Let’s not talk about other states, let’s talk about Tai’an Prefecture. The folk customs have really changed a lot in recent years.
As the first base area that Su Yonglin occupied and operated as a base camp, it was the first to establish a farmers' association to liberate farmers, the first to set up centralized factories, and the first to invest in industrial upgrading.
Over the years, among the peasant families in Tai'an Prefecture, no family with daughters is still rushing to marry off their daughters. They all hope that when they grow up, they will be sent to the factory to find a job.
Generally, girls will be sent to workshops when they are eleven or twelve years old to engage in some light manual technical work, such as sewing, weaving and making clothes. Their fathers think this is very good, not only for work, but also for training the skills they will need after getting married in the future. The female celebrity skills used.
And there is money to be made.
While earning wages from the factory, you can eat a free meal provided by the factory, take the factory's New Year's benefits, reduce the burden on your family, increase your family income, and you can also enjoy free medical care while working. Isn't this nice?
To put it bluntly, to put it crudely - what was once a money-losing thing has now become a money-making thing, who wouldn't be happy?
As a result, the age of marriage for women in Tai'an Prefecture has been slowly pushed back, and it is rare to hear of people getting married at the age of eleven or twelve.
This is not important. What is important is that I don’t know when the concept of "earn your own dowry and find your own husband" has also spread among the women in the Tai'an Prefecture factory.
From about the first year of Hongwu to the second year of Hongwu, the local custom of women earning their own dowries became popular.
Women in the factory began to negotiate with their families to save their wages and use them as dowries and expenses when they get married. When the time comes, they will not need to contribute money from their families, but they will use their own savings as dowries.
Most of the family members don't have any objections and agree with this view. The money is unavoidable anyway. If the family does not have to pay for it, the family will be happy to lighten the burden.
And because of the emergence of such customs, factory women in Tai'an Prefecture gradually began to have their own sense of independence in marriage.
They often do not readily accept the straightforward requirements of their elders for their marriage, and will no longer accept the custom of marrying a chicken and marrying a dog and following a dog as in the past. Instead, they ask for their own opinions to be consulted when choosing a husband.
They will marry only if they like them, but not if they don't like them. When choosing a husband, they often prefer male workers who also work in the factory, because they are also very aware of the income and treatment levels of male workers in the factory. .
Marriage between a male worker and a female worker is a choice where one plus one is greater than two. Both parties rely on the factory, and the life between the factory and the family must be rich, colorful and interesting.
Because they had their dowry money in hand and a good job that could guarantee their livelihood, they began to have unprecedented confidence in this matter.
For such confidence, parents obviously did not adapt in time, nor did they change their thinking in time. Although there are some enlightened parents who are willing to obey their daughters' ideas, there are also those old-fashioned parents who are unwilling to give up their father's rights.
Therefore, there have been some related disputes locally.
It needs to be mentioned that Su Yonglin has always been promoting people's literacy level and has been adhering to literacy campaigns.
In various situations that are conducive to literacy, such as the military and factories where work is concentrated, literacy becomes more efficient. The workers in the Taian Prefecture factory have become one of the groups with the highest literacy rate in the Ming Dynasty.
This is true for male workers, and it is also true for female workers. When it comes to teaching people to read, Su Yonglin requires that men and women be consistent.
The efficiency of workers' literacy is obviously higher than that of farmers, so the literacy rate of factory workers soon surpassed that of local farmers, becoming one of the most literate representative groups in the local area.
After recognizing the words and listening to the instructor in the factory preaching some of the ideas in Su Yonglin's political treatises, they gained some knowledge, still had money on hand, and had the financial foundation and support to live independently from their families. As a result, the female workers gradually began to have their own identity. independent consciousness.
This female worker named Xiao Cui has been working in the factory for four years. From the second year of work, she did not give the money to her father who liked to drink, but kept it in her own hands.
For this reason, the incompetent father went to the factory to cause trouble many times, asking Xiao Cui to give him his wages to buy wine, but Xiao Cui refused to give him the courage.
Her father wanted to beat her, but Xiao Cui's co-workers stopped her. Everyone scolded her father away with the same hatred.
From then on, Xiao Cui rarely went home. Occasionally he would sneak home to see his mother and brother, stuff some money, and then quickly return to the factory and live in the factory's workers' dormitory.
Xu felt the loss of his authority, which made his alcoholic father very unhappy.
And because he really lacked money to buy wine, this guy grew angry and evil in his heart, and decided to promise Xiao Cui to the family he owed money for drinking. The debt would be written off and he would get an extra sum of money.
Faced with this kind of thing, of course Xiao Cui firmly disagreed. She felt that she had been greatly insulted. She resisted with all her strength and refused to marry. No matter how many times the other party came to make trouble, she just refused to marry.
She would never allow herself to be sold as an object by her alcoholic father.
The co-workers supported Xiao Cui's rebellious behavior and also shared their hatred for the enemy. Every time they came to cause trouble, they would gather to drive them away and protect Xiao Cui. Perhaps they were also protecting their own rights to autonomy.
After reading this report, Su Yonglin believed that the people's awakening was hard-won, and it was necessary for him to maintain this awakening, take root, sprout, and grow.
The attack and ban on patriarchy, an important part of the feudal ideological framework, is an important step in completing social change and an important war to eradicate old ideas. He will never be merciful.
So while putting forward the suggestion of setting up a drama troupe and admitting women into the revival club, he told the revival members present at the meeting about this, and clearly stood on Xiao Cui's side and expressed his support for her.
"The behavior of Xiao Cui's father is a typical old way of thinking, full of oppression and exploitation of children. It is a direct manifestation of the powerful patriarchy in Confucian thought! It is a behavior that we must clearly oppose!
Treating having children as an investment in production, treating them as free labor force, treating sons with a little tenderness because it involves pensions and inheritance, and treating daughters as if they are splashed water, quite cold, is definitely not the case. Case! "
Su Yonglin slapped the table and said angrily: "It's just that this incident happened in our factory, so it was noticed by us. Otherwise, how long will it take for such a thing to be known? Like this kind of thing, Don’t you think Xiao Cui is brave?”
To be honest, changing customs is more difficult than political reform.
For a long time, Su Yonglin has focused on political and military reforms, but has not yet made any effort on the economic and people's livelihood issues that have a greater impact, let alone the topic of women.
Su Yonglin didn't mention it, and the others didn't take it seriously. They inherited the long-standing practice. Whether it's an official, a soldier, or joining the Fuxing Association, it's all a matter for men.
It wasn't until Su Yonglin told the story that women could join the revival society that they discovered that Ming society had really changed a lot.
Unknowingly, as the court set up more and more handicraft workshops in various places, more and more women were recruited to work. As time went by, so many women rebelled against their fathers.
And they don't know this.
Su Yonglin was silent for a while. Seeing that there was no movement from them, he sighed.
"So I said that we cannot isolate ourselves from the people. We cannot think that we understand everything just because we have been among the people. There are many things that we do not understand. I have set up a public consultation room to allow the people to take the initiative to come and communicate with us. We talk.
But what if some people can’t come up and talk to us? Only if we take the initiative to talk to them and ask them about the real situation can we have a deeper understanding of what is happening among the people.
Just like this matter, I'm just like you. If it weren't for this report, I wouldn't have known or realized that such a problem existed in the Ming Law, and that it would lead to such a bad incident, which is ridiculous! "
After Su Yonglin finished speaking, Xin Qiji began to speak.
"However, as you said, we have never considered this before. For thousands of years, the imperial court has never interfered with civil marriages. The orders of parents and matchmakers have always been the rules followed by the people... How to change it?"
