An interesting example of how the old English class system wasn't just about venal entrenched self-advantage. The upper classes of old really did feel a noblesse oblige, and were killed in the trenches at considerably higher rates in the trenches. Young men of high birth were expected to be officers, and to lead by example - a job that came with a life expectancy measured in days during the darkest hours of the first world war. One doubts if the present bearers of class privilege feel a similar sense of duty.
You read about the motivations of the elite in supporting religious institutions and dedicating their children to the regular and secular clergy, and you think, well, surely that's an arrangement of convenience or mutual advantage, mainly... but no, if you look at the data it really, really wasn't. They genuinely believed the whole eternal-damnation thing and took it super-seriously and contributed to the church in ways that were very much net-negative to them and their families (and that some others avoided doing to no clear disadvantage, so it doesn't seem to be a harm-avoidance measure, at least not in material or social terms). The norm, at least for a good stretch of centuries, was for these transactions to confer less in material or political benefits than they cost (though, sure, some were political power-plays or otherwise highly beneficial).
The thinking seems so alien that it's hard to really put myself in their shoes. Even the vast majority of the modern religious, and certainly the elite religious, at least in the US, don't act as if they truly believe like the barons and dukes of Europe did. The only place you see that kind of self-sacrificial dedication to religion these days is what we'd call cults.
The role and seriousness of religion in society has ebbed and flowed a lot historically.
There is reason to believe that during much of the Hellenistic period and before/after, most ancient Greeks saw the Gods as more of a folk tradition, for example. Hence the rise in schools of philosophical thought independent of religion. Likely many other Pagan societies had such ebbs and flows.
Ancient China went through similar periods IIUC.
It’s also hard for me to believe that Renaissance era Italians were really fervent believers given all the corruption involved in the Church (placing rich people as Popes, tons of Popes and priests having affairs and using the church money to live lavishly). Which is likely what led to the Reformation and the wars of religion - basically a return back to taking religion very seriously.
Historically it also seems to vary a lot based on class, with the upper end of society (by class or education) tending to be less religious. For example during the 19th century the average person was still quite religious in much of Europe, but the most educated classes had already become secular and begun to openly express Atheism. Then you look at things like the Wars of Religion following the reformation - most likely, this provided an excellent backdrop to motivate your soldiers with a real cause for fighting, which rulers used to accomplish their more practical goals of expanding their realm.
> The thinking seems so alien that it's hard to really put myself in their shoes. Even the vast majority of the modern religious, and certainly the elite religious, at least in the US, don't act as if they truly believe like the barons and dukes of Europe did. The only place you see that kind of self-sacrificial dedication to religion these days is what we'd call cults.
Right and it _should_ seem so. Faith is a gift, received without any prior claim on it; otherwise those who get it sooner would have a legitimate reason to think themselves more capable than others. The faithfulness that ought to result in active love is going on all over the place, including in the white collar workplace, but it goes on irrespective of other factors, including being seen, let alone being transmitted to history.
There was always a lot of desperation in second- and later born sons in the landed classes, everywhere. Because usually you wouldn’t inherit the the property, so you could as well gamble your life recklessly, and maybe get lucky. The fertility rate has been suggested as a good proxy to estimate wars and proclivity for terrorism.
Most of the Etonian Oxbridge guys I'm friends with ended up going to the military after graduating (one became a lawyer instead). It's still seen as a great job to begin your career with in those circles. I went to a public school (but not Oxbridge) and did a couple years in the Rifles myself.
lately it probably is entrenched but there's an irony in there. The old system was for gentry and nobles and the new system is for a new bureaucratic class of credentialists who use the old system as a scapegoat but in reality the new system is very self serving for these bureaucrats who would never send themselves to war.
I imagine it's more that they simply had no idea what they were getting into. The first world war was the first time anybody had seen a war with that kind of casualty distribution, not to mention, that kind of omnicidal lethality. Officers in previous wars had very good chances of survival.
With respect to fighting wars? No. The military has a couple stand out statistics, first being that most enlisted are of generational servitude while most officers are from opportunity (college recruitment). That means most people enlisted have a relative that served first. Second is that most enlistments come from the poorer part of the country, specifically the South and Midwest. The diversity of the military largely tracks those geographies. Officers similarly reflect where their volunteer pool comes from. That said, the modern upper echelon of US society have a pretty quiet yet thick disdain for military service. They'd probably never let their kids do it.
That's a funny rewriting of history, because we know that the casualty rate among enlisted (i.e. conscripted, in wwi and wwii) was much higher than for officers. The former were servants, factory labourers, peasants, etc, while the latter was a category reserved for the privileged.
I don't think that's true for the British Army in WW1:
"The casualty rates were highest among the subalterns... estimates for the mortality rates range from 65 to 81%. This was, at its lowest estimate, double the rate for enlisted men."
Ah sorry, I guess yet another case of English people going like "let's take a latin word and change its meaning LOL" :)
> Literally meaning "subordinate", subaltern is used to describe commissioned officers below the rank of captain and generally comprises the various grades of lieutenant.[2]
Commissioned officers are still subordinate to those above them. They just outrank NCOs and warrant officers. In theory, the freshest young ROTC grad can order the Command Sergeant Major of the Army (highest NCO in US Army) to do anything that is legal. In practice, nobody is that dumb. Intelligent lieutenants will give the sergeants under their command orders like "Sergeant, I need you and your troops to take out that enemy emplacement". Minor operational details are left up to the NCOs (who generally have much more combat experience) unless there is a specific reason that the lieutenant needs them to do or avoid some action, and generally those orders would just be the lieutenant following his or her own orders.
There was a big rural/urban divide in upper classes in WWI. Rural upper class would be officers on the front lines and get slaughtered at unthinkable rates, urban upper classes would do things like logistics and strategy and largely made it out okay.
If you 'know' that, you're wrong. Frankly, this is a classist prejudice with no basis in fact.
My boarding school had 700 names on the memorial to WW1. Mostly junior officers: 200 captains and 340 lieutenants. That's out of a cohort of maybe 3500 old boys who were the right age for the front: 20%. Eton itself says 1200 died and 5600 served.
They all volunteered, and the 18 year olds were mostly made second Lieutenants, and the second Lieutenant's job was to climb out of the trench first and shout 'follow me' and to move around the battlefield looking after his men. So they did, and they died in huge numbers.
The BBC says 12% of the British army's non-commissioned soldiers were killed during the war, compared with 17% of its officers.
The actual Prime Minister during the way, Asquith lost a son. Andrew Bonar Law (PM in the 1920s) lost two. Anthony Eden (PM in the 50s) lost two brothers and another brother was badly wounded.
