[fallingfrog]

As a counterpoint to this argument: https://www.eurozine.com/change-course-human-history/ David Graeber and David Wengrow argue that both oppression, and freedom, are present in every society from tiny to huge, the "egalitarian hunter gatherer" trope is a huge oversimplification, and really it's the cultural choices we make that determine whether we live in a free society or one full of domination and oppression. My favorite quote:

"Egalitarian cities, even regional confederacies, are historically quite commonplace. Egalitarian families and households are not. Once the historical verdict is in, we will see that the most painful loss of human freedoms began at the small scale – the level of gender relations, age groups, and domestic servitude – the kind of relationships that contain at once the greatest intimacy and the deepest forms of structural violence. If we really want to understand how it first became acceptable for some to turn wealth into power, and for others to end up being told their needs and lives don’t count, it is here that we should look. Here too, we predict, is where the most difficult work of creating a free society will have to take place."