Funny Pictures. Safe For Work, and Safe For The Kids Too.

Hippocrates:

No mention at all of using bows, and I believe the tribes believed to be Amazonian (e.g. the Scythians, Sarmations, etc.) didn't use bows exclusively. As most people are right handed, it makes sense to bulk up the right shoulder & arm for the use of swords, axes, maces and other hand-held weapons.

 

The thing I do not understand is that there is no evidence whatsoever that removing a breast has any effect whatsoever on *ANY* part of the body besides the breast itself. Thus the stronger arms argument makes no sense to me. Either way we are all vastly off topic, but it does not matter in any case.

And I am well aware most women do not have watermelon sized breasts. It is just a bit of hyperbole I used while trying to make a strong point. I have practiced both archery and riflery in my youth. I remember when I first started archery that the few girls in the group were separated and instructed in a few things they never told the guys. One of the girls shared the information freely, while the rest blushed. They were told to try a bow by pulling it back, and if it is even close to touching a nipple with the string, they should try another bow. (Because it hurts pretty bad to have a high tension cord whip a nipple on the shot, even if there is clothing in place.)

One of the girls had above average cup size and wore some sort of insert in her bra to give her some extra comfort in the event that it happened.

But whatever. Time for more pictures!

 

Does it have to make sense? That's what they believed, and that's what they practised. Supposedly.

 

Omnia: in case you're running out of cats, here's a refill:

 

I actually have hundreds of cat images. But thanks.

 

Hmmm, the closest I can think of is what was called a chastity belt. Basically a metal device/armor worn by women around bikini area that would lock and supposedly keep someone from stealing their virtue/virginity. I bet there was a large surge in the number of men that wanted to learn how to pick a lock during this period in history. Here is a quick wikipedia link:

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

 

THe Amazon disfiguring thing is really misogynistic, so I do blame us men for coming up with it. But then again, it was the ancient Greeks...and well, I don't think they're all high on the Women Equality rating. Not as much as 1960s woman empowerment movement, and the 1910s Woman's Suffrage thing
Bows do not require ninja powers to use after all. Sure modern bows can be made to require Hulk strength to draw back, but still.

Anyhow, this is the funny pic thread, not the let's talk about cutting off body parts thread.
I've been busy in real life, so please no one be angry for me mentioning that.

 

Actually, it all depends on the force behind the shot, and when it comes to the force you can apply, modern bows are kind of wimpy.

Olympic level bows have draw weight of 50 pounds. Yeah, it can be impressive, but you can get hunting bows with draw weight of 70 pounds, and that requires a lot more strength to use. And even then, while the exact draw weight of medieval longbows is unknown, what we know is that at the very least they got up to 130 pounds. Sure, you needed people trained from when they were little kids, but a medieval archer could really cause a lot of harm with a longbow.
And with such draw weights, bows required either very strong grip or ninja powers, because people with none of these tended to cause a lot of harm to their own bodies due to the string's tension.

And getting to what is and what is not possible, yes, it is very unlikely for anyone to be able to shoot an arrow through someone's chest without that arrow stopping. And yes, it is not possible to pierce any kind of armour with an arrow shot from a bow; but even then, the only armour that could resist arrows completely was plate armour, and that is because piercing something like that with an angled hit is difficult (physics says that).

And not to make this post of mine completely off the topic (but really, how can bows be off the topic? I mean, it's about bows, archery is awesome [even if I fail to hit the target 40% of the time]), here is a random picture:

 

Very nostalgic, Kazeto. My local game store used to have a sign warning that shoplifters would be drawn and quartered. I wonder if it's still there...

 

Ah. THank you, Kazeto, I am not an expert on warfare, and the tools of it.
The main thing I know is katanas are overrated, and Japan really had bad iron quality in their iron ore deposits and basically really bad swords, sort of, until they started trading with outside people in the 1500s.

thanks also for not shooting me with a bow.
Also, I thought Chainmail was the armor type resistant to arrows.
I know the entire strength of a bow resolves around how much force can be used to launch the arrow. Low force, and the arrow becomes as dangerous as a nerf dart. Even if the arrow is made of Titanium and fired from the best bow ever made.

 

No, no. Not the Greeks. The Ancient Greeks wrote about it, but they didn't perform it. And if Hippocrates is to be believed, then it was something done by women to women. Men were not involved. And if you look up the history of the tribes most likely to be the Amazonians, you find reports of women warriors with a greater regularity than most other cultures in the world. It's entirely likely they defended the villages whilst the men were away, or possibly even lived in cities exclusively of women, and as such would need to have some sort of military capabilities.

It might simply be that the removal of a breast was a misguided attempt to strengthen a warrior, but I think you can read into it so many ways that the truth will likely never be known. The bow theory works, certainly, but for all we know it was a positive side effect of the ritual, as it were/

 

I thought it was just a myth -- and as such, came more out of imagination than from experience. The seed of truth may come from the observation that if you remove buds from a fruit tree, that the remaining buds will result in larger fruit, or that when people have an injured limb, that their other limb may become stronger (as it is used more).

Myths don't necessarily start out as actual beliefs, but may possibly come from oral traditions like folk tales and songs, and so on. A person telling a story may add all sorts of embellishments, and so even if there was some inspiration or grain of truth to the story in the beginning, it becomes overshadowed as more and more is added to it over the years. Just look at how jokes keep getting repeated and reimagined today so that you may hear 20 different comedians all of whom have their own versions of what essentially is the same exact joke. On the surface, they may be unrecognizable from the original, but you realize that the essence of the original joke may still be buried in it (maybe you have to be a fan of old-time comics to see what I'm talking about). The whole 'cutting off of the right breast' may be such an embellishment that, because it was such a shocking visual, managed to survive as a permanent part of the myth, even if there was not a single grain of truth to it.

 

Many myths are rooted in some factual basis. I mean look at King Arthur - a massive mythical figure, particularly in English folklore - but he never existed as such. There are a number of people, however, who have been identified as inspirations for the myth.

And with the Amazon warriors, there's evidence that they were based on - or inspired by - groups such as the Scythians and Sarmatians. In fact, Hippocrates mentioned the thing about the right breast specifically in relation to the Sarmatians.

 

I was just speculating -- I don't know if the practice was ever actually carried out except by some seriously disturbed individuals. Yes, I know that some myths may be based on fact, but these myths do change over the years -- I mean using your example, there's been SO many retellings of the Arthurian legend, each one adapted for a new audience, with different inspirations. Arthur isn't always the same Arthur, and is so clearly based on a totally different archetype. The latest example, from the television series "Merlin", he seems to be based on a character from a bad vaudeville act.

 

Althea, with respect, you didn't understand what I meant.
It was misogynistic to ever think that women would do that. Even to other women.
The only reason any man would claim that a woman would do that, is if they were a misogynist.
And a misogynist is a man who hates women. That is the definition.

There is no truth to the bow thing. A woman can fire a bow just the same as a man. Without needing to remove a breast. By that same token of logic for breasts getting in the way, no fat man, and I weigh 320 pounds, could use a bow.
Also, my friend knows a woman who's a DD, think old school Lara Croft, and is really good at archery. Seems breasts don't cause problems after all.

I'm just simply pointing out there is no valid way any non misogynist would think a woman would ever do this. It's completely against all logic. Men don't even disfigure themselves for no reason, why would women do it?

Again, I'm not trying to make you angry, and I hope you understand. I'm not the type of person to try to make people angry.
Yes, I know it's probably more likely that a woman would remove a breast then it is for a man to self-castrate, but it doesn't mean it's that likely.
How many sane men would ever cut their own man parts off?
Also, Hippocrates was a medic, not a historian. I think he was probably making stuff up.

Also, I recommend we move this to another thread/location. Before Daynab beats me up.

 

Unless it's true, in which case your argument collapses like a deck of cards. And you don't need to hate women to be a misogynist.

 

Um. What's true?
Seriously, there is no evidence in real life that any women ever did this.
And I'm not sure why you're annoyed with me. I'm simply trying to get you to realize there is no evidence that anyone would have done this, and that any man who thinks women would do this are misogynists. They hate women, so why not demonize them by claiming they would remove a part of their body that men happen to like.
Personally, I believe in brains over look, and as long as a woman doesn't turn me to stone, she's okay with me.
The only source that women would ever do this is from Hippocrates himself. He's the only source. He was a medic. There is no other source of information on this. Unless I have been mistaken.
It also makes no sense that you would defend this position, you're a woman!

Also, definition of misogynist.

mi·sog·y·nist (m-sj-nst)
n.
One who hates women.
You cannot tell me one cannot hate women and be a misogynist. That's the very definition of the word.