One of my favorite random pieces of history: Lord Byron penned an (admittedly well-written) full-throated defense of Luddites, and was one of the most popular people to advocate destroying machines and slowing tech. http://www.luddites200.org.uk/LordByronspeech.html … Then he gave birth to Ada Lovelace.
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Replying to @AustenAllred
yeah this only seems ironic if one is deeply misinformed about what the luddites actually were and how they operated
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Replying to @profunc @AustenAllred
the luddites' fight was over wages and working conditions. in some actions they actually smashed some stocking-frames and left others right next to them intact, because they were owned by men who agreed to pay "just" prices for the work.
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Replying to @profunc @AustenAllred
in others they conducted "surprise inspections" of stockingers, determined they were operating fairly, gave the owners written affirmation that they'd passed inspection, and then left. the luddites weren't against mechanization; the machines were just leverage points.
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Replying to @profunc
It wasn’t about working conditions. It was about allowing non-gilded people to operate the looms. And thus it *was* about automation, even if that wasn’t the intent.
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More specifically, they were against the disruption enabled by automated frames
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