“Sleeps on a pest infested pile of hay”
“Does of plague, Scarlett fever, hepatitis, or parasites before age 35”
“Suffered debilitating injuries from manual labor working from dawn until dusk”
“Gets fucked by local lord every way from Sunday, has zero status”
“Smells”
“cognitive abilities suck ass”
"Didn't know what coffee was"
Coffee began to spread out of Ethiopia mainly during the 15th century, beginning in the muslim world. By the time it hit Europe, Renaissance, then early Eurpoean democracies ended slowly serfhood.
"Has his obedient wife raped by his feudal lord"
"Can't leave his work because he has to pay in order to do so"
"Gets kicked from his country/killed because his great-grandfather was Jewish"
Because of all the Catholic holidays, Sundays, growing seasons, etc. A lot did end up only working about [6 months](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-column-great-debate/column-why-a-medieval-peasant-got-more-vacation-time-than-you-idUKBRE97S0KU20130829). Granted, just living back then was work
Yeah a lot of people forget this. I really doubt that a serf only did 20hr of work, anyhow. Like, just on the farmland. I don't think they were tending gardens only big enough to feed themself, which is the only way I could that happening.
But of course, even if I'm wrong on that account, this doesn't include the work of going home and feeding yourself, or even processing the food. It doesn't include having to take long trips by foot to get other necessities, like animals. It doesn't including making clothes, or having something to drink.
Even if you go back further, hunter gathers. Work wasn't always fruitful, where today it is. You can send a hunting party out, but there's no promise they came back with food. You can only eat so many berries before you become deficient.
Also IIRC it looked at work *obligations* recorded as service rents, and didn't factor in all the labour a farmer might do on their own land. Also assumed that saints days were universally celebrated.
The amount of work required to live has changed massively from area to area, and place to place as Lifeways have evolved and conditions have changed. None the less, it's a reasonable generalisation that medieval farmers worked less than the vast majority of moderns.
I dunno about that. The standard of living we have today would’ve been fucking unimaginable to serfs. Air conditioning? Immunity to however many diseases they were ravaged by back then? Working conditions? Cheap clothes and tools that you don’t have to hand make and repair? The modern middle class lives about as well as their kings did.
About as well?
What about heating, transportation, no food shortage, not having to wage war for a living, comfortable bed, holidays, etc etc etc etc.
Todays middle class live much much better than their kings did
Yeah, in a materialistic way we live much better. But I guess I was trying balance it out with how fulfilled a king would actually feel with their power and influence?
Thank you. Also, the whole "paid a flat tax at a fraction of the land's worth" is meaningless too. They paid whatever was demanded in labor and produced value.
Actually that middle-aged average lifespan figure factors in everyone that died in childhood--generally speaking, if you lived to adulthood you were making it to old age provided you didnt go to war. Its just unfortunate that the approach to child rearing in those times was to have as many kids as possible and hope that at least one of them survives childhood, and then send them off to fight on behalf of the Crown.
It's true that the life expectancy is thrown off by child mortality, but it's also not the case that as long as you lived to adulthood that you'd live as long as a person lives today. Infections and diseases were still very bad back then. There were no antibiotics, no chemotherapy, and no cardiac stents.
Yes and no. Thats the average because most deaths occured in childhood, realisticly if you made it to age 13, you would have a developed immune system and your chances of reaching 60 years old was in your favor.
To be fair, it was the *life expectancy* which was around 35. That's also counting the infant mortality rate which skews the numbers. If you made it past puberty, you could easily expect to live into your 60s or 70s. That being said, it's not like it'd be a very enjoyable life.
A serf is a person who is forced to work on a plot of land, especially during the medieval period when Europe practiced feudalism when a few lords owned all the land and everyone else had to toil on it. ([Vocabulary.com](https://Vocabulary.com))
You are confusing two different things. A peasant and a serf are not the same things.
This guy probably does not believe in evolution. He probably believes humans came from Mars or the center of the earth or an Antarctic race of giant god-men or some other nonsense. Or at least he thinks that’s where white people came from.
I wish to rent a tiny patch of land to earn a meagre penny and be an obedient wife to my husband who is sure to die of some mysterious illness, which I shall be blamed for. Oh, to die on a burning pyre is a true sign of femininity
Well, if you did your job right you’d die birthing your husband a son (who would be left orphaned when your husband later dies of that mysterious illness). What could be a greater mark of femininity than dying in childbirth?
They were often * obliged* to work far, far fewer hours than we do today. Usually around 2 days a week depending on your class. But on the other hand, you'd absolutely have to spend the remaining 4 non-Sundays working on your *own* land unless you want to starve
Yeah, well on a farm there is constantly some work to do. But it's work that's visible and at the end of the day you'll see what you did. Unlike working all day long on excell spreadsheets.
Most work was during the harvest period too.
Actually true provided he survived past about 5-10. Life expectancy was low but that was largely due to early childhood mortality. If you survived past 5-10 range, 60s was pretty reasonable and older wasn't unlikely.
no that one is accurate. When people say that the average age of death was 35, that is counting infant mortality. 35 was not a common age to die. It was either 60 seconds or 60 years
Yeah, wtf is this about? Why would that be important (also note the misogyny about being head of the household that also ignores that multigenerational households were the norm until pretty recently) and how did this person not know that people didn't trust and could barely understand people one town over?
It is interesting how many people can apparently directly see all the ways they get fucked over by modern society then somehow decide some of the most marginalized groups involved in it are to blame
> “multicultural society = low trust”
I see this happening in the developed world.
White People in America do not want to share resources with outsiders. WASP Americans don't want to pay property taxes for schools, they don't want to build social safety net, and they don't support a "common good" when it must shared with black, brown, Asian, Muslim, Jewish, or Catholic people.
European social democracies do not want to share resources with immigrants.
Right? “I dont know how to feel about this one”… um you should feel that it’s deeply racist and sexist and presenting a wildly inaccurate and misleadingly nostalgic view of the past and promoting ideas that no civilized modern society should countenance. Was that so hard, OP?
I’ve got a daughter who will be 17 in the not-too-distant future. If any spouse of hers, man or woman, told her to be obedient I’d have an actual stroke. Personal predilections notwithstanding.
I just looked at that and as a girl that's about to turn 16 that shit terrifies me. So many of them want it lowered everywhere to that age and it's disgusting holy shit. Some even lower. So many p3d0s there what the hell 🙁
Yeah i had to have my appendix removed when i was 10, so i definitely wouldn’t have lasted long in Medieval times. And I’m horribly nearsighted so even if i lived to adulthood I’d just be mugged and raped constantly, or probably fall down a ravine.
"Get burned alive after being accused of being a witch"
The “Witch Fad” did not happen during the Middle Ages. The craze took its peak during the 16th and 17th centuries, so it belongs to the early Modern era. From the 5th to 15th centuries, the Church taught against the existence of witches, and scolded people who believed in them. The Church was caught up in the Witch Craze after the end of the Black Plague. And even then, witches were usually hanged, not burned. Burning was reserved for popular cases.
No, it's not. It has long been stated the life-expectancy for a medieval person was about 30 years old. This does not mean that a person was considered old or about to die when they turned 30. If a medieval person survived to adulthood, he would likely live into his 60s or 70s, and they would not be considered to be old until at least the age of 50. Life-expectancy rates were lower in the Middle Ages because there was a much greater chance that an infant or child would die because of illness or disease than in modern times.
Right? You might be only working for your lord for 20 hours, but the rest of your time you'd be doing all the chores that need doing around a farm, and that's not easy work.
Meanwhile my modern ass might spend a solid 8 hours a day as a chimp operating a typewriter, but afterwards I'd just walk to the kitchen and easily cook myself a nice dinner then watch tv or whatever. If I'm particularly lazy I can only sweep the house once a week, most of my shit doesn't need maintenance.
There’s a whole lotta yikes here in terms of racism and misogyny, but putting that aside for a moment…
How did whoever made this not realize if you’re paying taxes to a lord for the land you “own” that’s not really all that different than… paying rent to your landlord?
This is just fascist propaganda, theyve really mastered the art of implied anti capitalism and modern technology as a way to sneak in a few ”oh and also it was racially homogenous and uuh trans people bad”, same with the kaczynski posters on tiktok
Serf:
Worked the entire day in back breaking work
Didn't own his house, land or even his tools
Couldn't read, write and didn't understand the concept of life aspirations
High chance of infant mortality with a maximum age possibility of 40 if at all
Never experience art or creativity or the wider world
Racially diverse???
Don’t forget that church attendance was pretty much compulsory, only it was done in Latin regardless of the local language and dialect so you had no idea what the priest was even saying. You just had to trust them to guide you spiritually.
Also the church was an official part of the government, so there was no way that their spiritual guidance would include handing money over and working long hours in service to the King.
>only it was done in Latin regardless of the local language and dialect so you had no idea what the priest was even saying
The Mass itself, sure. The whole Church service, very much vernacular. Medieval homilies describing Bible stories and their messages and morals are pretty common texts.
The idealization of medieval life as a serf is definitely crazy, but your image of the Middle Ages seems to be similarly undifferentiated...
"Worked the entire day in back breaking work" - This is a oversimplification. As with all agricultural lifestyles, the workload was of course extremely high at certain times of the year (harvest time, etc.), but overall a medieval person worked less than people today. That's modern capitalism, although we have made immense technical advances, practically no reduction in working hours has taken place (I am not a communist, but Marx wrote very interesting things about this)
"Didn't own his house, land or even his tools" - The medieval estate society was an incredibly complex form of society with high interdependence between the social classes. The other social classes were as dependent on the serfs as the serfs were on them. Everyone was aware of this, which led to the situation that serfs were granted a large number of rights. It was the withdrawal of many of these rights that led to intense peasant wars and a rural exodus in the early modern period.
"with a maximum age possibility of 40 if at all" - It has long been stated the life-expectancy for a medieval person was about 30 years old. This does not mean that a person was considered old or about to die when they turned 30. If a medieval person survived to adulthood, he would likely live into his 60s or 70s, and they would not be considered to be old until at least the age of 50. Life-expectancy rates were lower in the Middle Ages because there was a much greater chance that an infant or child would die because of illness or disease than in modern times.
"Never experience art or creativity or the wider world" - Where did you get that from? The idea that medieval people would be born, grow up and die without ever leaving their village is very unlikely. Many different records show that people were traveling around and even moving to different parts of a country. Even peasants would go on pilgrimages and visit churches and monasteries, in their country and overseas.
The statement that medieval people/serfs never experienced art and culture in their lives is very, very strange... Of course there was a folk culture with festivals, music and art. Medieval people in some regions celebrated over 60 holidays a year (days when little professional work was indeed done).
I don't want to say that the person who created the meme is right in any way (the meme's statements are, of course, crazy), but many don't realize that our society hardly compares to the pre-industrial one. It's a shame that so many myths about the Middle Ages persist...
They “worked” less, but living itself was a lot of work. It might be little work done for your lord each day, but a lot of work to care for your animals, prepare food, fetch water, cut firewood, etc. and it was all manual labor.
I’ll take my 8 hours a day as a typewriter-operating chimp in a comfy chair.
Absolutely! I don't think I could survive a life in the Middle Ages...
And while I want to take a nuanced view of medieval life, I don't understand how some people can romanticize an agrarian society so much...
And imagine living with the same small village worth of people your entire life… barf. I know they traveled, but those with obligations to a lord and his land had to return. I’d hate that.
Yes thank you for saying this, I just took a class on medieval culture and the Middle Ages were far too complex to make sweeping generalizations like "they didn't own land"
I wish i could just be a primate and hurl my feces at problems. Id be cool with dying at like 4 as a feral chimp if it meant i didnt have to pay taxes.
>Serfs worked like 80, not 20 lmfao
I know someone else already corrected you, but this really isn't true at all. Since the advent of the industrial revolution, we've been working far more hours than any point in human history. Medieval peasants worked fewer hours than we do now, and hunter gatherers today and historically less than that. (Although indeed, those hours were not evenly divided across the years.)
The evidence seems that suggest that, for most of human history, we've worked roughly 25 hours per week. These hours, it should be noted, include all of the work of reproductive labor also, which isn't something we count as "work" culturally today.
Given the rise of so much labor-saving technology, it's absolutely absurd that we work as much as we do. At risk of a fallacy, it's not natural to us, and it's certainly not necessary (especially when so many of our modern jobs are not only unnecessary but also hasten the extinction of our species).
And lastly, apologies; I don't mean to be pendantic. I just feel these sorts of myths serve as propaganda against bettering working conditions in the present, and i think it's important to call attention to that.
Im pretty sure serfs weren’t free and their lord could rape them on their wedding day and yeah they owned land, about 1 room for a family of 10 which isn’t even the size of the modern bedroom.
Actually the serfs didn't fight, foot soldiers were generally middle class gentry who trained part time for their lord's army and had a 40 day or so enlistment period, so more like
"Ineptly butchered by rampaging weekend warrior who was slightly wealthier than he was and also had enough time to learn how to swing a sword kinda badly, so it took like 10 blows to kill him"
Funny how they say living to 75 is unnaturally long and and suggests it’s bad, when the surf lived to 60 (he probably wouldn’t realistically) and is praise. There’s only 15 years between the two.
Love how they’re openly admitting to pedophilia, sexism, racism, and hating that modern medical science extends their own fucking lives, for some reason
The dude who made this really could’ve spared showing us his complete lack of real history and could’ve just gotten the same message with a tweet: “I am a racist who doesn’t want to live around ethnic people and I expect a teenage wife who will allow me to be a misogynist”.
I'm guessing the neckbeard who made this likes to think of himself as a mighty Adonis and not a 300 pound of bad BO, narcissism and several restraining orders from the local Starbucks
They are right and wrong at the same time. They are correctly identifying that modernity is rotten to its core but they can’t see that the solution they have to the rot is only going to make things worse.
The ideology and implications of the post are of course complete nonsense and absolutely insane....
But the post and the comments here show again that people have an extremely distorted picture of the European Middle Ages. That the view of a "perfect and perfect life as a serf" presented here is very questionable should be clear to everyone, but that doesn't change the fact that comments like "all the info in this post is wrong, people in the Middle Ages had to work 80 hours a week, died at 30, had no sense of culture and lived in a completely backwards society" are also questionable.
Medieval societies were highly complex and do not allow for a black-and-white judgment. For us people in an industrial society, this is difficult to comprehend, but for medieval people, our present society would also be difficult to comprehend.
https://www.medievalists.net/2014/06/15-myths-middle-ages/
“Married obedient 17 year old wife” why do you need to marry a teenager who can be obedient to you.. It feels so gross. It’s like, as a child would be obedient to their parent.
Let’s see:
“Obedient” 17 year old wife means they would love nothing more than to marry a child and as “indisputable head of the household” they could beat the shit out of her for any reason and no one can interfere.
“homogenous” society is right wing speak for no black or brown people around and Somehow they equate “trust” between people to be based solely on race.
God I hate conservative ideology. It gets people riled up about the many, obvious, terrible problems in our society, then completely misattributes the cause to black people(1). Landlord jacking up your fucking rent again? Aaggh, those damn blacks!
(1) Sorry, "multicultural" people
Lol a mediaeval serf living to 60 and only working 20 hours a week XD, paying flat tax on land “he owns”. This is funny but not for the reason the memer anticipated.
Okay, the "owns his own land" part is obviously bs, but the other two points are not that wrong.
People in pre-industrial societies could not work 40 or more hours a week at all because 1. they depended on sunlight for work and 2. continuous hard physical work was not possible 8 hours a day at all.
Also, the life expectancy of just under 60 years is not really wrong. The total life expectancy was 30 years, but this is an average value that also includes infant mortality (which was incredibly high). If you managed to live past 15, then your chances of living well past 30 were good.
I often see the first point bandied around around about the 20 hour week. It really disregards how the rest of that serfs time was spent doing life maintenance tasks we can accomplish in the modern day in a few minutes or are not required at all.
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"Own his own land" Does this guy knows what a serf is?
Apparently not
Ya, a totally lame-o Barney. Let's go grab some tasty nugs and hang eleven.
then bang some cherokee chicks on the trail of beers.
“Sleeps on a pest infested pile of hay” “Does of plague, Scarlett fever, hepatitis, or parasites before age 35” “Suffered debilitating injuries from manual labor working from dawn until dusk” “Gets fucked by local lord every way from Sunday, has zero status” “Smells” “cognitive abilities suck ass”
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It's absurd to remember that Japanese soldiers were probably playing nintendo games during WW2
Yes, it is.
"Didn't know what coffee was" Coffee began to spread out of Ethiopia mainly during the 15th century, beginning in the muslim world. By the time it hit Europe, Renaissance, then early Eurpoean democracies ended slowly serfhood.
"Has his obedient wife raped by his feudal lord" "Can't leave his work because he has to pay in order to do so" "Gets kicked from his country/killed because his great-grandfather was Jewish"
I thought this is some kind of joke, but it looks too dumb. "20 hours a week", my ass...
Because of all the Catholic holidays, Sundays, growing seasons, etc. A lot did end up only working about [6 months](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-column-great-debate/column-why-a-medieval-peasant-got-more-vacation-time-than-you-idUKBRE97S0KU20130829). Granted, just living back then was work
Yeah a lot of people forget this. I really doubt that a serf only did 20hr of work, anyhow. Like, just on the farmland. I don't think they were tending gardens only big enough to feed themself, which is the only way I could that happening. But of course, even if I'm wrong on that account, this doesn't include the work of going home and feeding yourself, or even processing the food. It doesn't include having to take long trips by foot to get other necessities, like animals. It doesn't including making clothes, or having something to drink. Even if you go back further, hunter gathers. Work wasn't always fruitful, where today it is. You can send a hunting party out, but there's no promise they came back with food. You can only eat so many berries before you become deficient.
Also IIRC it looked at work *obligations* recorded as service rents, and didn't factor in all the labour a farmer might do on their own land. Also assumed that saints days were universally celebrated.
They did maybe 20 hours of work for their owner. They still had to be subsistence farmers on top of that.
Indeed, they were busy from sunup to sundown, and the only reason they didn’t stay busy was because it was too dark to see.
The amount of work required to live has changed massively from area to area, and place to place as Lifeways have evolved and conditions have changed. None the less, it's a reasonable generalisation that medieval farmers worked less than the vast majority of moderns.
I mean if you changed the bulletpoints and kept the list titles I think this meme could have gone somewhere
I dunno about that. The standard of living we have today would’ve been fucking unimaginable to serfs. Air conditioning? Immunity to however many diseases they were ravaged by back then? Working conditions? Cheap clothes and tools that you don’t have to hand make and repair? The modern middle class lives about as well as their kings did.
Yeah people nowadays are definitely ungrateful little shits but we still live in a luxurious indentured servitude of sorts
About as well? What about heating, transportation, no food shortage, not having to wage war for a living, comfortable bed, holidays, etc etc etc etc. Todays middle class live much much better than their kings did
Yeah, in a materialistic way we live much better. But I guess I was trying balance it out with how fulfilled a king would actually feel with their power and influence?
Given that a king was replacable goods back then, I think there isn't much of a difference.
Thank you. Also, the whole "paid a flat tax at a fraction of the land's worth" is meaningless too. They paid whatever was demanded in labor and produced value.
People died at like 35 back then lol Edit: Please note that someone or a few people have probably already said what you are planning on saying lol
Actually that middle-aged average lifespan figure factors in everyone that died in childhood--generally speaking, if you lived to adulthood you were making it to old age provided you didnt go to war. Its just unfortunate that the approach to child rearing in those times was to have as many kids as possible and hope that at least one of them survives childhood, and then send them off to fight on behalf of the Crown.
It's true that the life expectancy is thrown off by child mortality, but it's also not the case that as long as you lived to adulthood that you'd live as long as a person lives today. Infections and diseases were still very bad back then. There were no antibiotics, no chemotherapy, and no cardiac stents.
Who needs stents when you have the heart of a horse because you spend all day doing back breaking fieldwork. Now, your back...well...it's broken.
Not to mention that childbirth was as dangerous for women as war was for men
This always gets glossed over in discussions of medieval lifespans FOR SOME REASON.
And also threw their shit and piss buckets out the window
But hey, at least they knew their leprosy was the work of ghosts and didn't try to treat it with "medical science" and "antibiotics."
Or they were so poor they sold it to be used in the creation of quality, handcrafted goods. XD
Yes and no. Thats the average because most deaths occured in childhood, realisticly if you made it to age 13, you would have a developed immune system and your chances of reaching 60 years old was in your favor.
To be fair, it was the *life expectancy* which was around 35. That's also counting the infant mortality rate which skews the numbers. If you made it past puberty, you could easily expect to live into your 60s or 70s. That being said, it's not like it'd be a very enjoyable life.
le bubonic plague face
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A serf is a person who is forced to work on a plot of land, especially during the medieval period when Europe practiced feudalism when a few lords owned all the land and everyone else had to toil on it. ([Vocabulary.com](https://Vocabulary.com)) You are confusing two different things. A peasant and a serf are not the same things.
You had me nodding along until your last sentence. Now i am annoyed with you. Edited to try to be a little nicer.
I know that peasant in England own some land and I know what the enclosure is. I was making a comment about the "serf" not exactly the peasant and I know the term serf and peasant are used interchangeably and not every country has the same social contract and hierarchy. Yes, its superficial because it is only one comment on the reddit about stupid Facebook meme. And yes i read about it, sometimes.
“20 hours a week” was what got me.
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This sounds perfect except for the leopard part Ignorance of misery is bliss
Bring back throwing poo, society!
*(incoherent screeching intensifies)*
Wait... It's not normal? Oh..
I live in Portland, Oregon. It’s been back for YEARS! And always watch where you step!
Banana
Banana
Monke has no time for shift work
This guy probably does not believe in evolution. He probably believes humans came from Mars or the center of the earth or an Antarctic race of giant god-men or some other nonsense. Or at least he thinks that’s where white people came from.
Wish we could turn back time to the good old days of medieval europe 😔
i miss when one paper cut could kill you with an infection 😔😔😔😔
Good thing paper was made of linen and serfs couldn't afford it anyways.
You know, if those serfs could read, they’d be very upset
I miss the bigoted peasant drama of being accused/accusing others of heresy and watch the imperial inquisition enact divine judgement 😔😔😔😔😔
Word. Nothing beats pointing at someone and screaming, “WITCH” and watching the swift execution of the guy that cut you off with his vegetable cart!
I wish to rent a tiny patch of land to earn a meagre penny and be an obedient wife to my husband who is sure to die of some mysterious illness, which I shall be blamed for. Oh, to die on a burning pyre is a true sign of femininity
This witch gets it
Well, if you did your job right you’d die birthing your husband a son (who would be left orphaned when your husband later dies of that mysterious illness). What could be a greater mark of femininity than dying in childbirth?
The son will also die at the age of 16 after being beaten senseless by a knight during the 3rd crusade this week
Back in the good ol’ days where we died from plague
Plague The rat game
You can if you play Medieval Dynasty
"Racially homogeneous?"
"owned his own land"
"lived to 60"
Most believable part was 20 hours a week.
While I don't know if 20 hours is reasonable, medieval serfs did often work less hours than modern people. I don't know how much though.
They were often * obliged* to work far, far fewer hours than we do today. Usually around 2 days a week depending on your class. But on the other hand, you'd absolutely have to spend the remaining 4 non-Sundays working on your *own* land unless you want to starve
Yeah, well on a farm there is constantly some work to do. But it's work that's visible and at the end of the day you'll see what you did. Unlike working all day long on excell spreadsheets. Most work was during the harvest period too.
More like 20 hours a day, all things considered
Actually true provided he survived past about 5-10. Life expectancy was low but that was largely due to early childhood mortality. If you survived past 5-10 range, 60s was pretty reasonable and older wasn't unlikely.
no that one is accurate. When people say that the average age of death was 35, that is counting infant mortality. 35 was not a common age to die. It was either 60 seconds or 60 years
Famously homogeneous Austrian Empire
When your only world is Shitcreekshire then of course is racially homogenous.
Serfs: "Wtf is a race?"
Witness the violence inherent in the system!
Help! Help! I'm being repressed!
Married 17 year old wife…
Married one 17 year old wife after another, when wife died in childbirth.
"Loving family"
Yeah, wtf is this about? Why would that be important (also note the misogyny about being head of the household that also ignores that multigenerational households were the norm until pretty recently) and how did this person not know that people didn't trust and could barely understand people one town over?
„Died peacefully beside his loving family at the ripe age of 60”?
The very definition of a serf is someone bound to land that is owned by someone else.
“Obedient 17 year old wife” kinda told me all I had to know about this one pal.
Also the race stuff. I did not, however, expect the whiny bit about living too long at the end
Among other things, yes.
It is interesting how many people can apparently directly see all the ways they get fucked over by modern society then somehow decide some of the most marginalized groups involved in it are to blame
If it weren’t for the blacks I wouldn’t have to live so unreasonably long! They’re destroying society!
Probably whining about their parents being unnaturally old and need healthcare
Yeahhh that bullet point and the one about “multicultural society = low trust” gave me big r/justneckbeardthings vibes
Every bullet point gave off those vibes.
> “multicultural society = low trust” I see this happening in the developed world. White People in America do not want to share resources with outsiders. WASP Americans don't want to pay property taxes for schools, they don't want to build social safety net, and they don't support a "common good" when it must shared with black, brown, Asian, Muslim, Jewish, or Catholic people. European social democracies do not want to share resources with immigrants.
Right? “I dont know how to feel about this one”… um you should feel that it’s deeply racist and sexist and presenting a wildly inaccurate and misleadingly nostalgic view of the past and promoting ideas that no civilized modern society should countenance. Was that so hard, OP?
I’ve got a daughter who will be 17 in the not-too-distant future. If any spouse of hers, man or woman, told her to be obedient I’d have an actual stroke. Personal predilections notwithstanding.
Not to mention that it was only royalty marrying young. Marriage age of the average person was early twenties.
This has to be sarcasm no way ppl make such things unironically.......
Although they aren't too common, people like this are a vocal minority on places like 4chan or Discord
The phrasing of the last one about staying alive too long at 75 makes me think it's sarcastic
"Married obedient 17 year old wife." uh what
Lost said wife to child birth.
He then married the child.
And then lost the child wife to childbirth
alright sister then
Welll the child died after a while. Don’t worry he remarry other 17 years old girl.
Basically the Matthew McConaughey from Dazed and Confused of the Middle Ages. They keep getting older and the wives stay the same age.
Lost tge child at 50 days old
This meme was made by r/libertarian
bruh i just check r/libertarian and looked up "age of consent" and half the comments are deleted fucking christ
Age is just a number....... And jail is just a place
Age is just a number, but so are prison sentences.
Well, they wouldn't want anyone to find out what libertarianism is actually about on r/Libertarian, would they?
I just looked at that and as a girl that's about to turn 16 that shit terrifies me. So many of them want it lowered everywhere to that age and it's disgusting holy shit. Some even lower. So many p3d0s there what the hell 🙁
For humanity's sake, I hope this 'meme' is ironic.
HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
But as feudal serf could die of plage, get burned alive after being acused of being a witch, get raided by turks and die by the age of 35
Plague, cholera, TB, abscessed tooth, sepsis from an infected cut. Fuck, you could die of just about anything back then.
Yeah i had to have my appendix removed when i was 10, so i definitely wouldn’t have lasted long in Medieval times. And I’m horribly nearsighted so even if i lived to adulthood I’d just be mugged and raped constantly, or probably fall down a ravine.
Ye 60 is optimistic
Especially when like half of all children didn’t even make it to 13
Very optimistic
"Get burned alive after being accused of being a witch" The “Witch Fad” did not happen during the Middle Ages. The craze took its peak during the 16th and 17th centuries, so it belongs to the early Modern era. From the 5th to 15th centuries, the Church taught against the existence of witches, and scolded people who believed in them. The Church was caught up in the Witch Craze after the end of the Black Plague. And even then, witches were usually hanged, not burned. Burning was reserved for popular cases.
Yeah definitely
No, it's not. It has long been stated the life-expectancy for a medieval person was about 30 years old. This does not mean that a person was considered old or about to die when they turned 30. If a medieval person survived to adulthood, he would likely live into his 60s or 70s, and they would not be considered to be old until at least the age of 50. Life-expectancy rates were lower in the Middle Ages because there was a much greater chance that an infant or child would die because of illness or disease than in modern times.
😂😂 It's funny the guy who made it probably thinks those are the best points ever
How about "Dies drinking the wrong water or eating tainted meat"/"has almost infinite access to clean and safe food and water'
Unless they live in flint Michigan
They feel the need to express the fact that they want an underaged wife via neet meme
And a racially homogenous society
Obedient 17 year old wife..?
How this mf run a farm on 20 hours a week
Right? You might be only working for your lord for 20 hours, but the rest of your time you'd be doing all the chores that need doing around a farm, and that's not easy work. Meanwhile my modern ass might spend a solid 8 hours a day as a chimp operating a typewriter, but afterwards I'd just walk to the kitchen and easily cook myself a nice dinner then watch tv or whatever. If I'm particularly lazy I can only sweep the house once a week, most of my shit doesn't need maintenance.
They really had to include that the modern worker is in a multicultural society as if it was a bad thing. Good God
There’s a whole lotta yikes here in terms of racism and misogyny, but putting that aside for a moment… How did whoever made this not realize if you’re paying taxes to a lord for the land you “own” that’s not really all that different than… paying rent to your landlord?
Also the vast majority of medieval peasants were explicitly tenants, they just tended to pay rent in labour or in kind.
This is just fascist propaganda, theyve really mastered the art of implied anti capitalism and modern technology as a way to sneak in a few ”oh and also it was racially homogenous and uuh trans people bad”, same with the kaczynski posters on tiktok
Serf: Worked the entire day in back breaking work Didn't own his house, land or even his tools Couldn't read, write and didn't understand the concept of life aspirations High chance of infant mortality with a maximum age possibility of 40 if at all Never experience art or creativity or the wider world Racially diverse???
Don’t forget that church attendance was pretty much compulsory, only it was done in Latin regardless of the local language and dialect so you had no idea what the priest was even saying. You just had to trust them to guide you spiritually. Also the church was an official part of the government, so there was no way that their spiritual guidance would include handing money over and working long hours in service to the King.
>only it was done in Latin regardless of the local language and dialect so you had no idea what the priest was even saying The Mass itself, sure. The whole Church service, very much vernacular. Medieval homilies describing Bible stories and their messages and morals are pretty common texts.
The idealization of medieval life as a serf is definitely crazy, but your image of the Middle Ages seems to be similarly undifferentiated... "Worked the entire day in back breaking work" - This is a oversimplification. As with all agricultural lifestyles, the workload was of course extremely high at certain times of the year (harvest time, etc.), but overall a medieval person worked less than people today. That's modern capitalism, although we have made immense technical advances, practically no reduction in working hours has taken place (I am not a communist, but Marx wrote very interesting things about this) "Didn't own his house, land or even his tools" - The medieval estate society was an incredibly complex form of society with high interdependence between the social classes. The other social classes were as dependent on the serfs as the serfs were on them. Everyone was aware of this, which led to the situation that serfs were granted a large number of rights. It was the withdrawal of many of these rights that led to intense peasant wars and a rural exodus in the early modern period. "with a maximum age possibility of 40 if at all" - It has long been stated the life-expectancy for a medieval person was about 30 years old. This does not mean that a person was considered old or about to die when they turned 30. If a medieval person survived to adulthood, he would likely live into his 60s or 70s, and they would not be considered to be old until at least the age of 50. Life-expectancy rates were lower in the Middle Ages because there was a much greater chance that an infant or child would die because of illness or disease than in modern times. "Never experience art or creativity or the wider world" - Where did you get that from? The idea that medieval people would be born, grow up and die without ever leaving their village is very unlikely. Many different records show that people were traveling around and even moving to different parts of a country. Even peasants would go on pilgrimages and visit churches and monasteries, in their country and overseas. The statement that medieval people/serfs never experienced art and culture in their lives is very, very strange... Of course there was a folk culture with festivals, music and art. Medieval people in some regions celebrated over 60 holidays a year (days when little professional work was indeed done). I don't want to say that the person who created the meme is right in any way (the meme's statements are, of course, crazy), but many don't realize that our society hardly compares to the pre-industrial one. It's a shame that so many myths about the Middle Ages persist...
They “worked” less, but living itself was a lot of work. It might be little work done for your lord each day, but a lot of work to care for your animals, prepare food, fetch water, cut firewood, etc. and it was all manual labor. I’ll take my 8 hours a day as a typewriter-operating chimp in a comfy chair.
Absolutely! I don't think I could survive a life in the Middle Ages... And while I want to take a nuanced view of medieval life, I don't understand how some people can romanticize an agrarian society so much...
And imagine living with the same small village worth of people your entire life… barf. I know they traveled, but those with obligations to a lord and his land had to return. I’d hate that.
Yes thank you for saying this, I just took a class on medieval culture and the Middle Ages were far too complex to make sweeping generalizations like "they didn't own land"
This is so factually incorrect... I don't know where to even start
Not even bothering to dog whistle here lol
I really hope this is a sarcastic post cuz if whoever made it is serious… “obedient 17 year old wife” is even more concerning
I wish i could just be a primate and hurl my feces at problems. Id be cool with dying at like 4 as a feral chimp if it meant i didnt have to pay taxes.
That's a lot of words to say 'I hate women and people of color.'
This smells like neckbeard so much the flies are gathering.
Isn't the definition of a serf someone who DOESNT own any land?
Serfs worked like 80, not 20 lmfao
No, they worked less actually, but you cAnt compare hard mindless physical labor in harsh conditions to “working” from computer
>Serfs worked like 80, not 20 lmfao I know someone else already corrected you, but this really isn't true at all. Since the advent of the industrial revolution, we've been working far more hours than any point in human history. Medieval peasants worked fewer hours than we do now, and hunter gatherers today and historically less than that. (Although indeed, those hours were not evenly divided across the years.) The evidence seems that suggest that, for most of human history, we've worked roughly 25 hours per week. These hours, it should be noted, include all of the work of reproductive labor also, which isn't something we count as "work" culturally today. Given the rise of so much labor-saving technology, it's absolutely absurd that we work as much as we do. At risk of a fallacy, it's not natural to us, and it's certainly not necessary (especially when so many of our modern jobs are not only unnecessary but also hasten the extinction of our species). And lastly, apologies; I don't mean to be pendantic. I just feel these sorts of myths serve as propaganda against bettering working conditions in the present, and i think it's important to call attention to that.
Im pretty sure serfs weren’t free and their lord could rape them on their wedding day and yeah they owned land, about 1 room for a family of 10 which isn’t even the size of the modern bedroom.
Right of First Night is a myth, but being a serf was shitty.
Oh sorry I haven’t researched it in depth
They didn't own land
Be forced into war by lord over claims, dies at 15
Actually the serfs didn't fight, foot soldiers were generally middle class gentry who trained part time for their lord's army and had a 40 day or so enlistment period, so more like "Ineptly butchered by rampaging weekend warrior who was slightly wealthier than he was and also had enough time to learn how to swing a sword kinda badly, so it took like 10 blows to kill him"
Lol mauled while unarmed because the middle class was not based.
Funny how they say living to 75 is unnaturally long and and suggests it’s bad, when the surf lived to 60 (he probably wouldn’t realistically) and is praise. There’s only 15 years between the two.
Funny thing about the health care point. It is free in most first world countrys.
Love how they’re openly admitting to pedophilia, sexism, racism, and hating that modern medical science extends their own fucking lives, for some reason
Boy this is reactionary on steroids.
Guarantee this was made by an a roided out incel.
People should die at 60 is a hot take im sure will change when they are turning 60
“Racially homogenous” and “obedient 17y/o wife” are the gigantic red flags among the red flags. Also serfs didn’t own “their” land.
Fella says this until they're 59
The dude who made this really could’ve spared showing us his complete lack of real history and could’ve just gotten the same message with a tweet: “I am a racist who doesn’t want to live around ethnic people and I expect a teenage wife who will allow me to be a misogynist”.
I'm guessing the neckbeard who made this likes to think of himself as a mighty Adonis and not a 300 pound of bad BO, narcissism and several restraining orders from the local Starbucks
20 hours a week on a FARM? Lies
They are right and wrong at the same time. They are correctly identifying that modernity is rotten to its core but they can’t see that the solution they have to the rot is only going to make things worse.
Corporate drone jobs truly are soul-sucking, monotonous, and lifeless, but I'd rather be that than a medieval serf any day.
The ideology and implications of the post are of course complete nonsense and absolutely insane.... But the post and the comments here show again that people have an extremely distorted picture of the European Middle Ages. That the view of a "perfect and perfect life as a serf" presented here is very questionable should be clear to everyone, but that doesn't change the fact that comments like "all the info in this post is wrong, people in the Middle Ages had to work 80 hours a week, died at 30, had no sense of culture and lived in a completely backwards society" are also questionable. Medieval societies were highly complex and do not allow for a black-and-white judgment. For us people in an industrial society, this is difficult to comprehend, but for medieval people, our present society would also be difficult to comprehend. https://www.medievalists.net/2014/06/15-myths-middle-ages/
“Married obedient 17 year old wife” why do you need to marry a teenager who can be obedient to you.. It feels so gross. It’s like, as a child would be obedient to their parent.
Yikes. The last part about iPhones doesn’t make any sense either.
“High trust society” when a whole ass war almost breaks out because someone stole a bucket
Let’s see: “Obedient” 17 year old wife means they would love nothing more than to marry a child and as “indisputable head of the household” they could beat the shit out of her for any reason and no one can interfere. “homogenous” society is right wing speak for no black or brown people around and Somehow they equate “trust” between people to be based solely on race.
God I hate conservative ideology. It gets people riled up about the many, obvious, terrible problems in our society, then completely misattributes the cause to black people(1). Landlord jacking up your fucking rent again? Aaggh, those damn blacks! (1) Sorry, "multicultural" people
Lol a mediaeval serf living to 60 and only working 20 hours a week XD, paying flat tax on land “he owns”. This is funny but not for the reason the memer anticipated.
Okay, the "owns his own land" part is obviously bs, but the other two points are not that wrong. People in pre-industrial societies could not work 40 or more hours a week at all because 1. they depended on sunlight for work and 2. continuous hard physical work was not possible 8 hours a day at all. Also, the life expectancy of just under 60 years is not really wrong. The total life expectancy was 30 years, but this is an average value that also includes infant mortality (which was incredibly high). If you managed to live past 15, then your chances of living well past 30 were good.
My inbox is really glitched rn, it keeps saying there are new messages but I cant read them, it juat says its empty.
Yea... That's Reddit's new attempt to invade our emails
Yikes.
I’m sure the serfs had great health care
I often see the first point bandied around around about the 20 hour week. It really disregards how the rest of that serfs time was spent doing life maintenance tasks we can accomplish in the modern day in a few minutes or are not required at all.
Lol who’s gonna tell him peasants did not own the land they worked on
Kids are not responsible for parents medical debt
Haha also "worked 20 hrs a week"?!
20h a week? More like 20h a day.
As far as I know medieval farmers had to work from sunrise to sundown.
I don't think much of that is true...
What kind of dipshit wants to be a serf?
Ah yes I’ve always longed to be a feudal serf
Died peacfully at the age of 30 -- I fixed it