The Luddites, who smashed machines in the 19th century, in an organized effort to resist automation, are often portrayed as uneducated opponents of technology. But according toauthor Brian Merchant, “The Luddites were incredibly educated as to the harms of technology. They were very skilled technologists. So they understood exactly how new developments in machinery would affect the workplace, their industry, and their identities.
The Luddites were incredibly educated as to the harms of technology. They were technologists themselves. They used this stuff in their homes and in their workshops every day. They were very skilled technologists. So they understood exactly how new ways of organizing machinery, new developments in machinery would affect the workplace, their industry, and their identities. So the Luddites fought back in this intensely organized and deliberate and tactical manner.
It’s not just a reactionary backlash. It is registering a protest against machinery that in their view is being used to exploit them. This is the tool, this is the capital equipment that is being used to exploit them. So by striking against that, it both serves a tactical purpose and sends this symbolic message that, “We won’t be put under the thumb of this machinery.” And so, the Luddites found great purchase with this message among the emergent working classes in England.
He doesn’t find many allies, and it becomes a law. But you really see one of these early instances where the state has to say, “Breaking machinery is so bad that if you do it, we can hang you.” And it was of course, widely perceived as this monstrous reaction, but it doesn’t stop the state, and they do it. They hang dozens of Luddites for breaking machinery owned by these factory owners.
He was also probably out smashing machines when he wasn’t doing that, because he was involved in the Nottingham cloth trade and was a tactician as well.
They would say, “Dear Dr. X, or Mr. X,” or whoever they were addressing it to. “We know that your operation contains 300 looms, or the obnoxious machinery.” They called it the obnoxious machinery. “And it has taken the bread of 800 of our brothers. And if you do not take them down, you will get a visit from General Ludd or Ned Ludd’s Army.” Or whoever. And if the factory owner complied, then they would do good by their word. They would leave the factory owner alone.
You didn’t have to get the stamp of approval. Ned Ludd stood for the same thing, generally everywhere. You could invoke your own specific grievances. If you had a particular concern about, for instance, if your boss was starting to pay you in truck or pay you in goods that you then had to barter to actually make a wage, if that was what was going on in your town, then General Ludd could be against that too. But by and large, General Ludd was against the “machinery hurtful to commonality.
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