Defeated People

Some time ago I started an entry here on "defeated people", but because it seemed so negative, which was not my intent, I never published it.

It wasn't intended to be at all. Rather, the thread intended to look into the "post defeat" lives of the defeated.  We so rarely do that, but generally, people pick themselves up and move on.   But rarely does anyone look at that.  One of the reasons I so liked Cornelius Ryan's book is that he always included an appendix in his book listing where the principle individuals he interviewed now were, which was often illuminating.  Even badly defeated people often got back up on their feet and carried on.

This past week, as anyone who might stumble past this blog, I was in Alaska.  And in the course of that, stumbled across a community of Old Believers.  No matter what else a person might think of them, they're champions in this category as they've persevered against the odds, and defeat, for centuries. This caused me to reconsider adding this as a topic, rather than a single thread, so I'm going to add it as an occasionally recurring topical feature.