No, there was nothing "super cool" about the Luddites. Stop trying to rehabilitate these thugs. Failing that, do it someplace other than a site called "Hacker News."
If businesses decide to replace workers with AI, then it's also their collective responsibility to pay for their retraining, or if that isn't possible their social security.
It's telling that the AI sycophants side with the group that was actually murdering people, however.
Gee. Being "replaced" in a job like that sounds like a good career move to me.
The system that prevailed up to that point didn't give them many options, of course... but neither would their response to it. Sabotage doesn't bring progress, no matter who told you that it did, or how much you want to believe it.
Not only were they essentially one of the first organized labor protestors, they also protested against the poor quality of the products made by the machines. This is why they were extremely popular among most people who lived during this time, and would be sheltered by people unrelated to the workers of the mills.
Someone who made quality garments for their town was put out of business by a mill mass-producing terrible quality products. It’s almost the first echoes of what we see coming over from Amazon/Temu now.
There's absolutely no parallels here, to AI. A machine that is taking work from highly skilled labor ohhhh wait
We're primates that make and use tools. AI is a tool, so we'll make it and use it. What we won't do is compete with it. We have better things to do.
Please read the article I linked, it explains how the luddites’ motives are completely misunderstood by most people. This misunderstanding is furthered by people using the term Luddite as a pejorative. But this is somewhat like using the term “Black Panther” as a pejorative.