|
In the 1930s, silent films were being replaced by "talkies," and musicians who played in movie theaters across the country were losing work. So their union launched a smear campaign. It took out ads calling the music "canned" and urged people to insist on the live variety. "It's not clear anyone took it seriously," says Amy Bix, a historian at Iowa State University. In the 1930s, a Mississippi newspaper angry over a mechanized cotton picker, suggested readers drown it. "It should be driven right out of the cotton fields and sunk into the Mississippi River, together with its plans and specifications," the editors opined. One time there was violence was in 1975 at The Washington Post. Striking pressmen smashed six presses, beat a foreman and lit a fire. If workers have generally turned docile toward technology, perhaps it is because they know how much it has improved their lives. "The daily life in 1800 was not that different than in the time of Julius Caesar
-- in clothes, in diet, in life expectancy," says Mokyr of Northwestern. But now "nearly every aspect of life has changed. People are taller, richer and better fed." And a little less angry.
[Associated
Press;
Copyright 2013 The Associated
Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
News | Sports | Business | Rural Review | Teaching & Learning | Home and Family | Tourism | Obituaries
Community |
Perspectives
|
Law & Courts |
Leisure Time
|
Spiritual Life |
Health & Fitness |
Teen Scene
Calendar
|
Letters to the Editor