Misconceptions about Serfdom

I had thought Malcolm Gladwell (“Tipping Point”) was a more careful author, but in his recent book “Outliers” he started droning on about how Asian Rice Peasants were so much more productive than the old European Serfs because they weren’t coerced like slaves and they only had to hand over a fixed percentage of their produce for their tenancies instead of being mercilessly beaten every day and having all their produce taken from them as were the poor miserable Serfs.

Well, it was obvious that Mr. Gladwell had researched Rice Farming, as he seemed to know something about it. But about Serfdom, he felt it enough to go along with all of the old middle class bourgeois propaganda on the issue. He did not think he had to inform us about it, because obviously we already know everything we are supposed to know about it. Only none of it is right. Maybe old Max was not intentionally lying. Maybe he thought it enough to rely on what his 7th Grade Teacher had taught him. And she was only teaching what the books had to say. Once propaganda is in print, it tends to stay there.

Facts be known, the Serfs were much as Malcolm Gladwell had described the Asian Rice Peasants. They owed the Lord of the Manor a fixed amount of their produce each year. And the amount of this turnover was fixed by tradition. Century after Century went by and the amount owed to the Lord of the Manor never went up, even when methods of cultivation doubled and then tripled the productivity of the land. By dawn of the Revolution the Serfs had enough produce to spare over their own needs that they were doing fairly well on the cash markets. In all respects they looked exactly the same as any small respectable Farmer. Because that is what they were.

So what is the argument that the Serfs were virtual slaves? Well, for some perspective on this issue, consider that the most horrible thing that the Serfs endlessly complained about was the Tradition of Corvée, that is, for several day, yes, just several days, for each year the Serfs had to report to the manor ready and willing to do some collective work for improving the roads, mending the common fences, and just doing whatever it took to keep up the general infrastructure of the neighborhood. A few days. Bitch, bitch, bitch. I guess people just need something to bitch about or they simply ain’t happy. Outside of that there were no complaints. Sounds like a pretty good deal compared to what we ordinarily would think of as ‘slavery’, if that was the only complaint they could come up with.

Yes, there were restrictions, but the same restrictions that applied to the Lord of the Manor. The Land could not be subdivided. With both Serf and Lord, only the oldest son could inherit, and they would necessarily get the whole package. Second and third sons could join the Church, become Monks, join some Army or go to the Towns and Cities to look for work. The whole Feudal System encouraged a kind of Population Awareness, and the Church was greatly benefited by having such a steady source of fresh personnel, as were the Armies, which was probably something of a mixed blessing.

The Propaganda of History bemoans the ‘fact’ that the Serfs were “bound to the land”. Yes, if absolute entitlement and ownership should ever be expressed in such terms. When we buy a house, do we call it being ‘bound’. Do the Family Farmers in America or France call it ‘being bound to their farms’? Indeed, it was even stronger, that is, better, than ordinary ownership. Nowadays our Society has a number of mechanisms for throwing people out of the homes and taking their property – foreclosures and bankruptcies. The Serf had no such worry. The Serf had a traditional and irrevocable claim to his Land. That History has been fooled into describing that as some kind of a heinous burden, well, that is precisely how Propaganda is supposed to work. Using language to tell lies.

But why all the lies? Well, when the Bourgeois Middle Classes during the Age of Revolution (still going on) went after the Lords to steal their land or take it on the cheap, it would do them little good unless they also went after the Serfs, for, after all, it was the Serfs who actually held deed to the land in question. Of course, the Bourgeois Classes could have felt free to dispossess the Lords and deal with the Serfs respecting the same Traditional Centuries old Contracts and Customary Agreements. But the Middle Classes were keen businessmen (then as now) and realized that they could find Labor far more cheaply than what the Serfs were effectively working for. It was all about who they could screw the worst, even if they could not put it in exactly those same terms.

Why else so much concern over “Liberating the Serfs” expressed throughout every Capital of Europe, after the Bourgeois Revolutions had taken hold. There was no concern for the City Workers. No concern for anybody or anything… except tossing the Serfs off their land under the guise of liberating them.

But it was all Centuries ago. Couldn’t we start telling the Truth about it by now? Yet the old propaganda persists. Having Hereditary Ownership of so much of the European Landmass was a terrible injustice to the Serfs, and kicking them out of their homes was the best thing for them. Hurray for the Modern World and the Selfless Bighearted Middle Classes… and the hope that they don’t start murdering us on our sleep.