𝐈𝐧 𝐘𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐖𝐢𝐥𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐃𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐦𝐬 (English)

Chapter 74

Ozpin talked and talked and talked about Salem. It wasn't all world-shattering revelations. In fact, most of it was normal things – what her hobbies had been, what she had been like when they first met, what they had hoped to achieve together as rulers of a fledgeling Remnant. It was all a lot more interesting than Jaune thought it would be, like listening to a history documentary, but one that few people alive knew was true.

"Universal education was really what sparked the biggest riots?" Jaune asked.

"Oh yes. It was one of the most unpopular decisions we ever made." Ozpin chuckled, while Jaune marvelled at how something taken for a basic right could be so controversial. "You see, education was seen as something that made the nobility special and unique. It was a symbol of one's wealth and status. They feared that, should the peasantry become smarter, they might take jobs meant for intelligent, hard-working children. Namely, their own."

"On the other hand, the working classes saw it as an attack on traditional values. I'm sure it was fanned in no small part by the nobility, but the lower classes soon had it in their heads that these schools were meant to take away their children and impart foreign ideas into their heads. We were brainwashing them, manipulating them, or so the narrative became. Before, many families taught their children to follow in their footsteps and do whatever it was they and their fathers had done before them, and the idea of us enabling children to choose their own paths was seen as an assault on those values."

"Because farmers wanted their children to be farmers...?"

"You scoff, Mr Arc, but it was a big thing back then. Also, schooltime took children away from what their families saw as more productive things – like toiling in the fields or preparing for marriage. It was an old time, remember, and back then children could marry as early as thirteen years of age."

"That's crazy..."

"It's just a facet of developmental speed. Young animals grow become adults in the space of a year or two because they have to develop quickly to survive. The same goes for people. In today's world, with our relative safety, we enjoy a time when children can be allowed to remain children until their late teens. This gives them more time to learn, develop, and grow in their own way. Back then, a family could not afford to look after someone for so long, and there wasn't time for play. If you could go back, you would find fourteen-year-olds were far more mature in those times. By that age, you'd not only know a craft, but how to butcher an animal, cook it, pay taxes, and perhaps even repair and maintain your home. And you might even have a home of your own." Ozpin shrugged. "It was a different time."

"Do you prefer our time?"

"Yes. Of course. This – or close to this – is what Salem and I were aiming for."

"Close to this?"

"Obviously, our ideals were a little more utopic. We wanted a perfect world, or as close to perfection as could be managed. But, to answer your original question, a lot of the things you take for granted now were highly unpopular when they were first implemented. Healthcare was similarly despised – goodness, I remember when we introduced the idea of doctors having to wash their hands before treating a patient. That almost caused riots."

"You're exaggerating, surely."

"I wish I was. When it was first discovered, it was because of high mortality rates of women during childbirth. An aspiring doctor at the time discovered that the correlating cause was that the doctors were performing autopsies on bodies and then helping women give birth, all without any hygiene. This led to obvious infections. But, of course, the concept of an infection was alien at the time, so all he knew was that washing hands led to lower deaths. He brought that to us, we mandated it for a test, and lo and behold the rate of deaths among women in childbirth fell drastically. You would think that would be a popular thing."