Wang Mang Puns

And how did he push through with this type of seemingly wide-scale reform? Was This action done out of some genuine desire to reform society or some sort of political scheme?

Ruled China from 9-23 AD.

• Abolished slavery
• Carried out strong land reform
• Introduced price controls
• Nationalised several industries
• Taxed economically unproductive landowners and workers
• Taxed corporate profits for the first time

However, warfare, famine, natural disasters and corruption led to the collapse of his government and his assassination by the economic elites.

Could this be considered proto-socialism?

Where I learned about him: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Mang

EDIT in writing this I also remembered the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, a rebel faction in China that existed in the 1850s and controlled like 5% of China. It aimed to turn China into a Christian theocracy but also tried to carry out policies of gender equality and industrialisation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiping_Heavenly_Kingdom

Could they be considered proto-socialist?

So of all the wacky bad economics you have ever seen on this sub, I have literally never seen someone as crazy and wacky as Wang Mang. No seriously, there is no way I can possibly do this man justice, please, please, please read up on him. If you are a connoisseur of bad economics and just bad policy in general, there is absolutely nobody out there as interesting as Wang Mang.

During the middle of the Han dynasty, there was a man named Wang Mang (王莽). Who usurped the emperor and proclaimed himself emperor, naming his Dynasty the New Dynasty (新朝). Eventually though, he got overthrown and the Han were restored. The Han dynasty before Wang Mang’s usurpation is usually known as the Western Han, and afterwards it is known as the Eastern Han. That in itself is a very interesting story of unrest and palace intrigue, but that isn’t what we’re here for.

No, Wang Mang is crazy, Wang Mang is a religious fundamentalist and that’s the best way I can describe him. He is Confucian, and well, followed the works of Confucius to the letter. In fact, let me demonstrate this with an interesting story.

Aside: the reason why I call Wang Mang a religious fundamentalist is that in China, Confucianism is often treated as if it is a religion, well, it's odd really. Philosophers/sociologists/political scientists refer to Confucianism as 儒家 or literally translated as “house of ru” when referring to the philosophy, and the social economic policies of Confucius. In comparison, theologians refer to Confucianism as 儒教, or literally translated as the “ru religion”, and it refers to the religious and metaphysical ideas of Confucius, but then 儒教 is unlike most religions in that it doesn’t really have a Parthenon of gods or anything like that, it is more a moral code and set of ethical guidelines. Anyways, its confusing and if you read Chinese, the social-political side of Confucianism and the religious side of Confucianism on Wikipedia have two different pages.

The time Wang Mang stole everyone’s name:

Chinese names are a combination of a one or two character family name and a one or two character given name. Wang Mang (王莽) is an example of a one character family name (Wang, or 王) and a one character given name (Mang, or 莽). Many people in China both historically and today have two character given names, like 毛泽东(Mao Ze-dong).

Now something that strikes most students of Chinese history and classical literature odd is how nobody had two character given names in th

Has anyone read up on him? Seems like one of the more interesting emperors....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Mang

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/emperor-wang-mang-chinas-first-socialist-2402977/

I wouldn't call him a socialist necessarily but he was definitely a confucian idealist and a nostalgic conservative in the truest sense. Maybe he had good intentions.

"After Wang died, the crowd fought over the right to have the credit for having killed Wang, and tens of soldiers died in the ensuing fight. Wang's body was cut into pieces, and his head was delivered to the provisional Han capital Wancheng, to be hung on the city wall. However, the angry people took it off the wall and kicked it around, and someone cut his tongue off. Eventually, the head was preserved and kept in a court vault, until it was destroyed in a fire in the Jin dynasty."

"He retreated to his palace and summoned magicians with whom he passed his time testing spells; he began to assign strange, mystical titles to his army commanders: “The Colonel Holding a Great Axe to Chop Down Withered Wood” was one. "

" In 9, Wang Mang instituted a revolutionary land redistribution system, ordering that all land in the empire become legally the property of the empire, to be known as wangtian (王田), in a system similar to the Zhou well-field system. All further land transactions were banned, although property owners were allowed to continue to possess the property. However, if a family had less than eight members but had one "well" or larger property (about 0.6 km2), it was required to distribute the excess to fellow clan members, neighbors, or other members of the same village. Criticism of the wangtian system was punishable by exile. Wang also abolished slavery "

" “Frankly, my own assessment is that he was high on drugs for most of the period,” Tye writes. “Knowing all was lost, he chose to escape reality, seeking a few last weeks of pleasure.” "

" *The entire empire was already collapsing, but Wang Mang did not care, but rather buried his head in what is old, believing that once he returned the government structure to the old days, the empire will be peaceful. He only sought to establish

In Wang Mang's brief but disastrous interruption of the Han Dynasty, he made a number of (in)famous reforms, one of which was the abolition of slavery through the empire. Do was have any records of why he did this? Was it inspired by a deep moral conviction, was it part of his grander socioeconomic strategy, was it some combination of the two, or something else?

I can understand being a little disillusioned with the systems of the Han given that his being where he was could be taken as proof of their failures, but obviously the Zhou weren't immune to problems.

Were his views in this regard unique to him, or an example of a particular ideology of the time?

Edit: for any who might be interested, I have since found the article CENTERING THE REALM: WANG MANG, THE ZHOULI, AND EARLY CHINESE STATECRAFT, Michael Puett, available for free through academia.edu informative.

The exact wording is:

>By insisting that all gold be exchanged for copper, he cornered the market, and at his death in AD 23 the treasury held some 5 million oz (140,000 kg) of gold (more than the total supply in medieval Europe) and the strain was felt as far afield as Rome where the emperor Tiberius forbade the wearing of silk since it cost gold.

(p 43)

This is a great little anecdote that's stuck in my mind since I read it as a kid some fifteen years ago, but knowing more now about Roman history and the Romans' occasional penchant for sumptuary laws, I'm wondering about the factual soundness of this tidbit.

Was Tiberius' ruling motivated by a lack of gold, or by a concern for the morality of Roman men? Or was it a bit of both?

In Chinese history, there was a little-known interval when the Confucian official Wang Mang overthrew the weak Emperor Ai, and established the Xin Dynasty, bring about his Confucian reforms.

After certain disasters striking his brief rule, a member of the deposed Liu Household overthrew him, and re-established the Han Dynasty. For this, his brief rule will not be listed among the royal dynasties of China.

What may seem special about his rule was that he ruled just a few years "before Christ was born".

What do you perceive of this little segment of Chinese history? An unjustified usurpation that nonetheless marked the division between the Western and Eastern Han Dynasties? Or a reform that sought to revolutionise the government using Confucian principles?

I don't want to step on anybody's toes here, but the amount of non-dad jokes here in this subreddit really annoys me. First of all, dad jokes CAN be NSFW, it clearly says so in the sub rules. Secondly, it doesn't automatically make it a dad joke if it's from a conversation between you and your child. Most importantly, the jokes that your CHILDREN tell YOU are not dad jokes. The point of a dad joke is that it's so cheesy only a dad who's trying to be funny would make such a joke. That's it. They are stupid plays on words, lame puns and so on. There has to be a clever pun or wordplay for it to be considered a dad joke.

Again, to all the fellow dads, I apologise if I'm sounding too harsh. But I just needed to get it off my chest.

The nurse asked the rabbit, “what is your blood type?”

“I am probably a type O” said the rabbit.

The doctor says it terminal.

Alot of great jokes get posted here! However just because you have a joke, doesn't mean it's a dad joke.

THIS IS NOT ABOUT NSFW, THIS IS ABOUT LONG JOKES, BLONDE JOKES, SEXUAL JOKES, KNOCK KNOCK JOKES, POLITICAL JOKES, ETC BEING POSTED IN A DAD JOKE SUB

Try telling these sexual jokes that get posted here, to your kid and see how your spouse likes it.. if that goes well, Try telling one of your friends kid about your sex life being like Coca cola, first it was normal, than light and now zero , and see if the parents are OK with you telling their kid the "dad joke"

I'm not even referencing the NSFW, I'm saying Dad jokes are corny, and sometimes painful, not sexual

So check out r/jokes for all types of jokes

r/unclejokes for dirty jokes

r/3amjokes for real weird and alot of OC

r/cleandadjokes If your really sick of seeing not dad jokes in r/dadjokes

Punchline !

Edit: this is not a post about NSFW , This is about jokes, knock knock jokes, blonde jokes, political jokes etc being posted in a dad joke sub

Edit 2: don't touch the thermostat

Do your worst!

Previously

Today:

You know the drill: this is the thread for all your history-related outpourings that are not necessarily questions. Minor questions that you feel don't need or merit their own threads are welcome too. Discovered a great new book, documentary, article or blog? Has your Ph.D. application been successful? Have you made an archaeological discovery in your back yard? Did you find an anecdote about the Doge of Venice telling a joke to Michel Foucault? Tell us all about it.

As usual, moderation in this thread will be relatively non-existent -- jokes, anecdotes and light-hearted banter are welcome.

How the hell am I suppose to know when it’s raining in Sweden?