Nerds Republic

While people absolutely adore fighting on social media about issues of social justice, Facebook fights in general are notorious for being full of opinions and totally devoid of actual information. Arguments about feminism are no different. I’m in not here to impose opinions, but let’s have a look at some facts.

There’s really no denying that lady life has been rough for centuries. While you might think that feminism is about setting bras on fire and braiding armpit hair, it’s really about barring absolutely insane laws like these from existing in any way, shape, or form. Here are eight activities that were illegal for women to do in recent history…and some that women around the world still can’t do today.

1. Opening a line of credit.

In the ’60s, women had to have two things if they wanted to open a line of credit: good financial standing, and a husband. Most banks refused to give credit cards to single women. Fortunately, people removed their heads from…well…you know where in 1974, when the practice became illegal.

2. Serving on a jury.

Until the ’70s, many states denied women the right to serve on juries because evidently, the people who pushed watermelon-sized masses out of pinholes while their pelvises separated were “too frail” to handle the gory details of criminal activity. Following the 1974 ruling that women without husbands could handle using credit cards, 1975 legislation made it illegal to ban women from sitting on juries based on sex alone.

3. Taking oral contraceptives to actually avoid conception.

The pill was created in 1957, but was only intended to fix “extreme menstrual distress.” It was approved for contraceptive use in 1960, but if you weren’t married, you weren’t getting a prescription. Doctors were mostly men back then, which meant that dudes were regulating women’s sex lives. Sounds familiar.

4. Working while pregnant.

Until 1978, it was legal for employers to fire pregnant women. Thankfully, the Pregnancy Discrimination Act later became a thing. Today, employers respond on the opposite end of the spectrum by giving pregnant women in America the lousiest maternity leave in the developed world. Huzzah!

These might sound archaic, but women around the world still face bizarre legislative injustice today. Check out these little bundles of crazy, for example.

5. Driving a car.

Women in Saudi Arabia cannot drive cars, because officials say that women behind the wheel “undermine social values,” which is an idea that makes about as much sense to me as astrophysics would to a hamster.

6. Serving as a witness.

In Yemen, women aren’t recognized as full people in a court of law. Even if a woman agrees to testify in a case, a man has to back up her testimony. Lawmakers might think that women are half human, but the people who came up with that nonsense are all stupid.

7. Voting.

Women cannot vote in the Vatican City. While women could not vote in Saudi Arabia for centuries, they were finally granted suffrage in 2015. That means that the Vatican City is uniquely screwed up, and is the only country that bars women from voting to this day. Hey, Pope Francis. You’re a progressive guy. Let’s get on that, shall we?

8. Shopping.

Women in Pakistan aren’t allowed to shop during Ramadan in July. Just like people shame girls in school for, like, having shoulders and legs, legislators in Pakistan say that this has to be the law because men will get too distracted. Original, Pakistan. Real original.

(via The Telegraph / All Day)

Again, have your opinions. That’s fine. But let’s try to avoid doing that whole “denying women the right to speak about their lived experience” thing. It’s even less cool than not being able to drive a car for no apparent reason.

We’re all familiar with what a nickel looks like, right?

But what about a “Hobo Nickel”?

What, you might ask, is a “Hobo Nickel”? Because of the softness of the metals used in nickels (copper and nickel), people have been carving the money up for decades.

Since the 1700s, people have been creatively modifying the faces of coins.

Nickels are popular, but other denominations, such as pennies and quarters, have also been transformed.

Because of the low cost and small nature of the coins, homeless men and women have come to use them for currency, hence the name!

Nowadays, people uses the coins for more artistic purposes, like this necklace.

Designs range from intricately delicate to creepy-cool.

Before you complain that this is illegal, it should be noted that these pieces are made just for artistic enjoyment, so defacing the coins, in this case at least, will not land you any jail time.

If you’d like to try your hand at making your own “Hobo Nickel,” check out this cool tutorial.

Have you ever wondered how much the stuff in thrift stores is actually worth? I mean, if it’s that cheap, it can’t be that valuable, right?

Wrong. Sure, there’s a bunch of junk floating around in thrift stores, but some of it is worth a ton of money. Just ask the guy who picked up a picture for $2 that ended up being worth millions.

Randy Guijarro purchased this picture for $2 at a thrift store because he thought it looked cool.

As far as he was concerned, it probably wasn’t worth much.

But then he found out that this is one of the only photos of Billy the Kid.

It’s actually a picture of the famous outlaw and some of his gang members playing croquet in 1878.

The photo’s authenticity has been verified by historians, and it’s valued at roughly $5,000,000.

There was a lot of bang in those two bucks.

(via Where Cool Things Happen)

Hundreds of people love browsing thrift stores, and after hearing about this, I might start thrifting myself. Okay, probably not. I’m pretty sure that this type of thing doesn’t happen very often.

Social media is a blessing and a curse. On one hand, it lets us connect with people all over the world and stay in touch with the friends and relatives we might otherwise lose contact with. On the other, it can be a terrifying swamp of embarrassing photos and oversharing. But there’s one thing that it surprisingly isn’t. And that’s new.

How can social media not be new? How can it not require the Internet? In fact, analogue versions of LinkedIn and Facebook have been around for centuries. They existed in the form of paper books called alba amicorum, in which people collected messages and images from friends and colleagues. They’ve been around for hundreds of years. Dutch historian Sophie Reinders studies these fascinating pieces of history.

These books were used by young men and women in Northern Europe to record and keep track of friendships and professional relationships.

The practice is thought to have begun in about 1560.

Alba amicorum literally means “friend book” in Latin.

These books were used by both boys and girls, but because of how society functioned in the 1600s, they used them for different reasons.

Boys were routinely sent on tours of Europe to study at famous universities and institutions, and to meet with great thinkers and scholars. They used their friend books kind of like the way we use LinkedIn — as a way of gaining professional connections.

These images come from the book of Michael van der Meer, who recorded his travels with impressive illustrations.

Some images depict members of the aristocracy.

And he apparently spent time with pretty ladies.

This might be an early version of the “It’s Complicated” relationship option.

While boys toured the continent, girls were usually sent to spend time in convents or to serve as ladies-in-waiting, which helped them break into the best social circles. They didn’t travel much, but they still used friend books.

Instead of notes from scientists and artists, the girls’ books were filled with correspondences between friends and admirers, inside jokes, and detailed accounts of social events. If the boys’ books were like LinkedIn, then the girls’ were like Facebook.

Juliana de Roussel’s friend book was beautifully decorated as well.

This one belonged to Jacoba Cornelia Bolten, who was a socialite during that time period.

These books are striking in their similarity to Facebook — it’s just that the technology was a bit different. Pictures were drawn, and instead of sharing articles, they wrote down their favorite proverbs, song lyrics, and poems. Many women even wrote their own poetry.

Married couples could also “update their status” by writing a joint note. (That’s right. Joint social media was a nauseating problem back then, too.)

Pages like this one from Margaretha Haghen’s book show guests recounting their time at a party.

One passage reads, “In Shrovetide, on day two / We guests wrote this for you / And could not leave for home / So tipsy we’d become / Love made us so besotted / We left nothing in the bottle.” I guess things haven’t really changed that much.

(via MessyNessyChic)

These networks between people help historians develop a clearer picture of what life was really like during this time period. From the connections in their books, they can even piece together 400-year-old relationships.

Next time you want to complain about those darn kids on Facebook, remember that people have been posting silly things for hundreds of years. You can learn more about them on Reinders’ website, and through the National Library of the Netherlands’ digitized collection of books.

Paris’ Pere Lachaise cemetery is the final resting place of some very influential people, including Oscar Wilde, Edith Piaf, and Jim Morrison, as well as countless others. Like other cemeteries, it’s full of heartfelt memorials and classic grave markers.

There is, however, one exception to the traditional rule, and it’s one that’s been causing giggles for the past 140 or so years. It’s the grave of journalist Victor Noir, who died in a duel in 1870 and whose death had political repercussions throughout the country. And whoever created it made some very interesting stylistic choices.

This is Victor Noir.

He’s happy to see you.

The grave, which shows Noir at the moment of his death, lying on the ground in street clothes, is famous for the very noticeable bulge in his pants.

It’s not clear why this was done. Was it a reference to Noir’s…active social life? We’ll likely never know.

What we do know, however, is that in the years after his death, Noir’s grave became a fertility symbol to Parisian women.

It’s believed that touching or rubbing Noir’s bulge and kissing the statue on the lips, then leaving a flower in the upturned top hat, will guarantee fertility, childbirth, and a good sex life.

Because of this, the face and crotch of the statue show considerable wear, having been rubbed shiny by countless hands — and who knows what else.

Although, because of the wear, it kind of just looks like an unfortunate stain.

In 2004, a fence was erected (ahem) around the statue to prevent these kinds of goings-on, but it was removed by popular demand.

And people still visit Noir to this day for a little quality time.

(via Messy Nessy Chic)

If you happen to visit this famous cemetery, stop by the grave of Victor Noir. He’s always happy to have visitors. Let’s keep the inappropriate acts to a minimum, though.

In the early 1900s, English colonizers discovered a strange new animal which resembled the horses they knew back home, but with a dash of pizzazz: the zebra. They were, of course, intrigued by their new equine findings and set out to domesticate the wild animals for transportation.

As you probably noticed, due to the lack of documentation in history books, the attempt didn’t really take off. Though zebras do share a lot in common with their horse cousins, and have added benefits like a resistance to diseases carried by tsetse flies, they simply couldn’t be completely tamed.

But you can’t say it’s for lack of trying. These historical photos provide a glimpse of what you might have seen on your commute back in the day.

Imagine your cabbie rolling up with one of these fellas.

Just your average traffic jam in 1935.

“I could do this in my sleep.”

This is how Dr. Rosendo Ribeiro took house calls in Kenya.

Adventure seeker Osa Johnson always kept it classy in black-and-white, shown here in 1924.

This was taken around 1930 in Calcutta, India.

“So, what’re you in for?”

Walter Rothschild made sure the royals took notice when he rode up to Buckingham Palace.

A couple of soldiers from Germany’s calvary of colonial force in East Africa, 1911.

It is kind of a bummer that it didn’t work out. How cool would it be to ride one of these to your office? It’s almost like they were the snazzy new sports car of the early 20th century.

Of course, we’re also grateful they weren’t able to be tamed because otherwise we wouldn’t be able to see them in all their wild glory.