Spinozaad said:
I agree with the sentiment, but not with the argument. You're applying your own moral standards to previous times, that's a historical fallacy. We can't judge the part based on our standards.
Of course we can. The whole point of the post is comparing eras through our contemporary lens. The OP argues that people argue through today's lens that the past was superior, and called for refuting that. It is a historical fallacy, but one I am unable to easily ignore. If I grew up in a society where effectively owning one's wife was the norm vs. being raised by a single mother, I would definitely have different views.
More people than ever are starving of hunger and disease than ever before. War has become more brutal and total, we are destroying the environment, society is atomized more than ever, modern technology and ideas brought about the greatest and most senseless slaughters of human life on a mass industrial scale, etc. etc.
Per capita or straight numbers of people? History is full of complete genocides of people that went without condemnation (or if you believe the Bible, with the full support of God). While we have had larger genocides in recent history, they are far more likely to be condemned. If you start talking the Armenian genocide, Holocaust, or Pol Pot today versus Ghengis Khan, or other historical battles wherein every man, woman, and child of the opposing city was slaughtered. For all that its problems, the U.N. and Geneva Codes have led to a lessening of the horrors or war even as technology has increased the potential for those horrors. And indeed, only a half century later, you are unlikely to hear people rant enthusiastically about Hiroshima.
That's the condition I'm referring to. While the veneer has become more civilized, the heart of darkness is darker than ever, thanks to modernity.
I would disagree, but suspect we aren't changing each other's minds at this point.
