What do you want ????

EVil Church

OR

EVil Corporations

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*Psst* Hi, Historian here. You know back in the Middle Ages? Land was still divided between the classes and going onto your King/Lord's land would get you killed. Also, the lands used for farming were rented out to peasants pretty much in the same system from the Middle Ages to the 19th century. Communal land was used for forging nuts and grazing animals, it didn't really have many benfits.

Life super sucked in the Middle Ages.

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Rushkoff emailed me back and said I had misinterpreted his work. E.g. just because the Hudson river was cleaner and healthier before General Electric started dumping waste into it doesn't mean that life didn't suck for most people, particularly slaves.

However, that point doesn't come across in his book, which says that corporatism and centralized economies created a cascading effect that affected how people lived and ate, how healthy and tall they were, how much autonomy they had, etc. It's easy to interpret this statement as saying that people were better off in pre-Renaissance Europe. This undermines the credibility of the book's thesis, which is too bad because it has some interesting ideas in it.

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Furthermore, the Black Plague was spread from the far east by the Mongolians, and the only places spared were the most backwards places in the world. As far as I can see, this guy hates corporations so much that he'd rather live on a starvation diet in a disease infected bog and get beaten like cattle by his local lord rather than eat a Big Mac.

I'll take the Big Mac.

Not only does this guy know jack all about history, but

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People died of the plague because there was no cure, no health care to speak of, and we didn't know about bacteria or understand how infections, germs, etc., worked. It killed both the rich and the poor. Sheesh. Give me the 21st century any day over the Middle Ages.

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The Middle Ages, on the other hand, were never very kind to the peasants. And far more importantly, the Black Plague had nothing to do with how poor they were. People at all levels of society were very much affected by it (one king of Spain died of it), and it was brought to Europe, ironically given your theory, by the vibrant trade that existed between the East and West.

As for land no longer being the resource it used to be, it was still the most important resource a person could have until centuries later. And while people began moving back into cities for the first time since the Roman Empire 300 years before the plague (thus, creating a middle class and corporations that existed well before this time--though they were just now gaining steam), rural populations still dominated until the Industrial Revolution.

Thank you for the chance to lecture, though. Stick to what you know, Douglas.

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Yes please, let's have some more of the good old days.

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I wonder if war is actually better than peace.

During war you can develop a camaraderie with your fellow soldier that is really hard to replicate during peace time. Also, you're called upon to become your best self, test your limits, find out who you really are. During peace, you can just kind of do whatever you want. Everyone knows that it's better to eat in moderation and exercise regularly. During war, both of these are inevitable. Finally, many of us would like to travel, but our dreary safe jobs keep us from doing so. During war you either get to travel to new places or at least meet the people from new places that are invading your home.

The peace movement is historically just a propaganda campaign by those industries that benefit the most from peace - toiletry conglomerates, clothing companies, toy manufacturers. Think about it!

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