Only a Luddite would have the attention span to read that long of an article. Alas, I am not a Luddite.
Why You Should Be a Luddite
11–20 of 41 posts
Re: Why You Should Be a Luddite
#12Only a Luddite would have the attention span to read that long of an article. Alas, I am not a Luddite.
Can you explain what you mean here because this mostly sounds like a self own?
Ultimately, the luddites are just trying to prevent capital from destroying the working class.
Not that this would be apparent because nobody read...
The Fucking Article
Re: Why You Should Be a Luddite
#13[deleted]
Re: Why You Should Be a Luddite
#14Should probably paste the second paragraph here for everyone who doesn’t wanna read TFA. Most people’s understanding of the Luddites seems about on par with their knowledge of the “idiot McDonalds coffee lady” > The Luddites, Brian shows, weren’t anti-technology. In fact, they embraced new machines that helped them do their jobs better. They were against machines that destroyed workers’ livelihoods and rendered their…
It's a bullshit argument either way. Say it's 1800 and you need 100 workers to make a new suit, which costs as much as one's annual rent (yes, really). Suddenly machines show up and can make the same suit with 10 workers and at 1/10 the cost. The other 90 workers are outraged, break machines and cry about "enriching capitalists at the expense of laborers". What is the solution exactly? Should the average household continue to spend 20% of their income on clothing just because a small subset of workers needs to be subsidized indefinitely.
Re: Why You Should Be a Luddite
#15Should probably paste the second paragraph here for everyone who doesn’t wanna read TFA. Most people’s understanding of the Luddites seems about on par with their knowledge of the “idiot McDonalds coffee lady” > The Luddites, Brian shows, weren’t anti-technology. In fact, they embraced new machines that helped them do their jobs better. They were against machines that destroyed workers’ livelihoods and rendered their…
It's a bullshit argument either way. Say it's 1800 and you need 100 workers to make a new suit, which costs as much as one's annual rent (yes, really). Suddenly machines show up and can make the same suit with 10 workers and at 1/10 the cost. The other 90 workers are outraged, break machines and cry about "enriching capitalists at the expense of laborers". What is the solution exactly? Should the average household co…
I think a portion of people would say yes, it's better to keep the status quo. Imo progress always wins because eventually someone somewhere will break the taboo. Technology even gets lost and rediscovered, which means even if you supress the knowledge someone will still eventually do it. So it's pretty pointless to fight, I'd rather try to benefit from it.
Re: Why You Should Be a Luddite
#16If automation is the exploitation of workers by capitalists, then Luddism is the exploitation of consumers by workers. I don't want to be legally forced to pay double the price for clothing just because some well-connected weavers enacted regulation to ban more efficient competition.
Because it's all about, and only about, you. Yes?
Despite sounding like it's zero-sum, fighting for the consumer is actually the only way to lift everybody up. Fighting for workers specifically is playing favorites. Fighting for the ownership class is also playing favorites. Focusing on consumers makes everybody a winner over time.
Re: Why You Should Be a Luddite
#17Should probably paste the second paragraph here for everyone who doesn’t wanna read TFA. Most people’s understanding of the Luddites seems about on par with their knowledge of the “idiot McDonalds coffee lady” > The Luddites, Brian shows, weren’t anti-technology. In fact, they embraced new machines that helped them do their jobs better. They were against machines that destroyed workers’ livelihoods and rendered their…
It's a bullshit argument either way. Say it's 1800 and you need 100 workers to make a new suit, which costs as much as one's annual rent (yes, really). Suddenly machines show up and can make the same suit with 10 workers and at 1/10 the cost. The other 90 workers are outraged, break machines and cry about "enriching capitalists at the expense of laborers". What is the solution exactly? Should the average household co…
> a small subset of workers needs to be subsidized indefinitely.
In the context of 1800s industrial revolution, this means employing child labour, hugely unsafe machines that cause amputations and death, draconian death penalties against the Luddites, long working hours, and things like that. All for a small pitiful wage.
THAT is what this is about: outright exploitation that would be spectacularly illegal in well-organized countries today, and is called things like "de-facto slavery" in places where it still happens. If not having these things is "subsidizing" people then one of us doesn't know what that word means.
Re: Why You Should Be a Luddite
#18Only a Luddite would have the attention span to read that long of an article. Alas, I am not a Luddite.
Can you explain what you mean here because this mostly sounds like a self own? Ultimately, the luddites are just trying to prevent capital from destroying the working class. Not that this would be apparent because nobody read... The Fucking Article
It was a joke: technology has collapsed the attention span, therefore Luddites would have long attention spans; only someone with a long attention span would be able to read a long-form article like this one.
Re: Why You Should Be a Luddite
#19Re: Why You Should Be a Luddite
#20Should probably paste the second paragraph here for everyone who doesn’t wanna read TFA. Most people’s understanding of the Luddites seems about on par with their knowledge of the “idiot McDonalds coffee lady” > The Luddites, Brian shows, weren’t anti-technology. In fact, they embraced new machines that helped them do their jobs better. They were against machines that destroyed workers’ livelihoods and rendered their…
Recapped, towards the end of the article:
> The Luddites, again, were not anti-technology. They were anti getting trampled on and anti having no say in the way that this industrial development would take place. And when they lost that battle, this was the cost. It was decades and decades of mass immiseration.