A New Age...

Throughout history we had have a lot of changes called new ages. But this was a really new age, perhaps, the most important one, the Industrial Revolution. This new era brought changes as in modernity as political one (I call political everything that means to govern a country or land), especially in the Victorian Age. At this time, the economic and social changes were the most relevant that marked the English history until today.

Industrial Revolution signified that mills (now, factories) did not need the handwork at all. Thus, Europe started to have a lot of unemployed people. Years later, those industrialized companies built that we named factories. They needed workers to guide machines. Although, on the other hand, this was a big change, industries began to need more people to work, such as children and women. This was a big deal, because having children as workers and women and men working more hours that a human being could work, it’s illegal. Therefore, kings, queens, ministers, etc. had conflicts among them as a result of the discussion if they should had have this deal illegal or legal. Meanwhile, thousands of workers moved to towns where had factories that could give them jobs. As a people context, they lived in really poor conditions so they were capable to sacrifice more hours in works and taking their children to work. So, these many changes were good or bad, it was the initiative of progress or decline? As an example, the creation of public railroads, in 1825, as a way to near towns and communication, could be a good progress; it was a new era, where in few years later each town in England had one.

Railways helped to grow towns in poverty. People could be transported. News could be transported. Then, information of where there were jobs, where the problems were, what was happened with rights and illegal issues about people, and so forth. However, while, the public railroads were being constructed, politics were discussing about legal and illegal issues, about who was going to be the king or the queen of a land, who was richer than others, and so on. Between 1800 and 1900 there were many internal issues about power that it becomes to get confused sometimes. If politics had not been focus on who is who, what is for whom or standing by themselves, maybe, this time could be a good progress, and not a bad decline. it was new age in our history, and it is always called as modern progress and it was like this, but with powered people worried about materials things and , on the other side, poor people, workers, that had to put up with them and their contexts of hard work with illegal norms and strict morality.

In short, do you think that when Shaftesbury’s Factory Act made illegal to employ children below the age of 13 more than 48 hours per week, I mean, more or less 8 hours per day, is a real low or decision? When did those kids could study? Were the progress and the ambition so big that no one did care what people were living? This is a shame but it is the history, our history… and we should change it!