why are we told that feudalism is bad, europeans didn't bathe, medieval peasants were constantly smeared in shit and everyone was a torturous psychopathic sadist while andalusia and aztecs and everywhere else was an advanced complicated sophisticated vibrant civilization

>but it wasn't a utopia back then! they didn't have trans rights and iphones! you're swinging too far in the other direction!
oh yeah, sure, it wasn't a heavenly utopia, got it, but we are not fretting over little details here, like whether people bathed once a week or once a day, they claim they never bathed at all for centuries based on a handful of obscure renaissance writers and aristocrats, and literally no one questioned it for decades while it was taught as fact in every school and across the media, I don't think I can put into words how bizarre this is and how obviously forced it is from a historian's perspective, consider in an archaeological dig you have to show scientific levels of scrutiny over the way a bone flute was drilled or whatever or you can't get it published

what is the source of this enormous historical bias, where did this bias first appear, which people and groups are most responsible for spreading this meme

Who tells you this? You're not making up a scenario in your head and then getting mad at it are you?

>>17868036 (OP)
Andalusia was sophisticated.
Aztecs were not. They deserved to be destroyed.

>>17868036 (OP)
>Why are we told
By who? These are pop culture misconceptions, not anything any actual historian would claim
>what is the source of this enormous historical bias
The renaissance and protestant reformation

>>17868036 (OP)
it was just not nearly as prosperous as pax romana, which is why enlightenment/atheist thinkers push all ideas to make the dark ages a lot worse than it actually is

even assuming it really was that bad, that just gives another reason why we should respect and honor our ancestors. they lived in strife and suffering, yet they still carried on.

The "barbaric dark ages" meme is self-inflicted, because ever since the renaissance the European educated elites have always without exception believed that their current society is the peak of civilization and their generation is actually the first civilized people ever, and all of their ancestors were just unenlightened retards.