Armed protestors in a state house.
Big hog farms euthanizing hogs to keep from feeding them
Milk being poured out on the ground.
Chicken plants closing for lack of social distancing.
My Governor opening the state, too soon.
Now striking dept.store workers.
The whole world is going bonkers.
The world has been bonkers for forever. The rona is just scraping the frosting off the shit cake.
yes the poster’s a obnoxious twit reminds me of oklarhoma or whatever his name was except he’s apparently left-leaning
except for the last two lines its 1930-3 all over again …
As for the discussion of labor unions, you have to remember about 50- 70 percent of union gains were achieved in the great depression … in fact i just read a history.com thing on the first effective sit down strike
No. Fuck You.
This is why we can never have a nice revolution.
I’m not down with the OP’s phrasing, but for real: warehouse workers are running into really unsafe working conditions, and today’s strike is a desperate effort to pressure their employers to put some protections in place. It’s worth supporting those workers, and honoring a one-day strike is a very small but nonzero action in support of their efforts.
Most 'scabs’are trying to earn a living to support themselves/their families …
Remember, Casey Jones was murdered by strikers and organizers for going to work at his normal job to support his family. [Songwise, was there a real Casey Jones? I know offhand 2 versions of the story one union organizer and one where he was just trying to get over the mountains between Reno and California and wiped out because he was going too fast] Personally, while I sympathize with people wanting to force their employers [or employers in general] to provide better wages or improved working conditions, some people just want to keep their heads down and get on with their job and well, murder is murder …
[ex union member, as a matter of fact.]
I’m in full support of them this May 1st, and I’ve never belonged to a union. I would like to, but that’s just how the cards fell for me. Anyway, there are only two grocery stores in my area, so I’ll try to avoid ones that have strikers. Unions exist for a reason, workers. Look at Trump ordering meat processors back to work. If the comp’ny makes life unnecessarily dangerous for the employees, fuck the comp’ny, and the generally wealthy folks who are responsible for the conditions. No one should get paid shittily for risking their life. No one should be subject to unnecessary risks when safety measures are available.
THis ^
It’s about the balance of power, which has tipped a little too far in the direction of oligarchs the past few decades.
Now imagine this as the basis for an OP instead of the one we got.
Time says there was, and a Mrs. Casey Jones as well.
I’m somewhat skeptical of the claims about Amazon being unsafe, based on what relatives who work there are telling me. (And honestly, just a lot of the bs I see about them in general, having worked there myself)
What they’ve done locally is put up dividers at all work stations to eliminate contact between employees, canceled all meeting, changed start times to prevent crowding at the start and end of shift, require masks on everyone, expanded the break rooms so people can’t sit together, do temperature checks on everyone entering the building, and until today, if you were still nervous about getting sick, you could choose to miss work with no penalty. It’s considerably more than what we’re doing at my job (face masks, sanitizer, social distancing is monitored).
What a lot of people seem to want instead is for them to close the facility as Toyota (the other big local employer) did, which would let them qualify for unemployment benefits while staying home.
And, while I understand that, I can’t see how that could work. Those companies are basically what are allowing the lockdown to even happen. People can buy stuff from those places, even as smaller places have to shut down.
A company like Toyota which makes vehicles is not as important in the day-to-day aspects, and can more easily stop. It’s why I’m happy my dad (61 with asthma, hence at risk) was working at a place like that (manufacturing parts, technically) rather than where he used to work–the local grocery supplier. His company shut down even without a direct order from the state.
Now, if we can come up with a solution that keeps things running but allows these people to be safer, I’m all for it. I agree that these people shouldn’t be the ones who have to shoulder all the risk. But I can’t see how a full shutdown is a workable option.
Recognizing that “union-busting” is a term that has been used to describe just about any activity by an employer, legal or illegal that could be viewed as discouraging formation of a union by its employees, the case for thus labeling Trader Joe’s seems pretty weak. Informing employees through a letter or otherwise that unionization is not in their best interest? The horror.
Now that if true is union-busting.
I pledge to not enter any business where union picketers are shouting “Possum by”*
*in memory of the great Nathan’s Famous strike of '69.
How did you post this in post 9 when it’s a response to post 17?
Can we get another thing straight? “Cross a picket line” means to go work in the establishment, not patronize it. It’s like you’re wrong twice, which cancel each other out. Yes, if you cross a picket line, you’re a scab. If you are a customer, though, you are neither crossing a picket line nor a scab.
As someone mentioned above, union organizers tend to be their own worst enemy. When I worked at Amazon there were murmurs about unionizing, but all the rhetoric was basically how 1) we could gouge them for more money because Jeff Bezos had “too much” and 2) a union would make them stop drug testing or breathalyzing people that reeked of weed or beer returning from lunch. :smack:
Amazon has had to shut warehouses down because of the spread of COVID. They’ve refused to do so until workers protested. They’re not leading on this, they’re following worker, and consumer, pressure.
I don’t know whether what they’re doing now is adequate, but given the choice of believing the workers, and believing Amazon’s PR machine, I’m gonna err on the side of the workers.
Your theory that they’re just lazy assholes looking for paid time off? Not buying it.
That article called it “the latest” in a series of anti-union actions, linking to this NYTimes article, in which mandatory anti-union meetings and trying to get employees to rat out organizers is described:
IME, in practice in modern union lingo, “scab” and “crossing the picket line” have grown to include patronizing a business under strike. People are, by and large, perfectly aware of the traditional/technical/dictionary meaning and if the distinction becomes very important to a discussion they’ll make it clear, but especially in calls to action for solidarity people use “scab” and “cross the picket line” in a looser sense for two reasons:
But “tantamount to being a scab” or “tantamount to crossing the picket line” is a mouthful so it just gets shortened to “scab” and “crossing the picket line.”
Also seriously how hard is it to not buy shit online for one day.
The real Casey Jones was not murdered. He died in a railway accident. A freight train hauling corn was stopped on the tracks where it wasn’t supposed to be. Casey told his assistant to jump to safety before the crash and laid on the brake to minimize danger to others around. His engine ran off the tracks when it crashed into the corn car and he got killed. He was the only fatality. There was no strike on. It was an accident. Casey Jones heroically sacrificed his life to try to protect others.
Song lyrics say all kinds of untrue crap about him, including something about cocaine! He didn’t use cocaine either.