What's bad about making moral judgements about historical

>>2163625

And what exactly does it accomplish? It certainly doesn't explain their actions, as it would be bizarre in the extreme to assume that they would act according to a moral code that they themselves would not be familiar with and would not have practiced.

All it really lets you do is assert that your own code of morality is superior and thus allowing you a cheap sense of mastery over a long dead person who isn't there to defend himself or herself.

>>2163625

A pointless and futile exercise in judgement which adds nothing to the study of characters or events in history.

>>2163625
Because moral standards are relative. Things that we consider bad today might not have been considered bad in the past, and vice versa. Calling a certain king evil because he waged a war and conquered some land is just stupid and privileged. It was what literally everyone did, and if you didn't engage in it, then you would die, and that some guy 1000 years later thought that it was brave or whatever that you let yourself be killed is no consolation.

>>2163625
Because it makes no sense.
History is supposed to deal with facts, not whether a historical figure hurts your 2016 feelings.

>>2163625
>people seem to be adverse to the idea of holding up historical figures to a moral standard.
because every time it's been done before in the past it hasn't worked

you just call them pagans, rapists or whatever and then next century whoops it turns out that you were a racist or something