Why point out the middle ages? Those 1000 years were not worse than any other historic period, be it in antiquity or the early modern era.
Most inventions that make today's candy land are from the last 50-150 years.

Also, this is a very wealthy perspective. Easy access to fresh water, clean plumbing, access to modern medicin, central heating with thermostats, all that good stuff does not exist for large parts of humanity.

[–] TargaryenTKE@lemmy.world 4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Completely agree, I'm personally sick of the Medieval times being viewed as "the Dark Ages" where everything was objectively worse. Not only is it from a modern, first-world perspective as you've pointed out, but it's also extremely Euro- and Christian-centric and ignores that most of the rest of the world experienced at least a couple 'Golden Ages' during the same time. Hell, even IN Europe, the Islamic states were often (though not always) better off than a lot of their Catholic counterparts. I think a large part of the modern view of the Medieval times being 'backward' come from two main sources: 1-propoganda that came during/immediately after the various Crusades/Iberian Reconquista (not to mention the subsequent discovery of the Americas); 2-the Bubonic Plague which, without a doubt, WAS awful for everyone involved, but for whatever reason we tend to forget that it was only a relatively short amount of time (roughly one decade towards the start of the time period during the reign of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian, and another decade roughly 800 years later) within the much larger time frame of a whole millennium

[–] CyberEgg@discuss.tchncs.de 6 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I think a large part of the modern view of the Medieval times being 'backward' come from two main sources: 1-propoganda that came during/immediately after the various Crusades/Iberian Reconquista (not to mention the subsequent discovery of the Americas);

Close, but not quite there. The modern image of the Middle Ages mostly does com from propaganda of the Enlightenment period when intellectuals, artists, the upper classes etc wanted to distinguish themselves from what was before, and then some from later periods pushing some things back in time (witch burnings were not a medieval thing and the peak of plate armour was in the 16th century).

I know a german youtuber working on improving our image of the Middle Ages to a more realistic one, if you deal well with automatic subtitles I can recommend Geschichtsfenster.

[–] TargaryenTKE@lemmy.world 2 points 2 weeks ago

Good points! Also thanks, I'll definitely have to check that guy out

[–] esc@piefed.social 1 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

And yet even those parts of humanity live better than 100 years ago.

[–] Rothe@piefed.social 8 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

If you are literally starving or dying from a preventable disease without access to healthcare, it doesn't really matter if it is happening now or 1000 years ago, the result is exactly the same.

Claiming that every human on Earth lives better than 100 years ago is not only objectively wrong, but rings of the "even our homeless here in the US lives better than the richest person in Africa" ignorant nonsense some people likes to spew.

[–] esc@piefed.social 1 points 2 weeks ago

Do you measure better only by healthcare? A progress was made in almost every facet of life. Even in places where access to modern healthcare is limited or nonexistent.

[–] CyberEgg@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I would not agree to that generalization.

[–] esc@piefed.social 1 points 2 weeks ago

Feel free.