Revolution+In+France InNo+Maurice+Chiu+08.23.10

Awesome Stuff

The Mexican Revolution in the game Red Dead Redemption. In the game Red Dead Redemption, you play as John Marston, who was a former outlaw trying to go straight in the early 1900's as the wild west is coming to an end. You were sent by the government to hunt down the former gang members that you once rode with and called friends. Throughout your travels you will step into Mexico and while you are there, there is a Mexican Revolution against the Mexican government and military. The leader of the rebels was a man called Abraham Reyes. The reason why the French Revolution reminded me of this was because both revolution began because of the corruption of the government and the fact that they are taking all the money from the poor while they live a rich life. So I decided to use this as an "awesome" thing for the page and I also used it because Red Dead Redemption is awesome as well, it got extremely good ratings everywhere. The man with the brown jacket and goatee like mustache is Abraham Reyes. Citations: Web. 26 Aug 2010. 

Notes: France Before The Revlution Summer Of 1789: Millions of French people rebelled against the government and overthrew it.

Social Class Structure:
 * Peasants Class - 20 million people
 * Town Working Class - 2 million people
 * Middle Class - 2 million people
 * Noble Class - 120,000 - 350,000 people

Back then France used an estate system instead of a social class structure.By 1789 the estate system was discarded for being outdated and unfair. Three French Estates: First Estate - Clergy: About 130,000 people. They had their own court laws and did not have to pay certain taxes. Second Estate - Nobility: Between 120,000 to 350,000 people. They had the right to carry swords and had special treatment from the court. Third Estate - Everyone Else: About 27 million people. They had no privilege.
 * Clergy - People who work for the church.
 * Nobility - Nobles
 * Everyone else in the third estate.

Poverty: Poverty was a big problem in France because all the Nobles were extremely rich but everyone else was extremely poor and thus creating an inequality. The poverty was caused by the unequal taxation and there was tax for many things in the french middle ages. Most of the taxes the nobles were exempt or only had to pay very little and most of the citizens did not have enough money to pay the taxes and some families were thrown out of their homes for not being able to pay taxes to the government. Not only is the taxing causing poverty but also because of the citizens had to pay their landlord for renting their houses. Most the landlords were Nobles already so it only made them richer. Not only did the citizens had to pay for the rent but they also had to pay for usage of anything that was owned by the landlord, such as an oven or a mill. To add more to that the citizens had to pay the local church a tenth of their income or what they produced.

French Society and Philosophers: While most people in France did not question and speak out against the social system and just accept it as it is, there were those who did question the system and the government. These people were educated people, who were called Philosophes, shared a way of thinking called Reason. They believed that nothing is true until it has been observed and tested and they refuse to accept truth without questioning it. An example of a Philosophe was Lavoisier, who became famous for discovering how things burn and he was the one to discover and name Oxygen. He also abolished the Taille taxes, introduced old age pensions and built new hospitals. The most famous Philosophe was Voltaire. He questioned the power and the belief of the French Church and was involved with the Calas Affair. By the end of the 1780's most educated wanted to change the law due to Voltaire's writings. They wanted a humane, torture-free system of law and they also has tolerance non-catholics such as protestants and jews. They also wanted to change the way France was governed as well as a say in how the country was run.

Summary Of Notes: During the french middle ages, there were three estates with of Nobles, people related to the church, and everyone else. The ratios of the estates are very different as there are 120,000 to 350,000 nobles and some 27 million people who are just normal citizens. Because of poverty and the inequality of the class structure it led to the citizens revolting against the government in 1789. There were taxing problems as it was very unequal and there were many other problems like landlord rent that caused the poverty. While most the citizens never questioned the ways of the government and law, a few educated people called the Philosophes stood up and started questioning truth. A famous Philosophes called Voltaire has influenced the people with his writings into questioning the law and demanded there would be change.