Did Trans People Cause the Fall of Rome? (NO)

Ugh, this is such a bloody ridiculous idea. 

Every once in a while, some very smart and clever and unique and very interesting person shows up in the comments and tells me “this is why Rome fell” or something like that. 

The best part of it is that they’re usually commenting on the Gallae, the priestesses of Kybele.

I’ve argued before that they can be reasonably interpreted through a transgender historical lens. 

They first appeared in Rome in 205 BCE.

The Roman historian Titus Livius, or just Livy, tells us that (XXIX.XI).

At that point, the Roman state was just a bit bigger than the modern Republic of Italy.

They were in the midst of the Second Punic War against Carthage and had just acquired their first territories outside the Italian peninsula. 

Of course, Rome defeated Carthage, and in fact, the Romans themselves attributed their victory at least in part to the presence of Kybele and her Galla attendants.

So, it’s not only silly to say trans people caused the fall of Rome, it would be more accurate to say trans people caused the rise of Rome. 

Sorry, conservative Romaboo weirdos, iratus illo hoc morere (die mad about it). 

And there’s plenty.

We’ve barely scratched the surface of the topics available.

I’ve already made a bunch of video essays on it, and there’s plenty more source material upon which to draw. Don’t worry, I’m not running out of ideas.

But today I wanted to explore the ancient Mediterranean from a slightly different angle. 

You’ve heard the idea that trans people caused the fall of Rome, I’m sure. 

But where did this idea come from? 

Is there any truth at all to it?

And what actually did cause the fall of Rome?

Is it even something we can know? 

We’ll explore these ideas today. 

Now, if you’re here, it’s likely that you’re a trans person, or perhaps someone you love is, or maybe you just like learning about history.

That’s great.

You’re who I want to talk to.

Stick around. But on the off chance that you’re here because you find me objectionable, I encourage you to engage with this material in good faith.

To listen to the arguments I make, and consider them on their merits rather than on your preconceived notions.

If I’m wrong, you have nothing to lose by listening, and you can walk away with your biases intact. 

But you might just be surprised. 

Feel free to comment on your thoughts below if you do disagree with me, but remember that this is a nuanced exploration of the topic, complete with a long bibliography and inline citations, linked below.

So, if you think a single condescending or hateful sentence is a valid response to such a thing, it’s because you’re letting your sad little feelings control you.

And as someone once said, facts don’t care about your feelings. 

So, did trans people cause the fall of Rome? 

Before we can answer that question, we need to ask…

Chapter I: What Is the Fall of Rome?

Just a nice, easy, simple topic here, no big deal. Empires fall all the time, right?

And the explanation is always obvious.

Some barbarian hordes, or lead in the drinking water, or WOKE GENDER IDEOLOGY, right?

Yeah, no. 

It turns out, figuring out what causes the fall of empires is an incredibly complicated topic. 

In fact, even the date when the Roman Empire fell isn’t simple. 

So, before we answer the question of what caused the fall of Rome, we need to clarify what we mean by the “fall of Rome” in the first place. 

Maybe it’s easier to start with a simpler question. 

When did Rome fall? 

But okay, so it’s done after 480, right? 

Well…

Other states cropped up around the same time, made up of former Roman territory that hadn’t been conquered.

None of these places was ruled by someone who called themselves an emperor, but that was hardly unprecedented.

After all, Augustus became the first emperor in 27 BCE, but the Roman state had existed for like 700 years before then.

They didn’t always have an emperor. 

And besides, it’s not the ruler that creates a nation-state. 

Like, imagine if the capital of your country was conquered by an invading force. There was nobody left to be declared prime minister, or president, or premier, or whatever your country calls your leader.

That doesn’t necessarily mean your country would cease to exist, right?

Different regions might declare their own governments.

Others might unite to create their own successor states.

But they’re still a continuation of the country even if they aren’t complete, you know? 

But one by one, these successor states in the West fell, and eventually gave way to the kingdoms of medieval Europe.

So, had Rome fallen by then? 

Well… 

But Odoacer was never able to establish a proper system of succession, and after being defeated by Ostrogothic King Theodoric, he was murdered at a banquet in March of 493. 

So, alright?

Is 493 the point at which the Roman Empire fell? 

Well…

Theodoric also ruled Italy like a Roman. He also didn’t change much in terms of the administration of the peninsula. 

But Theodoric did eventually die, in 526 CE. So, is THAT when the Roman Empire fell? 

Well… 

Moving away from the chaos of the Roman Empire’s collapse, we still had a strong Roman Empire. 

Wait, what? 

The Roman Empire was split in half permanently in 395 CE.

It was the Western Roman Empire that “fell” in 476, or 480, or 493, or 526, or… but the Eastern Roman Empire continued on for nearly another thousand years.

It’s sometimes called the Byzantine Empire to make it easier for us to distinguish between the two.

But that’s a modern term.

They called themselves Romans, and that’s exactly what they were.

One of them was the city itself, ruled by Baldwin IX of Flanders, who proclaimed himself Emperor.

The Empire of Nicaea, a former Roman state, reasserted control over Constantinople in 1261, and proclaimed the empire to be restored.

But after this point, it was no longer an unbroken line of succession from the original, single, whole Roman Empire.

It was something different. 

So you could say it fell in 1204 CE, more than 200 years before that fateful day in 1453. 

The Empire of Trebizond was one of those splinter states which broke away from the empire in 1204 CE.

Its rulers called themselves Roman Emperors as well.

The city of Trebizond itself fell in 1461, but the Crimean territories remained independent.

Eventually, though, they too were conquered by the Ottomans.

This was the last political remnant of the once mighty Roman Empire, and it fell in December of 1475. 

Constantinople fell to the Ottoman Empire in 1453, and the sultan declared himself Caesar of Rome.

I really don’t think this counts because he was a conqueror, and unlike Odoacer and Theodoric, he made some pretty massive changes to the state’s administration.

But if you disagree with me, then you could say Rome didn’t fall until 1922, when the final sultan of the Ottoman Empire was deposed after World War I. 

It’s also been argued that the Russian Empire was the Third Rome, and therefore succeeded the Roman Empire.

It would be a silly argument, but you could do it. 

And if that’s the case, then what caused the fall of Rome? 

THIS GUY

Other possible dates have also been proposed.

For example, when Diocletian divided the empire for the first time in 286 CE, it could be argued that the Roman Empire became something different from what it once was.

I don’t buy that one quite as much, but I guess there’s an argument to be made for it. 

So not only is it complicated to understand *how* the Roman Empire fell, it’s not even straightforward to say *when* it fell. 

Besides, most historical nation states don’t usually have a clean “end”, and the difference to the average person may have been basically imperceptible.

If you were a Roman who lived in Italy, September 5th, 476, may have felt like just another normal day.

Classicists and historians like clean, specific dates so we know when to stop caring about whatever topic we’re reading about, but that’s not really how history works. 

All that said, when we talk about the “fall of Rome”, we’re generally referring to 476 CE.

That’s how the average person with a surface-level understanding of this stuff thinks of it. 

But as we’ve just seen, it’s nowhere near that simple. 

In fact, one could make the argument that Rome never fell in the first place, but simply changed forms.

After all, many people in former Western Roman territories retained their Roman identity, and Greeks referred to themselves as Romans for centuries while chafing under Ottoman rule.

So, the idea of “Roman” as an identity continued even after the nation-state bearing its name collapsed. 

So, where does this fascination with the fall of Rome come from? 

People had been speculating about why Rome fell for a long time.

But it was sparked in a big way by Edward Gibbon, when he published his book The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire in 1776.

Certainly the most interesting thing to happen that year. 

His ideas have mostly fallen out of fashion, but he started a centuries-long conversation on this topic that we’re forced to deal with today as reactionary know-nothing dinguses give us their historical takes based on vibes, whose sources include “just think about it” and “trust me, bro.” 

Chapter II: Why Did Rome Fall?

Oh boy, this one’s a doozy. 

There are like a thousand different reasons people give for why Rome fell.

And yes, one of them is because of trans people, which is a ridiculous idea, but we’ll take a closer look at that one later. 

Historian Alexander Demandt spammed a list of 210 factors that caused the fall of Rome in 1984 (Frank).

Since then plenty more have been added to the list.

I can’t possibly address every one of these because that would be boring as hell, and I’ve already committed to not writing a video as long as the Bearded Venus of Cyprus video unless it’s a REALLY interesting topic.

If someone wants, they could probably create an entire video essay channel picking apart each of these 210 ideas.

There are plenty of things I’d rather do though.

So we’ll just glance over a bunch of them today while resisting the urge to go off on a bunch of historical tangents, which y’all know I love to do. 

But it’s not like barbarians were a new thing.

Rome had dealt with them throughout its history.

If Odoacer had shown up in the days of Scipio Africanus or Julius Caesar or Agrippa, he’d have been easily dealt with, I’m sure. 

When you consider that “barbarian” just means someone who wasn’t a Greek or Roman, it could be argued that the entirety of Roman history is defined by Rome’s relationship with her barbarian neighbours.

Some of the key events in Roman history – the original sacking of Rome in 390 BCE, the three Punic Wars, the slave revolt led by Spartacus, Caesar’s conquest of Gaul, the Teutoburg Forest disaster, and so many more – were all directly linked to barbarians.

Even Christianity itself was a barbarian religion, originating in Judea.

So Rome had dealt with barbarians for centuries.

As time went on, though, Rome was simply less able to deal with them. 

Alright, so. What made Rome so weak that Odoacer could just stroll in and take over? 

Uhhhhh a lot of stuff. 

No Clear Line of Succession

That gave him Lucius, who died of an illness in 2 CE.

But that’s okay, because they also had a second son, Gaius, but he died of an illness in 4 CE.

But that’s okay, because they also had a third son, Agrippa Postumus, but he was apparently a maniac, so Augustus couldn’t use him as heir.

So, he had to go with Tiberius, the intelligent and capable but reclusive and moody son of Augustus’ wife Livia Drusilla from another marriage.

Real Spinal Tap drummer hours here. 

But by establishing a system in which the emperor had to declare his successor, he set things up for failure.

Because what happens when the emperor dies without a declared heir? 

Of course, you end up with a power vacuum, and the highly ambitious and powerful aristocrats of the Roman Empire abhorred a vacuum.

Nine months later, on January 15th, 69 CE, one of Galba’s allies, Otho (top right), murdered him and had himself declared emperor.

After losing a key battle against Vitellius, Otho took himself out, and Vitellius marched on the city and declared himself emperor in April.

A couple of months later, the general Vespasian (bottom left) was declared emperor by his troops.

He defeated Vitellius’ forces in October and, in December, entered the city, murdered Vitellius, and became emperor.

Rough, man. 

The Roman emperor Vespasian’s dynasty is called the Flavian Dynasty, because his full name was Titus Flavius Vespasianus.

He was able to hold power for a while after the chaos of 69 CE, but his heir, Titus, died after only two years in the purple.

His second son, Domitian, died without an heir, but the Romans were fortunate to have Nerva, who was declared emperor by the Senate almost immediately after Domitian’s death.

Nerva made sure to declare an heir, Trajan, and then died pretty quickly before Trajan had a chance to.

Really good move on his part.

Way to take one for the team, Nerva. 

It’s fiction, of course, but from what we can tell, he was about as awful as they portrayed him in the film.

There’s even a Year of Six Emperors in 238 CE.

They’ll use the force of government to do it, too.

They’ll suppress their political opponents, attack their own citizens, and do whatever they need to accrue more power.

When you have a culture like that, what do you think is going to happen? 

Eventually, the empire was divided into four by Diocletian (Boatwright 442).

Then reconstituted into two under Constantine and Licinius.

Then one again under just Constantine.

Then into three by his heirs.

Then one again under Constantius

Then two again under Valentinian and Valens

Then one again for a final time under Theodosius in 395, after which point it was permanently divided. 

But even amid all this chaos, it was still inconceivable to many Romans that their empire was in decline.

The city of Rome was sacked in 410 CE, but just a decade earlier, the poet Claudian wrote “There will never be an end to the power of Rome.” (Jones 1025)

On top of that, there was no real hierarchy below that of the emperor, outside of the original Cursus Honorum.

It’s not like modern countries, where there’s a clear path of succession.

Like, here in Canada, if the prime minister dies, the ruling party appoints a new one.

In the US, if the president dies, the vice president takes over.

But the Romans didn’t have that.

So, when an emperor died unexpectedly, which happened pretty often during a crisis, anybody with enough power could take his place.

That caused A LOT of civil wars. 

Did Plagues Cause the Fall of Rome?

There were plagues too.

In 262 CE, we’re told that 5000 people a day died in the city of Rome itself.

Around the same time, two-thirds of Alexandria’s population died (Boatwright, Gargola, and Talbert 436).

But that’s a long time before 476. 

So it seems unlikely that that led to the fall of Rome directly.

Did Christianity Cause the Fall of Rome?

To Pagan writers, the decline of Rome was obvious.

The state had turned its back on the old gods to whom they owed so much in favour of this weird barbarian cult from Judea.

Theodosius banned the worship of Pagan gods and closed the temples, and he was the last emperor to rule over a united empire (Jones 1025).

COINCIDENCE????? I THINK NOT! 

No, this idea is obviously silly.

But I think there’s something to be said about religious strife causing a lot of problems for Rome.

The Christian persecutions of the early and mid-empire were meant to help create a sense of unity among Romans.

But instead, they just ended up causing further divisions and made people distrustful of their own communities (Boatwright, Gargola, and Talbert 437).

How interesting, that the persecution of a misunderstood and oppressed minority within your society doesn’t actually improve morale or material conditions for anybody.

Good thing we’ve learned from that and are much smarter in the 21st century, hm? 

Was the Later Roman Army Weaker?

What of the Roman army?

It was much larger in the late Empire than in the past, a necessity in an increasingly dangerous world.

They also relied more on cavalry at this point, but it cost about as much to maintain a horse as it did a foot soldier.

As a result, an army made up of cavalry cost twice as much. 

Their commanders were also now mostly professional soldiers, rather than local magistrates or senators seeking glory.

But that was good, actually – it made them more effective. 

You may have read criticism that the army of the late empire was made up of barbarian soldiers, who were less loyal to the empire.

The former is true – there were a lot of Germanic soldiers recruited into the Roman army to swell its ranks.

But there’s no evidence that a Germanic Roman career general ever betrayed the empire.

Germanic tribal leaders?

Sure, plenty of those. Alaric, Theoderic, Odoacer, the list goes on.

But that’s not the same thing.

Alaric and Theoderic extorted military commands from the Romans, and Odoacer just invaded.

Similarly, our sources never mention Germanic troops being unruly, less effective, or less reliable (Jones 1035-7). 

This attitude also brushes aside the literally hundreds of years of civil war between Roman-born generals who coveted power.

So, foreigners didn’t make Rome worse, as it turns out.

GO FIGURE.

IMMIGRATION IS GOOD, ACTUALLY.

MULTICULTURALISM IS GOOD, ACTUALLY.

PEOPLE ARE NOT INHERENTLY LESS TRUSTWORTHY BECAUSE THEY COME FROM A DIFFERENT PLACE THAN YOU.

JUST BECAUSE SOME GERMANS WERE JERKS DOESN’T MEAN ALL GERMANS WERE.

YOU’RE JUST DOING A RACISM. 

This entire essay so far is basically me talking through all the reasons conservatives give for why THE WEST IS IN DECLINE and how they’re either nonsense, or the fault of conservatism in the first place. 

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it, and those who can are condemned to watch in horror while others repeat it…

*sigh*

ANYWAY, what else we got? 

There are plenty more factors that may have contributed to the fall of Rome, but I don’t want to get into all of them. Here’s a list of other ideas people have suggested on the screen here.

So, what caused the fall of Rome? 

A bunch of stuff. 

Chapter III: Did Moral Decay Cause the Fall of Rome?

One of the reasons I love making these videos is that I get to read a lot of intelligent work by many intelligent people, and then synthesize it into something easier to digest for you all. 

But nobody intelligent has written about moral decay causing the fall of Rome for a long time.

I’m going to have to dig into some real stinkers here. 

Geez, this sucks. 

Anyway, what follows is a quick (relatively speaking) historiography of the fall of Rome due to moral decay, or degeneracy, or whatever you want to call it.

If you’re new to that term, historiography is basically a history of history.

It’s a study of historical writings, examining how different historians reached their conclusions and how ideas about history have changed over time.

This isn’t going to be a complete, in-depth study of the historiography of the fall of Rome because it’s not that interesting a topic for me.

We’re necessarily skipping over some important ones, like Montesquieu, Adrian Goldsworthy, and a bunch of others, too.

But I hope to show you at least a few examples of where the idea came from and how it led to our modern ideas.

I’ll try to keep it brief, but YOU KNOW HOW I AM. 

For our purposes today, we’ll consider “moral decay” to be a deterioration in a society’s ethics, shared values, and mutual trust between individuals. 

Anyway, this idea goes all the way back to the waning days of the Roman Empire in the west, so let’s take a look at our earliest example. 

Salvianus of Marseilles

So, to late Roman Pagan writers, the reason was obvious.

They’d betrayed the very gods who helped them rise to primacy in the Mediterranean, in favour of this weird Jewish cult. 

This was such a common belief that St. Augustine prodded his disciple Orosius to write a survey of Roman history.

He tried to show that um, ACHKKSHUWALLY, worse stuff happened under the Pagan gods than the Christian one.

But as things got worse, even Christian writers got in on the action. 

The priest Salvianus of Marseilles, or just Salvian, wrote De Gubernatione Dei, or On the Management of God.

In it, he argues that terrible things were happening in the Roman world because both Christians and Pagans were falling into corruption and degeneracy.

Scholar J. J. Saunders argues it’s Salvian’s work that sparks the centuries-long discussion moralizing the fall of Rome (2-3).

Maybe he’s onto something.

Let’s take a closer look. 

The Life of Salvian

Salvian was born in Roman Gaul around the year 400 CE.

He may have been born in Augusta Treverorum, modern-day Trier, in Germany, but we’re not sure.

Either way, though, he was present during the destruction of the city in 406 CE, which would certainly have coloured his views on the world.

He was probably an aristocrat by birth as well, and the fact that Roman aristocrats weren’t necessarily safe during this period must also have influenced him. 

Early in life, he married a woman named Palladia and had a daughter named Auspiciola.

Eventually, though, the two of them separated.

Salvian went to a monastery, and Palladia joined a convent of nuns.

They may not have divorced, though; it’s not clear.

We also don’t know what happened to Auspiciola. 

While at the monastery, he was probably ordained as a priest.

Now, if you’re surprised that he was a priest but may have still been married, you’re not alone.

There were various attitudes toward priests and marriage, but it wasn’t officially banned until the Second Lateran Council in 1139 CE (Tanner 227).

So he could have been a priest and been married.

In fact, one of his friends at the monastery was Bishop Eucher, who was also married and had two children.

Go figure. 

Even today, there are some married priests.

In the Eastern Catholic Church, a married man can be ordained, but an ordained man can’t marry.

But even in the West, some married Protestant ministers who converted to Catholicism have been ordained as priests (Keating). 

Anyway, Salvian was well known as a preacher, and we can see  that in his writing style.

The way they’re written, it seems like his works started off as sermons before being repurposed. 

We’re told he was alive toward the end of the 5^th century, at which point he would have been nearly 100 years old.

Notable at any period, but especially so during the chaos of the 5^th century (O’Sullivan 1-5). 

So, when it comes to the fall of the Roman Empire, he’s the closest thing we have to an eyewitness account.

Great place to start.

He probably wrote De Gubernatione Dei between 439 and 450 CE, which was, of course, a rough time for the Romans in the West. 

The Fall of Rome According to Salvian

What’s his argument? 

He doesn’t even bother engaging with the idea that Rome is falling because it abandoned its old gods.

His primary audience is his fellow Christians, after all.

This isn’t an argument they really need to hear.

He also didn’t put much stock in the idea some Christians had at the time that God took a hands-off approach to ruling the universe.

He spends most of the first two books pointing out a bunch of scripture passages that show God always takes a direct, hands-on approach to the universe. 

That’s why he called his book De Gubernatione Dei – the word gubernatione is related to management, but it can also mean steering, like steering a ship. 

So no, it’s not because God is indifferent to the world.

Instead, he insists that this idea leads to abandoning God and His message and laws for the world at every level of society. 

What does this look like? 

Salvian tells us about an argument often made by the wealthy of Roman society – that the poor and slaves are untrustworthy thieves.

But if that’s true, it’s the fault of the rich, quote: 

First of all, if slaves are thieves, they are perhaps forced to steal through want. Even though the customary allowances are given, these allowances satisfy custom rather than sufficiency, and thus fulfill the law without fulfilling the need. Their indulgence makes their fault less blameworthy, because the guilt of the thief who is unwillingly forced into the theft is excusable. Holy Scripture seems to excuse in part the offense of the needy when it says: ‘the fault is not so great when a man has stolen; for he steals to feed his hungry soul.’ He steals to fill his hungry soul. For this reason, they who are excused by the Divine Word are not very well to be accused by us.

– Salvian, De Gubernatione Dei, IV.III

So, it’s not great to steal, naturally.

That’s one of the ten commandments, after all.

Salvian doesn’t excuse it, but he does point out that even scripture tells us it’s not so bad if you’re desperate.

That quote he used is from Proverbs 6:30, by the way. 

It’s not the fault of the poor if they steal to survive, says Salvian.

The same is true if they’re untrustworthy – they lie because they know they’ll be in for a rough punishment if they tell the truth (IV.III). 

Now, here’s another bit I want to read for no particular reason at all. 

But you, the noble and rich, who have an overflow of all good things, who, because of this, should honor God by your holy works because you enjoy His blessings unceasingly, let us see whether your actions are, I do not say holy, but at least harmless. And, as I have said before, who among the rich, with a few exceptions, is not tinged with all manner of crime? … I speak now about none, except him alone who knows that what I say applies to himself. If what I say is outside his conscience, my speech will in no way injure him. If he knows in his heart what I speak about, let him realize these things are not spoken by my tongue, but by his own conscience.

– Salvian, De Gubernatione Dei, IV.III

Damn, if ultra-wealthy people had a conscience, this would be devastating. 

From there, he goes on to describe the avarice of the ultra-wealthy of Rome, and the Roman state itself.

I won’t go through the whole thing, but here are some of his bangers: 

By the encroachments of the powerful the weak lose their belongings, or even themselves along with their belongings (IV.IV). 

Consider the remedies recently given to some cities. What have they done but make all the rich immune and pile more taxes on the wretched poor? …The rich have become richer by lessening the obligations which they bore lightly; the poor are dying from the multiplication of the burdens which they were already unable to bear… Hence it is I make the observation that there is nothing more vicious than the rich who are destroying the poor by their remedies, and none more unfortunate than the poor whom those things kill which are given as a remedy to all (IV.VI).

Do we think we are unworthy of the punishment of divine severity when we thus constantly punish the poor? Do we think, when we are constantly wicked, that God should not exercise His justice against all of us? Where or in whom are evils so great, except among the Romans (V.VIII)?

DAMN. Am I reading Salvian, or Marx? 

He does talk about other things as well, including the fact that the old gods are still worshipped and that people indulge in vices such as the theatre and the circus.

But he saves most of his venom for the ultra-wealthy of Rome, who consistently make life worse for the poor in order to enrich themselves, with no care for how it affects anyone else.

Grab yourself a copy, and start reading from just about any page.

There’s a pretty good chance you’ll find him ranting about how awful the ultra-wealthy of Rome are, and I am absolutely here for it. 

His argument, though, is biblical.

He draws upon scripture many times as he points out how awful the wealthy are.

And if you want to find scripture that talks about the evils of greed and exploitation of the poor, you’ll find PLENTY. 

That’s one of the reasons right-wing “Christians” make me so angry. Oppression of the poor is antithetical to so much of what’s actually written in the Bible. 

So, what in particular was Salvian referring to here? 

As Theodosius decreed, Roman tax collectors didn’t get to choose their career.

They were chosen at birth and had to collect as much tax as the government told them to.

If a tax collector fell short, he’d have to pay the difference himself, so he had no choice but to be brutal about it.

And the heavier the taxes got, the harsher tax collectors had to be (O’Sullivan 8).

There was a particular tax on the poor as well – it was called the capitatio.

There’s more than one capitatio, though, so if you look it up, you might get confused.

This one was a tax on everyone in the Empire, but if you owned land or were part of the patrician class, you didn’t have to pay it.

So, the poorer you were, the more likely you were to have to pay this tax.

Even slaves had to pay it. Rough. 

But here’s the thing.

The property tax was also too much for some property owners to bear.

So if you were a farmer who owned a small parcel of land, and the tax collector showed up and demanded more than you could pay, what were your options?

Really, there was only one.

You’d go to a wealthier landowner and give up your ownership of the land in exchange for him paying your taxes.

Then, you’d continue to live on the land and work it for the new owner.

But then, because you no longer owned land, you’d have to pay the capitatio as well.

So you were screwed either way. 

This is the predecessor of the system of feudal lords and serfs that would emerge later in medieval Europe.

So, the rich got richer, the poor stayed poor, and the middle class disappeared (O’Sullivan 9-11). 

This was a major problem in Rome, but particularly in Roman Gaul. 

We talked earlier about how Salvian was an eyewitness to the destruction of Augusta Treverorum.

Now, you might think of rabid hordes of maniacs frothing at the mouth to murder anybody in sight.

But Salvian seems mostly to be angry at the Roman aristocracy over it. 

Why?

Because he actually lived among the people of Roman Gaul.

That’s one of the big differences between him and today’s talking heads.

They’re just millionaires paid by billionaires to spread their propaganda and divide us working class folk. 

No, the barbarian invaders were just people, like anyone else.

And like anyone else, they just wanted a place to live and feel safe. 

This is true of all immigrants, by the way, and this is a great opportunity for me to segue into debunking some foolish ideas people have about the fall of Rome. 

Did Rome Fall Because of Foreigners? (NO)

Judging by my analytics, if you’re watching this, you’re probably from a country that has its fair share of scaremongering about immigrants.

But data consistently shows that immigration is Good, Actually. 

The UN’s International Organization on Migration released a report on how immigration has affected Canada positively.

It shows that newcomers to Canada typically skew young, so the amount they pay into public services on average is less than what they draw from it.

That’s especially true for the healthcare system.

They also tend to fully integrate – a third of them offer their labour as volunteers, and two-thirds join Canadian social organizations (IOM).

Neato.

But what about the Americans?

There’s plenty of anti-immigrant sentiment in Canada, absolutely, but I feel like Americans really need to hear that immigration is a net benefit right now.

A report published in 2016 by the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania says, quote:

The available evidence suggests that immigration leads to more innovation, a better educated workforce, greater occupational specialization, better matching of skills with jobs, and higher overall economic productivity. Immigration also has a net positive effect on combined federal, state, and local budgets.

It also says there isn’t much evidence to support the idea that immigration lowers wages. 

It’s not all sunshine and rainbows – lower income immigrants rely more heavily on public services, which can affect lower income native-born residents.

But overall, it’s a net positive for US society. 

So before you show up and start ranting about how FOREIGNERS RUINED THE ROMAN EMPIRE, no that’s not the case. 

In fact, the Roman Empire was always made up mostly of barbarians.

Rome was just one city, and even if it was a pretty big one for the time, compared to the rest of the Empire?

It’s nothing.  

Population collapse of Romans over time is what caused Rome to fall

People talk about depopulation causing the fall of Rome as well, including Elon Musk.

As usual, he’s wrong, but in a complicated way. 

There’s just not enough information available for us to calculate such things precisely.

Historian John D. Durand put together an important work on estimates of world population at various points in history, but even he admits that “vast areas of world demographic history remain unknown or very certainly uncharted” (253).

There’s only so much we can know about this stuff, y’know? 

We can see, however, that the amount of land cultivated decreased, which does suggest that the population decreased as well.

But why is this the case? 

Salvian already told us a pretty clear reason why.

A big portion of the population lived essentially at a subsistence level, so parents couldn’t afford to have enough children to offset the high mortality rate (Jones 1040-3). 

GO FIGURE???

WHEN PEOPLE CAN BARELY AFFORD RENT AND FOOD THEY END UP HAVING FEWER CHILDREN???

WHO COULD HAVE POSSIBLY FORESEEN THAT???????

So, Elon, if you’re really that concerned about depopulation, do your part and share all that wealth you’ve been hoarding, you sick fuck.

Good lord, I hate that man.

But there’s yet another factor – climate change. 

The modern phenomenon of climate change is largely anthropogenic.

In other words, it’s human activity that’s causing it.

It’s our fault.

And that’s true, I don’t want to hear any climate change denial nonsense in the comments. Shut up. 

Changes in how much energy we get from the Sun can affect our climate.

Of course, that can have all sorts of causes, and we’re just one of them.

Tiny variations in the Earth’s orbit, meteor impacts or volcanic eruptions that fill the air with stuff that reflects the Sun’s energy away from us, greenhouse gases that keep the Sun’s energy on Earth for longer, etc. 

Classicist Kyle Harper argues that the rise of Rome coincided with a particularly lucky climate.

They enjoyed warm, wet, and relatively stable weather, which created the perfect conditions for high agricultural output.

We’ve discovered this by reading tree rings and ice cores.

But at the same time, we’ve discovered extensive volcanic activity in the 530s and 540s CE, during the reign of Justinian.

That was also the last time the Romans would see a period of major territorial gain.

It also coincided with the first outbreak of the Bubonic Plague, which killed probably half the population of the Eastern Roman Empire, and I guess that’s also a bad thing to have happened (Harper). 

Like, as bad as the COVID-19 pandemic was – AND STILL IS, COVID IS NOT OVER – imagine how much worse it would have been without N95s or vaccines or the possibility of social distancing or working from home or buying horse dewormers from naturalcovidcures.freedom.org? 

Who knew that climate change and a pandemic would create instability in a society???

Or that climate change was linked with the debut of new pandemics???

INCONCEIVABLE!

If only somebody had written about this back in, say, 2017, when we had a chance to do something about it…

FURTHERMORE, archaeologists Susanne Hakenbeck and Ulf Buntgen examined environmental evidence for the Huns’ migrations from their original Eurasian homeland into Roman territory.

They found that the migrations were driven by climate change, which caused drought.

This caused a massive shift for them societally.

It forced them to give up their quiet pastoral life for one of extreme violence, raiding their neighbours for the sustenance they could no longer produce for themselves (Hakenbeck and Buntgen).

That brings us back to invaders attacking.

But once again, it’s not because they’re evil demon murderguys.

They just lived in a place that was no longer habitable. 

So, it’s foolish to say “population collapse of Romans over time is what caused Rome to fall”, even if there is a certain amount of truth to it.

Because what caused the depopulation?

Poverty among the working class, coupled with a decrease in arable land as a result of climate change. 

So, what led to the fall of Rome, according to Salvian? 

The greed, vice, and selfishness of the Roman ruling class. 

He’s not alone in that thought either. 

Arnold Jones

20th-century historian Arnold Jones wrote a book on the later years of Rome.

He pointed out several factors that led to its downfall.

In particular, he points out a group of freeloaders who sponged off the state and wasted its resources. 

Welfare queens? 

Disabled folks? 

People on FORMAE PABVLORVM? (food stamps)

No, the group of freeloaders specifically pointed out here is the senatorial class.

Check out this quote:

Though numerically small it was immensely rich, and absorbed a disproportionate share of the national income… The later emperors made little attempt to reduce the wealth of the senatorial order by special taxation, and weakly granted it fiscal privileges. They also vastly increased the numbers of the order, and lavishly enriched its members, old and new, by allowing them to make huge illicit profits from the offices which they held, and by bestowing upon them extravagant gifts of gold and land. The huge and ever-growing wealth which the aristocracy enjoyed was in the main derived from the estates which they inherited, bought, or received as gifts from the crown, and was a direct charge on the peasantry. (Jones 1045)

This is a modern historian, not an ancient source, but DAMN.

SERIOUSLY, DAMN.

Jones also talks about imperial bureaucrats and civil servants, and a growing clergy in the church.

However, he points out that many of them took vows of poverty and worked to earn a living.

So, they weren’t as idle as it may seem on the surface (Jones 1046-7).

SO HEY GO FIGURE wealth consolidation in the hands of fewer and more isolated rich weirdos who don’t produce anything doesn’t actually help preserve an empire???? 

Good thing we’ve learned from that, huh? 

I know I’m being profoundly unsubtle here to the point of obnoxiousness, but look, I’m just going where the source material leads me.

From what I can tell, it’s a relatively uncontroversial take to say that the avarice of the ruling class of Rome was one of the most significant factors in its fall.  

Them’s the breaks, kid. 

Edward Gibbon

It’s really impossible to talk about the historiography of the fall of Rome without talking about Edward Gibbon.

His work, “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, was really the first of its kind.

People had talked about the fall of Rome from an outsider’s perspective before, but he was the first to really pull it together into a significant and coherent work. 

We mentioned him briefly earlier.

He was an Englishman in the 1700’s, and released his work in six volumes between 1776 and 1789. 

If you’re going to build a narrative of decline, you may as well start from the highest height, and that’s what Gibbon does.

He begins with the 2nd century CE, when the empire reaches its height under the reign of what we call the Five Good Emperors – Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, and Marcus Aurelius. 

From there, he gives a narrative of the Roman world, weaving in his ideas of what caused its decline, and yeah, it’s ideas, plural.

After all, it would be foolish to suggest that moral decay alone could contribute to the fall of nations.

Instead, moral decay leaves you weak and vulnerable to both external and internal threats. 

It’s worth noting that Gibbon’s ideas have largely fallen out of vogue in the centuries since he wrote.

That doesn’t mean he was a bad scholar or anything; he was just a product of his time, and later scholarship found other, better ways to describe what he looked at.

That’s how scholarship works.

Today, Gibbon’s work isn’t worth reading as history in its own right, but for our historiographical purposes, it is useful. 

Gibbon is actually more interested in charting the history of Rome’s decline and fall than in its causes.

But he does still talk about the causes, otherwise we wouldn’t be mentioning him here. 

Toward the end of his massive work, he tells us, quote: 

After a diligent inquiry, I can discern four principal causes of the ruin of Rome, which continued to operate in a period of more than a thousand years. I. The injuries of time and nature. II. The hostile attacks of the barbarians and Christians. III. The use and abuse of the materials. And, IV. The domestic quarrels of the Romans (1278). 

He then goes into more detail about each.

He says he thinks the main cause of Rome’s fall is the fourth one – the Romans’ propensity for civil wars.

But that can’t really be attributed to moral decay, since the Romans had been doing that for centuries.

So I’m not going to explore it any further here, but it would be intellectually dishonest of me not to mention it, so yeah. 

But because this section is about moral decay, we’ll look at that.

In particular, he takes umbrage with how Christianity changed the Roman state, quote: 

The statues, altars, and houses of the [old gods], were an abomination in [the eyes of the Romans]; and in the absolute command of the city, they might labour with zeal and perseverance to erase the idolatry of their ancestors. The demolition of the temples in the east affords to them an example of conduct, and to us an argument of belief; and it is probable, that a portion of guilt or merit may be imputed with justice to the Roman proselytes (1279).

Christianity, having taken hold of the Roman Empire, began to dismantle elements of the Roman past.

This was as much due to changes in morals as to an attempt to fund their civilization.

But not only is this deeply disrespectful to their own past, it’s also clearly not sustainable.

Eventually, you’ll run out of bronze tiles to strip from the Pantheon or marble slabs to strip from the Colosseum.

When you break down your past to pay for your present, what happens to the future? 

At the same time, Christianity is very much focused on eternal salvation based on what you do in this life.

RELATED: Transmasculine Saints: Saint Pelagius of Antioch

RELATED: Transmasculine Saints: Saint Marinos the Monk

According to Gibbon, this caused the Romans to focus more on policing their own actions than working toward the greater good of their society. 

So, the main crux of his idea that “moral decline” led to the fall of Rome is Christianity.

Isn’t that fun? 

It’s worth pointing out that this idea is no longer considered valid.

In fact, it’s really easy to debunk.

If Christianity caused the fall of Rome, why did the Eastern Roman Empire, a thoroughly Christian state, last for another thousand years? 

No, it’s a silly idea.

Christianity didn’t cause the fall of Rome any more than Paganism caused its rise.

But if you’re going to make the argument that Rome fell due to moral decay, it’s important to understand what that means.  

So what do we have so far, in terms of moral decay? 

The rich oppressing the poor. 

The government not doing anything to help the poor.

Christianity ruining Roman culture. 

I’m sure this is what moralizing right-wing apes mean when they talk about the idea, huh? 

What we’ve not seen so far is anybody talking about trans people.

Trans women in ancient history didn’t seem to have been a problem.

The Gallae seemed to have begun their worship practices back in the 200’s BCE.

They were still doing it, in Britain, at least, in the 400’s CE.

RELATED: Exploring the Grave of a Galla Priestess

It seems that among serious scholars of the decline of the Roman Empire, trans people weren’t really considered a factor. 

The above sources aren’t the only ones I read, either.

Camille Paglia

I’m really not looking forward to this part. 

The beginning of this video was even more of a preamble than usual, I know.

I have a tendency to be long-winded in general.

But this time, it was more because I was procrastinating on actually digging into this section.

I don’t want to do it.

It’s not going to be fun.

Alright, let’s take a look at another one of these.

It’s a video conversation with Camille Paglia from 2016.

I’ll link the whole thing below so you can see the details for yourself, lest you think I’m misrepresenting the arguments made. 

Alright, let’s get started. 

Camille Paglia and Claire Fox

So, after a preamble in which the interviewer, Claire Fox, fangirls over Paglia, she talks about how modern militant feminism seems to demand protection from awful things, which she feels is a massive departure from what feminism used to be.

Then, she asks if Paglia has any thoughts on that. And does she ever. 

Paglia goes on an absolute rant, ping-ponging from point to point without providing any evidence.

She just keeps talking in one long incredibly unbroken sentence moving from topic to topic so that no one has a chance to interrupt it’s really quite obnoxious. 

The kids call it a Gish gallop now.

It’s a technique that’s deliberately used by all sorts of right-wingers to overwhelm you with a deluge of wrong ideas so you don’t even know where to start in responding.

I’m not sure if Paglia is aware that’s what she’s doing, or if she just has serious ADHD and her mouth can’t keep up with her thoughts. 

Anyway, Paglia agrees with Fox and thinks there’s been a “horrible regression” (3:06).

She tells us she thinks her generation – and she’s a boomer, because of course she is – has a greater sense of historical reality (3:10), because of what their parents experienced.

First the depression, then the Second World War.

Then, they themselves lived with the fear of nuclear war.

As a result, she tells us that her generation became overprotective of their children, driven by a desire to give them a better life. 

This gives us an interesting peek into her mindset, I think.

Because the word “overprotective” implies she thinks her generation went too far.

But if that’s the case, why then has she spent so much of her career railing against how queer people live our lives?

This betrays a profound lack of self-awareness on her part.

Perhaps, Camille, you’re simply continuing the overprotective streak of your generation? 

Let’s move on. 

From there, she describes her own childhood as being, quote: “in absolute open revolt against the code of a kind of simpering femininity that was being forced on us in the 1950s” (4:32).

She wasn’t a fan of the pretty, blonde, high femme aesthetic.

She even goes so far as to say that femininity felt oppressive to her (5:10), and that she “felt like she was absolutely suffocating” (6:13), and I’m sure a lot of trans men can relate to that. 

For Halloween, she tells us she always dressed as a man.

From Robin Hood to Napoleon to Hamlet to a Roman soldier, she always chose masculine costumes.

She even tells us she felt alienated because no other girls wanted to dress as she did (5:15). 

This is all fine so far.

Neither femininity nor masculinity should be forced on anyone.

Gender is far more complicated than the simple-minded among us might believe.

So, I agree with Paglia so far. 

Camille Paglia on Second-Wave Feminism

She found herself relating to the London youth culture of the 1960s, where she says she felt at home in the sense of rebellion and gender-bending that was going on (6:20).

But once she began hanging out with second-wave feminists, she felt like it had moved too far in the direction of “man-bashing”.

While first-wave feminism admired what men had accomplished and wanted a piece of the pie, second-wave feminism was about hating men. 

And look, not to sound like a not like other girls pick me trad or whatever, but I do think feminism can occasionally go too far into the realm of man-hating.

I’ve also known some awful women and nonbinaries as well. 

But that’s getting away from the topic. 

I can appreciate that certain elements of second-wave feminism can be unpalatable.

You’re never going to get me on board with the SCUM Manifesto, for example. 

Anyway, I’m getting away from myself here.

Can you tell I really don’t want to engage with Camille Paglia’s work? 

Why am I doing this to myself? I don’t have to make this video. 

First-wave feminism was important; it gained *SOME* American women the right to vote.

Women of colour wouldn’t get that right until much later (PBS).

But it mostly focused on legal inequalities.

Second-wave feminism did that, too, but it also dug more into social and cultural inequalities.

Women were *allowed* to get jobs, sure, but they often didn’t because the cultural expectation was for women to tend to the home and raise the kids. 

Now, when we divide feminism into “waves”, it makes it seem as though these were monolithic, unified movements with a single ideological set.

That’s rarely the case with ideological movements, and I think it’s dangerous to think that way.

Instead, it’s best to look at second-wave feminism for what it is – a rough grouping of (mostly) women who shared a belief in progress for the rights of women.

But within that movement, there was plenty of diversity of thought. 

Some second-wave feminists hated men, sure.

Some socialists hate gay people.

Some Muslims hate Black people.

Some Zoroastrians hate Brazilians, maybe.

Okay, that one might be a stretch. 

But plenty of second-wave feminists were married to men as well.

The world isn’t that simple.

You can’t paint things with such broad strokes like that. 

Anyway, Paglia seems to very much oppose second-wave feminism, because she thinks it’s based on hating men (8:05). 

But here’s the thing.

Second-wave feminism was largely created by boomers.

So, which is it, Camille?

Do boomers have a greater sense of historical reality and therefore are greater thinkers, or are second-wave feminists, who are largely boomers, ideological radicals who’ve built a quote: “absolute poison which has spread worldwide” (8:08)? 

Sexual Personae and the Immutability of Nature

Maybe she makes her views clearer in her most popular book, Sexual Personae. 

But I’m like 10 pages in, and there’s already so much I disagree with.

It’s an appeal to nature over and over, claiming humans are naturally hierarchical and we can’t change nature.

These tits on my chest say otherwise, Camile. 

I’m not reading this whole thing.

It’s like 700 pages long, and most of it won’t be relevant to our discussion today.

Now, it’s true there are certain elements of nature we can’t change. But even there, we have deep influence over them. 

No change in society will change nature (1) 

She makes this claim from the first page, and it’s simply not true.

The Industrial Revolution was a major societal shift that led to significant changes in Earth’s climate.

Unless she’s arguing that society can’t change the fundamental laws of nature, like gravity or electromagnetism, which, okay?

But then later on she says “science cannot avert a single thunderbolt” (5) and… yes, it can.

Has this woman ever heard of a lightning rod? 

This is Bill O’Reilly all over again. 

Ah, I need to stay focused.

There’s so much more I could say here.

So much nonsense I could comment on, but that’s not why we’re here. 

Does Camille Paglia Hate Women?

But though we might be able to admit feminism OCCASIONALLY goes too far into man-hating, the more I engage with Paglia’s work, the more I think she just hates women herself. 

Like, check this out – she claims that civilization in general was created by men to protect themselves from women, quote: 

Woman was an idol of belly-magic. She seemed to swell and give birth by her own law. From the beginning of time, woman has seemed an uncanny being. Man honored but feared her. She was the black maw that had spat him forth and would devour him anew. Men, bonding together, invented culture as a defense against female nature… And from this defensive head-magic has come the spectacular glory of male civilization, which has lifted woman with it. The very language and logic modern woman uses to assail patriarchal culture were the invention of men… 

All the genres of philosophy, science, high art, athletics and politics were invented by men. But by the Promethean law of conflict and capture, woman has a right to seize what she will and vie with man on her own terms.

– Camile Paglia – Sexual Personae, 9

What a weird thing to say.

Men were so scared of women that they “invented culture” in order to protect themselves? 

It’s worth noting that none of this has any historical basis.

Did Men Invent Athletics? (No)

Like, who “invented” athletics?

Nobody.

Athletics has been around for longer than writing has, and serious scholars on the topic will tell you it’s difficult to even define in the first place, let alone define how it started.

Classicist Nigel Crowther, under whom I had the wonderful privilege of studying during my undergrad, tells us this in his book Sport in Ancient Times, which I’ll read in my best approximation of his voice, quote: 

Some see sport as play, a part of nature, or a basic release from tension (a catharsis). Others have suggested that it arose from instinctive drives (or impulses), from the hunting ritual, or tests of strength. Yet others have remarked on the close association between sport and religion in the ancient world, but few would agree that religion is the origin of sport… According to the Marxist theory, sport is a preparation for work that separates human beings from beasts. One school of thought views sport as a means of discharging aggression; another maintains that it causes more aggression than it discharges… No single theory for the origin of sport has met with general acceptance, but sport is clearly a social phenomenon.

– Nigel Crowther – Sport in Ancient Times XXII

AtHlEtIcS wAs InVeNtEd By MeN tHo !!!1

I’ve frequently seen the claim circulating that the prehistoric illustrations in the Lascaux Caves in modern-day France depicted sport, but there’s only one human figure depicted, and it has the head of a bird (Tedesco).

Still wonderful, not sport.

Alas. 

Anyway. 

Did men invent athletics?

That’s an unprovable assertion.

And of course, Paglia provides no actual evidence, so we can dismiss this nonsensical claim outright. 

Did Men Invent Language? (No)

There is absolutely no evidence for this either.

We don’t entirely know how language evolved, but there are a bunch of different hypotheses for how it might have. 

One of them, proposed in 2004 by W. Tecumseh Fitch, is called the “Mother Tongue” hypothesis.

Essentially, it’s a theory that language began as a way for mothers to communicate with their offspring, which later extended to include other relatives.

I invite you to read more about it if you’re interested in such things, but we won’t go much more in-depth here.

The point is that not only is Paglia’s theory that men invented language to protect themselves from women nonsensical, but another theory, this one by an actual evolutionary biologist, posits the exact opposite (Fitch). 

Did Men Invent Philosophy? (Still No)

Men invented philosophy?

Again, this is silly.

Philosophy, at its simplest, is questioning the fundamentals of reality.

People have been doing that since the dawn of time.

Some of the earliest writings we have are of this nature.

Even in the Iliad, one of the oldest pieces of writing in the western tradition we have, Achilles questions whether he’ll be remembered after death and what sort of deeds he can do in life to ensure he is.

This sort of “what does it all mean” questioning is, at its base, philosophy. 

But also, Plato tells us in the Symposium that Socrates was taught the philosophy of love by a woman named Diotima (201d).

And if we consider, as many do, that Socrates is one of the most important figures in the history of Western philosophy, his wisdom came in part from at least one woman. 

This is just nonsense. 

Did Men Invent Art? (The Answer Won’t Shock You)

Men invented art?

No!

Art also predates writing. 

We do know they were layered on top of one another, though, which suggests they replaced earlier depictions over time. It was probably a multi-generational effort as a result. 

And if we go outside the West, we can find stuff a lot older.

What was the gender of the people who created these?

There’s no way of knowing.

But if you want to push a misogynistic agenda, you could simply claim it was men with no evidence to the contrary. 

I could go into detail on the other things here Paglia claims were invented by men, but really, she provides no evidence for any of it.

And, logically speaking, assertions made without evidence can be discarded without evidence.

But we don’t live in a logical world, so I wanted to provide at least some information here to help you see that this is pure ahistorical nonsense.

Paglia presents women as a passive beneficiary of culture, simply along for the ride as men do all the work, not providing any value beyond procreation. 

“in absolute open revolt against the code of a kind of simpering femininity that was being forced on us in the 1950s” (4:32).

What’s more simpering than that? 

So much of Paglia’s work seems to be built on making an assertion without proof, then moving on before we have a chance to question it. 

Let’s get back to the video. 

Camille Paglia’s Other Awful Ideas

Fox tries to bring the conversation back on topic by asking about “generation snowflake”.

And wow, it’s been a while since I’ve engaged in peak boomer bullshit like this. 

Anyway, she asks basically the same question again. At (10:05), she asks, quote:

Isn’t the point of women’s liberation to be free and strong and to take risks, rather than the ‘I can’t cope with that, if I see a picture it’s going to finish me off, who can protect me?’

Paglia sees this as a return to the enforced femininity of the 1950’s.

Millennials are demanding protection because “nothing has really happened to this generation; they have not had that initial experience my generation did of war” (11:10). 

What experience of war are you talking about, Camille?

Earlier, you said boomers had a greater sense of historical reality because you heard stories of war from your parents.

What experience of war did your generation have? 

Korea and Vietnam, maybe? Okay, I’ll give you that. But millennials had Iraq and Afghanistan. We also had to deal with the Great Recession of 2008, while her generation enjoyed a relatively strong economy throughout the 50’s, 60’s, and 70’s. 

I’m going to move on from this section, because my goal here is to debunk the idea that trans people caused the fall of Rome, not to debunk boomer bullshit. Besides, she just keeps characterizing millennials in a way that’s completely out of touch with reality. 

I haven’t been able to use this one for a while.

I do agree with one thing she says, though. Ancient history must be taught (12:10).

In particular, she insists on teaching young people about the disasters of history.

Again, I agree.

But what are these historical disasters?

We won’t know for a while yet. 

But anyway, before we get to the bit about trans people causing the fall of Rome, she addresses such important hot-button issues as: 

• Second-wave feminism is exposing young women to danger because psychotic males are looking at them as prey (18:30)
• “The male gaze is a crock” (19:30)
• Women who dress provocatively are “advertising, and if you’re advertising, be ready to sell” (21:45-23:30)
• Women who go on dates with men should accept full responsibility for the sex that comes along with it, and that “Date rape is a distortion of proper feminism.” (26:00)
• Men can tell when women are interested, and if women say no when men can tell they’re interested, it’s fascism (30:00)

She also goes a lot more into rape culture denial, which, as a survivor of sexual assault myself, I really don’t want to continue engaging with.

Let’s move on.

Alright, at about 36 minutes into this damn thing, they finally start to address gender. 

Fox starts off by talking about how, as a kid, it seemed unfair to her that all the traditionally masculine virtues, like intellect, bravery, and leadership, were seen as good things.

Meanwhile, all the feminine ones were “simpering and hopeless” (36:00).

And, yeah.

One of the reasons why Princess Leia is so beloved is that she’s not the boring old damsel in distress.

She does need to be rescued, true, but then she immediately rescues Luke, Han, and Chewie. She’s an intelligent, courageous leader who also happens to be a pretty lady. 

So, I agree.

Camille Paglia and “The Transgender Question”

But then Claire Fox says, “There is something weird about the transgender question” (36:34).

One hell of a segue there. 

Now look, that might not sound like there’s anything explicitly hateful about framing it as “the transgender question” on the surface.

But this is clearly echoing “the Jewish question”, which was an ongoing conversation around what was appropriate to do with the Jewish population of Europe in the 19th and early 20th centuries. 

The rhetoric escalated over time, with Bruno Bauer arguing in his 1843 book “The Jewish Question” that Jews couldn’t be emancipated and a full part of European society unless they gave up their religious convictions, because a free and emancipated nation required the abolishing of religion.

This was countered the following year by none other than Karl Marx, who said abolishing religion wasn’t a requirement for political emancipation.

I know that’s a massive oversimplification of both works, I’m sorry. 

Anyway, it continued back and forth over the years, with many different groups chiming in.

Eventually, though, the ruling party of Germany believed the very existence of Jews within its state was a threat.

They introduced heavier and more draconian measures in response to “the Jewish question”, until eventually they decided on their “Final solution to the Jewish question,” or just the “Final Solution”. 

Am I saying that Claire Fox is a Nazi?

No.

I am saying, however, that she was a member of the Brexit Party (Fox), opposes multiculturalism (Jeffries), and was appointed to the UK House of Lords by Boris Johnson (Fox). 

Anyway, it’s possible that her framing this as “the transgender question” is just an innocent flub, or a use of the term without really understanding what it means.

I want to do my best to be charitable here.

But considering how many awful things have been said in this conversation so far, and how many awful things have come up as I looked into her on even a surface level, it’s difficult to offer the benefit of the doubt. 

Anyway, she says there’s something else going on than just the liberation of gender fluidity, which Paglia herself celebrated earlier in the conversation.

It’s going too far, apparently.

People are seeking surgical interventions, and if anyone speaks out about it and says the wrong thing, they’re lambasted for it in the media. 

How does Paglia respond to this? 

She says that as soon as you feel dissatisfied with the limitations of your gender, there’s an enormous mechanism in place to help you halt puberty and transition (38:07).

This is at best a gross oversimplification of the reality of gaining access to transition-related care.

Even back in 2016, it was nowhere near that easy. 

She also says that transitioning opens one door and closes many others (38:45).

And, yeah, no shit. That’s the point.

I closed the door on being a man.

That also closed the door on the possibility of being a father, a boyfriend, a husband, and on and on.

But look – I wanted to close those doors. So, I did. 

This is true of every decision though, right?

Etymologically, decision comes from the Latin decidere, which is a combination of de – from – and caedere – to cut.

So literally it means to cut from. 

When you make a decision, you cut off other possibilities.

That’s the point! 

Like, imagine you’re deciding what you want to study in school.

You’ve narrowed it down to two choices – plumber or electrician.

You decide to go to plumbing school, and as a result, you close the door on being an electrician. 

You also close the door on your being a psychologist, or a dock worker, or an astrophysicist, or an elevator operator, or a baker, or a vending machine repair technician, or a software developer… 

Is that bad? No!

The world needs plumbers.

Closing doors is not inherently bad. 

BUT WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN????

It’s always about protecting the children with these people, isn’t it?

She says anyone who allows a minor to transition, and helps them to do so, is guilty of child abuse, a crime against humanity (38:53).

They should wait until they’re of the age of majority to have access to gender reassignment surgery. 

But that’s already the case. 

The World Professional Association for Transgender Healthcare (WPATH) creates their recommended guidelines for the care of transgender people.

The current version of their standards is version 8, but in 2016, when this interview was recorded, it was version 7, so let’s take a look at that one. 

In order to qualify for gender reassignment surgeries in 2016, WPATH recommended that people be of the age of majority in their country.

This includes both top and bottom surgery, regardless of what direction you’re going in your transition (58-60). 

Whether or not I agree with these guidelines is irrelevant here.

The point is, Paglia is ranting about something she doesn’t understand.

And that’s so typical of right-wingers, isn’t it?

They’re entirely led by their anger.

They just get angry about stuff, and they don’t bother to find out whether or not it’s true. It’s cringe as hell. 

But it’s also pretty rich to hear her accusing healthcare providers of child abuse when she herself has defended child abuse on multiple occasions. 

In an interview with TVO’s Daniel Richler, she talked about how much she hates… well, a lot of people.

But in particular, she really seemed to hate Sinead O’Connor.

In response to a conversation about Sinead O’Connor famously tearing up a photo of the Pope in protest of child abuse in the Catholic Church, she said, and I quote:

In the case of Sinead O’Connor, child abuse was justified!

Now that’s a horrible thing to say, no matter who you are.

But you might think she just said it jokingly and has a sick sense of humour.

But she actually has a long history of defending child abuse in general, and PDF files in particular. 

It always comes back to this, doesn’t it? 

If you’re sensitive to this sort of thing, I recommend you skip this next little bit.

Click here to jump forward.

In Sexual Personae, she says the following, quote:

These days, especially in America, b*y-love is not only scandalous and criminal, but somehow in bad taste. On the evening news, one sees handcuffed teachers, priests and Boy Scout leaders hustled into police vans. Therapists call them maladjusted, emotionally immature. But beauty has its own laws, inconsistent with Christian morality. As a woman, I feel free to protest that men today are pilloried for something that was rational and honorable in Greece at the height of its civilization. (116)

What a freak. 

This is all so gross, and I really don’t want to dig into it in-depth. But here are a few quick points: 

On 19 September 1991, she gave a talk at M.I.T, where she defended herself against accusations that she’s a neocon, where she said, quote: 

Now, when people call me a neocon, what kind of idiots are they? I’m someone who is on the record as being pro-p****graphy–all the way through k***ie p*** and snuff films.

– Paglia, Camille. “Crisis in the American Universities”.

Less than a month later, she wrote in Esquire: 

[P]retty boys have usually been considered by men to be as sexually desirable as women. This seems to me perfectly natural. Judeo-Christianity is unusual in finding the practice of b*y-love abhorrent.

– Paglia, Camille. “Pigs, Dudes, Slimeballs, Victims, Studs, Wimps, Girl Toys, Fools, Heroes, Human Beings?”

A couple of years later, she published Vamps and Tramps, a collection of essays. In that, she tells us how proud she is of inspiring the PDF file community, quote:

I have been thanked for my views by many men, by letter and in person after lectures, because of their own adolescent liaisons with supportive adults. At Bennington, I became aware… of a private connection between a genial aging male poet and a good-looking local youth in his early teens. It was against the law, but I saw nothing wrong with it. (89)

These are her own words. 

This woman is a sick f**k.

Absolutely impossible to defend unless you, too, are a sick f**k.

And she has the nerve to accuse others of child abuse when she herself is a proud supporter of child abuse? 

Of course, she’s found a home in the world of alt-right talking heads. 

She’s been favourably interviewed or recommended by such right-wing luminaries as Tucker Carlson, Jordan Peterson, Breitbart, and Daily Wire. 

Because of course she has.

Camille Paglia on the Transgenders

When do we get to the part where transgenders cause societal collapse? 

At 40:30. After she drops a weapons-grade Gish gallop, she tells us, quote: 

The more I explored it, I realized that historically, the movement toward androgyny occurs in late phases of culture, okay? As a civilization is starting to unravel, okay, and you can find it again and again and again through history in the Greek art you can see it happening all of a sudden the sculptures of nude young men who used to be very robust in the archaic period suddenly began to seem like wet noodles toward the end, and the people who live in such periods – a late phase of culture – whether it’s the Hellenistic era, whether it’s the Roman Empire, whether it’s the mauve decade of Oscar Wilde in the 1890s, whether it’s Weimar Germany, people who live in such times feel like they’re very sophisticated, they’re very cosmopolitan. Homosexuality, heterosexuality, so what? Anything goes, and so on. But from the perspective of historical distance, you can see that it’s a culture that no longer believes in itself. And what you invariably get are people who are convinced of the power of heroic masculinity on the edges of society – whether they’re the Vandals or the Huns or the barbarians of ISIS – you see them starting to mass on the outside of the culture, and that’s what we have right now, a rather terrifying disconnect between the infatuation with the transgender movement in our own culture, and what’s going on out there. That’s why I’m concerned. I feel it’s ominous. I question whether the transgender choice is indeed genuine in every single case, but what concerns me is when well-meaning adults believe that they’re helping people by making some permanent change in the body from which there is no going back. (40:44-42:51)

What evidence does she provide for this? 

None. 

So, it’s up to us, then. 

What Is a “Late Phase of Culture”?

What does she mean by a “late phase of culture”?

I don’t know. 

What we call the later Roman Empire is a historical invention to help us discuss the era’s political realities.

We talked about that already. 

But as we’ve also already talked about, EXHAUSTIVELY, there’s no formal date for the end of the Roman Empire.

Even if there were, the Romans themselves lived on, and the culture continued.

And she specifically refers to the late phase of cultures, not of political entities.

The culture in Italy in 477 CE wouldn’t have been much different from that of 476, but in 576 it would have changed quite a bit.

But then, it would have been a lot different in 376 CE as well, right?

Go look up a photo of your city from 100 years ago, if your city is even that old, and you’ll see how different it looks.

Montesquieu even tells us the Romans’ ability to adapt to new ideas is what made them so dominant in the first place, quote:

And it should be noted that the main reason for the Romans becoming masters of the world was that, having fought successively against all peoples, they always gave up their own practices as soon as they found better ones. (6)

Eventually, Roman culture would evolve into medieval European cultures – French, Burgundian, Slavic, etc.

But those cultures evolved from Roman culture, along with a mix of other influences along the way.

Those then evolved into the various cultures of colonial-era Europe – French, British, Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese – which they exported around the world, usually through the barrel of a gun. 

So, what’s the “late phase” of Roman culture?

Arguably, we’re in it. 

We also sometimes use the “late” phase of a culture to mark periods of significant innovation.

You can cook with it, store food and drinks in it, ferment stuff in it, keep vermin away from it more easily, and so much more.

It’s also often a culture’s first foray into creating decorative objects. 

So, in that case, the late phase of the Neolithic was a good thing.

But that doesn’t seem to be what she’s talking about here.

She tells us it’s a sign of a culture that no longer believes in itself. 

Now, I think a lot of us have good reason to no longer believe in modern culture as it is, but let’s put that aside. 

The Hellenistic Era and Effeminacy

Broadly speaking, we divide ancient Greek sculpture into three eras: archaic, classical, and Hellenistic. 

It is true that archaic Mediterranean sculpture tends to depict figures that are quite masculine. Take a look at these kouroi, for example.

We talked about these in the Bearded Venus video.

They’re statues of young men that are always in the same pose.

They show up all over the archaic Mediterranean.

The techniques they used were cruder, but the masculine depiction is there. 

But there are plenty of Hellenistic sculptures that are just as masculine. 

This famous statue of Laocoön and his sons being attacked by serpents is a great example.

We found it in Italy, but it was probably made by Greek artists from Rhodes, and is absolutely in the Hellenistic style.

It’s one of the most striking statues I’ve ever seen, and it’s hard to argue that Laocoön is depicted androgynously here. 

Here’s the Gigantomachy Frieze, from Pergamon, on the west coast of Asia Minor.

It was sculpted sometime in the 2nd century BCE as part of a gigantic altar.

What do you see here?

Manly men with manly beards fighting other manly men.

Yeah there are a couple of clean-shaven gods and women, but that doesn’t negate the clear depictions of masculinity here. 

Was there some Hellenistic art that was androgynous?

Yeah.

But there are also androgynous archaic statues.

We looked at a bunch of them in the Bearded Venus video, and that’s only what we found on Cyprus.

There are a whole lot more of them that we just haven’t gotten into yet. 

But if you cherry-pick what you want to show, you can construct a narrative that fits your agenda more easily. 

The Hellenistic Era and Cultural Decline

She also presents the Hellenistic era as a period associated with decline, and… literally the opposite is true. 

The Hellenistic era is the period following Alexander’s conquests, when successor states emerged and fought over his empire.

RELATED: Bagoas, the Transgender Lover of Alexander the Great

It was ancient Greece at its political and cultural peak. 

Greek culture spread far from its source, influencing the evolution of art and culture as far as India. 

The sculptures we looked at a moment ago were Hellenistic.

It’s when artists in the Western tradition first learned to express human emotion deeply through their work.

You feel sympathy for these blocks of stone.

You see every muscle intricately carved. It’s beautiful stuff. 

The Hellenistic era also saw the birth of Stoic and Epicurean philosophies. Skepticism, too.

No, not YouTube skepticism, The Amazing Atheist isn’t that old. 

What about science? 

Eratosthenes figured out the Earth was round during the Hellenistic age.

He even calculated the Earth’s circumference and got pretty close. 

The Great Library of Alexandria was built during the Hellenistic age!

Do declining cultures build great libraries? I don’t think so.

And it was NOT the only major library. 

I could go on for A WHILE.

But the idea that the Hellenistic era was a culture in decline is, once again, pure ahistorical nonsense. 

But what is she basing this idea on?

Decadence

It seems she associates the “late phase” of a culture with decadence. 

When writing about the writer Charles Baudelaire, Paul Bourget gave us the following definition of decadence, which I think is of great use to us here. Decadence is, quote:

the state of a society which produces too small a number of individuals for the work of community life.

– 15, my own translation

That seems a little too simplistic, though.

A little too straightforward, almost as though it’s a tangible, measurable trait.

Like we can tell a society has entered a decadent state just as readily as we can tell when a liquid has entered a gaseous state. 

But it’s not.

It’s a moral judgment. 

So, was the later Roman Empire decadent? 

If we believe the Romans themselves, yes, but that was always the case.

In fact, so much of the Roman literary tradition is just a centuries-long game of pining for the good old days. 

Livy on Roman Decadence

Titus Livius, or just Livy, was a historian who wrote during the reign of Augustus, the first emperor.

We’ve talked about him a bunch of times before – in the videos on Teiresias, the Bearded Venus, the Galla grave, and so on.

We even mentioned him at the very beginning of this video.

He wrote an enormous work of 142 volumes covering the history of Rome from its founding.

Unfortunately, only 35 of them survive today. 

And what we have is practically dripping with morality.

He begins his work by saying that while other histories tend to rush through the oldest material to reach the contemporary era, he’s more interested in staying in the earliest period.

He tells us, quote:

I shall find antiquity a rewarding study, if only because, while I am absorbed in it, I shall be able to turn my eyes from the troubles which for so long have tormented the modern world. (29)

I mean, relatable.

That’s half the reason why some of y’all watch my videos, I’m sure. 

But shortly after, he tells us about his moral crusade, quote:

I invite the reader’s attention to the much more serious consideration of the kind of lives our ancestors lived, of who were the men, and what the means both in politics and war by which Rome’s power was first acquired and subsequently expanded; I would then have him trace the process of our moral decline, to watch, first, the sinking of the foundations of morality as the old teaching was allowed to lapse, then the rapidly increasing disintegration, then the final collapse of the whole edifice, and the dark dawning of our modern day when we can neither endure our vices nor face the remedies needed to cure them. (30)

Livy was born too early. 

Livy pretty clearly ties the greatness of the past to Rome’s military might, and he sees his era as a time of decay from that greatness.

There’s probably nothing noteworthy here.

After all, empires in decline double in size and sustain that growth for centuries all the time, don’t they? 

There’s more to Livy’s moralizing tendencies than territorial gains.

I’m kind of oversimplifying it here, but it’s also a tangent and doesn’t matter that much to the main point, so let’s move on. 

The point is, Livy had moralizing tendencies.

It’s hard to deny that. So if Livy thought of trans people in ancient Rome to be a sign of moral decay, I think we can assume he’d make that pretty clear. 

So, does he?

No. 

He’s much more interested in the heroism, piety, and familial loyalty of the great figures of the early Roman state.

In fact, when he tells us about how Kybele first arrived in Rome, he only makes a brief, casual mention of her priests – the Gallae – accompanying her.

He doesn’t comment on their appearance, their mannerisms, their effeminacy, or anything of the sort. 

Livy, the great moralizer of Roman history, was a trans ally. 

Sallust on Roman Decadence

Shortly before Livy, we have Gaius Sallustius Crispus, or just Sallust.

He was born in the 80’s BCE, probably 86, and died in 35 or 34 BCE.

That means he would have been dead before Livy began writing his own works.

He was a senator and an ally of the First Triumvirate – Julius Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus.

He was governor of the Roman province of Africa Nova in 45 BCE, during which time he apparently engaged in widespread extortion and plundering in the area, if his accusers are to be believed.

But this may not have been true, since accusing your political rivals of awful things was one of the most beloved pastimes of the Roman aristocracy (Rolfe IX). 

Anyway, he retired from politics after the assassination of Caesar in 44 BCE, and became a writer of history.

Only a few of his works survive today.

We have Bellum Catilinae, about Catiline’s attempt to overthrow the Roman Republic in 63 BCE.

In it, he portrays Catiline as corrupt, ruthless, power-hungry, and a danger to the state. 

We also have Bellum Iugurthinum, about the war between Rome and the Numidian kingdom, under Jugurtha.

He probably knew a bit more about this one, since he was governor of the former Numidian territory that became a part of Rome, spoiler alert. 

We know he wrote another work, Historiae, which covered the period from 78 to 67 BCE, but we only have some small fragments of it. 

His work, too, involves a lot of moralizing. 

Scholar Brian Matthew Mumper wrote his PhD dissertation on the topic.

In it, he describes the nature of Sallust’s moralizing and his pessimism. 

Some scholars think it’s similar to Livy’s: that he viewed the past as a much nobler, more dignified, and more honourable time, and his own era as one of decadence and decline.

But others think he was always pessimistic, and assumed the Romans would cycle back and forth between vice and harmony, or discordia and concordia. 

Does Sallust talk about trans people as a force that drew the Roman world toward discordia? 

He doesn’t seem to.

I found no mention of the Gallae, of Kybele, of homosexuality, of cinaedi (effeminate men), of hetaerae (prostitutes), or any of the old moral yarns we often see from conservatives these days. 

A key turning point seemed to be the year 146 BCE, when Carthage was destroyed. With it came a great influx of wealth into the Roman state, which led to greater corruption and more laziness (157-159). 

“Mo’ money, mo’ problems” – Sallust, probably

Again, not trans people.  

So, What the Hell is Camille Paglia Talking About?

Now, Camille Paglia thinks trans people make a culture effeminate, which leads to stronger, more masculine cultures conquering them.

That’s also nonsense.

The presence of femininity in people of any gender doesn’t negate masculinity.

And if trans people are a sign modern culture is becoming effeminate and weak… how does she explain trans men? 

She probably doesn’t.

Transphobes usually forget trans men exist. 

Look, I could go on, but this is long enough.

I really didn’t plan on making this video this bloody long. 

The point is, Camille Paglia’s little rant here is pure ahistorical nonsense. 

So, what the hell is she talking about? 

I don’t know.

Your guess is as good as mine.

But in terms of trans people being linked to cultural collapse, there’s no evidence of that. 

Camille Paglia is just saying stuff. 

What Does All This Tell Us?

So let’s recap. 

When did Rome fall? It’s complicated and there’s no single, straightforward answer. 

What did the fall of Rome look like? It’s complicated and there’s no single, straightforward answer.

What caused the fall of Rome? It’s complicated and there’s no single, straightforward answer.

Did Rome ever actually fall in the first place? It’s complicated and there’s no single, straightforward answer.

Any scholar on the topic worth their letters will tell you as much, even if they do happen to be transphobic, and there are plenty of transphobic classicists out there I’m sure. 

So, why do people think trans people caused the fall of Rome? 

The best explanation I can find is that people saw writers who talked about “moral decay” causing the fall of Rome, and rather than learning what those writers meant by the term, they used it to confirm their own moral biases. 

It’s a simple explanation for a complex topic. I haven’t found a better way to make sense of this mind virus, and oh, how I’ve looked. 

The ancient Mediterranean is such a wonderful period of history, spanning thousands of years and dozens of cultures. We, as a culture, find the Romans particularly fascinating because, on a surface reading, they look a lot like us. We know more about them than we do any other culture in the West before the advent of the printing press, so we can get a much more in-depth understanding of who they were. 

That means we can see ourselves in them much more than we can, say, the Etruscans, or the Villanovan culture. But along with that, I think, comes a glance at our own mortality as a culture. If an insignificant little town in Italy can rise to become the dominant culture in the region, and then collapse, what does that say about our own culture? 

I think everyone has a sense that the foundation upon which we’ve built modern Western culture is deeply unstable. Intelligent people have been sounding every alarm they could find for decades about our destruction of the environment, our lack of preparedness for major health crises, the erosion of democratic institutions, our overreliance on fossil fuels, and our stubborn unwillingness to move away from them, our willingness to put up with massive economic inequality… the list goes on. 

When we look at the fall of Rome, we see the fall of a once-great civilization, and wonder if we ourselves are living through a similar event. 

At the same time, I think most of us recognize that it doesn’t have to be this way. Life doesn’t have to be so fucking hard. We weren’t put on this planet just to toil in meaningless jobs we hate to make some asshole richer, and then die. So when we look back to the Roman Empire, which looks a whole lot like the empire of global capital, some of us may hope to find a way to avoid a similar fate. 

But there’s a danger in that. Learning from the past is important. Obviously, I believe that. But at the same time, it’s easy to let the past simply confirm your biases. 

If you think the West is falling because of moral decay, you’ll find Roman writers who confirm that for you. And if you think trans people are a sign of moral decay, that can lead you to the conclusion that trans people caused the fall of Rome. But that’s nonsense. 

I think conservatism has also always been drawn to the idea of finding moral excuses for social woes. That’s absolutely true in the modern age – the right wing blames trans people for just about every cultural woe today in the same way they blamed tornadoes on gay marriage. This is nonsensical magical thinking, of course, but if you’re looking for simplistic answers offered by charlatans who want to take advantage of you, you’ll find it. 

So, did trans people cause the fall of Rome? No. 

In my work putting this video together, I didn’t find anything coming anywhere near a convincing argument in favour of that idea. 

So, what did cause the fall of Rome? 

A lot of things. 

I knew I wasn’t going to find the cause for the fall of Rome in researching this video. Thousands of years of scholarship, by minds much more devoted to the subject than I, has yet to find that. 

But what I found particularly interesting is that social inequality and climate change seem to be significant driving factors. 

So, if we’re looking to the past to learn more about how to avoid a similar fate to that of the Romans, maybe we ought to address those. 

But regardless of what led to its fall – or if it even ever fell in the first place – we’re still here. 

Because as much as we must contribute to the culture in which we live, that culture exists purely to benefit the people within it. Otherwise, what’s the point of culture? 

Why are we doing any of this? 

But even if the Roman Empire fell, many of the people who created that culture survived and passed down their own cultural experiences. 

That includes trans people. 

From the early days of the Roman Republic to the twilight of the Empire, we find evidence of trans people.

Christians persecuted pagan worship practices, including those of the Gallae, but that wasn’t enough to erase us. The collapse of a centralized Roman state wasn’t enough to erase us. The instability of the Medieval era wasn’t enough to erase us. You and I are a testament to that. 

My friends, we’re part of a glorious tradition of gender nonconformity stretching throughout the ages. From the dawn of history to the present day, we find people who look like us. 

We’re present during the fall of empires, but we’re also present during their rise. We’re a part of the human story, just like anybody else. 

Because we have always existed. 

And so long as humanity continues to endure, so too shall we. 

Ancient Sources Cited: 

►Plato. “Lysis. Symposium. Phaedrus”. Edited and translated by Christopher Emlyn-Jones, William Preddy. Loeb Classical Library 166. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2022.
►Titus Livius. “The Early History of Rome: Books I-V of The History of Rome from its Foundation”. Translated by Aubrey de Sélincourt. Toronto, Penguin Books Canada, 1960.
►Titus Livius. “The War with Hannibal: Books XXI-XXX of The History of Rome from its Foundation”. Translated by Aubrey de Sélincourt. Toronto, Penguin Books Canada, 1965. 
►Sallust. “The War with Catiline. The War with Jugurtha”. Edited by John T. Ramsey. Translated by J. C. Rolfe. Loeb Classical Library 116. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2013.
►Salvianus of Marseilles. “The Writings of Salvian, the Presbyter”. Translated by Jeremiah F. O’Sullivan. New York, Cima Publishing Co, 1947.

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►Harper, Kyle. “How Climate Change and Plague Helped Bring Down the Roman Empire”. Smithsonian Magazine, 19 December 2017. Accessed 13 October 2025.
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►Keating, Karl. “Priestly Celibacy”. EWTN Blog. 2021. Accessed 19 April 2026.
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►McDaniel, Spencer. “No, Transgender People Are Not a Sign of Cultural Collapse”. Tales of Time Forgotten, 20 November 2020. Accessed 15 February 2026. 
►Montesquieu, Charles. “Considerations on the Causes of the Greatness of the Romans and their Decline”. Translated by David Lowenthal. New York, The Free Press, 1999.
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►Paglia, Camille. “Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson”. New York, Vintage Books, 1990.
►Paglia, Camille. “Crisis in the American Universities”. M.I.T. Writing Program. 19 September 1991. Archived 10 July 2012.
►Paglia, Camille. “Pigs, Dudes, Slimeballs, Victims, Studs, Wimps, Girl Toys, Fools, Heroes, Human Beings?” Esquire. 1 October 1991. Archived 10 September 2019. 
►Paglia, Camille. “Vamps and Tramps”. New York, Random House, 1994. 
►Paglia, Camille. “Imprint”. By Daniel Richler. 1992.
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►Paglia, Camille. “Feminism Based on Destroying Men is ‘Absolute Poison’ to Our Culture”. Tucker Carlson Tonight. Fox News, 15 October 2018.
►PBS. “Not All Women Gained the Vote in 1920”. American Experience Blog. 6 July, 2020. Accessed 4 February 2026. 
►Penn Wharton Budget Model. “The Effects of Immigration on the United States’ Economy”. Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, 2016.
►Saunders, J. J. “The Debate on the Fall of Rome”. History, vol. 48, no. 162, 1963, pp. 1–17. JSTOR. Accessed 13 Nov. 2025.
►Tedesco, Laura Anne. “Lascaux (ca. 15,000 B.C.)”. The Met Essay Collection. 1 October 2026. Accessed 19 April 2026.
►UK Parliament. “Votes in Parliament: Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) Order 2025”. 3 July 2025. Accessed 21 April 2026.

*Praeger Publishers is NOT affiliated with PraegerU, by the way. Nigel Crowther is a legitimate historian under whom I studied during my undergraduate.

Images Used:

All images created by Sophie Edwards, public domain, or Fair Use, except:
►Rome and Carthage at the start of the Second Punic War by William Robert Shepherd CC3.0
►Julius Nepos and Romulus Augustus solidi by Classical Numismatics Group CC2.5
►Rome 395 CE by Jan van der Crabben CC3.0
►Justinian’s conquests by NeimWiki CC4.0
►Walls of Constantinople by BigDaddy1204 CC4.0
►Empire of Trebizond by Samhanin CC4.0
►Caffa and Theodoro by Amitchell125 CC3.0
►World War 1 map by Exec CC3.0
►Russian Empire 1914 by Simeon Netchev CC4.0
►Map of the Tetrarchy in 293 by Coppermine Photo Gallery CC3.0
►Prima Porta Augustus by Alexander Z CC3.0
►Agrippa portrait by Egisto Sani CC2.0
►Denarius of Julia with children by Classical Numismatic Group CC2.5
►Portrait of Tiberius by Egisto Sani CC2.0
►Camille Paglia photo by Fronteiras do Pensamento CC4.0
►St. John’s College Library by CharlieRCD CC3.0
►CN Tower Struck by Lightning by Raul Heinrich CC3.0 (Zeus added by me)
►Sulawesi pig by Basran Burhan CC4.0
►Rome at its height by Tataryn CC3.0
►Medieval Church map by Simeon Netchev CC4.0
►Delphi Kouroi by Ricardo André Frantz CC3.0
►2nd Athenian kouros by Francesco Bini CC4.0
►Thera kouros by Ricardo André Frantz CC3.0
►Farnese Herakles by Marie-Lan Nguyen CC2.5