tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post2055885949302069515..comments2024-03-25T15:17:04.488-07:00Comments on Captain Capitalism: Why the Left Hates the Division of LaborCaptain Capitalismhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05620212946121617985noreply@blogger.comBlogger37125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-70180648462971116152012-12-17T00:26:56.375-08:002012-12-17T00:26:56.375-08:00It makes sense if you look at the push for complet...<i>It makes sense if you look at the push for complete equality not as the ultimate goal but as a means to an end with the end being control over everything you do. </i><br /><br />I find that it makes more sense still to describe it thusly: completely equality is their conscious goal, but total control is their end-of-road.<br /><br />That accomodates, and dismisses as ultimately irrelevant, the question of whether they are sincere, deluded or lying about the goal. The road leads where the road leads, regardless of the intentions or state of mind of the traveler.Seeraknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-11604102940099285182012-12-17T00:12:52.780-08:002012-12-17T00:12:52.780-08:00Division of labor contradicts a key metaphysical p...Division of labor contradicts a key metaphysical premise of collectivism: the interchangeability of individuals. One X is as good as another X /they all look the same.<br /><br />Division of labor contradicts a key political premise of Leftism: that "socialism" means working together while capitalism/individualism means lone wolves. People obviously work together under capitalism, by means of division of labor, destroying that premise.<br /><br />It's similar to core conservatives' discomfort with the <i>liberal</i> Enlightenment principle of individual rights as enshrined in America's founding; it contradicts their is/ought dichotomy, as it's a plain case of the Founders basing what sort of society *ought* to exist on the fact of what mankind *is*.<br /><br />The underlying premise shared by both sides, of course, is the idea that reality is not real, objective and independent, but is instead the product of some consciousness. They differ only on the point of *whose* consciousness does the authoring; the conservatives say God, the Left says the collective's.<br /><br />So naturally, when faced with an inconvenient fact, their goal is not to adjust to its reality (because there is no such thing), but to re-author reality to adjust to *their* prior moral demands.Seeraknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-76663303920776723912012-12-11T18:05:47.640-08:002012-12-11T18:05:47.640-08:00@Herb Nowell: Anon 7:34 ("Division of labor =...@Herb Nowell: Anon 7:34 ("Division of labor = degrees = credentialism = HR, risk aversive corporations. You can't have it both ways.") is on to something, I think.<br /><br />Let us take your auto mechanic example. The earliest mechanics pretty much built the entire car themselves. Kudos to such engineers and craftsman, but it's not terribly efficient or cheap.<br /><br />Divide the labor. Now you're specializing in the engines, you've got a mind like a watchmaker, you love puzzles, it suits you well. Your co-worker has got a smooth and steady hand, making him a whiz at shaping the metal of the bodywork. Everyone is doing what they're good at, getting more work done in a day and at a higher quality, and you're well compensated for your skills. Life is good.<br /><br />Divide the labor further and further. Now you're a minimum wage monkey working at a lube change garage. Not very challenging, monotonous, and the wages pay the bills... maybe. And that's all your job involves as far as engines go; it's more efficient to have a lot of little shops equipped and staffed to handle the most basic and common maintenance, and a few fully loaded garages to handle the complex and uncommon jobs, like rebuilding a transmission or something.<br /><br />That's how a corporate chain will logically structure. And what becomes of the oil change attendant, long term? Will he ever learn any skills beyond being able to change a filter blindfolded? Not on the job, probably. The company wants to maximize the number of oil changes performed, to get the most out of this highly specialized cog. Maybe if he gets a diploma in automotive servicing at a trade school part time, he can apply for a transfer to one of the company's full-service garages.<br /><br />Now, if he worked at a small business garage (independent of any corporation or maybe just leasing a franchise name), he's more likely to get his hands dirty on all manner of automotive repair, learning on the job. It's certainly a much more flexible environment, and he will advance because of what he can demonstrably do, as opposed to just having a piece of paper that says he can.<br /><br />Every industry is different, of course. Myself, I'm in the construction industry, and first hired on as a helper, the only qualifications being a pulse and an ability to show up not drunk or stoned. But because it was a company of about 2 dozen people, and I had a couple of relevant courses under my belt, I learned how to operate the equipment and do the calculations that was usually the province of crew chiefs. At a certain point, even STEM education is overrated and padded to suck up tuition dollars; I've worked with guys fresh out their degree who are officially way smarter than me, but who can't translate plans on paper to real world actions or improvise when equipment breaks. The kind that wants to set-up several thousands of dollars of equipment to do a task I first learned to do with a plum-bob and a tape measure. Because that's the only way they know how to do it, and if they don't have the computerized instrumentation holding their hand (it breaks or having GIGO trouble), they can't adapt. They know what buttons to press to make the computer automatically spit out the answer they need, but they have no idea how to do the basic trigonometry themselves.<br /><br />I think that's what Anon 7:34 is trying to get at when he talks about over-specialization. I don't pretend to have a solution, beyond encouraging people to work at smaller companies and avoid larger corporations (and their HR departments and pointy-haired bosses and so forth), and to develop a diversity of practical skills.V10noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-45987095636246642762012-12-11T17:37:06.132-08:002012-12-11T17:37:06.132-08:00When I was a kid I loved Soccer, I loved playing a...When I was a kid I loved Soccer, I loved playing at it, practicing it and worked hard at it.<br /><br />I played in a competitive league outside of school. When my school formed a team I joined. <br /><br />After realizing they didn't keep score. I got disinterested and faded out quit the team and moved onto other things.<br /><br />When I go to visit and I get to playing whatever sports in the back yard with my brothers who are 15 and 20 years my younger. They keep score on their elder sibling.<br /><br />Oh and of course I never played sports with my sister because she was always doing girl stuff and didn't have much interest.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-3045781715145408792012-12-11T06:42:59.925-08:002012-12-11T06:42:59.925-08:00I'd just like to take a moment to thank Sweden...I'd just like to take a moment to thank Sweden for going balls-out crazy with the "no gender" thing so that in a decade or two, the rest of the world can point to them and say, "This is what happens when you pretend there are no differences between men and women."<br /><br />To the extent that they succeed, they'll have produced the most milquetoast androgynous men that the world has ever seen.<br /><br />Society <i>needs</i> men, and the Swedes, bless their stupid gender-neutral hearts, have decided to take one for the team and sacrifice their society to show us why.Ryan Fullernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-78832144611766723852012-12-11T06:04:35.176-08:002012-12-11T06:04:35.176-08:00"What would happen if the government funded S..."What would happen if the government funded STEM programs and cut all those worthless degrees from the universities?"<br /><br />Simple - the government would mandate that they have to take 80% of the people who majored in those worthless degrees, and for "diversity" would force you to higher them. It is already happening - I know a LOT of people who have degrees in STEM areas who are doing "other things" - mostly stocks, and other derivative markets since either they aren't the right color or sex (basically they are Caucasian, males). So it would just be more of that - which is already why the US no longer leads in patents, or discoveries... <br /><br />Obama wanted us to be "one of many" and he's doing everything he can to ensure it in every way he can...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-3445178398387146192012-12-10T22:36:18.486-08:002012-12-10T22:36:18.486-08:00Division of labor allows for increased productivit...Division of labor allows for increased productivity- which then allows us extra time for inventing, arts, learning/teaching (some would consider this 'real' progress). This is how we, as a society, made it 'this far'. I don't want to go back to the groovy 1400's with their windmills and stick/mud houses.Seranoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-6950205778818302732012-12-10T22:00:20.558-08:002012-12-10T22:00:20.558-08:00but also seems hell bent on social equality
No, t...<i> but also seems hell bent on social equality</i><br /><br />No, they aren't. Not really. It is true that they want to make everybody else equal. But they also want to make themselves superior, as the arbiters of what that social equality is and means. As the people from whom you must get permission to do anything useful.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-32567479650108929992012-12-10T20:40:48.788-08:002012-12-10T20:40:48.788-08:00"Here's a better idea. Leave the adults o..."Here's a better idea. Leave the adults out of sports until the kids are 11 or 12. I remember playing baseball as a kid; I got skipped a grade in grade 3, and went from being a superior athlete in my class to the runt of grade 4. We played before school, during recess, at lunch, and after school. Because I stunk (relatively) I was banished to either right field or catcher. But here's the thing: because no adults were around, no one got benched. If you showed up, you played. Yes, you got hooted at each at-bat, and people ran on your arm, but you played.<br /><br />And, with a child's innate sense of justice, I knew I deserved to be in right because I stunk. I didn't whine or complain; I went there because I knew it was where I should be.<br /><br />We were as competitive as hell and always kept score, but since we chose up new sides each morning, no one gave a d*mn. Leave the kids alone and let them play; they'll be alright. "<br /><br />Exactly. We used to play football when I was a tween/teen. This other kid and I were the fastest, strongest players in our group. We never played on the same team. We tried to divide it up somewhat evenly, depending on who was playing, but in the game, nobody complained about who got the ball more, or really any other aspect of the game. If you were on my team, you wanted me to get the ball, so we would have the best chance of scoring. Same thing on the other side. There were no hurt feelings, most of the time, and we all had fun. Sure, there were disputes about various plays, but no big deal. Kids can handle a lot more than they're given credit for. BTW, none of us were traditional jocks.whahappan?noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-37683487365706824162012-12-10T19:26:31.900-08:002012-12-10T19:26:31.900-08:00From a personal perspective, I take pride in being...From a personal perspective, I take pride in being able to do a wide variety of things and I'm always seeking opportunity to learn more. I have a large pallet of skills because of a do-it-yourself mentality. <br /><br />Second, it makes me extremely valuable at work so I'm less likely to lose my job to offshoring because of the versatility and advanced skill level.<br /><br />Third, my organization runs more efficiently precisely because we can do everything in house and the small number of people means we have far less overhead in interpersonal communications.<br /><br />Now, just because I CAN do stuff doesn't mean I SHOULD do those things - not when there are persons who a) enjoy doing those things and b) do them extremely well and c) can do them cheaper, faster and better than I.<br /><br />Net - I think there is a balance between generalization of skills vs. specialization that every organization must determine is right.still not a robotnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-32398595849569656762012-12-10T17:40:50.418-08:002012-12-10T17:40:50.418-08:00No. Skill development happens during practice and ...<i>No. Skill development happens during practice and drill, when the benched kids are made to understand why they were benched and what they must do to overcome those deficiencies.</i><br /><br />I'm sorry Amy, but skill does not develop only in practice. And to Kevin B, coaching matters and that's why the adults are involved. Game play and the ability to coach a child in that game is immensely important. The immediate feedback of a goal or a good play helps and then the praise of a coach pointing out what they did well or what they could have done matters. The score doesn't. Not everything is an ideological battleground, although the differing philosophies of sport can get that way. As a coach, and a long term non-parental coach, I am 100% behind the "non-competitive" philosophy behind young children's youth sports. The kids always know the score anyway, but they forget soon enough. Hopefully they don't forget the other lessons we teach them.The Rathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00762317244980526077noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-90218177590749272612012-12-10T17:32:27.558-08:002012-12-10T17:32:27.558-08:00With regards to those who argue that there are rat...With regards to those who argue that there are rational reasons to reject the division of labor, even those who acknowledge that there are no ECONOMIC arguments against it, I have this to say:<br /><br />The Industrial Revolution, which was division of labor writ large in addition to everything else it was, produced a population growth in the 19th century of roughly 300% in all of the nations that experienced it, including us.<br />This means that the previous system was killing off its population so fast that the breeding rate was only barely keeping up.<br />Glamourizing the Middle Ages and the yeoman farmer does not speak well of you or of your view of man; there is a REASON that even the most collectivist and primitive nations desperately grapple for Western technology even where they eschew Western individualism.<br />Being a yeoman farmer was back-breaking work from before sunrise til after sunset, every single workingday of the year. We're talking 14 and 16 hour days on average. Yeoman herders and farmers might have to leave their homes at 3am on market days just to get there in time to sell their produce for what it would bring, and then trudge home afterwards.<br />Remember, life expectancy did not reach 50 even in the US until the 1920s. It was under 40 in the 1890s still. The average yeoman farmer was lucky if he lived to see 40.<br />Illness was absolutely fatal, if only to his farm and not to him. So was injury. Miss a day of work, good reason or not, and there was a good chance your family would starve. Work through the illness or injury, and you might die instead, potentially guaranteeing their starvation.<br />Go and read some of the things John Locke had to say about how the average English family lived in the 17th century.<br /><br />Seriously. So much of what makes a civilization possible comes from division of labor and ONLY from division of labor that it becomes like violence: without it, the other virtues are impossible.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-66958294186292929142012-12-10T17:29:43.773-08:002012-12-10T17:29:43.773-08:00Anon (9:55) said, "There are, actually, quite...Anon (9:55) said, "There are, actually, quite sensible and rational reasons for eschewing the division of labour. However, not a one has anything to do with economics, where Smith's pin factory is both the beginning and end of the argument."<br /><br />O.K. so if you ever need a complicated surgery to save your worthless life, be sure to grab the janitor. I'm sure he'll be just as good. Woldn't want to perpetuate that, division of labor crap. What a maroon.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-17952663788454170412012-12-10T16:32:15.739-08:002012-12-10T16:32:15.739-08:00Rat said,
"Actually, Captain, the reason we ...Rat said, <br />"Actually, Captain, the reason we don't keep score in kids' sports is much simpler than a Marxian conspiracy. We do it because we want to keep adult competitiveness separate from a child's skill development."<br /><br />Why don't adults leave the kids alone to play and let them learn about skills and competition by themselves?Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18194867861358564423noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-64304582610296903682012-12-10T13:55:22.505-08:002012-12-10T13:55:22.505-08:00"One of the things I could not explain until ..."One of the things I could not explain until recently was how the left not only wants financial equality, but also seems hell bent on social equality."<br /><br />It makes sense if you look at the push for complete equality not as the ultimate goal but as a means to an end with the end being control over everything you do. <br /><br />Like you said - hurt feelings. Some people cannot tolerate the thought that others are making things and achieving whatever they want to do without their involvement. Their idea of achievement is for you to have to get permission from them before you do anything at all.<br /><br />This isn't just a Left/Marxist thing: establishment Republicans and religious groups like the Moral Majority behave the same way.<br />ScottHnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-1544600775042774592012-12-10T13:30:55.261-08:002012-12-10T13:30:55.261-08:00First minute or so.
http://youtu.be/93tR96egox4First minute or so.<br /><br />http://youtu.be/93tR96egox4Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-54232674166419925852012-12-10T13:18:07.952-08:002012-12-10T13:18:07.952-08:00I remember a scene from The Adventures of Baron Mu...I remember a scene from The Adventures of Baron Munchausen in which the mayor of a town under siege, The Right Ordinary Horatio Jackson, played by Jonathan Pryce, executes a hero of the siege for conduct that makes everyone else look bad.<br /><br />GMEconomartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-5147801645031985712012-12-10T12:31:03.675-08:002012-12-10T12:31:03.675-08:00@The Rat, 11:21 a.m. 12/10/2012 -
No. Skill deve...@The Rat, 11:21 a.m. 12/10/2012 - <br /><br />No. Skill development happens during practice and drill, when the benched kids are made to understand why they were benched and what they must do to overcome those deficiencies.<br /><br />No one man can do it all, not in sports or academics or polemics. But the gift of a human's considerably lengthy youth is that he can probe various areas and learn those areas in which he is strong or weak. The act of NOT keeping score gives little feedback to children who seek to find a place of necessity* in the world.<br /><br />*Note that I do not say "importance" or "prominence," as such things are subjective according to the whims of contemporary society. Necessity is the vital characteristic: is a person who can figure necessary to society? Yes. Are the abilities to negotiate, recognize strength and weakness, deal fairly and in strict accordance with the law, and lose gracefully (by recognizing ones own weaknesses) necessary to society? Yes. <br /><br />Teaching kids that anyone and everyone can be a winner, in any competition and in all situations, only fosters the socialist belief in equality of outcome despite opportunity. Some kids need to be benched, sometimes to spur their desire to improve, other times to inspire them to find other tracks to purse greatness, or, at the least, a position of necessity in society. <br /><br />One-tenth of one-percent of NFL players represent the pool of hopeful young men who line up at scrimmage as Golden Bears. It is up to mature and knowledgeable adults to deflate their dreams early on, so as to avoid wasted time. This does not mean kill their spirit or beat them down; on the contrary, it means helping them find a more suitable path for their energy and desires, something that I find adults unwilling or unable (or both) to do for the youth under their tutelage.Amyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02887726976835609577noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-39066361742416185672012-12-10T11:59:40.143-08:002012-12-10T11:59:40.143-08:00Rat:
Here's a better idea. Leave the adults o...Rat:<br /><br />Here's a better idea. Leave the adults out of sports until the kids are 11 or 12. I remember playing baseball as a kid; I got skipped a grade in grade 3, and went from being a superior athlete in my class to the runt of grade 4. We played before school, during recess, at lunch, and after school. Because I stunk (relatively) I was banished to either right field or catcher. But here's the thing: because no adults were around, no one got benched. If you showed up, you played. Yes, you got hooted at each at-bat, and people ran on your arm, but you played. <br /><br />And, with a child's innate sense of justice, I knew I deserved to be in right because I stunk. I didn't whine or complain; I went there because I knew it was where I should be. <br /><br />We were as competitive as hell and always kept score, but since we chose up new sides each morning, no one gave a d*mn. Leave the kids alone and let them play; they'll be alright. KevinBhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12620210206336047177noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-76146017363116721562012-12-10T11:41:08.758-08:002012-12-10T11:41:08.758-08:00You forgot the eternal leftist argument for everyt...You forgot the eternal leftist argument for everything: "It isn't fair that..."Tim Wohlfordhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04083211657061442828noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-74679553606338992962012-12-10T11:21:28.278-08:002012-12-10T11:21:28.278-08:00Actually, Captain, the reason we don't keep sc...Actually, Captain, the reason we don't keep score in kids' sports is much simpler than a Marxian conspiracy. We do it because we want to keep adult competitiveness separate from a child's skill development. We would prefer coaches ignore the score at an early age and concentrate on skills. When winning is important weak players get benched which retards their skill development. Who really remembers if you won a game when you were 8 years old? We keep score when we tier players by skill, usually around 11 in the sports I have been involved in.The Rathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00762317244980526077noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-47682743654580687302012-12-10T11:20:01.085-08:002012-12-10T11:20:01.085-08:00Of course it makes no sense. On the one hand they ...Of course it makes no sense. On the one hand they claim that women, blacks, mexicans, whomever, is oppressed and can't get a fair shake.<br /><br />Then they turn around and try and turn us all into the same thing by trying to actually oppress everybody. If anyone feels even slightly jilted by society all society must suffer.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-21791745715495711402012-12-10T10:10:17.163-08:002012-12-10T10:10:17.163-08:00@Anon 7:34
Your last sentence proves your clueles...@Anon 7:34<br /><br />Your last sentence proves your cluelessness:<br /><br /><i>Division of labor = degrees = credentialism = HR, risk aversive corporations. You can't have it both ways.</i><br /><br />Realy? So, if I'm an auto mechanic, and I hire a cook to make my meals we both have to get college degrees? What if he also hires me to fix his car?<br /><br />Division of labor merely means some people do certain tasks and other people do different tasks. Humans have done that for most if not all of our existence. Division of labor is observed among hunter gathers. The most basic is between hunter and gathers but even those two groups there is differentiation.<br /><br />Hell, you even see in animals other than humans. Watch a wolf pack run down a deer. Different wolves do different tasks.<br /><br />Humans didn't invent universities, credentialism, and HR offices until the past millennium and even then only the first. The last two are more recent.<br /><br />Wolves, to the best of anyone's knowledge, haven't invented any of them.<br /><br />Yet, somehow division of labor makes them inevitable.<br /><br />Right.Pulp Herbhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02486803457210325703noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-66585794636703025172012-12-10T10:03:22.695-08:002012-12-10T10:03:22.695-08:00Capt.... sadly what you have found has already met...Capt.... sadly what you have found has already metastasized here in the Ontario workplace..... rule upon rule, and yes provincial regulated workplace feelings directly came up a couple years ago at the yearly "safety" meeting.<br /><br />In a company with fifty or so men that do heavy construction ..... the guys used to question the crap now they just silently put up with it.....it took a gentle PC barrage over ten years but it's taken hold and mom's the word while they are being fed a spoonful of crap .<br /><br />And the kids that have been self esteemed into some form of borderline retardation (you only realize that if you ask them what they think) well... that's a whole other ball of wax but you can see they are pretty well unreachable when it comes to certain realities productive people used to have to deal with, one being growing up and being independent.<br /><br />Maybe it's just me but I thought it used to be a natural progression in a persons life growing up , working for a living, God forbid even getting their hands dirty, working up a sweat, or making a real personal sacrifice for a wage.<br /><br />Now it's college is done where's the money.<br /><br />Not all the twenty somethings think that way, but many do and though they're educated something important and once instinctive seems to be missing, and in my opinion (here in Ontario Canada )we already let progressives take that away.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8358039.post-24720795823295301042012-12-10T09:55:30.790-08:002012-12-10T09:55:30.790-08:00There are, actually, quite sensible and rational r...There are, actually, quite sensible and rational reasons for eschewing the division of labour. However, not a one has anything to do with economics, where Smith's pin factory is both the beginning and end of the argument. The economic benefits are irrefutable.<br /><br />But one might study, for example, Mr. C. Chaplin's "Modern Times" or read some of Macluhan to understand that there are also costs to division of labour. They are both psychic and societal, and they still exist today.<br /><br />Yeoman farmer, c. 1825 (i.e. almost all of us, since about 90% of the world's population worked in agriculture at the time) was farmer and animal husbander, smith and carpenter. His wife was baker and cook, mender of clothes, tender of the sick. They saw each day, each harvest, each cycle, their place in the world; they were, for lack of a better word, "whole". Their day began with the rising of the sun, and it ended with the setting. The only summons they answered to was the church bell on Sunday.<br /><br />Come the mills and machine shops and coal mines of the Industrial Revolution, and much changes for yeoman farmer's son. He now answers to a bell or a whistle, which tells him when to start work, when to stop, when to eat, when to go home. He no longer sees the fullness of a job; he sees only his task. He is no longer connected to the seasons, for the timing and pacing of his work doesn't depend on the weather. As the Captain noted above, I can't claim originality of these thoughts; some group of poets (Wordsworth? Byron? who were those guys) beat me to it. But "Industrial Man", as Macluhan tagged him, was different from the agricultural man who came before. <br /><br />The paradox of division of labour is that it requires so LITTLE of a man, in terms of thought or effort, yet it produces so MUCH MORE than the whole man could on his own. (Smith, again) Any one who has worked for two minutes on a farm knows how much physical effort is involved; there is mental effort as well. Yet, particularly in the early days of the IR, the jobs were designed to be as simple and mind-numbingly repetitive as possible. Little was required of the worker other than eyes, ears, and hands, and not much of those. And that had effects.<br /><br />As an example, one was the increase in drinking. Farmers couldn't afford to get drunk every night, regardless of how much ale they had on hand. The physical stress of the work wouldn't let them. Our new factory worker, however, had both the money to buy drink and freedom from harsh physical labour; he could show up hungover day after day, and so long as he didn't get his fingers caught in the press, keep his job. Note that there were no Temperance Unions in the 1700's. (BTW, I'm not at all against drinking; I'm using this as an example of a societal change.)<br /><br />Macluhan noted that this disaffected Industrial Man was forever searching for some integrating and unifying "role". The reason so many TV shows feature cops, doctors, lawyers, etc. is that those people have <i>roles</i> in our society, which most of us are denied. I've yet to see a top ten show about accountants or plant supervisors. <br /><br />So, while I am grateful for the immense wealth the division of labour has created for all of us, I'm also cognizant of its costs. Western society was great for a few years after WWII because all had found a role - defeat fascism - to live for, and that spirit carried on to the post-war period. But, as the boomers who had never known rationing or privation grew up, that unifying spirit vanished. Combined with the immense splintering of media offered through the generations of telecom advances, we have become more and more a nation (a Western world, actually) of smaller and smaller tribes. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com