What inaccurate historical factoid do you just go with?

I'm gonna be that guy... but former English teacher here - By definition, factoids are inaccurate :) inaccuracies repeated so often that people 'go with it', that's when they become factoids.

'inaccurate factoid' is an example of a tautology. Like naan bread, or armed gunman.

55

You are technically correct, the best kind of correct.

21
Just FYI, factoid has been misused for long enough that it now has an official second, contradictory definition:

A briefly stated and usually trivial fact.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/factoid

11
C'mon dude. As a history teacher, I can tell you that it is definitely possible to fire a gun without arms.

11
- I'm not even a gun dude and I've heard of those guns that shoot if you look at em funny. Hi points? I don't remember.
  
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A gunman doesn't cease to be a gunman if he's disarmed. Though he can't be a gunman if he wasn't armed in the first place.

7
- Most people have at least one arm, so aren't all gunmen armed?
  
  3
If you're a former English teacher you should be aware that language changes and while "factoid" was originally coined to mean a made up fact, the term is currently mostly used to refer to small inconsequential facts.

3
- That's literally the most ironic thing I've read
  
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Wouldn't it be a pleonasm? Tautology is more about the logic realm, specifically about repeating an argument or a statement as it they were different. Here "inaccurate factoid" is merely inaccurate vocabulary.

3
- It's more redundant than inaccurate.
  
  3
Nice.

0

Vikings had horns on their helmets

29

I like to believe that dinosaurs (especially stegosauruses) had lovely singing voices, because its nice and doesn't hurt anybody.

28

how loud could their operas get? what range of octaves are possible with the range of species? could they beat box? were there ventriloquists?

3
- three 2) yes 3) only in Portuguese 4) only in Portuguese
  
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Now I'm imagining a Tyrannosaurus Rex singing a bird song every morning.

2

Spartans were a dominant military force. They were actually kind of a shitty military force who was really good at PR.

The Spartan Hegemony only lasted 30 years, and only because they kind of glory-hogged the aftermath of the Greco-Persian war after nearly losing the war due to their refusal to muster.

25

At Thermopylae 300 Spartans fought to the last man, along with 700 Athenians and more from other cities.

7
- Yes that would be the PR campaign I am referencing.
  
  11
Spartans were good at one kind of military unit, but that was it.

4

That Napoleon was short

23

He wasn't short? 😨

2
- He was short. But so was everyone else then.
  
  22
- He was average for the day. He just happened to be measured in different units than the British and had really tall bodyguards.
  
  13

Padeira de Aljubarrota killed 7 Castillians by cooking them in her bakery's oven in 1385.

Brites de Almeida das born in 1350 with 6 fingers in each hand, a though lady, could easily kill a man with her hands (and did it a few times), was kidnapped and enslaved in Northern Africa, managed to escape with her bare hands, helped out 2 other Portuguese guys to escape, stole a boat, sailed back with the guys, had a prob with one of them, killed him. Tried to establish herself in a honest way, but crime and murder were always coming her way somehow, ended up moving towns and disguise herself as a man. Met and older lady friend, a baker, that wanted to maker her an honest person. They lived happily as a couple. Older lady dies, she inherits the bakery. Castille tries to occupy Portugal, big battle, Portugal is outnumbered but manages to have a spectacular win. Some castillans are running around and looting. She lures 7 into her bakery, cooks them alive in her oven. Forever a national hero and legend.

Nothing of this is proven, including the Castillans she killed (which is the factoid that made her a hero) but there're even songs about her and whenever Portugal plays against Spain in football you'll see some people dressed as a baker on the stadium.

A lesbian serial-killer who escapsed enslavement to kill Castillans in one of the most important battles of our history? To me nothing can be truer than this, independently of what you can prove or not.

18

George Washington had wooden dentures.

I learned it from Day of the Tentacle and even if I know now that it isn't true,it still pops into my mind everytime someone talks about him or dentures.

17

Also, Betsy Ross originally created a tentacle shaped flag, not a rectangular one.

6
Yeah, he had those wind up teeth instead

3
- Ha. Ha. Ha.
  
  Oozo the Clown
  
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i thought he had dentures made of slave teeth?

2
Day of the Tentacle

Time for a replay. Is there an android option nowadays?

1
- Sort of.
  
  There's a ScummVM emulator on the playstore, so it's possible to play the original on android if you can find the "rom" files.
  
  I haven't tried DOTT in particular, but last time I replayed a scumm game I quickly lost interest due to the outdated controls.
  
  2
Founding fathers were white washed.

1

Jewish slaves build the pyramids.

They were build by Egyptians, probably out of loyalty to the pharaohs.

Columbus discovered America.

He never reached the mainland. He didn't go any further then the Caribbean Islands.

15

Man, this one is infuriating for me, and I'm Jewish.

It's like we based an entire religion out of this lie - every aspect of the old testament is riddled with exodus references.

6
- did the Jews ever claim to have built the pyramids?
  
  4
- Was Egyptian slavery of Jews not a thing at ALL?
  
  2
Columbus reached the mainland on his third and fourth voyages.

3
- On his subsequent voyages he went farther south, to Central and South America. He never got close to what is now the mainland of America. Wikipedia
  
  1

Albert Einstein did badly at school

12

That Ben Franklin said beer is proof that God loves us

11

Ben Franklin got so high he forgot to be president.

14
- Ben Franklin banged so many whores even the French were impressed.
  
  9

Bush did 9/11

10

I'm gonna have to figure out how to get the Kubrick moon landing joke to segue into this or vice versa

2

Hobby Lobby hired ISIS to steal the Epic of Gilgamesh

9

Ah, Hobby Lobby's Hammurabi Robbing Hobby.

16
- 🥇
  
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Current flows from positive to negative

9

Hahahahaha....sob....

1

"Poor artists imitate, great ones steal"

I have no idea who actually coined this, but I heard once that it was Mark Twain. I'm pretty sure it wasn't, but it sounds like something he'd say and attaching his name to it actually helps convey the message and its tone, so fuck it, Mark Twain said that.

9

The thing about the Pythagorean Theorem and having to cut your tongue out to join the cult that teaches you, so that you can't just blab it all over town. I teach physics and I love to play it up!

6

Finland exists

3

Im gonna make my own site on this, i just created another on topic of Australia Nationality test

2

The Ying Yang summarizes the Big Bang, basically the universe wondered what it could be so first it was black and white and then the alterations of those states started showing up. You are the universe itself creating self awareness and providing more ways to answer the original question: “what could I be”?

1

“In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."

15
- I would like a word with the manager of the Universe please.
  
  2

That their was a man who got skimmed by a cannonball in the ass, got treated, and returned to the deck the same day to continue watching the battle.

1

It was necessary to nuke Japan. Oh wait, it wasn't.

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