› added 5 years ago

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TIL that in Germany, and some other countries, there's no punishment for escaping prison. Their law consider it's a basic human instinct to want to escape, so no extra time is added to the initial sentence if no other laws are broken in order to escape.

AELg TIL Steven Spielberg initially considered filming Schindler’s List entirely in German and Polish, but decided he “wanted people to watch the images, not read subtitles. There’s too much safety in reading. It would have been an excuse to take their eyes off the screen and watch something else.”
J1B9l TIL that during World War II, US Army Lieutenant Colonel Cohen was selected by General Patton to organize a raid to rescue Patton's son-in-law from a German camp; Cohen was prevented from leading the raid due to hemorrhoids. Patton personally examined Cohen and remarked, "that is some sorry ass."
nWeWr TIL that in 1965, artist Andy Warhol made an 8-hour, B&W silent film called “Empire” that consisted of one stationary shot of the Empire State Building. It had no characters or narrative, and Warhol stated that the purpose of the film was “to see time go by.”
ve1r TIL that in 2001, an LA artist impersonated a Caltrans worker, forged an invoice, used a hidden ladder, and installed his own freeway sign in the presence of another highway crew. Nobody noticed, he was never charged, and the sign remained for over eight years.
BQMW TIL that the Canadian military tortured a young man to death in Somalia in 1993. In response to this incident the Canadian government and military disbanded the entire branch of their military (Airborne command) that had committed the act.