Bullfighting can be considered a martial art right?

[Syn7]

lol good point. im lucky to live in oregon we have so many local farms, many of which are completely organic, sustainable businesses, and humane, you can actually buy good food, from meat to vegitables and fruits, at will any day of the week.

bow hunters are like rambo. all awesome

yeah we got a lot of that here too... like ALOT.... lots of those pick your own veggie farms too... and farmers markets like crazy.... everyday... i think we send out more than we bring in... pound for pound that is, and im talking real food, not oreos and sh!t like that... things that may very well be edible, but arent what i consider food...

[goju]

as a spaniard (well half spaniard from my mams side) i find bull fighting idiotic because the animal is considered a national symbol of sorts in many parts. it would be like americans having monthly bald eagle hunts.

[Syn7]

as a spaniard (well half spaniard from my mams side) i find bull fighting idiotic because the animal is considered a national symbol of sorts in many parts. it would be like americans having monthly bald eagle hunts.

yeah i always wondered why americans chose the eagle as one of its symbols... the eagle is rome, it was rome for a long long time... so for them to adopt the same logo yet wanting to be so different from the old ways, to set up a new and more righteous republic, seems odd to me... why chose such a roman symbol??? why not use something new and more suited to the difference they were supposed to be... it was a place where all, in theory, were to be treated fair... thats not how rome was... they may have been more multicultural for the time but "real" romans were always head and shoulders above the "new" romans... and it was alot worse than how "new" americans dont get the same fair shake that "real" americans get... it was pretty unfair 2200 years ago during the republic, which was arguably the best rome... the time in the republic, well before the empire, when things were more ideal than what it later became...

[SoCo KungFu]

yeah i always wondered why americans chose the eagle as one of its symbols... the eagle is rome, it was rome for a long long time... so for them to adopt the same logo yet wanting to be so different from the old ways, to set up a new and more righteous republic, seems odd to me... why chose such a roman symbol??? why not use something new and more suited to the difference they were supposed to be... it was a place where all, in theory, were to be treated fair... thats not how rome was... they may have been more multicultural for the time but "real" romans were always head and shoulders above the "new" romans... and it was alot worse than how "new" americans dont get the same fair shake that "real" americans get... it was pretty unfair 2200 years ago during the republic, which was arguably the best rome... the time in the republic, well before the empire, when things were more ideal than what it later became...

The eagle has been used symbolically in cultures on just about every continent; Chinese, Japanese, Indians, Romans, Greeks before them, various native American tribes. Its been used in multiple religions. Why do you automatically link it to Romans? Everyone has used it. The bald eagle specifically is used because its native to North America. And its better than a turkey.

[Sihing73]

The bald eagle specifically is used because its native to North America. And its better than a turkey.

Ah yes, but old Ben Franklin wanted to use the Wild Turkey. Wild Turkeys are pretty wily and smart unlike the domesticated ones. Kind of like the American Male in many ways...................you decide which one I am comparing the American Male to, the Wild or Domestic Turkey

[Syn7]

just study the seals... its roman, like all the western eagles after rome... it looks roman, not chinese... and one could argue that most if not all eagles used after rome in europe are because of rome... rome was a big deal... the biggest deal so far... HUGE influence on everything western... it makes sense that the old nobility would slowly crawl on their bellies to the new world and insinuate themselves... keep playing their game of class warfare that new americans were supposed to be escaping... ive never studied the american eagles reasons for being... but i know rome pretty well... and that eagle is roman...


that reminds me tho... i am downloading a documentary called rome, the lost city of china... i have no idea what thats gonna be like... i just liked the title...


and yeah, why not a wild turkey???














Napoleonic eagle.






these are all very roman eagles used in seals or used as standards...
they even use latin... its roman man... very very roman... i could post pics for days... and this just from a few minutes on wiki, not even real research...

[goju]

The national bird of the United StatesThe Bald Eagle is the national bird of the United States of America. It appears on most of its official seals, including the Seal of the President of the United States.[42] The Continental Congress adopted the current design for the Great Seal of the United States including a Bald Eagle grasping thirteen arrows and a thirteen-leaf olive branch with its talons on June 20, 1782.[43][44] The founders of the United States were fond of comparing their new republic with the Roman Republic, in which eagle imagery was prominent.


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

[SoCo KungFu]

Wikipedia leaves a bit to be desired. You have to get deeper into the iconography. The olive branch dates back to the Greeks not the Romans. The only thing specifically Roman other than the latin (which practically every European country has been influenced by) is the eagle grasping the lightning bolt, which is very distinctly pre-Christian Roman. That concept has been imitated in other seals, but its not a completely Roman depiction. And its not all about the seals. The neo-classical design of the more prominent government buildings have more in common with the Greeks than the Romans. Of particular influence was the Parthenon. The deviation that is more Romanticized is the use of Corinthian columns externally, which the Greeks reserved for internal building structures.

It only makes sense though that most gov buildings are designed with a Greek influence since the form of government used today found its roots in the Greek city states, the Roman republic took that idea and spread it out further. And Rome having the greatest military of the ancient world, of course the military (which is where you most often see the eagle clutching random object be it lightning, missile, etc) would influence military symbolism. The pres, ie. Commander in Chief, is you know the highest position of military authority (and most presidents actually served at some point although that's becoming less common, and I don't count Bush's stint in national guard, that's a vacation).

But then culturally you have a much more muddied picture. In typical life I would say that traditionally the eagle to more Americans had a connection to native cultural aspects than to the Greeks or Romans. That's changed a lot though now that the demographics of the country have changed. Now I would say its more of an "American" (in other words, a lack of connection to anything else) than a connection to any previous culture.

[SoCo KungFu]

And if you really want to get technical one could make an argument that the Romans stole the idea from the Egyptians, Persians and other eastern cultures in their time. All of which had been around long before the Romans were even a blip on a map. The seals were not originally eagles, those are Phoenixes. The symbolism is in that like the Phoenix, Rome rose from the ashes of Troy. The early accounts of Phoenix in writing were influenced by Hinduism, Garuda is what I think they called it.

When it began to appear on Roman gold coins, it had been made more raptor-like in appearance.

And the Romans were weird about their mythology anyways. You have a group of people that for the better part of their history hated the idea of a king or dictator, yet at the same time clung to the myth of their creation and named their country after the first king....

[Syn7]

you know i agree, rome did take it from egypt... but the states werent emulating egyptians...

dude... that is a roman eagle thru and thru...

its an interesting discussion... if it wasnt 6am i'd be right into it... i'll come back tho... i have lots more...

[Syn7]

The national bird of the United StatesThe Bald Eagle is the national bird of the United States of America. It appears on most of its official seals, including the Seal of the President of the United States.[42] The Continental Congress adopted the current design for the Great Seal of the United States including a Bald Eagle grasping thirteen arrows and a thirteen-leaf olive branch with its talons on June 20, 1782.[43][44] The founders of the United States were fond of comparing their new republic with the Roman Republic, in which eagle imagery was prominent.


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

i dont have an issue with emulating the republic, its the period after octavian that we really want to avoid... the republic was a great idea... its only real downfall was the majority of its nobility and their belief that rome was theirs to squeeze... but there was that small percentage who believed in a rome greater than themselves and they did great things...

and even tho i agree with most of what he did, we can blame it all in gaius julius caesar(which does not freakin spell ceaser) he was so talented that he made everyone around him seem like a tard... that ****ed off too many people... well, that and the fact that he was giving away "rights" of the 1st and 2nd class to the 5th and headcount...

[Syn7]

if you have the time, show me some pictures of non roman or roman influenced eagles that look like a roman eagle... i know its hard to find pics of things that are over 2000 years old, but i saw a few in my quick search... shoulda posted them too, if only to show the difference...



oh and just to be clear... im not and was never saying that rome was the first to use the eagle... im saying the american seal is a distinctly roman eagle...

ok i'll find more pics later... pics are better than words in this case...

[SoCo KungFu]

Relatively flattened relief, symmetry, juxtaposition of head (2nd pic), stylization in detail. So I suppose natives are in the hand of the romans too?

I didn't say it wasn't a roman depiction. In fact I both said it was, and gave the reasons why. I also outlined a number of elements which were in fact, not roman. You're trying to look at one thing and paste it all across our entire library of symbolism. Fact is culturally, we draw just as much from natives as we do greeks/romans, probably more so. We just happen to follow a gov pattern of which finds roots established in the time of those civilizations (and our artwork pertaining to that government reflects this). And for the record, in a lot of ways, so do you. As does a large part of Europe...

What I find interesting is that you from the onset seem, in more than one thread, to feel the need to attack everything associated with our country and seek to find the negativity in all aspects. You're makin a stink over a piece of artwork for crying out loud. I could be wrong, but this is the impression you give off. And if I remember right I'm not the first to notice, I think Drake made a similar such comment once before.

I suppose I should ask, why do Canadians still pay homage to a monarchy that has had its hand in the oppression and decline of peoples in practically all continents of the modern world (N/S America, S Africa, Australia, Asia (India, China))? But do I automatically assume that cuz you have the queen on your seal that you serve to that subjugation? No. Although for all that you Canadians seem to like criticizing us Americans, the ones I've met in my times up north and the *******s I have to deal with 6 months out the year down south, yall are in no position to be getting high and mighty... Just sayin.

Why do we use the eagle? Its really simple. The bird clutching the bolt is roman origin, the olive branch is greek, the bald eagle itself is totally N. American and depicted in some way in just about every native tribe. And like pretty much every other civilization, we think its cool and noble. And its still better than a turkey...

[SoCo KungFu]

Greek coin


Historical flags, the first of which originates with Macedonia (early Greeks)
http://www.coconis.gr/english/historical.html

[SoCo KungFu]

And its still better than a turkey...

Except maybe