Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Enchanted Trinkets Complete--a hardcover book containing over 500 magic items for your D&D games!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="MoogleEmpMog" data-source="post: 2328134" data-attributes="member: 22882">People in prior eras dedicated a significantly greater percentage of their time to surviving.I'll admit, in, say, 1950 or 1960, the average American, at least, had more free time.  The number is skewed (from a modern perspective; you could make the case, probably a stronger one in a historical number, that the modern number is the aberration) because the vast majority of women didn't work.  Not only did they personally have much more free time, which a great many dedicated to volunteer organizations, but their work in the home also freed up their husbands to have more free time.  Marriage came younger and more commonly, divorce much less, so the familial dynamic defined free time.  Meanwhile, prosperity meant fewer men had to work multiple jobs or long hours, and technology greatly reduced the burden of housework.Prior to that period (itself an abnormality, as is the present day, in terms of unprecedented and widespread prosperity), men habitually worked more than eight hours and housework occupied a much greater percentage of women's time.People have 'more commitments' today because of cultural constraints, not physical ones.  As for the drop in volunteers, that is almost certainly a cultural rather than temporal change, albeit one likely related to the decay in family structure.Most people admit to watching significant amounts of television every week - BAM, those people could be volunteering (or gaming) - they have no commitments in that time.  Most people who would be interested in gaming admit to significant amounts of electronic gaming (ala the OP's World of Warcraft example) - BAM, those people could be volunteering, or gaming - they have no commitments, or different commitments, in that time.  Reading a book?  Volunteer or game.  Watching a movie?  Volunteer or game.  Going to a sporting event?  Volunteer or game.  Volunteering?  Game.  Gaming?  Volunteer.A huge block of time is voluntary for modern people.I'll give you that it's less than it would have been in, say, 1960; less, perhaps, than it would have been in 1970 or even 1980 when many families still operated under the historically normal structure.  I'll even grant that the '50s and '60s were so radically culturally different that they could qualify as a different era.</blockquote>

Verification