Throaway1982 4 days ago

The Luddites were trying to stop themselves & their families from starving to death. The factory owners were only interested in profit. It isn't like the Luddites were given a generous re-training package and they turned it down. They had 0 rights, I mean that literally: 0.

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theamk 4 days ago | parent [-]

You missed MR2Z's argument: there are more people in the world than luddites and factory owners.

During industrial revolution, the clothes (and other fabrics) were getting dramatically cheaper. A family that could only afford cheapest clothes could now get a higher quality stuff. A family that could not afford any clothes at all, could now get cheap stuff.

This is what the luddites wanted to stop. It's not "luddites starving to death" vs "factory owner get no profit", it was "luddites starving to death" vs "many many more people can not afford clothes"

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Throaway1982 3 days ago | parent [-]

Except for the fact that the Luddites' labour grievances could easily have been addressed by the factory owners (rise in pay, better conditions) while still offering cheaper fabrics through industrialization. There was simply no desire to do so. No one was saved from freezing to death by cheaper textiles.

People did starve to death and turn to things such as alcohol due to labour displacement during Industrialization. At the time, the prevailing wisdom was that lower-class people were naturally inferior. Robert Owen challenged this theory.

And yes, that was the choice given to the Luddites. Have no work (and therefore no food), because the factory owner can replace you with machines, and you have no labour rights, so he will simply cast you out and make more profit. I did not miss Mr2Z's argument, yours is just incorrect.

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SR2Z 3 days ago | parent [-]

> No one was saved from freezing to death by cheaper textiles.

Citation needed for that one.

> Except for the fact that the Luddites' labour grievances could easily have been addressed by the factory owners (rise in pay, better conditions) while still offering cheaper fabrics through industrialization.

So how long would the employers be required to pay them, in your mind? A year? Ten? A lifetime?

It would be the end consumer of the textile that would have to pay for those former textile workers to do nothing.

People can find new jobs when the world changes. It's not pleasant, but it's frankly a lot better than trying to force their old employer to keep them on payroll in a job where they can't do work.

	▲	Throaway1982 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		"People can find new jobs when the world changes. It's not pleasant, but it's frankly a lot better than trying to force their old employer to keep them on payroll in a job where they can't do work." This is what you don't understand. There was no re-tooling or re-training for the Luddites. This wasn't a 20th century downsizing situation. This was one step above slavery. They didn't just go get new jobs. They got extremely precarious work with no labour rights (at all) at lower pay than before and in competition with hordes of desperate unemployed labourers. This has nothing to do with free market economics like you're posting. "citation needed for that one." Actually no, you're the one who keeps saying that industrialization / replacing human workers with machines saved people's lives with cheap textiles, but you show no proof of this, so you're the one who needs a citation!