Guest keeper of the light Posted December 30, 2015 Report Share Posted December 30, 2015 I searched but I couldn't find any similar. So I'm asking you. I'm currently reading The Final Empire, almost finished the first half. And I have a question about skaa children. At first I thought that my question can be answered in other books but this is not that kind of a question and I decided to post here. So, how the skaa raise their children? I know they live in very harsh circumstances and raising a kid is very hard. You have to be very precise and you have to sacrifice yourself, spending hours. How could a skaa take care of a baby? Working twenty hours of a day? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DreamEternal Posted December 30, 2015 Report Share Posted December 30, 2015 (edited) Very, very poorly, probably while working, and with as little care as possible because they just didn't have the energy to care. Edited December 30, 2015 by DreamEternal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest keeper of the light Posted December 30, 2015 Report Share Posted December 30, 2015 But how could a kid survive under those circumstances? At least some of them has to survive. Or, changing the question, how could a kid whom raised like that can do that much hard work and continue to live? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stormgate Posted December 30, 2015 Report Share Posted December 30, 2015 Because they must. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manavortex Posted December 30, 2015 Report Share Posted December 30, 2015 Probably the same way farmers raised their children in the dark ages, or the slaves on the plantations in earth's history. I assume that they would carry the babies around with them, toddlers would probably be supervised somewhere and as soon as they are old enough to help, it's help... 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DreamEternal Posted December 30, 2015 Report Share Posted December 30, 2015 (edited) But how could a kid survive under those circumstances? At least some of them has to survive. With much luck. Most probably die. Or, changing the question, how could a kid whom raised like that can do that much hard work and continue to live?If they survived childhood, they are though enough to live a few more years. Plus, skaa life expectancy never was much high. Edited December 30, 2015 by DreamEternal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest keeper of the light Posted December 30, 2015 Report Share Posted December 30, 2015 Okay, thank you all Eveb though I'm only reading the first book, I have a feel that this series is going to share the crown with SA. I loved it so much. But I don't like Elend. I suppose he and Vin are going to have a romantic relationship that I dislike so much and that makes Elend even more annoying Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stormgate Posted December 30, 2015 Report Share Posted December 30, 2015 He gets better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
king of nowhere Posted December 30, 2015 Report Share Posted December 30, 2015 extensive childcare is a luxury we got with an advanced society. for most of the human history, it wasn't like that. children don't strictly need that much care anyway. Oh, they will grow dumber without someone to teach them. and they probably will have some pshycological issue for the lack of attention. without an education, they could be more prone to violence and bullying. of course there is a greater chance they will hurt themselves. extensive childcare is a good thing. but if you don't care for the well-being of those people, and you only need to use them for manual farming under the threat of violence, with the prospect that they will age fast and die of the poor conditions by the time they are forty, then it's not your problem. But I don't like Elend. I suppose he and Vin are going to have a romantic relationship that I dislike so much and that makes Elend even more annoying i didn't like elend at first, but revised my opinion somewhere along the second book. or even near the end of the first, don''t remember Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
natc Posted December 31, 2015 Report Share Posted December 31, 2015 Well Elend tries. And he always continues trying until he gets it right. Sure that usually takes way too many screwups in the mean time, but if there's any similarity between him and Vin it's sheer stubbornness. He's also a pretty decent guy for a Luthadel noble. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stormgate Posted December 31, 2015 Report Share Posted December 31, 2015 Well Elend tries. And he always continues trying until he gets it right. Sure that usually takes way too many screwups in the mean time, but if there's any similarity between him and Vin it's sheer stubbornness. He's also a pretty decent guy for a Luthadel noble. Yeah, he only raped one skaa, and that time he didn't want to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oversleep Posted December 31, 2015 Report Share Posted December 31, 2015 (edited) Yeah, he only raped one skaa, and that time he didn't want to. He was kinda forced to do it, and he thought he's doing it with a courtesan. ... Wait, he DID it with a courtesan IIRC. But he didn't know they kill them if a noble sleeps with them. Edited December 31, 2015 by Oversleep Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest keeper of the light Posted December 31, 2015 Report Share Posted December 31, 2015 Guys, spoiler alert! I said I read "half of the first book". I only got a major spoiler and it bothers me, so please don't ruin the series for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Citadel16 Posted December 31, 2015 Report Share Posted December 31, 2015 spoiler tags, people. sorry, kid. we're all used to everybody knowin' whats goin' on. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stormgate Posted December 31, 2015 Report Share Posted December 31, 2015 It ends awesomely. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
killersquirrel59 Posted December 31, 2015 Report Share Posted December 31, 2015 I hated Elend at first as well. However, I agree with the previous posters, he gets a lot better. Stick with it and wait until you see him in book 3 before you judge too harshly. Where you're at, he's still cooking. Needs some time to finish. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DreamEternal Posted December 31, 2015 Report Share Posted December 31, 2015 Yeah, he only raped one skaa, and that time he didn't want to. You have to remember nobles often beat their children to the brink of death in the hope that they may snap. I am quite sure Straff implied to Elend that he may have not tried hard enough last time, and would try again if he had the opportunity. So Elend didn't have a choice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Voidus Posted December 31, 2015 Report Share Posted December 31, 2015 I recommend not lurking in the Mistborn subsections much if you haven't even finished book 1, people generally try to be considerate but not everyone reads through the whole thread enough to know how far you've gotten.Especially since Mistborn is so old now people aren't used to having to use spoiler tags for it.But yeah, basically what everyone else said. Skaa would have had a very low infant mortality rate and pretty cruddy childcare probably but they had increased reproduction rates to make up for it. I imagine around 8/10 would have died before being able to do much work but that doesn't really matter if they all have 10 children or so to keep the population stable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MitchBade Posted December 31, 2015 Report Share Posted December 31, 2015 To answer the original question, the old phrase 'it takes a village' is appropriate here. In a lot of labor intensive communities in real life adults would switch off watching all the kids at once. One of the reasons why communities used to be more tight knit. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yurisses Posted January 1, 2016 Report Share Posted January 1, 2016 (edited) Child mortality was sky high, much like that of our world pre-modernisation. (in 18th century Sweden every third child died, and in 19th century Germany every second child died.) Of course, fertility was also proportionally very high to compensate. Mitchbade is probably right, as well. The nobles would have had much to lose in disallowing arrangements for the town infants to be cared for. Edited January 1, 2016 by yurisses Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest keeper of the light Posted January 1, 2016 Report Share Posted January 1, 2016 Well, later in the book, Hammond said "skaas are having 10-12 children" or something like that. That counts as an explanation I guess. Even though they are growing in pretty harsh times and they are dying, there are so much kids so that is not a trouble. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stormgate Posted January 1, 2016 Report Share Posted January 1, 2016 It makes sense. Cruel, inhuman sense, but it makes sense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oversleep Posted January 1, 2016 Report Share Posted January 1, 2016 It makes sense. Cruel, inhuman sense, but it makes sense. What we see as cruel was norm few centuries ago. Well, nobody killed women just because a noble slept with them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts