No, it doesn't. It has to do with denigrating the period in comparison to Classical Rome. The concept you seem to have of "conditions were so primitive outside of Spain that I doubt "Europeans", as a whole, could come to a resolve about anything other than building more dongeons" is simply in error.
The idea of five hard years in the mid-500s determining what the Franks were doing in 730 is silly. A longer "small ice age" in the 16th through 18th centuries didn't stop the Renaissance and Enlightenment, nor did the massive die off of population in the plague years stop late Medieval civilization. In both cases the hardships spurred new social development.
It's not a "mini ice age" Fur Shur.
The Chinese got off the dime faster ~ only took them 300 years to do a fundamental economic recovery.
Boys at Mecca were virtually untouched by the whole thing, but Byzantium seems to have had one serious economic catastrophe for about 80 years.
Yup, most of Europe was pretty much like Africa circa 1300 ~ but even worse ~ the only folks left were those who lived on or very near the ocean; e.g. the Friesians, the Irish, the coastal Britons, the Sa'ami, the Romans, etc.
It took quite a while to repopulate the Continent and retrieve civilization from the ruins.