The magnificence of the Ambursons began in 1873. Their splendor lasted throughout all the years that saw their Midland town spread and darken into a city.

A foundational aspect of any kind of progress is that it's irreversible. If you invent a new technology, it's not just that you have this new thing.

It's that it becomes a kind of regime that, you know, is completely inescapable and that has, you know, an existence almost independent from our kind of will to use it or control it.

And that's something that really comes through in this movie during the dinner conversation scene that you're talking about.

One of the things Eugene is

saying is that eventually they're going to have to widen the roads because people are going to be

using these cars. And then I think it's the old major, Amberson is talking about how, well,

that's going to reduce property values downtown because people will be able to live, you know,

outside of the, you know,

the center of town, et cetera, et cetera. And in a very non-didactic way, that's Wells getting in a

very similar point to the one that George Grant kind of spent his whole life and career writing

about, which is the idea that, uh, once something like this comes along, once it disrupts

the rhythms of life,

certain things have such a pull that eventually you have to structure everything around them.

The car is a really good example of that.

The entire way that cities worked, where certain kinds of businesses and industries were concentrated,

where people lived in relation to other people, all of that changed.

And the car was a really, really big reason

for that. And the picture itself destroyed me. I was, I didn't get a job as director for years

afterwards. Anyway, I think we're passed overdue to get to the meat of today's episode, which is to get

into part one of our 15-part series discussing cancel culture.

Well, I know you have many thoughts in this. No, I'm just kidding. We have a movie to talk about,

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