(In advance, I apologize to my friend Don Luskin for shamelessly using
his writing style. You'll see.)
"Moron liberal" seems awfully redundant. In any case, last night
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll e-mailed me a bit of an accusation that I'm unable to respond to his previous e-mail. Click
here to see the full history of how I've been verbally abusing him. As I always say,
liberals deserve no mercy, on here as well as
other blogs.
Despite Tutton's paranoia mixed with delusions of grandeur, I simply haven't had the chance to get around to his e-mail. I've bought a couple of new computers, not to mention booking plane tickets and finalizing other itineraries for an upcoming tropical vacation with a beautiful woman. So
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll had better think otherwise if he thinks he's a priority to me.
Subject: Sifflez tandis que vous travaillez!
I thought you were going to post my e-mail (a couple of weeks ago)? But it's OK; I'm sure every one of your 10 readers has figured out that it must have answered your uninformed insults in a manner too embarassing for your ego to bear, n'est-ce pas vrai?
Can't you whistle?
Considering
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll can't spell, he'd better cease trying to speak English. The subject, roughly translated, is "Whistle while you work." Before he fancied himself a German speaker, and now he thinks he can speak French. Who'd like to bet that he used Babelfish or the like, or maybe asked a friend? After all, as they say,
hic puer est stultissimus omnium.As a matter of fact, as I'm writing this paragraph, I still haven't read the e-mail to which he refers. Let's get to that now:
Since you call yourself "Der Eidelblogger", I assumed that you were a "wannabe Kraut", hence the sarcastic German comments.
This is the problem with moron liberals like Tutton. Their first error is to
assume.
If you called yourself "Le Eidelbloggeur", I would have used sarcastic French.
A lingual absurdity, since my last name
is German. Besides, I'd have shot myself before calling myself that. This blog has never refrained from France-bashing when possible.
Then again, absurdity is the norm from the liberal mind, especially from the mind of
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll.
Whatever the language, if you cannot see the difference between selling apples on the street corner and working in the mines, I am afraid you are hopeless. Saying "I make no value judgement" is the same as saying "It's OK by me".
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll still doesn't understand the point. Will he ever understand that some societies are simply too poor for adults alone to feed the population, or is he too dulled by his 20th/21st century comfort?
Does
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll have such a problem with the English language that he didn't see how my father had a very real risk of starvation? My father missed meals more than once, because selling apples (and
his mother's bathtub gin) went only so far. When he was old enough to work at a store, he labored every hour he could, for every dime he could earn. Now, if he had found an opportunity to work in a dangerous factory at the mere age of 11 years,
you're damn right he'd have taken it. Those were desperate times, when a relatively rich nation found many of its people reduced to what we today would call Third World living -- a day-to-day struggle for the basic need of food, let alone shelter.
The liberals always like to say that they are personally against abortion, but they don't want to force their opinion on anyone.
No, that's not even a smidgen true. There are plenty of liberals who believe in the necessity of strict family planning, because they hold to this myth of planetary overpopulation. "Freedom of choice" is only their cover story, because such freedom never applies to your wallet, your house or with whom you transact commerce.
If everyone thought like that, slavery would still be legal in the US, and children would still be pulling carts in the tunnels.
Only a moron like
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll could mix a complete non-sequitur with absurd comparisons. The difference between slavery and child labor is simply that they
are different: slavery is involuntary servitude, but child labor
is voluntary, like it or not.
And for his information,
slavery persisted in the United States because the federal government sanctioned it,
ever since the Constitution was drafted in 1787. Let him mull that over a bit.
I pointed out,
And I'd like Tutton to point out anytime that children were doing such things. The sheer logic escapes him: a cart won't fit much at all if it must fit in a tunnel smaller than a grown man. A mine owner wasn't going to hire children when he needed the strength of grown men.
Well,
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll said,
I am happy now to point you to just a small portion of the massive amounts of documentation a person can find, if he cares to look.
And, yes, as I am sure you will note, Engels is quoted below. If the Brits and Americans had not addressed the most egregious forms of labor exploitation, the Communists would have taken over, but luckily good people saw the worst injustices and remedied them.
Good lord, for all the times that
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll claims he's not a liberal, he sounds like a Marxist. Just listen to him say it: "labor exploitation."
And he points to
this, written by some liberal professor by the name of David Cody. The thing is, Cody hardly qualifies as an authority to cite, because he isn't a historian! He's a professor, but actually only an
associate professor of
American literature at Hartwick, a tiny liberal arts school in upstate New York.
So as the claptrap on this site goes:
That the shameful practice of child labor should have played an important role in the Industrial Revolution from its outset is not to be wondered at. The displaced working classes, from the seventeenth century on, took it for granted that a family would not be able to support itself if the children were not employed.
Prior to the Industrial Revolution, entire families toiled in the fields and woods, risking starvation if they couldn't produce enough. Is "Dr." Cody (who is not a trained economic historian) really as much of a moron as
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll to think that the pre-industrial, agrarian West allowed children to play happily?
When they were in elementary school, my sister and her friends wrote some ridiculous tune about "little pioneer children" singing happy songs. "Pioneer children," living with their families in mainly in pre-industrial conditions, had to labor as soon as they could walk. School was unheard-of, because young children were needed to help milk cows, pull crops, draw water, gather wood, etc.
On the other hand, what industrialization does for economies is that it stabilizes output, allowing people to produce excesses that they can save and reinvest into ever-advancing technology. The reality is that at first, children will still have to work as economic forces adjust. They have to work,
just like they did before, until the economy becomes progressively wealthy: eventually only teenagers and adults will have to work, and eventually they'll need to work fewer and fewer hours to support their families. As I've pointed out,
this kind of productivity increase is thanks to technology, not because government decided we shouldn't work more than 40 hours a week. Government can legislate and regulate all it wants, but it has no power to help people produce the same amount in less time. I would presume
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll has heard of the term "blood from a turnip."
In Defoe's day he thought it admirable that in the vicinity of Halifax scarcely anybody above the age of 4 was idle.
This is a logical fallacy called "appeal to authority." Just because Daniel Defoe wrote books doesn't make him a great economist. Now, we're assuming that "Dr." Cody (who is not a trained economic historian) is telling the truth here, but if that's what Defoe really believed, he sounds more Keynesian than anything.
The children of the poor were forced by economic conditions to work, as Dickens, with his family in debtor's prison, worked at age 12 in the Blacking Factory.
The stupidity of "Dr." Cody's argument is that it ignores the reality that the poor in non-industrialized societies are, imagine that, also "forced by economic conditions to work."
In 1840 perhaps only twenty percent of the children of London had any schooling, a number which had risen by 1860, when perhaps half of the children between 5 and 15 were in some sort of school, if only a day school (of the sort in which Dickens's Pip finds himself in Great Expectations) or a Sunday school; the others were working.
Again, the stupidity of "Dr." Cody (who is not a trained economic historian) is that he ignores the reality that
hardly any children in pre-industrialized societies could go to any school at all. Twenty percent was unheard-of, because children were needed to work lest the families starve.
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll just can't understand that last part, that in poor economies, if the parents alone work, the entire family won't have enough to eat.
Many of the more fortunate found employment as apprentices to respectable trades (in the building trade workers put in 64 hours a week in summer and 52 in winter) or as general servants — there were over 120,000 domestic servants in London alone at mid-century, who worked 80 hour weeks for one halfpence per hour — but many more were not so lucky.
"Dr." Cody (who is not a trained economic historian) would rather have them working in the countryside, hoping to scrape together a few potatoes and a small chance of a goose at Christmastime? Instead of 64 hours per week, he thinks it's a better life that they toil 80+ in the fields, starting before dark?
While 120,000 domestic servants sounds like a lot, London did have a population of over
two-and-a-half million by 1850. These were also steady jobs where, though they may not have lived in luxury, guaranteed housing and food for the servants, as opposed to the real risk of starvation in the countryside.
Most prostitutes (and there were thousands in London alone) were between 15 and 22 years of age.
This is no different than non-industrialized societies. What does "Dr." Cody (who is not a trained economic historian) expect, that prostitutes would be elderly spinsters?
Many children worked 16 hour days under atrocious conditions, as their elders did. Ineffective parliamentary acts to regulate the work of workhouse children in factories and cotton mills to 12 hours per day had been passed as early as 1802 and 1819.
Atrocious conditions? Of course, because they were
factories. Conditions weren't made intentionally bad, they simply
were because of the nature of the work. What does "Dr." Cody (who is not a trained economic historian) expect, gilded machinery, marble floors, and beluga with Bollinger Grand Année?
The problem with liberals is that they ascribe malicious intentions to everything about the free market. The real reason the laws were ineffective isn't because the employers were evil and forced children to work long hours, but because the families
needed the children to work. "Dr." Cody is not a trained economic historian, nor is
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll (obviously!), but you shouldn't have to be one to understand the simple reality that when a child brings home 75% of a paycheck and the family needed 100%, the family will starve if they don't break the law.
...(children as young as 3 had been put to work previously).
Now think about it: at age 3, what can a child really do? With what strength? Again, it's this stupidity that
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll demonstrated before, claiming that young children were used to haul coal through tunnels too small for grown men. Hauling what, a few coals at a time? Business owners and managers aren't stupid: they know what's profitable, and a tiny tunnel would never yield enough profit to break even. Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll said I was wrong but offered a non-sequitur as his "proof": the reality still remains that when it comes to physical labor, one strong adult can do far more output over time than several small children.
This act applied only to the textile industry, where children were put to work at the age of 5, and not to a host of other industries and occupations.
Who, besides
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll, is idiotic enough to think that a 5-year-old should go to school and be more of a burden on his starving family, rather than pulling a few levers to help feed them? Pulling levers and low-torque crankwheels is about such a young kid can do, though Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll and "Dr." Cody (who is not a trained economic historian) would have you think they were pushing huge carts and hauling large bales of cloth.
Iron and coal mines (where children, again, both boys and girls, began work at age 5, and generally died before they were 25)
Someone who is 25 years old is not a child, so it's a ludicrous implication that children were being sent to death sentences. The fact is that mines have always been dangerous work, but people have
voluntarily done it to feed their families. Even today with all our safety equipment, we have miners who die in accidents when young.
...gas works, shipyards, construction, match factories, nail factories, and the business of chimney sweeping, for example (which Blake would use as an emblem of the destruction of the innocent), where the exploitation of child labor was more extensive, was to be enforced in all of England by a total of four inspectors. After further radical agitation, another act in 1847 limited both adults and children to ten hours of work daily.
There we go again, "exploitation." Who was being exploited? Families needed their children to work, bottom line.
Next,
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll pointed to an excerpt of
The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844. Here's how he quoted it to me in e-mail:
The transport of coal and iron-stone, on the other hand, is very hard labour, the stuff being shoved in large tubs
, without wheels, over the uneven floor of the mine; often over moist clay, or through water, and frequently up steep inclines and through paths so low-roofed that the workers are forced to creep on hands and knees. For this more wearing labour, therefore, older children and half-grown girls are employed. One man or two boys per tub are employed, according to circumstances; and, if two boys, one pushes and the other pulls. The loosening of the ore or coal, which is done by men or strong youths of sixteen years or more, is also very weary work. The usual working-day is eleven to twelve hours, often longer; in Scotland i t reaches fourteen hours, and double time is frequent, when all the employees are at work below ground twenty-four, and even thirty -six hours at a stretch. Set times for meals are almost unknown, so that these people eat when hunger and time permit.
Like other liberals, he resorted to the trick of selective quoting. His other mistake is to cite Engels' propaganda at all.
Now,
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll claimed previously that "Little children pulling carts through tunnels that grown men cannot fit through," but Engels himself said that the youngest children were manipulating doors for those doing the actual heavy work. Moreover, Engels contradicted himself in the same breath: "For this more wearing labour, therefore, older children and half-grown girls are employed. One man or two boys per tub are employed, according to circumstances; and, if two boys, one pushes and the other pulls." So which is it?
Note that even Engels admitted, "The standard of living of the miners is in general described as fairly good and their wages high in comparison with those of the agricultural labourers surrounding them (who, however, live at starvation rates), except in certain parts of Scotland and in the Irish mines, where great misery prevails." Nice, let
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll go right on proving my points for me! The point is that people will do what they must to survive.
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll further blathered:
The 1842 Mines Act
No female was to be employed underground
No boy under 10 years old was to be employed underground.
Parish apprentices between the ages of 10 and 18 could continue to work in the mines.
There were no clauses relating to hours of work, and inspection could only take place on the basis of checking the 'condition of the workers'. Ironically, many women were annoyed that they could no longer earn the much needed money.
Exactly -- people were voluntarily working the hard, long hours, but the law forbade them. And God help a family if they happened to have all daughters, or a few sons early on when the husband and wife could barely support themselves.
So there we go.
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll proves he's as much of an economic and historical ignoramus as ever. At least he's also stopped claiming he's
not a liberal, since his defense of government intervention has left no doubt that "nationalist" was merely a mask.
And by the way,
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll can leave comments here to continue the discussion. (Note I don't address him directly, as he's that much beneath us.) His e-mail address is now going into my spam filter, as I get too much e-mail already, and I have no more time to waste on him. I have one e-mail account with over 1000 unread messages, and another with over 1500 unread messages. I'm just really busy these days and don't have the time to answer all the messages I get, although
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll should feel honored that I deigned to pick on him so ruthlessly. I haven't really ripped on liberals in a long time, so this was more for the fun of it, and presenting real economic history, and not because I think
Tutton our liberal "But I'm not a liberal!" troll is worth the time to refute.
He can deride me for not having a lot of blog readers, but as anyone with a single working synapse can deduce, my low readership is because I no longer blog that often. Furthermore, let's see him show the stats of his own blog. Oh, that's right,
he doesn't have one.
Labels: Liberal idiots
