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> Yep. The refrain hasn't really changed since before Ned Ludd and the boys
> smashed the power looms in Britain's textile plants.
"Luddite" is always thrown at someone who resists change. What people
conveniently forget, however, is that the original Luddites were right, at
least in the short term. Many of them did lose their jobs, and, in the context
of early 19th century Britain, that did mean that families starved and died and
separated.
Those consequences are less likely in modern industrial society (although not
impossible), but suffering is still a result. It's hardly surprising,
therefore, that people don't accept them. It is one thing to talk abstractly
about progress when you are thinking academically or don't expect to have the
same problem, and quite another to be facing those problems yourself.
One of the unfortunate consequences in these situations is that the victims
often turn xenophobic. This is unfortunate not only in itself, racism being
always unjustified, but also because it's misplacing the blame. These sorts of
changes are not made simply by blind forces, as the rhetoric often implies, but
by individuals looking out for their own interests and ignoring the interests
of others.
> Human progress consists of people finding ways to produce more of a good or
> service with the same or fewer inputs (capital, labor, and materials). Over
> time, this process leads to more of everything -- food, medicine,
> information, toys, leisure time, etc. -- for the same effort, making the
> world wealthier and everyone better off.
Sigh. I thought we had got away from the myths that change is always ultimately
better and that what's good for companies and their owners is good for everyone
else. That may be true some of the time, but what evidence beyond a strong
belief do you have that it's always true? It certainly ignores some basic
questions. For example: Does anyone have the right to make others suffer for
the greater good? Do those who lose income and prosperity in the short term
ever gain them back in the long term? Is the short-term suffering balanced by
later happiness? To assume all these things without proof seems a faith as
blind as that of the Luddites, and possibly even more damaging.
--
Bruce Byfield bbyfield -at- axionet -dot- com 604-421.7177
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