{"id":1880,"date":"2009-05-15T17:48:53","date_gmt":"2009-05-15T07:48:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/?p=1880"},"modified":"2009-05-15T18:16:13","modified_gmt":"2009-05-15T08:16:13","slug":"john-kinsella-on-neo-luddism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/?p=1880","title":{"rendered":"John Kinsella on Neo-Luddism"},"content":{"rendered":"

Neo-Luddism<\/a>
\nJohn Kinsella
\nABC Unleashed
\nMay 15, 2009<\/p>\n

“Technology isn’t the deliverance of humanity, it is its damnation. ‘Progress’, used as a noun, becomes the linchpin of technological propaganda. Computers aren’t a tool of liberation, but of destruction \u2014 look to the power they are chewing, the materials that go into making them, the pollution engendered in their manufacture, especially of batteries for laptops, despite the propaganda of ‘greener’ models, the radiation they emit and the health risks associated with associated wireless technology are being constantly debated.<\/p>\n

As an anarchist, I believe firmly that ‘small’ is necessary (or, as Andrew Fleming on his anarchist blog notes, ‘local’, or what I might call ‘regional’), that rights are best protected on a community level and without centralised hierarchies as delivered by the State; that rights come out of consensus (all members of a community having an equal say and all members’ agreement being necessary to making ‘change’ within the community \u2014 we might understand this within the usual dynamic as a shift in ‘policy’, but it is fundamentally different)…”<\/p>\n

See also<\/em> :<\/p>\n

Luddism, Neo-Luddites and Dystopian Views of Technology<\/a>, Martin Ryder, University of Colorado at Denver, School of Education:<\/p>\n

“Cultural change necessarily involves resistance to change. The term Luddite has been resurrected from a previous era to describe one who distrusts or fears the inevitable changes brought about by new technology. The original Luddite revolt occurred in 1811, an action against the English Textile factories that displaced craftsmen in favor of machines. Today’s Luddites continue to raise moral and ethical arguments against the excesses of modern technology to the extent that our inventions and our technical systems have evolved to control us rather than to serve us and to the extent that such leviathans can threaten our essential humanity…”<\/p>\n

Rebels Against The Future: The Luddites and their War on the Industrial Revolution<\/em>, Kirkpatrick Sale, 1995 | The Luddites’ War on Industry<\/a>, Do Or Die!<\/em>, No.6, 1997 | The Luddites and the Combination Acts<\/a>, MIA<\/p>\n