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Comment by ezst | Hacker News Reader

> That is just like when loom machines took money away from weavers back in the 19th century, or computers took money away from typists/secretaries in the 20th century. We should carefully consider whether or not that is a net good for society.

I don't want to sound like a luddite, but each of those contributed to a consolidation of wealth that was largely offset by new jobs and new markets. How exactly do you think this is paying off here? Tech companies get to benefit, we know that, which sounds like a dead end. So it's ok that everyone else loses?

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> I don't want to sound like a luddite

it's not a dirty word. being a luddite means caring about your professional and personal communities.

It's a loaded word by this point. The luddites smashed stocking frame looms. At first those looms were human powered, and then water powered, and then steam engines came onto the scene. Steam engines where when people got wrecked. Those things were a menace! They'd crush limbs, amputate fingers, give you horrible RSI, fuck up your lungs with all the dirt in the air. The worst part is that children were better for it because they have little fingers which were better at fixing the machines. The late 16th Century didn't have the legal system in place that we have. OHSA, labor law, unions, liability, insurance. Those are all things that didn't exist back then but do now.

So these days, saying you're luddite doesn't mean you care about your professional and personal communities, it says you're anti-technology and anti-progress. If you want to say you care about your professional and personal communities, just say that.

Their arguments back then are not different at all to those today’s. Luddism was always about protecting jobs, a was against tech (self driving cars or automated looms) that would eliminate those jobs. Smashing a Waymo in SF is not much different from smashing up an automatic loom.

No, Luddists were always about protecting their own jobs.

Not really, it parallels the movements of today almost too perfectly:

The Luddites (1811–1816) were not merely destroying machines to stop technological progress; they were a broader, community-backed protest movement fighting for economic survival, fair wages, and against the erosion of their traditional, skilled way of life. While they were textile artisans at the core, the movement was fueled by widespread distress during the Napoleonic Wars and received support from local communities and even some sympathetic small-business owners.

> OHSA, labor law, unions, liability, insurance. Those are all things that didn't exist back then but do now.

what social movement could possibly have been an early progenitor of the modern labor rights movement?

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