I thoroughly enjoyed and benefited from your recent essay, “South Pacific Avenue: A Metaphor for Post-Industrial America,” in the “At Length” section of the Aug. 4-17, 2022, edition of Random Lengths News. I am not a resident of LA/LB Harbor Area, but I have visited it several times and definitely appreciate the rich history of San Pedro and its environs. Using the colorful history of South Pacific Avenue and the erosion of its legacy to ultimately get at the problem of “modernization” and how the mindless installment of automation can harm communities and their workers—in this case, longshore workers, their families, and so forth—was a writing strategy one can admire. Thanks for this one and for highlighting the challenge that “the machine” can present to us all.
Harvey Schwartz, El Cerrito
I found James’ last column (“South Pacific Avenue: A Metaphor for Post-Industrial America,” in the “At Length” section of the Aug. 4-17, 2022,) both informative and sobering. Automation has been around a while. Almost a century ago hundreds of thousands of people, mostly women, worked as manual phone operators. When automation came, proponents assured us that the new technology would create more jobs than the ones that were lost. More recently auto workers have lost a lot of jobs to robotics as well as seeing plants move overseas. In the mid-1990s automation hit radio. Disc jockeys were replaced with tapes that made “one-hit wonders” out of Roy Orbison (Pretty Woman), Van Morrison (Brown-eyed Girl) and—gasp—the Rolling Stones (Satisfaction).Major league baseball has hinted that it would not mind replacing umpires by expanding the technology it already has in place to call balls and strikes. And just a few years ago there was a lot of talk about driverless vehicles. This hasn’t received much media coverage lately but you bet the ranch, this isn’t going away. Automation should be part of the political debate, especially if the technology was developed on taxpayers’ dime, The sooner the better. In fact, somebody should talk about it at the Labor Day Picnic in a few weeks.
Steve Varalyay , Torrance
Throughout my life, my actions have been far reaching, and have hurt many. I have lived a selfish and self-centered life. The damages untold and for me unknown. And for this, I am truly sorry. I live now with God in heart, with an unshakable faith that His son laid his life down for me. To all of you, I apologize.
R.F., San Pedro
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