(November 19, 2023 at 8:18 am)Fake Messiah Wrote: People in medieval times didn't need to be educated because that way they were more easily exploited by the aristocracy and the Church to whom they were pretty much slaves. So they certainly needed to be kept ignorant so that they don't learn how to think. Which tells you what kind of time it was.
This is a very confused and silly view of how all pre-modern agrarian societies worked. As I said, they had no need of education. They worked the land as their ancestors had done and both they and the upper classes didn't and couldn't think of any alternatives to this arrangement. But they were not "pretty much slaves", though many of their ancestors, in Roman times, had been actual slaves. Medieval peasants had legal rights and privileges that actual slaves could never dream of. So much so that some earned enough income (something slaves tend not to do) to buy their way out of villeinage and chose not to. Then there's the fact there was a whole stratum of (also largely illiterate) fully free peasantry that were not feudal villeins at all. You don't seem to know anything about this period beyond some cartoonish cliches. You could try reading a book occasionally.
Quote:And yet, despite that, there were numerous peasant revolts where hundreds of thousands of people were slaughtered.
Except if you look at what those revolts were about, it wasn't them demanding a new economic system. Or literacy. The Great Revolt of 1381 in England was sparked by a poll tax, but demanded a return to certain ancient peasants' rights (some of which were imaginary legends) that they considered had been eroded. It was also an appeal to the King, with full acknowledgement of the hierarchy of medieval society as natural and normal. And it definitely wasn't an appeal for greater literacy. The first thing the rebels did when they entered any town was burn those pesky written records and books they saw as symbols of bad government. Again, maybe reading a few books yourself before venturing into historical topics would be a good idea for you.
