Period pieces and pretty people

Part of the attraction of certain period pieces is being able to watch the lives of the rich, power, and privileged on-screen, even if one is not consciously aware that the kind of life they are vicariously experiencing was not available to all. Certainly, it is rare that one will see the romance and leisure of the poor depicted. The life of the lower classes are touched upon in Mansfield Park and the novels of Dickens; they may be depicted in other films and novels conveying a certain moral or social message. It seems to me that it is implicit within much of historical recreations and historical fiction that the lot of the lower classes is to be avoided if possible. I can't think of any work that shows how the humble poor truly living the Beatitudes are gathering up a treasure in heaven.

Do we envy the rich for their lifestyle and their clothing? After all, if we envy the rich who are living now, what is to prevent us from envying the rich of a different time period? The claim could be made that things and practices of the elites of the past were more elegant and graceful, and that these have been lost by the noveau riche (and the decline has been rather steep most recently). Still, do the works of Austen reinforce our sense of entitlement and exaggerated expectations of what constitutes the good life? (At least with Austen's novel the focus is on true compatability, centered in virtue.)

One is usually unaware of the cultural and economic changes that have taken place in England, for example; knowledge of these would have us understand the novels of Austen better, and how the power of the landed aristocracy was waning. One assumes that things have always been good, or that things have always been done in this way. It is easy to watch a film like Apocalypto and point to the excesses and moral atrocities of another state (or empire). But it is difficult to imagine how things could be both different and better.

Because the past is rather inaccessible, we easily end up with a limited perception of historical reality and hence a limited understanding of the present in so far as we do not adequately grasp its causes. It also seems to me that part of the inheritance of liberal culture (or English culture) is a Whiggish belief in progress over time. This is obvious in our belief that the American system as it exists now is the best ever, never mind that the building of empire is not something new, but has been manifest throughout the past 2 centuries. The inherent weaknesses in the Constitution have been there since the beginning, and have only become more apparent as oligarchs have been able to use technology and developments in economic arrangements to their advantage.

Pointing to prosperity as a proof that the system is good is a phantom argument--could not the Aztecs and the Mayans make the same claim?