Great post about the writer's strike at the Bellman.
I followed the link from there to Strikeadeal where there is more from the "below-the-line" perspective. From what I can gather, it is the duty of writers to write. It is wrong of them to stop performing this function, as it can have a negative impact on the lives of others. Apparently, if a strike situation begins to affect your life, you should automatically blame the workers for intransigence, not the corporation.
This is, of course, a common feature of the national conversation about labor, unions, and strikes in this country. I am sure the sociologists can explain it, but I have always found it amazing that the default position in people's minds always seems to be that it is the workers who are to blame during a strike. Even more amazing to me are the people who "support" a strike right up to the moment when it affects them, then their support disappears and we hear about those lazy workers. Rich, lazy workers whose jobs aren't all that hard anyway.
This is one of those things where I am just unable to imagine the mindset that causes one to think that somehow someone else is obligated to labor so that your life is better. That people should somehow be forced to labor so that the structure of our capitalist society is not damaged. That somehow it is only natural and right that those at the top of the economic pyramid should continue to reap all the rewards of everyone's labor. I don't understand it.
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apparently many WGA writers asked if they could come out to the Strike a Deal event this weekend to show support for the below-the-line folks who are being negatively impacted by the strike and they were told to stay away because they would not be welcome! that's some fucked up shit.
by the way, did you see that today is "Trek Day" on the picket line? someone needs to remind the Strike a Deal folks of the wise words of Mr. Spock: "Logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few."
("the few" in this case being the media corporations, not the writers, dammit!)
I was wondering.
What really chaps me is that the demonstration seems to be a fully funded subsidiary of IATSE. And no, I don't believe their protestations that it's a grass roots movement that arose independently of the union.
And here's something that I just now heard. Apparently, the reason the WGA walked away from the table was that management was refusing to negotiate on anything until the WGA agreed to a no-strike clause that would have kept the WGA from respecting the picket lines of other unions.
Pah.
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