Morning, y’all! I hope everyone had a wonderful Fourth of July. We celebrated by watching lots of televised sports, eating steak and apple pie and complaining about the metric system.
Let’s get to it.
IF THE ROBOTS ARE COMING FOR US, IT WILL TAKE A WHILE
Credit: (Hyosub Shin/AJC)
Credit: (Hyosub Shin/AJC)
Robots are everywhere at Hyundai’s multibillion-dollar factory near Savannah, which it calls its Metaplant, and they’re doing a fine job. They’re also showing us the limits of what robotics can bring to a factory floor.
- More than 300 robots are involved in the manufacturing of vehicles at the plant. However, Hyundai leaders say the jobs they’re doing are the dirty, boring, dangerous ones, and that their proliferation won’t mean fewer actual jobs for actual people.
- While robots can do some of the heavy lifting, tasks that require fine motor skills, soft parts or a sophisticated sense of touch are human domains.
- That includes arranging seat belts into place and manipulating small fastenings; working with delicate parts like hoses, wires, carpets and trim panels and supervising technology on the floor.
OK, but what about the people whose actual livelihoods depend on employment; who get injured and require food and can’t simply be shut off at the end of a shift?
- Georgia Quick Start, a state-funded workforce development program, operates the Hyundai Mobility Training Center on the Metaplant campus to prepare workers for the high-tech tasks required at the factory.
- Brent Stubbs, the facility’s chief administrative officer, compared the advanced tech to construction equipment, washing machines and other advancements that revolutionized human labor.
- “Nobody drives by and sees tractors and goes, ‘I tell you what I miss, those good old days when human beings were doing that,’” he said.
🔎 READ MORE: The history of robots in auto plants, and how they’ve affected human jobs
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TEACHER WINS SETTLEMENT OVER CHARLIE KIRK POSTS
After far-right commentator Charlie Kirk was shot and killed during a speech in September 2025, several educators across the country lost their jobs and faced legal threats for publicly speaking out against Kirk and his views.
- Months later, some of these educators have been granted legal recompense.
- The Oglethorpe County School District just paid nearly $300,000 to settle a lawsuit with a former Georgia teacher of the year finalist.
- High school English teacher Michelle Mickens posted a pro-gun quote from Kirk on her private social media account. She added that she didn’t “condone violence of any kind” and called Kirk “a horrible person, a fascist full of hate for anyone who was different.”
- “I pray that without him, people can be kinder and more tolerant to one another.”
- Mickens said she was pressured to resign. In her suit, she accused the district of violating her right to free speech.
Mickens’ termination wasn’t an isolated incident. At least two teachers in Cobb County lost their jobs, and an unidentified number were placed on leave after making posts that allegedly “celebrated or condoned” Kirk’s death. An Emory University professor and child cancer researcher faced a similar fate, as did a Delta Air Lines flight attendant.
🔎 READ MORE: What else Mickens’ post said, what the district said in response
GEORGIA LAUNCHES DOMESTIC VIOLENCE PROTECTION PROGRAM
Credit: Jenni Girtman/AJC
Credit: Jenni Girtman/AJC
Georgia has launched a new program to protect survivors of family and domestic violence by shielding their addresses from abusers.
- Participants in Georgia’s “Safe at Home Program” will be given an alternate address that can be used in place of their residential address on many state and local government records.
- The law passed in 2024 with strong bipartisan support, and the program went into effect last week.
- Many states have similar confidentiality programs, or programs in development.
🔎 READ MORE: Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger talks about the program
MUST-KNOW POLITICS AND BUSINESS
🗳️The FBI shored up about 260 staffers from various field offices to work on its investigation of the 2020 election in Fulton County. In a memo describing the push, the agency described it as a “priority investigation.” Staffers were instructed to review more than 700 records each by July 17.
🧊 ICE arrested 10,000 people over a five-day period at the end of June. The figures reflect the agency’s shift from high-profile immigration sweeps to quieter, more insidious ways to fulfill the Trump administration’s deportation agenda.
🏢 Centurion Foundation, an Atlanta-based nonprofit, purchased the aging Northlake Mall in Tucker. The deal paves the way for Emory Healthcare, its major healthcare tenant, to begin a huge expansion.
IT’S A BIRD! ON A PLANE! IT’S …
Credit: (Estela Muñoz/AJC)
Credit: (Estela Muñoz/AJC)
Passengers on a July 4 Delta flight from Atlanta to Philadelphia got an eyeful (and several earfuls) of Independence, or Indy, a bald eagle from the Auburn University Raptor Center headed to Philly for 250th anniversary festivities at Independence Hall.
- And yes, even Indy needed to endure the minor injustices of a TSA security check.
- Indy’s also an experienced commercial flyer.
- “She’s racked up those SkyMiles,” said trainer Amanda Sweeney, which is a hilarious thing to say on several levels.
🦅 READ MORE: The many logistics of flying with a noble bird of prey
NEWS BITES
E-bikes are exploding in popularity, but they are not toys
The not-a-toy truth makes itself abundantly clear the second you’re on one of these suckers, that’s for sure.
Runners showcased their fashion sense at the 57th Peachtree Road Race
Full 16th-century getups with wigs and buff breeches? Check. Alarmingly tiny American flag swim briefs? Also check.
You’ve never hated anything as much as Neil hates traffic cones.
Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce got married at Madison Square Garden
Not what usually comes to mind for a “garden wedding” but mazel tov nonetheless.
ON THIS DATE
July 6, 1955
Credit: AJC
Credit: AJC
Russians not happy, Anderson finds. What most impressed Paul Anderson, a typical Georgia boy from a typical Georgia town, on his trip to Russia? The people. “They didn’t show much emotion,” he said. “They didn’t seem to be too happy even at the opera.” Weightlifter Paul — only a “shadow” of his former self at 320 pounds — made that observation in an interview after he arrived at his home here Tuesday night.
Not even happy at the opera?! That Slavic stoicism is strong.
Despite the hardiness of our local stock, Anderson wasn’t just a “typical Georgia boy,” either. He once claimed the title of World’s Strongest Man, and a great statue of him graces his hometown of Toccoa.
ONE MORE THING
Reading about the limits of robotic labor made me think about our incredible human sense of touch. (In fact, reading about computers doing human things always makes me appreciate our inherent skills, our capacity for chaos, connection, memory, humor, passion and synthesis that will never be replicated despite the self-interested assertions of a wealthy few.)
One study from 2013 showed humans can distinguish texture differences as small as 13 nanometers.
As one researcher put it, “(I)f your finger was the size of the Earth, you could feel the difference between houses from cars.”
Our brains also have multiple wirings for different types of touch: pressing, squeezing, dragging, vibration and so on.
Take that, robots.
Thanks for reading to the very bottom of A.M. ATL. Questions, comments, ideas? Contact us at AMATL@ajc.com.
Until next time.
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