Jobs Agonista

When Mike Daisey originally presented the monologue The Agony and The Ecstasy of Steve Jobs in 2010, the immediate controversy was not about the content but the integrity of the author. This is bullshit. Sophisticated analysis, if it ignores the savage abuse of workers to deconstruct the detail of the way that the issues it describes are presented, becomes yet another weapon to defend injustice. The bottom line – that first world users of technology to think a little harder about the manufacturing process - is simple and to complain that Daisey conflated stories of specific workers for dramatic effect is to find an excuse for human rights violations.

On the other hand, writing a review that praises Grant O’Rourke’s performance or Marcus Roche for his direction is hiding serious political matters beneath aesthetic preoccupations. The behaviour of the owners of the factories that produce our computers, our phones, our blenders, is inhumane. The Agony is valuable in so far as it exposes this conduct, not how O’Rourke holds his American accent for over an hour.

For the record, O’Rourke and Roche do a great job.

 Daisey’s monologue follows both the career of Apple “genius asshole” Steve Jobs and the journalist’s visit to the Chinese factories that make his computers. From the description of a suicide epidemic in one factory, through to the meetings with workers destroyed by long hours and repetitive work, Daisey pictures a living hell of relentless exploitation.

For the record, these meetings have been criticised for being impressionistic rather than literal fact, and Daisey conflated several meetings into single encounters.

Admittedly, the discussion of Job’s career is unflattering and may not necessarily relate to the cruelties in the factories. He comes across as ruthless but, as Daisey acknowledges, his failure to address the issue might be a case of simply seeing what he wants to see, rather than maliciousness.

But the life of a worker making a computer is horrifying. Daisey observes that people in their twenties experience debilitating physical injury through the repetition of their work. They sleep fifteen to a tiny room, and can end up on sixteen-hour shifts.

For the record, I am writing this on a computer that was made in these factories.

Having revealed the horror, Daisey recognises the complicity of the users in this abuse of workers. He encourages a more thoughtful approach to consumer electronics. The programme also suggests writing to Apple about it. The Agony is a cry for a response, an awareness of how the technological paradise of Scotland is resting heavily on the shoulders of the poor.

For the record, this is a first draft: more responses will follow.