Mongol Trials

I personally enjoyed the Mongol trials. I liked having a class activity where even if someone came prepared they could be completely thrown off. I felt that I did not do as good as I could and should have. I regret allowing my team to keep my focus on genocide as a european knight and take all of the blame for that. I should have stepped up and told them to base my questions more on the kidnapping and terrorism aspects of the trial, as genocide does not generally work in the case of wars and battles. After the trial my feelings on the Mongols are completely mixed. I do think in some ways that they are not just crazed killers, but they are far more than common empire builders. I also want to admire their empire, but I can not help but think they were too aggressive. As far as the verdict in the trial I would say that the Mongols are guilty of kidnapping and terrorism, but the defenses points were far too weak to say the Mongols are guilty of genocide.

Genghis Khan: Crazy Killer, or Strategic Genius?

I see Genghis Khan as a strtegic genius more than a crazy killer. Do not get me wrong he was responsible for a lot of deaths, but they did serve to benefit him. Whenever he wanted to kill people, it was motivated killing, he did not just think to himself, "hey I really want to go kill all those people in the village over, that sounds fun", instead he thought, "those people are my enemies and I need to eliminate them while they are distracted so my people are ot harmed". Genghis was also brought up in a very brutal part of the world where it was normal to see death. Killing or harming people was a way to survive, so when he was plotting invasions to kill many people, it was not killing to kill, it was killing to survive. Also, I think if Genghis Khan was a psychotic man motivated by ending lives, he would have executed his former best friend when he was captured. Instead he could not even watch as the man he now called his greatest enemy, who had invaded him multiple times, was executed. Genghis Khan clearly used his killing methods strictly for strategy and not for some kind of sick pleasures.

Crusades Project

The crusades that my group chose were 3, 5, and 8. In the 3rd cusade Richard Lionhart was abandoned by his followers. When he attempts to attack the Muslims by himself I think the Muslims thought he was crazy. However the Muslims were willing to negotiate with him for the probable trade and new ideas that would result as a sort of prize for them. In the 5th crusade, the crusaders attempt to attack Egypt, although many of them die of heat stroke before even seeing battle. The Muslims view them as very insensible for this reason and they do not take the crusaders seriously. The 8th crusade is just a failure. The crusaders fall very quickly and by this point the Muslims are just annoyed by the crusaders' attempts.

Crusade Project Progress

All of the finished rage comics have been emailed to everyone who took part in the meeting our group had on Sunday. I will be posting them with my personal description of each one shortly. However I have opted not to do the children's crusade anymore.

Crusade Project Progress

Today I decided to collaborate with Joe Greeley, Steven Hong, Derek DeCastro, Josh Rosenberg, and Keval Kapadia. We chose to work on crusades 3, 5, and 8. We are planning on making several rage comics to voice our opinions.

Diwali

Throughout this year we have studied both India and Hinduism, and Diwali is the major holiday celebrated in India and by Hindus. It is the celebration of good's triumph over evil, and the celebration ranges depending on the luni-solar Hindu calendar.