Kara 0:00

Hey everybody, this is Kara.

SPEAKER_01 0:01

This is Deja.

Kara 0:03

And this is Ed. And this is your day's dumpster fire.

Ed 0:06

See if we got it now. We love it. That was very royal.

Kara 0:38

I love that song. We love it. Mozart is the man. If anybody wants to know, Mozart's my favorite classical musical artist.

Ed 0:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

It's my only classical unit. Yep.

Ed 0:48

It's like it's like the one of the few people that like everybody remembers. They remember Mozart and Beethoven.

SPEAKER_01 0:53

Facts.

Ed 0:54

And then maybe Bach. Yeah. Or Batch.

Kara 0:58

A lot of it like that.

Ed 0:59

Batch. Bach.

Kara 1:03

Ew. Like a cat throwing up.

Ed 1:13

Yeah, that's true. That was. Yeah. In case if you're wondering, this is our second time recording our intro because the first time I had everything really loud. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:24

And like I'm doing great with that. My head is fine. It's right.

Ed 1:29

Yeah, because you've got the plague. Yep. And here we are sitting on a petri dish. With the door closed.

SPEAKER_01 1:36

Door closed. Windows open, so it's a little warm.

Ed 1:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:40

The bacteria's just thriving.

Ed 1:42

It's like the opening to The Last of Us.

SPEAKER_01 1:44

Just go.

Ed 1:46

Yeah, well, and this is a uh this is a momentous, momentous moment for us. Uh so um we all three of us are actually in the same room recording. Kara's got a Kara's forgot her medications and she's just randomly swiping at things. Uh normally we see each other on camera as we swipe at things, but now it's just in person.

SPEAKER_01 2:10

There's dog hair on my hat. We can confirm there's nothing in the air.

Ed 2:13

Yeah, I know.

Kara 2:15

No, there's dog hair in my hat, and I was getting it off. She like looks cross-eyed while she's pulling up the brim of her hat.

Ed 2:22

As long as not like as long as she's not like talking to like some random person off the side of the room.

Kara 2:27

Like considering we're on the second floor, I'd be really concerned if I were talking to some random person.

SPEAKER_01 2:33

How did you get all the way up here?

Ed 2:37

But yeah, so like this is this is momentous. Uh Deja months and months and months ago proposed the idea of like, hey, let's all set things up so that we can record in the same room. Because before we were using online apps that were like um, think of like Zoom but on steroids, and it worked good. Well, worked well. It worked, it worked, it did many, many biggly things. Oh um, she hates my Trump impersonation.

SPEAKER_03 3:08

Oh it was tremendous, many, many biggly things.

SPEAKER_01 3:14

I did not pick up on that. That's why you were so confused.

Ed 3:24

No, but like uh uh we had this ingenious idea of let's try like recording in the same room. So I had to go out and buy like this mixer and more cables and all sorts of stuff, and it's been a rather wild roller coaster ride of settings. And it turns out I have no idea what I'm doing.

SPEAKER_01 3:45

Again.

Ed 3:46

And uh last week or this last episode, if you listen to that one, I had my daughter on. And uh go listen to it. Um, if you, if you think you are, or if you know somebody or someone who's in your family kind of dealing with a uh an eating disorder, uh, I had my daughter on here who's kind of been through it, and she kind of gave like a firsthand account of how it works, what to look for, what to do, what to say. And so that I we recorded that because both Deja and and Kara had to do like adult family responsibilities. Sorry. Yeah, don't ever let that happen again.

SPEAKER_01 4:22

Yeah. She's like, oh, I'm just gonna have another set of 3,000 cousins visiting every next Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. So sorry guys. Yeah, for sure.

Ed 4:32

Just like her and her husband. She has like family over every weekend, it seems like.

SPEAKER_01 4:36

Well, it's fine. We're loved. We're loved.

Ed 4:39

Right?

SPEAKER_01 4:40

They really like her, not apparently how my life is. Well, because she's not good. Is she not? I'm the fun aunt.

Ed 4:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:48

It's Lizzie. Lizzie's the crazy aunt. She's the one kids.

Ed 4:54

Yeah, Lizzie is the one that would like have like 15 cats and I feel like she.

SPEAKER_01 5:01

Oh man, if Lizzie were my aunt, that'd be so funny.

Ed 5:05

Uh speaking of Lizzie, for those of you who don't know, that's Kara's sister and slash our boss.

Kara 5:10

That is correct.

SPEAKER_01 5:11

My little sister is my boss.

Ed 5:13

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 5:13

It's fun. It's a it's actually it's so fun. It works out great.

Ed 5:17

Yeah, she's she's hilarious. But I was getting ready to comment. Like, I'm going back to public teaching. What do you guys get?

SPEAKER_03 5:24

We'll figure it out.

Ed 5:26

So, yeah, uh, here we are. This is the first episode. Not the first time we've recorded. I think we've recorded a couple of episodes multiple times over, but I screwed it all up. I think now I finally got it figured out, and I say we get into our trash can fire.

Kara 5:41

I thought that was our trash can fire. Oh.

Ed 5:43

Oh yeah. Did you want to just make that our trash can fire?

Kara 5:46

Let's make that our trash can fire. That way we can save the other one for next time, and then we have another one for the third one that we're going to record today.

Ed 5:53

Yes. Exactly. Okay. Because of stuff.

SPEAKER_01 5:57

So something like that.

Ed 5:59

Yeah, yeah. You're with us. Look at our listener numbers to skyrocket.

SPEAKER_01 6:04

Uh one, two, three, four.

Ed 6:09

And then and then it's like, oh, I didn't know you could have a negative number of listeners.

SPEAKER_01 6:14

People have just completely deleted the app that they're using.

Ed 6:18

Yeah, people are like, okay, okay, days dump Safari, you owe me an episode now. Like I'm sorry. Go explain that to our students and how to do integers.

SPEAKER_01 6:27

Oh my goodness.

Ed 6:28

So yeah, today I think we got we we've got a uh pretty massive episode, kind of almost like a series.

Kara 6:35

Yes. Actually, it is more like a series than it is anything else.

Ed 6:39

Yeah.

Kara 6:39

Yeah. Yeah.

Ed 6:40

So you do you want to go briefly talk about what you're gonna be doing today and then Deja, what like you have in mind part of the series, and then I'll finish off with what I have in my part of the series and then go through it all.

Kara 6:51

Yeah, so I am going to start with King Louis XVI and his part that he played in the French Revolution. So it's going to be a lot of um politics and finances and beheadings. So you're welcome.

Ed 7:06

That sounds thrilling.

Kara 7:07

I'm so excited, dude.

SPEAKER_01 7:09

Maybe this is why I had the dream that I had last night, actually.

Kara 7:12

Now that I think about it, I'm like, oh wait, there was a lot of heads chopped off. Yes, and a hand.

Ed 7:20

There's a hand that went missing too?

Kara 7:21

Yes, in the storming of Bastille. We'll get there.

SPEAKER_01 7:24

We'll get there. How about you, Deja? It's all making sense. I am going to be doing Marie Antoinette. And there's gonna be a lot of really bad stuff that happens there too. A lot of gambling and a lot of um misconceptions. A lot of misconceptions, a lot of lies, a lot of propaganda truths.

Ed 7:46

Well, I think for both of your ladies' episodes, it's uh I I think history history.

SPEAKER_01 7:53

History.

Ed 7:54

History. Um yes, in 1796, there was a lot of history going on.

Kara 8:02

Oh no. I didn't like that. I didn't like that either.

Ed 8:05

Yeah, just lost another listener. Um It was me. Yeah, it just irritated somebody. I I I I pissed off that guy in England that listens to our show. Sorry.

Kara 8:13

Yeah, sorry. Sorry to Britain.

Ed 8:16

Um yeah, I think there's a lot of misconceptions. I I don't think uh history did those two justice because if you try to find two people that should have never been put in those positions to solve the problems that were going on in France at that time, it was these two. They would have been fine probably in any other time period in history where there wasn't massive debt and war going on. It you know, if if the if if France was doing swimmingly, we would never have known about these two.

SPEAKER_01 8:48

Swimmingly.

Ed 8:49

Swimmingly. Yeah, um, a lot of misconceptions there, and then what I'm gonna dive into uh is how the French Revolution was actually a revolution in terms of like it's a cycle. So it starts off with France trying to get rid of royalty and a king and a queen and everything like that, and in the process of doing so, they ended up with an emperor. And so I'm gonna kind of go over Napoleon.

Kara 9:17

Napoleon.

Ed 9:18

Napoleon. Yeah, that's actually how you would have pronounced his name, who is actually Italian, so I don't know how to say his name in Italian. It's a me at a Mario. It's a Napoleon. Um there goes our Italian listener. Um so I'm gonna be doing Napoleon, but instead of kind of like doing his rise to fame and all that stuff, I'm just kind of gonna bullet point that because you know what, that's not the dumpster fire. The dumpster fire is when he tried to invade Russia with 700,000 soldiers and most of Europe's armies behind him, and he got just absolutely wrecked by a boy czar and uh a guy who had no military experience at all, but Russia, let's just say Russia knows how to winter.

SPEAKER_01 10:06

It's true.

Ed 10:06

They they can winter with the best of them. They're the best winterers, and uh yeah, they're yeah, they're real, yeah, they're pro, they're master class winterers. So I'm gonna go into how Napoleon kind of botched all that up and how he kind of got screwed in that a little bit, and um, yeah, and then he does a stomach cancer. Great. So sometime later. So, Kara. Okay, before I mess something up on this doohickey, let's get it going.

Kara 10:34

So, we're gonna start with Louis XIV before we get to the 16th, which is Louis XVI's great great-grandfather. There are a lot of Louis to talk about, but I'm gonna start with 14. Louis the 14th is a guy who ruled with absolute monarchy, meaning he was the sole proprietor of protection and finance and religion, and anything that was passed through any kind of system of government or parlement or anything was through the king.

Ed 11:03

What so there was no was there like any sort of like uh like I I don't want to say a constitutional monarchy, because that's kind of what they were pushing for, but was there any sort of like parliament or congress, or was it just like Louis was the end all be all sole decider of all laws and all that stuff?

Kara 11:20

Louis the 14th was end all be all decider of all laws with a group of advisors.

Ed 11:26

Got it.

Kara 11:27

And the group of advisors were essentially called the Parlement, not Parliament, which is different. Uh the Parlement was like a 13-court system that would assist Louis in passing certain laws. Got it. Does that make sense?

Ed 11:44

So it's kind of like the small council on Game of Thrones. Those were mainly advisors, but they're the ones that came up with the policies, and then it would have been the king that enacted them.

Kara 11:53

There's no national bank, there's no council really, like not council, but like a branch of different branches of government. There's no checks and balances, there's nothing. It's an absolute monarchy. Okay. Um, whereas in England, they had a constitutional monarchy. Um, England went through their glorious revolution back in like 1688, something, somewhere around there, 88, 89, so a hundred years prior to this. And they were kind of the forefathers of a constitutional monarchy where they had the checks and balances, the two chambers of parliament, and they had a prime minister and all of that stuff. Um, so we're gonna start there. And then Louis XIV was succeeded by Louis XV. When Louis XV was in power, France was one of the largest European powers of the 18th century. It had the largest population just behind Russia, it had the largest army in Europe, and it became a cultural center full of education, ideas, and sciences. This was the center of the Enlightenment. Um, France's largest population also provided a very large tax pool, which was great. We we need that, as you'll find out. France also boasted a super strong trading route and colonial outposts that primarily got their money with coffee, sugar, and slaves as their main sources of external wealth. Um they primarily traded through the Caribbean and down south in that area. Uh not necessarily with the um what would become the United States, that was primarily uh Britain's uh area. Um so despite all of these wonderful and helpful strengths that France had, France was in crippling debt by the time we get to Louis XV. Between 1749 and 63, France was involved in conflicts against the British, mostly for land. They fought the British in the Second Karnak War in India in 1749 to 54, and then the French-Indian War in North America from 1754 to 1763, and finally the seventh the seven years' war between all three India, India, North America, and in Europe. War is very expensive, and France lost the Seven Years' War, so like they were in bad shape. The Seven Years' War in particular left both Britain and France in shambles. Uh, the difference in their recovery was the economic process that they had in place and a lot of boring peppermint stuff.

Ed 14:16

Well, and I think uh I think a lot of it too was uh Britain had that navy.

Kara 14:20

Well, they had the navy, but what really did it was their trading.

Ed 14:22

Yeah, well that's that's that's what I'm saying. They had they they controlled the oceans for the most part. So Britain was able to trade overseas and make money, and they also had those profitable um colonies in the Americas generating a lot of money, whereas France, I don't think, had that. I think France was kind of, I don't want to say landlocked, but France was trading more over land with actual like land-based neighbors, whereas Britain could go all over the world.

Kara 14:51

Yep. Well, in a nutshell, Britain was making a crap ton of money off of the slave trade and the triangular trade route. That was their moneymaker, that was their baby. So they had that going for them, but also because they had that constitutional monarchy system, because they had that constitutional monarchy system, it was a lot easier for them to pass different kinds of taxes. So they would just send it to the chamber, the chamber would be like, all right, cool, and then we'll tax whoever. Obviously, this is going to cause problems in 1775, but uh it was a lot easier for them to raise money as opposed to France. And I'm going to explain right now. Legally speaking, French society was still following the three estate system. The first estate was the clergy, followed by the nobility, and then the common people have everybody else. However, society was uh changing extremely fast. A class of wealthy merchants began to rise into the aristocracy. So in the Middle Ages, we had the a very hierarchical structured like clergy first, nobility second, common people third. There is no going in between these three estates. Now, especially after the Enlightenment and during the Enlightenment, we have a lot of estates and common people moving up into the aristocracy because they're making a lot of money off of trading, they're making a lot of money off of land. Um, and we're starting to see more of a free flow of how these estates are working, which is extremely important. Uh, they would often buy seats of power into the parlement. So we start to have a lot of wealthy aristocratic people from both the aristocracy and the common people or the bourgeois buying seats into this council government parlement position. And it just it's a really weird system where we're having common people who are now very literate and educated because of the power of the press starting to get their own ideas from the Enlightenment, and they're also making money. And the monarchy is starting to get a little bit concerned. Like this absolute monarchy system is going to start to crumble.

Ed 16:58

Do you think this may have been in part due to the Gutenberg press? Everything. Like people could now, more and more people were becoming literate, and more and more people could gain information, knowledge on their own. Whereas, like in medieval times, knowledge, all knowledge kind of came from the priest. Whereas now they could go out and figure this stuff out on their own.

Kara 17:17

So my students are going to be hearing this all year over and over and over and over and over again. The power of the press, the Gutenberg press, and afterwards changes everything. Absolutely everything from the Renaissance on. It started with humanism, humanism evolves into the Enlightenment, the Enlightenment evolves into government and law and modern thinking. It's everything. So, yes.

Ed 17:42

Well, it just seems like, especially when you when you start having like common folk setting up businesses, and then suddenly you're I think you're starting to see a rise. I know this happened in England as well. You're starting to see a rise of people that don't have that royal name or that that family name that dates back to you know hundreds of years ago. You have like these nobodies that are now making more money than some of these big family names. Like there's big family names that have been around since the beginning of France, but they have no money. Like they were completely bankrupt, but they are living this life because of their name only. But now you're starting to see merchants and stuff like that generating a ton of money, and they're like, wait a second, where's our voice? Like, don't we have a say in it? I'm making a ton of money now, so shouldn't I have a place? And so they were literally just buying their way in to government.

Kara 18:40

Yeah, and we'll get there. What they're doing is they're buying their way into government, but they're still technically considered in the common class.

Ed 18:46

Okay.

Kara 18:48

Which is where the fun part starts because the nobility class and the clergy did not pay taxes. They accounted together for about 20% of France's entire population, and the population's huge, remember. And that leaves all of the tax responsibility to the peasant class or the common class, and that consists of the other 80%.

Ed 19:08

Wow. That's almost like what it's like in America today. Funny. It's almost like history is repeating itself. So when do we have our revolution? And I just put Kara in a really awkward position.

SPEAKER_01 19:27

Looking into my soul, like I'm sorry, I didn't want to look at him.

Ed 19:32

Help me not. Help me not. We're trying to get sponsors, not death threats. Go ahead. We'll talk about that later.

Kara 19:44

Um okay.

Ed 19:45

That'll be the next episode.

Kara 19:46

Do we have to? I don't want to talk about it later. So in the 18th century, taxes demanded by the aristocracy were in extreme abundance. So there was a land tax. On top of the land tax, they had a 5% estate tax. And then they had a tax based on the number of people in a family. And then they had a tax on the use of nobility equipment like mills or wine presses or bakeries. So they had a tax on that. And then they had a tax on salt. There was even a tax where if you were selling something, like if you were a merchant trying to make a lot of money, they they would tax you for going from one town to another town. And then if you had to cross multiple towns, they would tax you for that. So you had all of these taxes, and then they had other taxes as well. So they would work the land that they lived on. And this is like a landlord type of situation. So just living on this land. They would work on the land for a certain number of days, right? And and they would work like let's say Monday through Friday. And that Monday through Friday work would go all to the aristocracy or the landlord or whoever owns that piece of land. And then Sunday and Saturday, those days work and harvest or whatever you get in those two days, that's just for you to survive off of. So that's kind of how they paid rent.

Ed 20:58

Oh, yeah, because you got all those taxes, and then you still got to pay your landlords and yep.

Kara 21:03

So you still gotta pay your landlord, you still gotta eat. Peasants also paid rent in cash on top of that. And then on top of that, they would have to pay the church, the church tizi tithy. On top of that.

Ed 21:14

Tithy?

Kara 21:14

Titty, tithe, tithe.

Ed 21:15

Tith.

Kara 21:16

Tithe. Thank you. Tithy. It's a fun word. It's a fun word. Tithe.

Ed 21:20

Look at the size of those tithes, those tithes.

SPEAKER_01 21:23

Like no, I feel dumb. No, you are so smart.

Ed 21:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:28

Anyway, spending a lot of money.

Ed 21:30

And I love that for you.

SPEAKER_01 21:33

You're spending a lot of money. We'll like bleep it out like it was a bad word. Okay. Yeah, there we go. That's a good idea.

Ed 21:39

I think I actually have a bleep thing in here. Push it. Uh yeah, let's just see what this does. Oh, yeah. Big ol' huge giant ease.

SPEAKER_01 21:53

This is going so it's like an awesome potion.

Ed 21:56

Like, look at those melons. What is it? That looks like a giant peanuts, get your peanuts.

Kara 22:06

Oh boy.

Ed 22:07

Oh, I'm way too much fun with this. It's tithes. Tithes. So tithes.

Kara 22:13

Sorry. Anyway. Before Louis XVI took the throne, there were a lot of early attempts to reform the tax system. But because the nobility would often buy their way to influence political power, usually the reforms wouldn't go through because they wanted to keep all of their money, which is obvious. So, and this is especially in the Parlement. So, I mean it's they're they're buying out the Parlement. However, Louis XV was able to shut down the Parlement after having all of these issues. And that was that was a good deal for the absolute monarchy part of things. Get that Parlement shut down so he can have more control over his government. And eventually the nobility would deny any kind of reform to get these taxes passed. So this this there was no reform insight for these tax problems. So it was a lot, I know. But now we get to Louis, our Louis, our Louis XVI. So Louis was the third son of Louis, the Dauphin, and grandson of Louis the Fifteent.

Ed 23:14

And then the great-grandson of Louis XIV.

Kara 23:18

Yes. Yes.

Ed 23:19

Yeah, just one Marie after another.

SPEAKER_01 23:21

It's like all of France was just Marie and Louis. Marie and Louis.

Ed 23:25

Like you guys couldn't come up with anything original. Well, it's like thinking in England, they had like how many Johns? Yeah, James. George.

Kara 23:33

George. Charles.

Ed 23:34

John James George.

Kara 23:35

Marie was Austrian.

Ed 23:37

Yeah. So that one's original. Yeah.

Kara 23:40

Well, it was it's original in France. First time. France, yeah. Uh as a child, Louis was well educated. He excelled in geography, Latin, and history. And in his free time, he often went hunting with his grandfather, the king, and enjoyed playing sports. Uh, personality, he was extremely quiet. He was shy. He didn't have a lot of charisma. He was kind of boring and weird. You mean he didn't have a lot of Riz? No. No, none. No Riz.

Ed 24:07

But he probably had a lot of drip for being the king.

Kara 24:09

That slaps. No, no. You're capping.

Ed 24:14

Skippity.

SPEAKER_02 24:16

No!

Ed 24:20

Totally toilet Ohio that.

SPEAKER_01 24:24

I don't know any other grimace. That's a thing.

Ed 24:29

Grimace?

SPEAKER_01 24:30

Yeah. It's like Skippity.

Ed 24:32

Oh, it's like that Gen Alpha talk still. I know like grimace, like a like a look, like a grimacing look.

SPEAKER_01 24:37

Like the grimace shake, like the shake? You remember that trim? Oh, the purple guy from any day. Oh, yeah. So it's like Skippity's Toilet Ohio grimace. Back to Back to the Riz. Yes.

Ed 24:51

Oh, it's okay, guys. We've lost all our listeners by now.

Kara 24:56

I'm trying so hard.

Ed 24:58

So we can we can say whatever we want now. We're good to go. We've officially offended everybody.

Kara 25:05

Anyway. So obviously, King Louis did not have the personality to be a king. Just no. In December of 1765, when he was 11, his father died of tuberculosis, and that made him the new Delphant of France or the Prince. And I would also note that this is two years after the Seven Years' War, and the country is still struggling financially extremely much so. So he is now the heir of a nation that is dying. After his father died, I'm not going to try to say that, um, but this Duke became his tutor. And this guy was extremely religious with a focus on morality and religious history instead of a more well-rounded education. Uh, the Duke was very firm in his belief that, quote, timidity was a virtue and that he thank you was a virtue and that he should never reveal his true thoughts or opinions of others. So he was being taught that he needs to be a quiet, timid little mouse guy, and he should never have an opinion. Uh some some historians now believe that this was a major reason reason for a lot of Louis's decisions later and his demeanor in his adult life. Revolutionaries at the time used this quality in his personality as propaganda, and they would always call the king stupid, or he didn't know what he was doing, so they really used it against him. In 1768, Louis's grandfather arranged a political marriage to solidify a new alliance they had just made with Austria. I'm not going to go into those details, just know it's a political marriage. His bride to be was the Austrian Archduchess Maria Antonia, and she would eventually change that. But two years later, in 1770, they were married. Uh Louis was 15 and Maria was 14, so they were children. Children. They are children.

Ed 27:05

Well, it I I guess, like, too, if you if you really honestly think about it, okay, you're you're 15 years old, and try to think back when you were 15 years old. No. You're freaking out about, or you're getting excited about like maybe getting your learner's permit, and you're freaking out about like a test at school that you're trying to pass. This 15-year-old knows that he's inheriting a country that is horrifically in debt. That um there is already a rising group of people that are getting really, really, really frustrated. And he like, I I have to mention he was aware of what was going on, and then his personality was that okay, I'd rather be a quiet giant. I I would rather, you know, say what needs to be said versus say what I want to say kind of a thing. And like you combine all that into a 15-year-old boy who now just got married. How was he supposed to fix all this? I mean, I could not even begin to fathom what I was supposed to what I would supposed to be doing if I was 15 and inheriting a country such as this.

SPEAKER_01 28:14

And it's not even put in his head at 15, it's put in his head before 15, too. Like he knew he knew he was gonna marry.

Ed 28:22

Yeah, it's like Yeah, oh yeah, and throw a marriage on top of that. And yeah, based off of my cursory understanding of this guy, like he was probably even too nervous to get married.

Kara 28:32

Oh, absolutely, 100% he was. Absolutely. He probably didn't even want to get married. It's also important to note that Maria is from Austria, and it's a newly obtained country, and the French crown just kind of did it. And the common French people weren't really excited about this whole thing at all. And they were extremely suspicious of the Austrian population, let alone their queen now being from Austria. So for the next seven years, the new royal couple didn't have any children, and the French population, more likely the people in the courts, attributed this to a lack of Louis not being man enough to consummate the marriage. And uh they they just felt that he he wasn't up for the task, right? Like they were making fun of him, they thought they were saying that he had a physical deformities and there's something wrong with him mentally. Guys, he's 15.

Ed 29:27

Compared to all the other 15-year-olds out there, like, oh, all these other 15-year-olds would have been fine, but Louie, there is something wrong with him.

SPEAKER_01 29:34

I was getting so irritated, right? I've been I've been so like irritated by this particular situation because I'm like, dog, he is not old enough to be worrying about this stuff at all. And like the amount of pressure, and then you have all of these out, anyways. Yeah, yeah.

Ed 29:53

Like homeboy probably hasn't even kissed a girl yet, let alone consummated a marriage. Consummated marriage, yeah.

Kara 29:59

Yeah, so like okay, he's 15. By the time he's 22, they still haven't had a child. In 1774, while we're still working through this, Louis, his grandfather, the 15th, he died at 64 years old. Louis was 19, and he took the throne after the death of his grandfather.

Ed 30:17

Not not much better.

Kara 30:19

He was 19 years old. Now, usually, especially before him, like his father was four, I think, when he when he got the crown, his grandfather was four or five years old. So, in that perspective, Louis's kind of on the older side, and you would think that he would have some experience, and he does because he was working so closely with his grandfather, but I just a friendly reminder of what he's inheriting here. He's inheriting a bankrupt country. The 80% of the population, even if they are wealthy, are being taxed to oblivion, and the country has been at war for like 20 years, and they're trying to get over that. So it's a good time. It's it's a good time. Mental health, isn't it? Right now, the interesting thing about Louis is even though he has all of these issues, his priority was that he wanted the pop, the the popular people, the populace, I guess, to love him as a king. So he was more concerned about the people loving him than actually fixing what was going on with the country.

Ed 31:23

Yeah. I mean, that to a teenager, child. Yeah, to a teenager, you're more worried about your self-image than you are your responsibilities.

SPEAKER_01 31:31

Yeah. 100%. Right. It's normal.

Ed 31:34

Basically. Yeah, it's like that that's that's the normal stage of life. Yes.

Kara 31:37

And 100%, yes, that's normal, but also we have to remember back in these days. Back in these days, in the context of the time, it's not a good look. And also it's going to it's going to lead to a lot of bad decisions. So remember that Parliament system I was talking about, the one that his grandfather disposed of, and it was bad for him because he didn't have any absolute power because the rich guys kept taking over and was screwing the common people as well as him.

Ed 32:04

Sounds like a good time.

Kara 32:06

He put it back into place. Okay. As one does. He put it back into place because the Parlement, in the view of the common estate, is something that gives them some sort of representation. But what they don't understand is that it's the rich people of that third estate that are running it.

Ed 32:35

Okay.

Kara 32:35

So what Louis did is he put that back into place thinking that it will help his popularity.

Ed 32:42

Got it. So in other words, it's like, hey, I'm gonna bring this back so people will like me for bringing this back. But what he failed to realize is that he just brought back the rich people. Meanwhile, the taxes are being paid by 80% of the population, and they're like, where's our representation?

Kara 33:01

Correct. Um, Louis is often quoted as saying something along the lines of the public opinion is never wrong. Um, so just to emphasize more that he he really truly does care about what his people think of him. Yeah. Uh Louis was also a man who was very much in touch with the ideas of reason in the Enlightenment. He was extremely focused on human rights, which is another reason why, or probably another reason why he was so hyper focused on getting the approval of the people as opposed to the approval of the aristocracy or the clergy. He was primarily focused on the people, likely because he was taught in this like age of enlightenment, age of reason type of culture or environment.

Ed 33:42

So he was trying to be progressive.

Kara 33:43

He was trying to be progressive, but it it it didn't work. Like his plan was when he when he came in was to follow these enlightenment ideas and to be a king of the people. That was his plan. That's what he wanted to do.

Ed 33:58

Problem is he had no idea who the people were. Well, like he knew the rich people. Like that was that was kind of like the circle, but yes, he was he meant well for the common folks, but he had no idea realistically what it was that they were dealing with.

Kara 34:16

His great-grandfather, Louis XIV, I forgot to mention this, uh, he built Versailles. And for those of you who don't know, Versailles is about 12 miles away from Paris. And this is back when we didn't have any cars or anything like that. So 12 miles is a pretty good distance away. And it was a physical reminder, especially for people who are living in Paris during the Enlightenment, of the separation between the nobility and the everybody else.

Ed 34:45

Oh, yeah.

Kara 34:46

So he's living in Versailles, he's running things from Versailles, 12 miles away from Paris, the biggest city in the country. So he's he's trying. Early in his reign, Louis would have a hard time making decisions or deciding who to support in terms of foreign policy and finances. It's like that boring stuff that no young person really wants to do or take care of. Uh, he would often get stuck between the opinions of people such as Anne Robert Jacques Turgot. I am going to murder these names over and over again. I'm so sorry.

Ed 35:18

But I can't Robert Jacques Turgeot.

Kara 35:21

Turgeot and Jacques Necker or Joucot Necker?

Ed 35:25

It would be Jacques Nickey.

Kara 35:27

Okay. I'm gonna go with Necker because it sounds funny. He's Swiss too.

SPEAKER_01 35:33

He's Swiss. He's a Swiss guy. I I that's not what made me laugh.

Ed 35:37

I'm just saying, make sure you uh really emphasize the vowels.

SPEAKER_01 35:42

Oh, I see what you're saying.

Ed 35:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:44

We'll go with Nikkei. I didn't even think that. I didn't even think that.

Ed 35:47

Yeah, it's just like because I I wasn't following along on the notes, and then I heard necker. I'm like, what? What?

Kara 35:54

Well, that's how they were pronouncing it in the documentaries and stuff that I said. Oh, okay.

Ed 35:57

So yeah, if he's Swiss, it would be pronounced Necker, but still like bro.

Kara 36:01

You gotta be careful. Yeah. Yeah. It makes sense. Jacques N. N.

Ed 36:06

Yeah.

Kara 36:06

Nikkei.

Ed 36:07

Mr. Jacques. We'll call him Nick.

Kara 36:09

Mr. Jacques. Just Nick. Mr. Necker. Nick. Anyway, because he he pops up a few times. So I don't want to butcher that too much. Anyway, for the most part, Louis would compromise on making big decisions, or he would make a ruling that wouldn't be strong enough to sustain any type of reform or change. He would he would always trade a compromise, but he was always overshadowed or overtaken by bigger personalities. And they, his advisors, would essentially be the one who took to make these big decisions for him because he didn't want to do it.

Ed 36:40

Well, the thing is, is like a compromise is not necessarily a bad thing.

Kara 36:45

A compromise is not a bad thing, but when you're in a country who's almost bankrupt, you have to make a decision.

Ed 36:51

Yeah, almost a polarizing decision.

Kara 36:53

Yeah. And you have to stand by it, which sucks because normally I'm like compromise queen. I love compromises.

SPEAKER_01 37:00

Yep. But it's like you you you get it. Yeah.

Ed 37:03

But yeah, there's got to be a point where you have to stick to your gun. So it's a good thing. Selfish.

Kara 37:07

Yep. Selfish.

Ed 37:09

Selfish.

Kara 37:10

He also had a reputation of listening to the advice of his aristocratic advisors that cared more about their wealth than the wealth of the people that he was trying to gain support of. Um, so he wouldn't often make these big financial decisions. It was the rich people, which kind of was not what he wanted to do in terms of the popularity, popularity popularity thing he's trying to do.

Ed 37:32

Like his story. His Tory.

Kara 37:36

His story. Oh no, I need to butcher something now. My story. I need caffeine so bad.

Ed 37:43

My wife's on away.

Kara 37:45

Oh. All right. Bless you. Bless bless her soul. Anyway, so yes, he's he's dealing with all of these things. He can't make decisions. Well, it's not that he can't make decisions. He doesn't want to make decisions, or he's afraid to make decisions. We don't really know, but we do have to remember that he's still really young. At this point, Louis was also known to be eating his feelings without sharing his feelings. Yes.

Ed 38:08

Eating uh, like, oh, he so he took his anxiety and ate it away.

Kara 38:12

He um, so psychologists and historians today believe that he was suffering from anxiety and depression.

SPEAKER_01 38:19

Oh yeah.

Kara 38:19

Like a hundred percent, and you can see it. Yeah, but he would eat and eat and eat, and he wouldn't have, or he does he did not want to have any kind of outlet. He didn't write things down, he didn't talk to people, uh, he he just shut it down and kept it in and bottled up. Um, he was known in the courts and in Versailles to be like the slow-moving chubby guy who ate and he drank an excessive amount, which is considering the culture of Versailles at the time, for people at Versailles to say that he's eating a lot and he's drinking a lot, that's like Henry VIII's status. Like that's crazy.

Ed 38:58

Well, especially too when the fattest person in your country is the leader. Yeah, that's a problem. Kind of like uh you look at like him Jong un. He's like the biggest guy in all of North Korea because there's not enough food to go around. Yeah. And so he gets what he wants, so he's huge. Uh, but what about the other millions of people that aren't eating? So that that too could be a bad look.

Kara 39:22

Yep, and at this time we're we're sitting around 1773 to 77, with 75 conveniently thrown in there in the middle. In 75, we had the flower wars wars, which was a series of riots in in France, primarily in the in the um farm agricultural areas, um, because they didn't have enough food to make bread, and they didn't have enough money to buy bread. So people were rioting because they were hungry, and he's over here eating his feelings. Yep. So um he was also really reserved. He even in his personal journals and diaries, like I was telling you guys earlier, they were more like ledgers. It was just like, I shot a pig today.

SPEAKER_01 40:08

It's like very factual, yes, very factual, like emotional, but very logical.

Kara 40:14

Yeah, he wouldn't even you know go into great detail. It was like we had a meeting today about this, and that was it.

SPEAKER_01 40:21

Right. Oh, those are the best journal entries. My kids' work journals. It's like I did math. Yeah, it's like cool, what kind of math?

Kara 40:30

Yeah, how'd you feel about your math work today? Yeah, so there's little to no personal information or thoughts, especially in these early years. It does change when we get closer to uh like 91, 92, we'll get there. But as of right now, these it kind of sucks if you're a historian because you're like, what is this? Why?

Ed 40:54

Like your country's starving to death, and here yeah, and here you're talking about your moorings bowel movement. Like this isn't this isn't what I'm looking for.

Kara 41:06

Like, I need something with more sustenance than I'm sure historians went to go find the queen's journals because the king is just not doing it.

SPEAKER_01 41:15

It's like this is boring.

Ed 41:17

Yeah, they just like throw it over their shoulders like, give me, give me Marie stuff. Let's play this. Yeah, it looks big. This is juicy. Let's go.

Kara 41:25

Yeah, no kidding.

unknown 41:26

No kidding.

Kara 41:27

So Louis would often leave his wife uh to go hunting or go hang out by himself. He'd just leave her alone all the time.

Ed 41:34

Robert Brathian stuff, yeah.

Kara 41:35

Oh, yeah. Just just doing manly things and left her alone by herself. Uh, he also picked up an interesting locksmithing hobby.

SPEAKER_01 41:43

Yeah, I thought that was such a weird thing.

Kara 41:46

Yeah, I know, and he did that from when he was a child. That's something he started when he was a kid. And then as he got older and more depressed and stressed out, that was his escape. That was like his only outlet.

SPEAKER_01 41:56

That was not journals, not coloring, nothing music, locksmithing. Did he do that with his grandfather? Do I probably didn't remember hearing something like that? Yeah.

Ed 42:07

So, what you're saying, when we look at all the kings in history, like each king had something to bring to the table. Like they had something. What you're saying is that Louie here was a genius at breaking out of escape rooms.

SPEAKER_01 42:22

Yeah, he was really good at being ease.

Ed 42:25

Like, just he could he didn't break anything.

SPEAKER_01 42:27

He knows what to do with a bobby pin.

Ed 42:29

Like he knows, yeah, he can pick any lock. So he's what you want to bring with you when you're doing an escape room. But other than that, he doesn't really have much going for him.

SPEAKER_01 42:36

Like, if you have like a big pack of wolves that are coming in, I mean he liked hunting, but like really, if you got locked out, that's the guy. That's the guy. That's the guy. Yeah. If you can get to the door.

Ed 42:50

Now I'm envisioning that on the uh what was the third or the second or third Matrix movie where they had the key maker, and his little Asian guy is like filing this key, and then here you go, and he puts it in the motorcycle and it fires right up, and like, wow, you are handy. Like, now I'm thinking of that little Asian guy as like King Louis.

Kara 43:08

Except King Louis is a really big guy.

Ed 43:10

Yeah, he's not Asian either.

Kara 43:11

So he's doing all this stuff by himself, right? Meanwhile, in the meantime, in the meantime, in between time, in between time, I'm waiting on that caffeine man, Maria, who's now going by Marie Antoinette, her French name. She began to become the brunt of a lot of political propaganda and shaming. So she you'll hear it more from from Deja. Yeah, she'll explain, but it's like she's going through so much and she's going through it by herself because Louie is going through his own crap and trying to figure out his own stuff, but in him doing so, he's kind of leaving her.

SPEAKER_01 43:47

And he's just and he's so reserved, yeah, that there's it's just like there's no more room for her. Exactly.

Kara 43:55

And that sucks because she's going through so much. And I'm so sorry I Can't go into it. But you will you will do it for me.

Ed 44:03

Well, and I feel like he couldn't like he was so reserved, he probably wouldn't even tell her to be like, hey, cut back on the gambling or cut back on this, cut back on that. He probably just didn't have it within him to put his foot down and be like, uh, this whole nation's horribly in debt. Maybe being in debt like millions of dollars isn't going to help our image, if he was even aware that was going on.

Kara 44:23

He probably wasn't aware. Honestly, I think his anxiety, he's so he was so just just hyper tunnel vision focused on what he's trying to go through. And what Sox is Marie Antoinette was was trying to tell him. She saw through everything. Yeah, she's really smart. Yeah, she tried to tell him over and over and over again throughout this whole thing, and he was just so tunnel vision. And and let don't get me wrong, especially later on, he was a very good father, and he really did love his wife. Yeah, oh yeah, he just made so many mistakes, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:56

And that's like a really big thing, is he didn't not like her.

Kara 45:00

Yeah, no, it wasn't like that.

SPEAKER_01 45:01

There wasn't, it wasn't like a lack of care. Yeah, he was. I don't I don't personally think he was ever in love with her. I don't think it was that kind of love, but I do think he had a lot of care for her. He respected her, yeah, respected her a lot, but I think it was a very like I think there was a lot of neglect because of his own personal mental health, yeah.

Kara 45:20

Yeah, a hundred percent. So yeah, like don't get me wrong, I don't want to sound like the the propaganda reel that was going around at this time.

Ed 45:29

Like he well, and I think the propaganda this had a heyday with it. Like the propaganda could just take it and spin it any way they wanted.

Kara 45:37

Oh, it was a machine, yeah. Like this propaganda machine, let me tell you, is so strong.

Ed 45:43

Yeah.

Kara 45:44

Like the rumor mill, especially in Paris, like and Versailles, the French are terrible about this at this time, period.

SPEAKER_01 45:51

My horoscope today said not to gossip. Isn't that funny? No, that is funny. We're talking about that do not gossip today. I'm like, I'm not gossiping, I'm spending facts. Yeah, someone else did the gossiping, we had to sift through that. Okay.

Ed 46:05

Well, and I and I know uh at this time in France they had those salons. Yeah, well, yeah, where they like anybody could go to these things and just discuss whatever it is they wanted.

Kara 46:15

Those were primarily in Paris, and then in Versailles, it was worse because Versailles is a smaller group of people, yeah, and it's like living in a tiny town where everybody knows everybody and everybody knows everybody's business. So it just was rampant.

Ed 46:32

I just find it funny like Versailles back then was considered like really, really far away. When but when I look at my morning commute to get to our school, it's like 45 miles away.

SPEAKER_01 46:44

It's it's like the the distance between Paris and Versailles is like my house to your house, yeah, versus like what I'm thinking of in my head when I picture it because of all the things that I've read and how far away it was, it feels like I'm driving to work. Yeah. Ain't technology great.

Ed 47:00

Yeah, that's just it's just wild to just kind of put it in perspective like that.

Kara 47:05

Think about it now. If let's because it took a few hours to get to Versailles from Paris. I would say, in today's terms, by car, if we left Phoenix and we got to maybe Sedona. I was thinking Flagstaff, so yeah, we're on the same page.

SPEAKER_01 47:21

Yeah.

Kara 47:22

Yeah, something like that.

Ed 47:23

That that part of the state.

Kara 47:24

Yeah. Or north, or further north.

SPEAKER_01 47:27

Yeah, like the Grand Canyon. Yeah.

Kara 47:31

Yeah.

Ed 47:31

Grand Canyon's about four hours away.

Kara 47:33

Yeah, that's about right.

Ed 47:34

Yeah. Yeah.

Kara 47:35

Anyway. So in 1777, we have all this crazy stuff going on. Louis is super depressed. Marie Antoinette is going through her stuff. We've got financial issues that we're trying to fix, but we can't. And we have the propaganda machine talking about Louis's incompetence and in having a child. And the Holy Roman Emperor is so depressing. It really is so bad. I know, I know. The Holy Roman Emperor. So, if for those of you who want some clarification, the Holy Roman Emperor was essentially the uh the king of France, not Germany, the king of Germany. He writes to Louis and he says, Bro, what are you doing? You can figure this out, but you're being an idiot. And then he goes and travels to France and uh stays for a visit, hangs out with the queen and the king and all of that stuff. And about nine months after his visit, Marie was pregnant. Bada bing, bada bing. So it could be safe to say that good old Uncle Joey provided some helpful advice to the king to uh consummate that marriage. So good on Uncle Joseph over here.

Ed 48:45

Got him on the internet, showed him a few websites. Yeah. Oh dear.

SPEAKER_01 48:49

Had to help the brother out. Kara got her. We gotta take a break. Kara got her caffeine. Everyone, I got my caffeine. I'm so sorry.

Ed 49:00

Yeah, now she's gonna start slurping and things.

SPEAKER_01 49:02

No, she won't. She hates every day. Not every day, because we don't record everything. Every time we record, we like have to test it by Kara. Oh she's making the face. She doesn't like it. So cringy. She refuses to do that to us.

Kara 49:16

I hate it so much.

unknown 49:17

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 49:18

And she's back. And hydrated. Let's go.

Kara 49:20

And I'm hydrated. Here we go. Just ready for the Bastille. Okay. So in 1778. Bastilli. The Bastilly. Louis made a very popular decision amongst at least the people. Now, I'm not saying it was a good decision, but it was a popular decision. In 1778, he agreed to assist the American colonies in their revolution against France. The reason this was extremely popular is not because they wanted to necessarily help the colonies out, but because they wanted to stick it to Britain. Now he got these funds from the Swiss banker who I mentioned earlier.

Ed 49:59

Mr. Neck.

Kara 50:00

Mr. Neck. He got these from that guy. And the war ended in 1783, and it was considered a victory for Louis because you know the colonies won. That's who Louis was supporting. It was a whole thing. Britain lost Hawsack it, that whole thing. And what he didn't know was that it was really expensive to borrow all of that money.

Ed 50:25

Yeah.

Kara 50:25

And it's going to be that can bite him in the butt.

Ed 50:27

But it was probably like 30, 40% interest as well to make it even better.

Kara 50:32

Oh, we're gonna get there. But for now, woohoo, great job, Louie.

Ed 50:35

And also, too, like the only reason one of the reasons why uh France got involved is because a certain Benjamin Franklin was hanging out there. Yes. And he was playing the long game of the sales pitch. And it wouldn't have surprised me if uh Mr. Franklin maybe made some promises, uh, maybe some financial promises down the road that, hey, you help us out.

Kara 50:57

Yeah.

Ed 50:58

And then that never came to fruition.

Kara 51:01

Yeah, I forgot about that part. Yeah, so so Ben Franklin was like, hey, you help me out, I'll help you out, I'll help you with some of your debt.

SPEAKER_02 51:07

Yep.

Kara 51:08

We'll get you caught up.

SPEAKER_02 51:09

Yep.

Kara 51:09

And then after the war, Louis was like, hey, hey, George Washington. Yeah. About that debt. And then Washington's like, what debt?

Ed 51:17

What debt? What are you talking about? Like, I was in the field fighting a war. I have no idea what you're talking about.

SPEAKER_01 51:22

Yeah. What do you mean? I almost died. I do not know what you're talking about.

Ed 51:27

Yeah. Yeah. I literally just got this job and I don't even want it. So I don't know what to tell you, bro. Call the 800 number.

Kara 51:34

So during during the time of the revolution, Louis and Marie's first daughter was born in 1778, followed by their oldest son in 1781, a second ton a second son in 85, and a daughter in 87. Unfortunately, their youngest daughter did pass away at 11 months old, but all of the other children, for the most part, survived. Except for, we'll get there. Anyway. So Louis also became a patron for a very niche science that I thought was fun. Again, he's trying to be super popular with this age of reason. He really liked science. It's great. Despite his wartime debt, he did finance a lot of these um scientific explorations of hot air balloons. Oh yeah. The man loved him. So one noble patron, I cannot how do you say this? Etienne? Etienne Montgolfier. Yeah, yeah. Montgolfier. Golfier. Okay, that guy.

Ed 52:28

Yeah, I'm trying to find it in the notes.

Kara 52:30

Oh, sorry. Page like four. So he he financed this guy. This guy's great.

Ed 52:36

Yeah, Etienne Montgolfier.

Kara 52:40

Okay.

Ed 52:40

Yeah, Etienne Montgolfier.

Kara 52:42

Thank you. So he sent a balloon 60 feet above Versailles. And it was carrying one sheep, one duck, and a rooster in a basket. I don't know why. I just love that little detail so much.

Ed 52:53

Some men send monkeys into space, other men send a duck into the air because, you know, in case that duck couldn't fly. Balloons. Yeah, that balloon was going to help him.

SPEAKER_01 53:03

I'm so tired of humans and flying.

Kara 53:06

It's so fun though. I loved it. Anyway, in 1785.

Ed 53:10

That sheep, what is going on? Looking over the edge. I was probably screaming the entire time. Meanwhile, that Etienne guy is like, get me the heck out of here. This just throws a sheep over.

unknown 53:27

Oh no.

Ed 53:28

So annoying.

SPEAKER_01 53:29

It's like, bah.

Kara 53:31

Oh. So great. Another one that Louis completely financed was an expedition of Jean-Francois de la Peru, in which he circumnavigated the world. I think on a boat. I don't remember. Yeah, I think.

Ed 53:44

But he circumnavigated. That was the only thing that could make it around the world that time.

Kara 53:47

Yeah, I don't think it was a balloon, but it was a boat. And Louis also built a very fancy new naval port in Cherbour. How do you say this? Cherbourg.

Ed 54:00

Cherboard.

Kara 54:01

I am so sorry. Anyone who's from France, I'm butchering into so much.

Ed 54:05

I took like five years of French when I was in junior high and high school, and I'm better than we are. I'm working my way through it, but yeah, Cherboard.

SPEAKER_01 54:14

I'm trying to learn French. So I'm trying to like remember the things that I've been learning from doing though. I took Spanish.

Kara 54:21

So I'm I'm I did too and I failed. I'm fine.

SPEAKER_01 54:23

It's really bad in school. Anyways.

Kara 54:25

Anyways. So while these triumphs were extremely celebrated by the wealthier people and subjects, even the wealthier like people in the common class, they were still like, yeah, this is great. Uh, peasants who were struggling, who were trying to figure out how to eat their next meal, were definitely taking note. Another notable success during Louis's early reign was the Edict of Versailles in 1788. This did restore a lot of civil rights to Protestants in France after 102 years of not being able to practice the religion they wanted. So that was something that he did that was positive.

Ed 54:58

So like he gave them the ability to like like practice their religion, but they could also vote and vote and all that other fun stuff. Okay.

Kara 55:06

So that was cool. That is cool. Yeah. Now, are you ready?

Ed 55:09

Yeah, I feel like now, now we're gonna light this dumpster fire.

SPEAKER_01 55:13

Are you ready? Here's doing her are you ready dance? And it's like she like kind of punches the air forward, like it's very cute, and I'm ready only because she's so excited.

Ed 55:27

Yeah, she's she's doing like the running man from like the early 2000s. Yeah, she's all right, little foxtail hanging off the side. Let's go, Utah Saints.

Kara 55:39

So we set all these dominoes up, let's knock them down. Let's knock down all these dominoes that we have set up in 1786. One of Louis's chief financial advisors had a heart to heart with his king, and he says, You know, great work with the revolution, good job. But we have a problem. Um, we don't have any more money, and the peasants can't afford any more taxes. And Louis was like, You're lying? Don't don't kid me like that. Louis goes and takes a look at the books himself, and he's like, Oh, anxiety.

SPEAKER_01 56:05

Crap!

Ed 56:05

Yeah, he's just looking at the tipping the pages out, and there's like nothing.

SPEAKER_01 56:09

Like, he's like, Hello.

Ed 56:10

Yeah, uh, where is everything? And they're like, turn to the first page and it says zero. Oh.

SPEAKER_01 56:19

Yeah, it's like when I opened my my bank account the day before payday. I'm like, oh crap.

Kara 56:25

One more day, one more day.

Ed 56:26

Yeah, if it wasn't for that big old giant negative sign in front of it, we'd be loaded.

unknown 56:31

Yeah.

Kara 56:33

Integers, friends.

Ed 56:35

It's amazing what that little dash does. Like, take some white out and get rid of it. Like, dude, I am financially sick.

Kara 56:42

So the financial advisory, he's like, okay, we're up to our necks in loans. Half of our payments are only going towards interest. So all of these loans that they took out for this award, they are paying 60% interest. All of their everything they're paying is 60% interest. And that's not even a principle, none of that. So, on top of that, do you remember that loan that you took out from that Swiss banker guy?

SPEAKER_01 57:06

Oh yeah, Mr. Necker.

Kara 57:08

Those are coming due here pretty soon. So we're not even adding that.

Ed 57:12

But now, meanwhile, like, hey, America.

SPEAKER_01 57:17

Bonjour.

Ed 57:19

I'm holding this little piece of paper with three letters on it that says I owe you.

SPEAKER_01 57:24

I need that.

Ed 57:26

Yeah, we need that.

SPEAKER_01 57:28

I thought it was supposed to be U O I. And it's not working out for me.

Ed 57:34

Yeah. Meanwhile, America is like trying to figure out how in the world like they're gonna be American. Well, and Virginia's like, I already paid my debts, and then the North States are like, uh, so absorb our debts. Yeah, it's I can see the mess over there translating to mess over in France.

Kara 57:51

Oh, Lord, I'm glad I don't exist during this time period. It's crazy. So with all of these financial issues, Louis decides to see if the Parlement that he just put into place would be willing to assist in the tax reform. So we got to do something with these taxes, right? We have to figure out how to get some money because eight this 80% of the population, even the wealthy ones, can't give us any more taxes. So we have to figure this out. Okay, right? So they go over there. And okay, so he goes to this the Swiss banker. And the Swiss, this is the Swiss banker's plan, he says. He says This is how we are going to reform it. We're going to put we are going to put in more land taxes on top of the land taxes everybody already pays. And we're going to put in a stamp tax. Woo! Stamp taxes. We know that goes really well. Yeah, because how did that turn out in America? Yeah, yeah. Holy cow.

Ed 58:42

So you know there'll be a glass tax and a sugar tax and a tea tax.

Kara 58:46

It's already a salt tax, water tax, a breathing tax. All right, so this is the plan. They go to Parliament in 1787 and they go to the Parlement in Paris. And essentially, the Parlement is like, you're an idiot. They refuse any tax reform. Louis and his financial advisors are proposed. And they told them essentially that they needed to hold an estate general. So an estate general is the big meeting where you have all three estates that meet together and then they vote.

SPEAKER_02 59:14

Okay. Okay.

Kara 59:15

And this hasn't been done since 1614. Oh. Nobody really knows how to do it.

Ed 59:21

No one was alive for that. I can see King Louie's like, so do we put the uh do we put the snacks over there next to the drinks? Or yeah.

SPEAKER_01 59:31

The drinks and the snacks need to be right. So Louie's like, yeah, we need to put the food there.

Kara 59:35

I'm gonna get real stressed out during the. Can we get Mozart to perform?

unknown 59:39

Yeah.

Kara 59:40

That would be planned.

Ed 59:41

Yeah, pay him whatever he wants. Yeah, we don't care.

Kara 59:43

Just pay him what he wants. Meanwhile, Marie Antoinette's like, this is a bad idea, this is a bad idea, this is a bad idea.

SPEAKER_02 59:49

Yeah.

Ed 59:49

Meanwhile, she's like, hey, honey, um, I I need $150,000.

Kara 59:54

Actually, we'll we'll get to her response to this whole thing. But uh anyway, so they they also had an interesting point this Parlement in Paris. They said uh they're going to refuse the king's tax reform ideas, and they essentially told them they will no longer hike taxes just because you are the king. Uh it will be decided amongst the citizens of France, not subjects, but citizens. This is the first time on record where anybody of any kind of power uses the word citizens as opposed to subjects.

Ed 1:00:26

Yeah. In fact, like I know like at the height of the French Revolution, everybody had to refer to themselves as like citizen so-and-so, citizens Robespierre and citizen Napoleon and and all that.

Kara 1:00:37

Yep, and this is the first time that it was said. So in 1788, after failing at this, uh, and before they tried the estate general idea because they really didn't want to do it, uh, Brian, who was the financial advisor, along with you know, the Swiss guy, they attempted to undermine the Parlement. Good. So after they asked for permission, they're like, maybe we can try forgiveness instead. How does that go?

Ed 1:01:02

Ask for forgiveness when you owe billions of dollars to do that.

Kara 1:01:06

There's no all right. All right, so they went over there. This it instantly backfired.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:12

Yeah.

Ed 1:01:13

He's like, Louis's like, hey, look, I'm so sorry. I don't have the money, but I got all these coupons. And like, here's one for a carriage wash.

Kara 1:01:21

I have to.

Ed 1:01:22

Here's another one for like a horse wash.

Kara 1:01:23

Let me tell you that they tried that with the general population. Uh we will get there. Oh. So this is.

Ed 1:01:30

I'm joking. Like, I'm literally trying to make jokes, and you're like, no, no, stop going ahead of me.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:37

It's just like, oh stop sweet.

Ed 1:01:40

Ed, stop, stop like reading ahead. Like, and then I'm like, no, I'm just trying to be funny here. Like, I know, stop reading ahead. I'm not. I'm just trying to show how funny this is. Like, we're gonna get to it.

Kara 1:01:52

So instead of getting the people on their side, so instead of getting this 80% of the population, including the rich commoners on the nobility side, what they do is the people began to riot. They saw this action as the monarchy trashing their existence of a court system and replacing it with a royal court. Remember, the Parliament is like a symbol of their say in what happens. So when they go in there and they're like, no, no, no, we're gonna do it our way, the people didn't like that. Now, this riot is called the revolt of Parliament. Some historians marked June 7th, 1788, the day that this riot started as the start of the revolution. So, depending on what historian you ask, this is the start of the revolution, not Bastille, which is an interesting kind of fact. I thought it was interesting. Anyway, so because of the reaction of the people, it was extremely violent. They started throwing tiles at everybody. So they also called it like the tile riot. It's great, it's a fun time. And soldiers were sent in to calm the situation down. They had other people from nearby towns coming in. This is outside of Paris, this is not in Paris, but they had like other people from other towns coming in to fight against the soldiers that were being sent in. It was a whole thing.

Ed 1:03:04

Yeah, meanwhile, rich people walking into the bathrooms, like, where's all our tiles?

SPEAKER_01 1:03:08

I know they're like, Why are our roofs so confused?

Ed 1:03:11

Yeah, it's like it's this bare like sheetrock. Like, I I just put these tiles in yesterday and now they're gone. And you look out the window, and just people like throwing them like snowballs at each other.

Kara 1:03:23

So essentially, what happened was the all of these writers drove the soldiers out. They drove out the nobility. Oh, yeah. Like, bye-bye. Thank you. Don't come again. And younger people in the bourgeois class, so that higher echelon common class. Uh, I probably said it wrong, but don't worry about it. Anyway, yeah.

Ed 1:03:45

You say bourgeois bourgeoisie.

Kara 1:03:48

Yeah, I've heard bourgeoisie, but it's harder for me to say. So I'm not sure. You're like burgousey. Burgazy.

Ed 1:03:57

Brad Pitt's character is like Galarmo. It's a guillermo. Golarmo.

Kara 1:04:05

Oh, it's a good time. Dominique Dico. Okay, hold on. Here we go. In the salons around Paris and around the larger towns and all of that stuff, the younger people who are witnessing and hearing about this revolt, um, and especially the ones who were in the higher higher classes nearest to nobility, they saw this as an opportunity. Lou and the nobility believe that they can control the situation or find a way to control it. In reality, they're going to be losing it to these people who are having ideas. After this revolt, the younger, these younger lawyer revolutionary types, so like a lot of these people are lawyers, they're steeped into law, they're steeped into the enlightenment ideas and all of this stuff. They're following what's happening in the American experiment.

Ed 1:04:52

And I think by this time, uh Thomas Jefferson was there now.

Kara 1:04:55

Yeah, Thomas Jefferson was probably here now.

Ed 1:04:57

And he was stirring the pot.

Kara 1:04:59

Um, but I will also say that their view of how they want to do things is more like Britain and not like America.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:05

And I will also say that this entire time I am saying all of these dates as if I have been singing Hamilton. I love it. Everything 17. 17, 89.

Ed 1:05:17

They make a out of my head. You get Lynn Moonwell to do a uh a uh a whole like musical on the French Revolution.

Kara 1:05:25

Amazing.

Ed 1:05:25

I mean, okay and shoot your shot or lose your head, pull the string.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:34

Oh no.

Ed 1:05:35

As the guitine like slowly comes down. As a bullet slowly hits Hamilton.

Kara 1:05:45

So these younger lawyer people.

Ed 1:05:49

Younger lawyer people.

Kara 1:05:52

Yeah, the younger lawyer lawyer people. I am a middle school teacher, therefore I will talk to you like a middle school teacher. She's like, you know what? I am An educator. I am.

Ed 1:06:02

These skippity lawyers.

Kara 1:06:03

No, that's not right. So these people are now demanding an estate general, just like the Parliament was demanding an estate general, just like everybody in that third class wants an estate general.

Ed 1:06:16

Well, okay, so like they want an estate general, right? But do the do they I mean obviously like the the the rich people probably could pick a few representatives, but did like the common people even know who they're gonna select for this? Like not all 10 million people can show up at once.

Kara 1:06:34

Yeah, no, they they do have an election system where they vote for who they're going to have representing them. Um it's extremely complicated and kind of confusing, and I didn't really understand it, so I'm not going to talk about the election process. Yeah. But they did have an election system to you know how to find somebody to show representatives, yes.

Ed 1:06:53

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:53

Dang, if it's not making sense to you, I wonder how confusing it is. Because I feel like your like your explanation of like feudalism was so perfect and made sense. But anything else I read or looked at, I'm like, what?

Ed 1:07:08

Well, and don't forget too, like, they were using a different calendar at this time as well. When the revolution was was up and running, they changed the calendar to like different epics of uh what was going on. So like gosh, yeah, they had their own their their own way of doing things, and and the French way was like, let's make it as confusing and as complicated as possible. Yeah.

Kara 1:07:32

So the third estate, the common people, the commons, as they were often called.

Ed 1:07:36

Or the song coulons.

Kara 1:07:38

Sure.

Ed 1:07:39

One the ones without pants.

Kara 1:07:41

Sure.

Ed 1:07:42

So they have coulants, those are the rich people because they had fancy pants, and then the song coulants were the ones without the fancy pants of the common folk.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:49

Right, right, right.

Kara 1:07:50

I love that. But when I say commons, I'm talking about both. Okay. Umbrella. Got it. Got it. Okay. Okay. So they have an equal number of representatives and votes and all of that stuff. Now the clergy and the nobility and the commons, all three of those have one vote in this estate general. How do you think that will likely go if they all vote separately on the same issue?

Ed 1:08:15

So three different voting sessions, three different chambers.

Kara 1:08:20

So you have the nobility in a chamber, the clergy in a chamber, and the commons in a chamber, right? If you are going to vote on tax reform, and the first estate, the clergy, who's making lots of money off of the common people, and the second estate, the nobility, who's making lots of money off the common people. How do you think that's going to be voted every single time?

SPEAKER_01 1:08:42

It's gonna go so great.

Ed 1:08:47

Hear me out this is this is gonna be perfect.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:50

It's gonna be a great system. Everyone's gonna be happy.

Ed 1:08:54

Yes, very much. Everybody in this room, we're golden. Like, so don't worry about a thing. Right. So tax the crap out of those people in the other room.

Kara 1:09:03

Okay, so that's that's how it works generally.

Ed 1:09:06

All right.

Kara 1:09:07

Now, what they want, the common people, they are asking for this estates general, but they want some some differences with it, right? Because this this thing hasn't been held since 1614. So they're like, all right, so what we want to do is we want to have this vote, and we want to have double the amount of representatives for us, and we want to all vote in the same room. That way they get majority rules. Because what they're aiming for is majority rules.

Ed 1:09:32

Yeah. And literally, let's be in the same room so our votes are actually counted. Because I'm I'm pretty certain, too, they were probably experiencing things where, like, okay, they would vote and then it would go into the next room where they weren't allowed to go, where the bourgeoisie and the other states were, and they probably looked at the votes and just threw them into the trash can, and then they probably were telling them, like, oh yeah, we we saw your votes, we but yeah, unfortunately they got lost. Yeah. So there's a suggestion box outside our door. Just put your thoughts and feelings in there, and uh you're good to go.

Kara 1:10:13

Yeah. So primarily out of desperation, Louie and his advisors decided that maybe forming the estate general is not a bad idea. With some inspiration from British Parliament, the people in the third estate agreed to this plan. And in August of 1788, it was publicly announced that the three that the Estates General would take place in May of the next year. Um when they announced this, the official Estates General had not been held since 1614, so really everybody's just winging it. Now, even though we are just winging it, there is some planning involved. Literally a week or so later, after this announcement to the public that the Estates General is going to be held, the Crown sent out another announcement to the public. The financial advisor of this guy, Brian, that we were just talking about, he goes on public record and tells everybody the Crown is officially bankrupt.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:00

Oh yeah!

Kara 1:11:02

And everyone will have to be paid in paper money. Cool. Which back then was essentially an IOU.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:08

Not a dang thing.

Ed 1:11:09

So when I was joking about the whole IOU thing, and you're like, slow your roll, let's stop reading ahead.

Kara 1:11:16

Here we are.

Ed 1:11:17

Oh yeah, because at that time the uh all all paper money had to be tied to like a gold standard. And if there was no gold, then that piece of paper meant absolutely nothing. So oh Lord.

Kara 1:11:30

In June of 1788, there were massive rain and hailstorms during the summer, with hailstones that were big enough to damage harvests on the farms and crops that were still trying to grow. The rest of the summer suffered a drought that was extremely hot that dried out the remaining crops. And the winter was brutally cold going into 1789, the magical year that we all love so much. 17. Eight nine. So so this lovely series of events caused a major food shortage. On top of the IOU announcement, on top of the ever-awaiting estate general meeting. So, on top of all these other things, like I just said, Louis just had now he has to deal with this food shortage, and he's absolutely bankrupt. He did try, he tried to start like a lottery system to ration out grains and stuff for the people. He tried to give whatever he had to the people. It just wasn't enough. But he did try. We have to give him that. How's his personal image looking now? He's still fat.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:32

He's still a chunker.

Ed 1:12:34

At least this way, if he had just like shed some weight and try to look hungry like everybody else, that may it probably would have gone over a little better. A little better, yeah. Or may just the king. I just need you to look like hell while you go out and make this announcement so that you can look like you're suffering with everybody else.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:50

Just look like you're straight up not having a good time. Yeah, that's all we ask. Yeah.

Ed 1:12:53

Yeah. Maybe having like maybe announcing a masquerade for all of Europe's like wealthiest. Let's put that on the back burner for now. That that's not a good look.

Kara 1:13:05

Yes. So this this Brienne guy, after he makes this decision and after this really crappy harvest season, Louis fires him. And instead he hires this uh Swiss guy, this neck guy. And um, this Swiss guy, the propaganda machine loves him, which is weird. Like a Swiss banker, propaganda, the public, the Parisians, they love this guy. Really?

SPEAKER_01 1:13:26

They actually liked him? They actually liked him. Oh, I genuinely be a little facetious.

Kara 1:13:30

No, no, no, no. They loved him to a point because what they believed, and the Swiss, even back then, had this reputation of being like this straight arrow Protestant banker people. Like if anybody's going to handle your checkbook, it's you.

Ed 1:13:42

Yeah. Right. Very logical, very. Very logical.

Kara 1:13:45

They know what they're doing.

Ed 1:13:46

So they're like a whole country of spox.

Kara 1:13:48

Right. And so essentially, the propaganda machine made this guy out to be the hero and savior that was going to save French from financial ruin. Good. Okay. So we need to remember this. This is very important. This is a guy who also loaned Louis money in here. Our lord of the stuff. He's actually a pretty stand-up guy. I don't mind him anyway.

Ed 1:14:06

Yeah, talk about a guy who was like in the middle of it.

Kara 1:14:08

Yeah.

Ed 1:14:09

I feel like I wish he'd wrote a book.

Kara 1:14:12

Right?

Ed 1:14:13

Because the things that the conversations he had to been a part of like probably changed France's history for like all the 1800s.

Kara 1:14:20

Yeah. So I'm going to put the shortage into perspective for you, real quick. A family of four would generally eat two loaves of bread. And these breads were called like four-pound loaves, and they were kind of big. See uh Ed's episode on bread. Anyway, so they would eat two of them per day. A day's work would earn somebody about 25 soux. And that piece of bread would cost eight soux. So essentially, already they're paying over half of their income, their daily income on bread, just to feed their families.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:50

Yeah.

Kara 1:14:50

It's over half of the wages. And with this food shortage happening, what do you think is going to happen to the price of bread?

SPEAKER_02 1:14:56

Yeah.

Kara 1:14:57

It's going to go up. Way up. The rumor mill starts to roll around, and people are blaming nobility. They're saying that they're hoarding extra grain and having lots of parties with lots of food and everybody's having a good time. Well, everybody's starving and they're spending all of their money just trying to eat. The only thing that's going to fix this is the estate general mag the estate general meeting, this magical meeting that's going to fix everything for us. It's not a good time for Louie. Everybody's talking crap about him and his wife.

Ed 1:15:28

It's amazing how it still goes on today. Like it doesn't matter who's who's in charge in Washington, uh, they always just get beat up on every every little thing. Granted, I think in America, uh it like we're not as influenced by one person in Washington, DC, uh, as much as like how everybody would be influenced by Louis's decisions. But I just find it so fascinating that if you want to be the most hated person in your country, become the leader of it. For sure.

Kara 1:16:01

Yeah.

Ed 1:16:01

Because you will get blamed for everything.

Kara 1:16:03

Power of the press.

Ed 1:16:04

Yeah.

Kara 1:16:05

It never goes away. So farmers are struggling. Unemployment is rampant, especially in the large cities as Paris. So people who are trying to escape the food shortages in the countryside, they're going to the cities thinking it's going to be better. But because France is bankrupt, the cities are just as bad. There's no food. The weather is hot garbage. I didn't like that heart garbage.

Ed 1:16:28

Steam and steam and garbage.

Kara 1:16:30

Everything is hanging trash. This meeting has not been elaborated in public. All they told the public was we're going to have this meeting. I don't know how we're going to do it yet. It hasn't been done in 100 years, but we're going to do it. In 1789, just before the estate is held, it is announced that our Swiss banker, by our Swiss banker, that the meeting will be organized as such. So just before this is held, this is how we're going to do it. The third estate will have a doubled number of representatives, just like they wanted. Up from up to 600 from 300.

Ed 1:17:02

Ooh.

Kara 1:17:03

That's a big representatives. It has not been decided whether the estates will all sit together in one chamber or if they will congregate into different chamber chambers by estates. So at this point, they are not telling anybody whether everybody's going to be in the same room or not. They hold elections to choose their representatives for each estate. So the people, no, not the people, the men get to vote for who they want to represent them. She said the men. No, no, no. Just kidding.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:31

Yeah. That's crazy.

Kara 1:17:33

That's crazy.

Ed 1:17:34

People insinuates everybody. And that's not how it works.

Kara 1:17:40

I do want to remind everybody that when we're talking about voting, especially at this time, it's always the men.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:45

And I just automatically, when you're like the people voting, I'm like the men. Yeah. Just so you know, like that's automatically like my yeah perspective.

Ed 1:17:53

It's interesting how like that we just instinctively just default to that.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:56

Yeah, that's just because it's the truth. Yeah, it is when women weren't people.

Ed 1:18:01

It's crazy. Let's like get ahead of ourselves here.

Kara 1:18:04

So what Louie does, what Louis does is during this election process is actually rather interesting. He sits down and he listens to all of these representatives and he says, Tell me your grievances.

Ed 1:18:16

Oh, that's a good idea.

Kara 1:18:18

And he does he sits down and he listens to everybody, which I have to give him some credit for that. But however, most of these representatives they ask for things that are not attainable. They ask for lower or zero taxes. Okay. They ask for more food, they ask for more freedom, they ask for lower prices, they ask for less government or more government, depending on who you ask. And it's just it's so much that cannot be provided. Gosh, the anxiety this man is probably having so deeply for him. My anxiety is going crazy. All right. So finally, May 4th, 1789. The meeting is being held on May 5th. So May 4th, there's a fanfare. It's a parade. It's a big shindig. Like everybody's coming to see this critical. Oh, yeah, there's music playing. Everybody. Everybody in the clergy.

Ed 1:19:07

It's like the Renaissance fair.

Kara 1:19:09

So just let me let me read you this quote real quick from uh the Versailles website. It says, from all over France, 1,200 deputies have arrived for the event. The deputies of a third estate, the commoners, were the greatest in number, dressed in black with a gold and black overcoat. They were all holding a candle in their hand except for those carrying the banners and the king's falconers. The king himself was wearing an overcoat of golden fabric and was surrounded by the most important officers to the crown. On his hat he wore a regent diamond, which was the largest diamond in the kingdom. The queen was wearing a gold and silver dress. The king cheered, but not the queen. Uh-huh.

Ed 1:19:47

Good, good. Now I I didn't know how to really relate to your subjects.

Kara 1:19:51

Right. I also want to note that the common estate was not told that this is going to be a fancy dress-up event. So the clergy was told. Yeah, so they were just told to wear black, and that's what they did. And they I guess there was some like gold in there, but for the most part, they just wore black. Oh golly. The meeting was held in Versailles in a single hall. It was kind of small.

Ed 1:20:16

Whoa, 1,200 people stuffed into one hallway?

Kara 1:20:19

Yeah. Oh no.

Ed 1:20:20

I know the hallway was big, but still.

Kara 1:20:22

I'm so claustrophobic. King Louis does have a speech, and at the end he removes his hat. And this is just for funsies because I really love this little note. Hey, you're told me about this. So he he has his speech, right? And at the end of his, he's just like, hey, welcome, whatever. He removes his hat as noble tradition, right? So he removes his hat and the nobility follows, but the commoners are really confused. They don't know what the general customs are. So they they kind of remove their hats, like, and then and then Louis puts it on, and then the the commoners are confused again. Then they put it on, and then Louie just like taking his hat on and off.

Ed 1:20:55

Everybody's just like 10 minutes. It's just this silent, like everybody's just hats on, hats off. What are we doing?

Kara 1:21:03

It has nothing to do with anything. There is no consequence.

Ed 1:21:06

And then there's one guy that's like, where's my bread? That's what I'm doing.

Kara 1:21:09

It's just like, are we done yet?

Ed 1:21:11

Where's the hors d'oeuvres? Get it.

Kara 1:21:14

Okay, so remember, we have our Swiss banker now. He's up to speak at this magical meeting that's going to solve all of our financial problems. This is our financial hero, everybody. The commoners who have glorified this guy are all very excited. Like, this is this is super exciting. Um And what he does is he's go he goes out there to speak, and he only speaks for about 30 minutes. Only? Only 30 minutes. Wow. All right, and he goes, All right, guys, we have like two and a half hours of this. I'm just gonna hand my speech off to this other guy who can speak better. And this other guy who can supposedly speak better.

Ed 1:21:52

With like Ben Stein.

Kara 1:21:56

He starts he starts a speech that's like the utopia. He starts a speech that our Swiss banker wrote, and it's so dreadfully boring that the king actually starts to fall asleep. Folks in the hall are now starting to fall asleep. It must have been riveting, right? Can you imagine?

SPEAKER_01 1:22:16

I'm just imagining like Professor Snape reading like uh like a Donald Trump speech. There's so much like emphasis in that man's like speeches. Yeah.

Kara 1:22:27

And then Snape's just like we will be fixing the issue.

Ed 1:22:34

And we will be paying our taxes, Mr. Potter.

Kara 1:22:40

So you have this guy, right? Whose reputation has been exploded to the point where he's basically a folk hero. And he's he's supposed to be having all of these solutions to all of your problems, and his speech is so boring.

Ed 1:22:54

Everybody passes 1200 people in one setting.

Kara 1:22:58

Oh no. Oh, it was so bad. And then the next day, so the next day it was safe for like voting and deliberating and all of that stuff. This is this is where the problem is, it's not as funny. So the plan was, and this was not communicated to the commons. The plan was that they were going to be deliberating and voting in separate chambers as tradition. So again, King Louis compromised. What he did was he doubled up the representation, but he did not give them the majority vote.

Ed 1:23:31

And so wait, what they only had like a like a 50% vote?

Kara 1:23:35

So instead of having the majority vote where everybody votes one room, yeah, they were going into the separate chambers and then each estate would have just one vote, which means clergy and nobility versus commons. Yeah. Yeah.

unknown 1:23:46

Good.

Ed 1:23:47

So it's nobody nobody's gonna think that's unfair.

Kara 1:23:49

Yeah, right. So instead of everybody moving to the chambers or like the rooms for the chambers or whatever, as they were instructed, the entire commons estate, the entire 600 people didn't move. They refused. Yeah, they wanted to have an equal opportunity, they wanted to vote as a whole group because that would give them more in in in representation. So now we're at a stalemate, and it lasted a few days at first. They're still here in this room. Gosh. They didn't move and they refused to do any kind of vote or deliberation. I'm sure eventually they went like to a hotel or whatever and they left the actual building, but they didn't put in any type of vote or decision, and they made that stalemate last for a month. They refused to do it. And by the time they're we're done here, we come back to Versailles because Louis is like, we gotta figure this out. And Louis is gone for a little bit. I'll explain why later. And then he comes back, and the people of the commons, the representative, they say, okay, either we do this together like we wanted, or we, as a third estate, we leave here. We call ourselves the National Assembly, and we will handle the issues ourselves. And we will forget you because we're 80% of the population. We don't really need you. You're bankrupt. You have no power.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:06

Yeah.

Kara 1:25:06

Goodbye. All right. So during the stalemate, on June 4th, now we're we're going back to Louis's personal life here. On June 4th, during this whole thing, Louis's firstborn son dies of tuberculosis. Both Louis and Marie Antwinette are incredibly distraught. And I I did want to re-emphasize again, they were really good parents. They loved their children so much. So this was really hard for them.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:28

They actually spent a lot of time with their kids where they would do actual like family things with them.

Ed 1:25:34

Like actually parent.

Kara 1:25:35

Yeah. Yeah. They were really um non-traditional. They were weird. Yeah, it was very different.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:40

Yeah.

Ed 1:25:41

They were non-traditional by being a traditional parent. Correct. Yeah. In today's society.

Kara 1:25:45

Yes. So Louis falls into a deep depression, more depressed than he was before. And he leaves Versailles altogether. The family as a whole basically leaves Versailles to go to a retreat somewhere else. And he's gone for this whole stalemate, which I don't blame him. No, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:02

I don't blame him. As you probably should. It's probably best for your mental health to like take a moment. Yeah. Yeah.

Ed 1:26:09

But when he retrieves, the common folk ain't gonna care.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:12

Oh no, no, no. They're like, yeah, that's crazy. My my firstborn died with his head chopped off from a horse.

Ed 1:26:19

Yeah. Like or like, yeah, like all my kids die at the ripe old age of dying at childbirth.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:26

Exactly. I'm like, oh, your kid made it that far? Congrats.

Ed 1:26:30

My kids starve to death, so I don't want to hear it. Right.

Kara 1:26:34

Yeah. So Louis gets back. He finds the estate general has been completely broken. The Commons has decided to take matters into their own hands, and they made this National Assembly thing. And all of his advisors are pointing fingers at the Swiss banker for being an idiot.

Ed 1:26:49

Now it's on fire.

Kara 1:26:50

Correct. Louis, because he's such a good decision maker, he has a hard time choosing between his Swiss banker friend and tradition versus the Commons Ultimatum in National Assembly. Finally, he makes a decision. Louis announces that there will be a new meeting, and this meeting will meet the third estate halfway, but there will be no more of this National Assembly business. You are going to be a part of this estate. I'm going to lay down the law, at least I'm going to try to, and we're going to figure this out. Right? And he's like, I'm going to make a decision.

Ed 1:27:24

No more debt, and everybody gets pay raises.

Kara 1:27:26

Yes.

Ed 1:27:27

Let's go.

Kara 1:27:28

Let's go. Okay, here we go. Now, Louie closes the hall, locking out the third estate members. It's raining. He doesn't tell the third estate members the plan. The plan. Good. So they're essentially locked out of their meeting house, these National Assembly men. And what they do instead is they they're just like, let's meet somewhere else. We'll just have our meeting somewhere else. And one of their members, you're gonna like this, a doctor named Joseph Ignace Guilloton. Yeah. He knows a guy who owns a tennis. Court.

Ed 1:28:01

That's right.

Kara 1:28:02

Yeah.

Ed 1:28:02

Yeah. Yeah.

Kara 1:28:06

He knows the guy who owns the tennis court. So the guy who invented the guillotine, who go figure he he he figures this out. So the assembly then goes to the tennis court instead and they swear an oath. And like it's a whole thing. They're dressed up, they're copying a painting that they really like, they're cosplaying. It's great. This is cute. It's really cute. So they go to the tennis court and they swear an oath that they would never disassemble the assembly until a new constitution for France is written and put into place.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:36

Guys, we're never gonna do that.

Kara 1:28:38

Yeah, we're not gonna do that. You all look great, by the way. So that invention going.

Ed 1:28:46

Let's play tennis until then.

Kara 1:28:48

So Louis's big meeting occurs three days after the tennis. Oh he thinks it's a good look to bring the angry third estate into this meeting only after the first two estates enter the building. And then on top of that, he doesn't even let them enter through the front door. He brings them through the side. Good. They also notice that their favorite Swiss banker is absent. Uh-huh. He's not there. As uh they probably no. All right.

Ed 1:29:12

They realize that Ben Stein wasn't there. So here they go.

Kara 1:29:15

So Louis then proceeds to tell the assembly that the three estates must be in place, but taxes will be reformed based on their representatives. The third estate says no, we are not compromising. They refuse to leave, and then everybody else leaves, and then they start cleaning up, and they're still in the building. And then Louis doesn't really say much. He's just like, you can stay as long as you want. I don't care. And then four days later, Louis gives up his position and he's like, you know what? Do whatever you want. I don't care. Like, do what you need to do. Okay.

Ed 1:29:49

Guys, just figure it out.

Kara 1:29:50

Just figure it out. Now I have a question for everybody. Should I stop here? Because this is right before the best deal. Yeah, yeah.

Ed 1:29:55

Let's wait. Yeah, let's start the uh let's start the next episode off with a bang.

Kara 1:29:59

Yeah, yeah. Alright. So when we get back, we'll chat about the best deal and the revolution there. Before we go, I don't wanna I'm gonna end it on that cliffhanger, but is there any housekeeping that we need to take care of or any business?

SPEAKER_01 1:30:13

The Instagram will be updated today. Excellent. I do have that on my list of to-dos after I finish my schoolwork.

Kara 1:30:22

So will the website that'll be updated on Monday.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:26

Yeah, I think that's uh that's really good. I do want to add some extra things on the Instagram so that you guys can see some other cool stuff other than what we talk about. Sweet. That's what I've got.

Ed 1:30:40

Awesome. Yeah, and um, I don't really have too much. I I finally got our Patreon account like established. Now we just gotta go through the arduous work of copying and pasting the link onto our website. Sick. Uh but the Patreon account um basically gives you guys an opportunity to help out your favorite podcast. Um we're not gonna be like concealing episodes and and all that kind of stuff. This is just strictly donation. Uh if you like what you're hearing, cool. Uh help us out a little bit and um or give us more ideas.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:15

And if you don't, then you should.

Ed 1:31:16

Yeah, if you don't, then make let's help us make it better. So tell us. Yeah, tell us what we need to do. But nicely. Nicely and and give us money. Gently, but firm.

Kara 1:31:27

If you do want to get a hold of us, you can reach us at our Instagram at the Days Dumpster Fire or you can find our website at thedaysdumpsterfire.com. There's also a little page in there where you can submit trash can fires if you really want to give us one and you want us to share your trash can fire, which would be fun. If you have any ideas, you can also send it to us at thedaysdumpsterfire at gmail.com. Yeah. And uh all right, that's it. That's all we got for now.

Ed 1:31:53

Until next time.

Kara 1:31:54

When we get back, we are going to Storm the Bastille, baby. Let's go!

SPEAKER_01 1:31:59

That was fun. I can't wait. I can't wait to fill in some of the like little things with with Antoine.

Ed 1:32:06

Antoine. Yeah. Antoine. Antoine.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:09

A lot of the documentaries. Am I good to stop the recording? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Come back.