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Comment by unionizenow | Hacker News Reader

The article makes it sound as though the eight hour work day was a gift from the bosses to the workers; or an attempt to make them better consumers.

The truth is that thousands of workers died in a world wide struggle for humane working conditions during the 19th century.

In Chicago: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haymarket_affair

In 1921 bombs were dropped on striking coal miners in West Virginia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Blair_Mountain

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It's one of the greatest legacies of the US unions. E.g. May Day as the international day for workers demonstrations came about largely in recognition of the sacrifices of the Haymarket Massacre, and thanks to the AFL reiterating it's commitment to the 8 hour day by planning new demonstrations for May 1st 1890.

Less than 100 years ago, this stuff happened. Far out. I truly can't comprehend the strikebreakers getting away with... Well, cold blooded murder. Massacres. It's horrible.

Very simple: the striking workers were considered criminals - rabble that no upstanding citizen would want to get associated with. Today, they'd be called terrorists.

Now think about how today, the American military gets away with bombing weddings...

To be honest it was a high risk wedding. They couldn't just let innocent people go.

After all, one of America's founding fathers said - "I'd rather murder trillions with my bear hands, than let a guilty man go free".

^ Note: Bear arms is not an error.

Both John Adams and Benjamin Franklin appear to have believed in the "Blackstone's formulation":

It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackstone%27s_formulation

Do you have a citation for who said your quote - I'm not an American but that really doesn't sound like something one of their founders would have said (of course, I could well be wrong!).

It was obviously sarcasm. The style, the connotation, the number (?! which is preposterous).

I guess the old adage about sarcasm being indistinguishable from regular internet posts.

Oops - my sarcasm detector failed to fire.

BTW You may be thinking of Poe's Law:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law

"Without a blatant display of humor, it is impossible to create a parody of extremism or fundamentalism that someone won't mistake for the real thing."

I think he meant it facetiously.

It is only called 'class warfare' when the working class fights back.

Another well-known example of violence against striking workers in the US is the Ludlow massacre. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_Massacre

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