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[Akura]

This heat is killing me. It was 90°F yesterday, and it was 90° today. Too tired, too sweaty, and I'm pretty certain I have a slight sunburn on the top of my head.

Actually, that last one might be really bad, since the top of the head is the most dangerous place to get sunburnt iirc due to risk of skin cancer.

I'm just glad the temperature is going down for the rest of the week.

[Teneb]

Britain didn't need slaves, they had the Irish. They had too many underclass and had to export them (first to America then to Australia when that deal fell through). D'ya think they would be in the business of importing more slaves in that situation? Nope.

Seriously though, the UK had the class system and sort-of feudal arrangements right up through to the Edwardian era, with live-in servant's in the "servants quarters" who were basically not a whole lot above a slave caste.

After researching what Life in Servants had to do BEFORE rampant Industrialization...

YEAH they were slaves in just about everyway. Even if they weren't "Technically" slaves, their treatment was equal to that of slaves.

If they are treated like slaves and work like slaves, they are slaves. Call them whatever you want, doesn't change that.

This heat is killing me. It was 90°F yesterday, and it was 90° today. Too tired, too sweaty, and I'm pretty certain I have a slight sunburn on the top of my head.

Actually, that last one might be really bad, since the top of the head is the most dangerous place to get sunburnt iirc due to risk of skin cancer.

I'm just glad the temperature is going down for the rest of the week.

Is it bad that I consider 90F/32C to be just Slightly Hot?

[SOLDIER First]

If they are treated like slaves and work like slaves, they are slaves. Call them whatever you want, doesn't change that.

Uh, actually, if they're paid, they can't be slaves. It's in the definition. /s

[Neonivek]

If they are treated like slaves and work like slaves, they are slaves. Call them whatever you want, doesn't change that.

Uh, actually, if they're paid, they can't be slaves. It's in the definition. /s

Being paid, to my knowledge, isn't part of the definition of slave. Lots of slaves in history did earn wages.

It is your autonomy.

The issue is that a Live in Servant isn't as "free to leave" as they might seem. What with their pathetic pay, making them more reliant on staying, and 24/7 work period (making it impossible to find somewhere else to live). You could make a reasonable argument that they were slaves by circumstance.

A huge reason why industrialization changed this is because they offered something no one else did... Weekends off.

[SOLDIER First]

/s

[Reelya]

If you receive food then it's payment. Payment in goods is still payment. Just because one type of employer gives you some coins as well as food then that doesn't change how the deal operates. Therefore receiving food/goods/lodging/coins as part of your servitude doesn't mean that it contradicts the definition of slavery.

In the case of Britain's servant class, it was caste-based servitude. Rotten, exploitative conditions but the only choice you had was to go work for another boss. All of whom made you live in mouldy basements, apparently, and eat scraps.

So effectively it was a type of slavery, but with a caste system. Reforms protecting the rights of servants were only enacted in the Edwardian era, so literally right before the servant system collapsed after WWI.

[SOLDIER First]

/s

[hector13]

Wage slavery is a thing, man.

[Yoink]

32 degrees isn't hot at all you wimps.

[hector13]

Pfft. I imagine you think sub-10 is too cold.

[Neonivek]

If you receive food then it's payment. Payment in goods is still payment. Just because one type of employer gives you some coins as well as food then that doesn't change how the deal operates. Therefore receiving food/goods/lodging/coins as part of your servitude doesn't mean that it contradicts the definition of slavery.

In the case of Britain's servant class, it was caste-based servitude. Rotten, exploitative conditions but the only choice you had was to go work for another boss. All of whom made you live in mouldy basements, apparently, and eat scraps.

So effectively it was a type of slavery, but with a caste system. Reforms protecting the rights of servants were only enacted in the Edwardian era, so literally right before the servant system collapsed after WWI.

Honestly I loathe the caste system implemented. It seriously made no sense that on the basis of someone's birth that you create laws that outright prevent them from having certain jobs (typically ones that make money) and even as far as what they can wear (Yes Fashion Police!).

The only reason Industrialization worked in England is because... well... Business was considered "bad".

By the by! you can still see the effect of England's Caste system today in their own laws... some which are still functional and acted upon. (Which is a HUGE WTF for me)

[Reelya]

http://www.waynesthisandthat.com/servantwages.htm
http://www.express.co.uk/expressyourself/348130/The-real-life-Downton-Abbey-The-true-story-of-servants

Reading up on it, the base-level wage of a maid was about $1300 / year in todays money and sites are saying they did 17 hour days 6 days a week (they got Sunday morning off for church and one afternoon a week, no actual "days off" however). That works out as 25 cent an hour in inflation-adjusted figures. You got paid every 3 months, a share of your wage which was counted yearly, but that was apparently only because of legislation introduced to protect the rights of domestics in the Edwardian era (post 1900), so before that you had to wait a whole year to get paid, and if you left early because the employer was totally fucked, I'm betting you didn't get paid.

What actually ended the situation was factory and office jobs in the industrial era. There was a mass exodus out of the "service" jobs at this time and domestic employers tried to entice the girls back with "prettier uniforms" but it didn't help (previously they'd deliberately given them ugly uniforms to cement the "underclass" status of the servant caste). That's the surest sign it was exploitative. As soon as workers had other options, they told the gentry "go fuck yourselves" in no uncertain terms.

[Teneb]

32 degrees isn't hot at all you wimps.

Finally, someone gets it. I regularly face 40+ temperatures in summer, easily getting past 45 and sometimes peaking at 50. 32 ain't nothing.

Pfft. I imagine you think sub-10 is too cold.

It's so cold it might as well be a crime.

[Neonivek]

Gentry? You underestimate how dang exploited these people were! You could own a stay in servant with very little actual pay yourself.

[TD1]

Main pay was probably in room and board.