DNYUZ: On a brisk recent Sunday, a band of teenagers met on the steps of Central Library on Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn to start the weekly meeting of the Luddite Club, a high school group that promotes a lifestyle of self-liberation from social media and technology. As the dozen teens headed into Prospect Park, they hid away their iPhones — or, in the case of the most devout members, their flip phones, which some had decorated with stickers and nail polish.
They marched up a hill toward their usual spot, a dirt mound located far from the park’s crowds. Among them was Odille Zexter-Kaiser, a senior at Edward R. Murrow High School in Midwood, who trudged through leaves in Doc Martens and mismatched wool socks.
“It’s a little frowned on if someone doesn’t show up,” Odille said. “We’re here every Sunday, rain or shine, even snow. We don’t keep in touch with each other, so you have to show up.”
After the club members gathered logs to form a circle, they sat and withdrew into a bubble of serenity.
Some drew in sketchbooks. Others painted with a watercolor kit. One of them closed their eyes to listen to the wind. Many read intently — the books in their satchels included Dostoevsky’s “Crime and Punishment,” Art Spiegelman’s “Maus II” and “The Consolation of Philosophy” by Boethius. The club members cite libertine writers like Hunter S. Thompson and Jack Kerouac as heroes, and they have a fondness forworks condemning technology, like “Player Piano” by Kurt Vonnegut. Arthur, the bespectacled PBS aardvark, is their mascot.
“Lots of us have read this book called ‘Into the Wild,’” said Lola Shub, a senior at Essex Street Academy, referring to Jon Krakauer’s 1996 nonfiction book about the nomad Chris McCandless, who died while trying to live off the land in the Alaskan wilderness. “We’ve all got this theory that we’re not just meant to be confined to buildings and work. And that guy was experiencing life. Real life. Social media and phones are not real life.” MORE.
h/t illustr8r
That’s one way not to get robbed in Brooklyn.
Technology is a tool. Any tool can be used for good or evil. A screwdriver can build a circuit or stab a kidney. A hammer can drive a nail into a gallows, or hit Paul Pelosi in the head in the hands of his disturbed gay rape victim. A gun can kill a pregnant woman or stop the rape that made her pregnant.
The tool is irrelevant, the hand and mind that wield it are what can make it evil.
Everything these modern ‘luddites’ wear, use, read, or eat is the product of technology, from the surfactants that may have opened their newborn lungs to life to the bed they lie in to take their last breath.
Don’t hate the sinner, hate the sin.
And don’t hate the phone, hate the people in government that use it to enslave you.
Your anger and mistrust are misdirected.
See Washington, DC for further details.
They are not missing anything.
I’m surprised that they even know what Luddites are! Do they also know who John Galt is or John the barbarian from Brave New World? And have they read Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury?
Good for them. I hope they can carry that spirit and ethos beyond high school, and that it spreads.
But It took me awhile before I was sure that wasn’t the Babylon Bee.
SNS answered the “Riddle of Steel” quite well.
I’ll give them extra credit for reading Crime And Punishment by Dostoevsky and Kurt Vonnegut. Harrison Bergeron short story by Vonnegut should also be on their reading list.
“Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.”
-Frank Herbert, “Dune”
Might I also suggest they read The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce, That Hideous Strength by CS Lewis, the essays of GK Chesterton, Mark Twain, the short story A Good Man Is Hard To Find by Flannery O’Connor etc. And above all read, read and and reread if necessary, all the good books that you can find and turn off the idiot box and other electronic distractions and stay the hell off of social media. Write in cursive, write old fashioned snail mail letters to family and friends and think for yourselves and don’t believe all the lies and malarkey the lamestream media tells you is the truth.
Every generation does this.
And every generation gets conned all over again.
General Malaise DECEMBER 17, 2022 AT 9:42 AM
“Every generation does this.
And every generation gets conned all over again.”
…that’s why the Communists hate the 5th Commandment so much, and why they do everything they can to degrade parents and cut them out of children’s lives, so the devil they serve can use his same old tricks against a new unlearned generation…
But they all had phones.
I was encouraged as I read, but somewhat deflated when I got to the part where their school ‘counselor’ brought up Che as a role model to inspire their struggle.
They remind me of the homeschooled kids I know. I hope it sticks.
Unfortunately, they also remind me of the kids I hung out with in high school. We eschewed disco, read Vonnegut, spent Saturdays at the museums and galleries in the city, and promised each other we’d never end up in the burbs with office jobs. A lot of them did though, taking government office jobs even, or government subsidized nonprofit jobs.
I have never regretted opting out to life in a small town and a small business, where we use phones and tech sparingly, pay by cash or check, and still prefer books, live music, or a crackling fire for our entertainment.
Kudos to these kids for recognizing the damage a virtual life can do to the real one; I hope some of them opt for small colleges or no college and get out of New York for a while.
It’s a start. Simply the recognition that too often we turn inanimate objects into idols and worship them with our time, energy, spirit and emotion.
I thought it was interesting that the Luddite Club founder talked to her school counselor who told her that Che Guavera was an fine example of a revolutionary.
OMG! You have no idea how wonderful wonderful it was to read this.. As I am a 100% Luddite. Although I have a computer I do not have a cell phone, and would not know how to even turn one on…..As “I have nothing to say, Nothing that demands I communicate that instant.
I await no call, text, or email that Couldn’t be served as well with a stamp and a complete sentence, both of which Seem destined for histories dustbin”
Hanoverfist
DECEMBER 17, 2022 AT 8:59 AM
“SNS answered the “Riddle of Steel” quite well.”
Thank you.
I also know the answer to “WHAT IS BEST IN LIFE”.
I don’t believe them. Their peers will see to it that they engage one way or another with technology. Those hypocrites are under their covers at night texting and watching TikTok – because their peers are too. As much as I hate the cell phone, it’s a handy tool – just like a hard wired phone is. I like computers as well. They’ll bend, we all had to.