You imply an importance nuance to all this that I had glossed over.

I should say that tats have moved, not from being a badge of group membership to one of pure individualism, but rather from being a badge of membership in a discrete, identifiable group with reasonably demanding criteria for which the tat is a symbol, to membership in a generalized, trend-type “group” that places no demands, does nothing in particular, and masquerades as “individualism” for the lazy.

The former way of describing it works, but only as a kind of shorthand.

I’d have some respect for the duelling scar, if only because at least you have to have exchanged blows with a sword. It might be more or less painful than a tat, but it’s more active and less passive. But that might be just class and cultural bias on my part. The horse hair thing does sound Eurogangsta.

And in America the bipartisan consensus in favor of lower wages through higher immigration rhymes with low-class behahvior.

Some years ago when in my 50′s a beautiful young women was the server at a fast food restaurant I frequent. She was highly tattooed and modified with gages and piercings. I asked her given her natural beauty why all the ‘artwork’. She expressed her artful inclinations towards color and self-expression. I acknowledged her answer and then asked had she never seen tattoos and piercings would she have got them. She seemed stunned by the question and startled by her own response which was no probably not.

Tattoos are a sign of general cultural rot. The university teacher’s ‘fuck you’ attitude is pervasive as a symptom of less respect for self, others and the individual’s place in society. The individual is the tribe into himself.

In WW2, I guess it’s not surprising that the next gen propagandists would conflate National Socialism and Prussian militarism so closely in many of their materials, or cast them as natural allies in some of the more sophisticated ones.

There’s not zero validity to it, looking at the long sweep of German social trends of the preceding century, but it always was simple minded to see them as the same, especially in societies that had until recently been wildly militaristic themselves by the standards of our own current opinionmakers. [Military parades, horrors, were a more common sight in Britain and France then. There are postcards and photos.]

And the Prussian state model had its virtues. Rational public administration with an ethic of professionalism and service. A hegelian concept of a state ruled by law. Different laws, sure. But clear procedure and forms. THeir own ideals of justice and humanity. And, sure, later on Bismarck’s welfare state. Support for science and education.

And all the stuff Kirk cited, too.

Star Trek Voyager [sorry] did a variant on this. The holographic sentient AI Doctor set up a holo program in which he could experience life as the head of a family of sort of sentient holograms. He made it the most sickeningly sweet pseudo 1950s setting you could find, just to drive the point home. His teen “son” joined a group of similarly aged boys [human and other diverse Earth-resident humanoids] who mimicked Klingon warrior culture and dress and values, to the Dr’s distress. How could his “son” reject his heritage as a “member” of Earth’s peaceful utopian society?

My reaction was why would anyone seeking such behaviour modes automatically borrow from those of an alien society instead of their own ample cultural resources. Oh, wait, because you have memory wiped your civilization or morally condemned your entire past and all such behaviours and left them no resources. Also, it was kind of a backhanded insult to the Klingons to use a tawdry rip off of their culture as the chose vehicle for a bunch of teenage toughs. But what can you do? Klingons wouldn’t lower themselves to file a complaint.

Sometimes the upper and under types are doing the same sorts of things separately and unaware of one another, sure, but sometimes they are quite, ahem, intermingled in personnel, assignments, and venues.

Some times and places that has likely even generated a bit of mutual sympathy. Sometimes it even generates one of the many political forms of high and low versus middle. Usually that’s upper class and respectable workers against middle class and managers, but sometimes it’s upper class rallying the most degraded of the peasantry and mob to arms to suppress the bourgeois or equivalent.

But there’s also an element of superficiality to it in a society that’s still minimally healthy. The upper class rake slumming in the actual slums trying to play Dorian Gray doesn’t actually think he’s a member and still has a certain contempt for his surroundings. Sebastian Flyte dying in Tangier knows he failed to live up to something. These days that last saving grace, arrogance or shame is gone.

I don’t know if it’s cited in any of the classical Roman historians, or if so which one(s), or if it’s just one of the calumnies leveled by the more moralizing of them, but modern literature has the idea of Roman matrons messing about with gladiators and slaves. TV shows didn’t make it up, at least.

Of course, they would be high ranking wives and daughters who had already produced children, or who knew what precautions or postcautions to use, who if it came to the painful [and dangerous] consequence for the dumber ones would at least have no compunction about disposing of the child in a society that sanctioned such things. And likely had female kin support lined up to help and guide. Or they might be old enough to worry less about it and were just applying the [more limited than the male] rights and discretion of the female senior family members over male property. Just like their husbands or fathers would do with male or female property.

How common that really was is another question. Can’t imagine it never happened. The Romans were still humans. There would naturally be some requirement for the males in senior positions [the husband, the male head of the family if it was not him] to tolerate this sort of behaviour, for whatever reasons of their own. THeir concern would naturally involve ensuring no risk of polluting the household with slave offspring, I should think. Or any other male’s offspring really.

Of course there is also somewhere in the record the idea that some upper class women were looking for gladiators specifically to father children on them. Can’t imagine what was in that for their husbands and fathers, so curious how real that phenomenon was and how carefully managed.

And of course probably none of those women ever imagined ever ending up in a medium to long term relationship with a gladiator or slave, or any situation other than intermittent controlled encounters. And would have had some resources to order other males to repay any misbehaviour by said slave tenfold. Nothing like an upper class woman hooking up long term with a violent underclass male today. I can’t imagine any Roman woman of the upper classes would have either thought she could get away with that [her family's men would put paid to it] or would have been dumb enough not to anticipate the consequences of being long in the power of such a man.

We are a stupid, stupid people.

Prussia gets a bad rap because of stereotypes. The reality is quite different–If you want to get a more balanced view of it all, go back and look at the history of where the Finns learned the art of modern war. The story of the Jaakari, who formed the basis of the modern Finnish Army, is an interesting one:

http://www.alternativefinland.com/the-jaakarit-and-their-place-in-the-finnish-army/

That’s part of the reality of Prussia, and you can argue quite effectively that part of the Prussian military tradition led to the later developments of the Sturmtruppen, who effectively created most of our modern infantry tactics centered on decentralized leadership and tactics. The image of the lock-step Prussian militarist isn’t at all accurate–Much of the German military tradition for initiative and low-level leadership came out of the Prussians. von Lettow-Vorbeck was a Prussian through-and-through, and he was one of the few high-ranking Germans that told Hitler to go piss up a rope when the Nazis came calling to have him join the regime in order to lend it some legitimacy.

The whole “Prussian militarist” thing is a stereotype that ought to have you calling most stereotypes into question, due to the inaccuracy. Remember that most of the plotters against Hitler were Prussian aristocrats, and that von Stauffenberg was one of those “Prussian militarists” everyone is so horrified about. They weren’t perfect people, by any means, but they also weren’t the monsters that popular imagination has them as, either.

Interesting point for someone to spend some time researching, BTW, is the whole “light infantry” movement in Europe, of which the Jaegers were only one example of. There were also the Bersaglieri in Italy, the Chasseurs a Pied (and, Alpin…) in France, and the Rifles in Great Britain. Fascinating stuff to research, and since they were the mostly-unknown rootstock for much of our modern infantry tactics, well worth the effort of looking up. I wish there were more material for them, but nobody really gives a rip about these things, in general–It’s more interesting to learn about guns, tanks, and ships than the men who use them.