Reply #3: For so much of human history [View All]

[supernova]

living in a society meant that you got pegged early with one persona, one concept of who you are. Often this was tied to where you fell on the economic scale. People with less had less options in life. People with more, had more options, but those options were limited to those of their class. If you were poor, you worked the fields. If you were rich, you became a knight if you were first born, a clergyman if you were last born. There's more to it, but that's the basic outline. It didn't matter if you personally felt that persona was a good fit for you. For us women, it meant that we were wives and mothers and nothing else. You stayed that idea in others' minds until you died. It affected your schooling, if any, whom you were allowed to marry, and what kinds of jobs you could get.

Until arguably, the Renaissance and the American and French Revolutions.

The idea that you could change that story, the story you were born with if you wanted, is definitely new. That's why it is celebrated.