg, and the house might be fired upon. With Nicholas and his wife and children were four of their servants - the Tsar's personal physician Eugene Botkin, his wife's maid Anna Demidova, and the family's chef, Ivan Kharitonov, and footman, Alexei Trupp. In the basement an impromptu firing squad was waiting in an adjoining room, comprised of seven Communist soldiers from Central Europe, and three local Bolsheviks, all under the command of Bolshevik officer Yakov Yurovsky (the soldiers are often described as Hungarians; in his account, Yurovsky described them as "Latvians"). Nicholas was carrying his son; when the family arrived in the basement, the former empress complained that there were no chairs for them to sit in. Yurovsky ordered chairs brought in, and when the empress and the heir were seated, the executioners filed into the room. Yurovsky announced to them that they had been condemned to death by the Ural Soviet of Workers' Deputies. A stunned Nicholas asked, "What? What?" and turned toward his family. He asked Yurovsky to repeat the order; the commander did so. One witness among the several who later wrote accounts of Nicholas's last moments reported that the Tsar said, "You know not what you do."

The executioners drew revolvers and the shooting began. Nicholas was the first to die; Yurovsky shot him multiple times in the head and chest. Anastasia, Tatiana, Olga, and Maria survived the first hail of bullets; the sisters were wearing over 1.3 kilograms of diamonds and precious gems sewn into their clothing, which provided some initial protection from the bullets and bayonets.[47] They were stabbed with bayonets and then shot at close range in the head.[48]

An official announcement appeared in the national press two days later, announcing the killing of the tsar and his family in Yekaterinburg. It declared that the monarch had been executed on the order of the Presidium of the Ural Regional Soviet, because the approach of the anti-Bolshevik Czechoslovak Legion in the area posed a danger that the Romanovs might be freed.[49] However, Leon Trotsky stated in his diary that the assassination took place on the authority of Lenin and Sverdlov.


Yekaterinburg's "Church on the Blood", built on the spot where the Ipatiev House once stood.In January 1998, the remains excavated from underneath a dirt road near Yekaterinburg, in 1991, were identified as those of Nicholas II and his family (excluding one of the sisters, and Alexei). The identifications by separate Russian, British and American scientists using DNA analysis concur and were found to be conclusive.[50]. In April 2008, the Russian authorities announced that in 2007 they had found the two missing skeletal Romanov remains near Yekaterinburg and confirmed their identifies by DNA testing. On 1 October 2008, Russia's Supreme Court ruled that Nicholas II and his family were victims of political repression and should be rehabilitated.[51][52] [53] In March 2009, results of the DNA testing were published, confirming that the two bodies discovered in 2007 were those of Crown Prince Alexei and one of his sisters.[54]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_II_of_Russia

[Blaupanzer]

Be careful of accounts about the details of the death of the tsar and his family. Contemporaneous accounts were brutally suppressed/destroyed, subsequent accounts had accompanying political agendas. The last paragraph above may have more credibility, although organic material is not a useful foundation for dirt roads, tends to create sunken spots.

[The Mad Monk]

True enough, though I tend to give more credit to things with lots of footnotes.

[bc1871]

how so?

they weren't under a road. It was in a field. You're probably thinking of che guevara, who was buried under an airstrip.

Killing royalty

Killing che

Death to Communism!

[bc1871]

You are a moron.

Obviously you're nothing more then a brainless liberal, who spouts communist bull****!