[quote=Magic Magnum]
True.I guess it's not something I think about much cause the majority of RP's I'm in take place in some kind of fantasy land.So if people are going to a gritty/cruel medieval world they just make it that, not much need to focus on the specific year or location.
[/quote]

Of course, a fantasy world is easier to make up whatever you want, but people and cultures are complex and sometimes contradictory. I did an RP once set in the height of the Black Plague in Germany. It was pretty damn gritty and awful. Society breaks down and people prey on the weak, superstitions run wild and lead to mass murders. This was probably the closest to anarchy that occurred in the Middle Ages.

While life was certainly rough up until modern era and there was a reason for the gender roles seen as 'traditional' but like everything human, it is complex and not always what it appears. Certainly the Vikings raiding the coast of England and Ireland are a good example of barbaric hordes. They looted and burned, they took slaves and raped women. But on the home front a woman in pagan Viking society had a significant among of control over herself. Divorce was common and though it tended to favor men when it came to adultery, a woman could divorce her husband if they just did not get along. If he was caught hitting her in public, he would face a fine or even a challenge from the men of her family. So it was illegal for a man to abuse his wife and yet it was seen as perfectly fine for the same man to go rape an Irish woman during a raid or even kill his own slaves without a blink of an eye from the legal system. 

Anyway, that's enough from me about that. I could dig up examples all night.