Maybe the Luddites had it right

[Cyrano]

(If you don’t want to look it up, Luddites were people opposed to the industrial revolution and all the mechanical devices and automation that came with it at the beginning of the 19th century.)

I’ve just finished my monthly bills and have made out checks for my home phone, cell phone, the electric company, the water company, car insurance, my credit card, medical insurance, and a few more things that I didn’t want, but needed.

Had the Luddites been successful in stopping the industrial revolution, I wouldn’t have seen any of these bills, nor even have known what they meant had they arrived in the mail.

Yeah, I know, the advancements of the past 200 years have supposedly improved everyone’s life. But at what cost? For many millennium, people lived without TVs, phones, computers, washing machines, refrigerators and even garbage disposals.

The one thing the industrial revolution did create, after about a century and a half, was a middle class. But we have seen over the past eight years how easy it was for the wealthy, powerful and greedy to destroy the middle class.

So maybe, just maybe, the Luddites were right. It’s something to consider. Especially for those whose jobs have disappeared and unemployment insurance has run out.

Life before the industrial revolution was no bed of roses. But most people knew how to survive and fend for themselves. And for those who didn’t or couldn’t – are they any better off in today’s world? Ask the homeless of New Orleans, or the unemployed in the rust belt, or the millions without health insurance.

For those wondering if I'm really serious about wanting to return to the past, the answer, on most days, is no. But then there are other days on which I think it wouldn't be such a bad idea.

What are your thoughts on this?