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| TheMarquise |
Edited Fri 19 Mar 10, 8:37 PM by TheMarquise
| 19 Mar 10, 8:44 PM X_Gordon_X UK, 3 yrs  |
I totally agree. I was active in the miners strike and the difference between reality and what the media portrayed was astounding, though not surprising as the tv cameras were always behind the police lines and never behind the picket lines. |
| 19 Mar 10, 8:51 PM Scorchio 7 yrs |
I agree! And it strikes me as more than a little odd that the same media that reports how times are hard, with people finding it difficult to make ends meet, then lambast workers for striving to attain the best deal possible for themselves. |
| 19 Mar 10, 9:50 PM gingerbread UK(TW), 3 yrs |
Here, people seem to strike everyday in different sectors. Last week nibblets nursery went on strike for one day, no idea why. Cant say how its all portrayed in the media though as I dont watch tv or anything. Language problems as ever. (RAH)² (AH)³ + RO (MA + MAMA) + (GA)² + OOH(LA)² = Bad Romance |
| 19 Mar 10, 9:59 PM CookieMonster UK, 6 yrs |
What I find odd is that employers power is underpinned by a ready supply of cheap foreign/alternative labour, something the Labour party and by exstention there paymasters the unions support. Weve already seen it in the refineries. I would like to see the brothers square that circle before i start taking their bleating about pay and conditions seriously. |
| 19 Mar 10, 11:19 PM condemned UK(M), 11 yrs  |
I was involved in a strike for 16 months.You don't realise just quite what you are up against until you are in it. If you play it by the rules and there is no violence,the media lose interest and you get no coverage.Fight,do some damage and you are crazy militants.Damned if you do,damned if you don't. Then there are the scabs.A strike brings out the best and worse in people but by heck you find out who you can trust and who you can't! Worse still are the opportunist scabs.Fed a diet of how great these jobs are they are then used as scab labour to break the strike.Many leave fairly quickly as the supposed 'Easy job with loads of cash'soon proves to be harder than they thought. Nobody takes a decision to strike easily.Everyone has bills to pay and when on strike you lose money. People laugh and scoff at unions.But any conditions and rights they have now were often hard fought over,sometimes with blood and lives,by union members.If the ruling classes had there way we would still be in the bloody workehouse and kids would be up the equivalent of todays chimneys.Oh i forgot....they are.In the sweatshops of the far East,where suprisingly unions don't prosper. |
| 19 Mar 10, 11:28 PM Scribbles UK(RH), 4 yrs |
I think people assume that what's wanted by the workers is likely to be unreasonable given that the economy is so tough. I think they also really do think, as you said perhaps rhetorically, that their delayed holiday is worth more than somebody else's job, just because it's somebody else and they don't know them. |
| 19 Mar 10, 11:33 PM Doghouse_Reilly UK(MK), 6 yrs |
The reason strikes are attacked through the media and these various other channels is because they absolutely terrify those in charge. This point absolutely cannot be overstated. In South America union organisers are frequently the targets of violence, in the US around the start of the 20th century companies would employ strike breakers to get the workers back to work by any means possible. In Detroit in the 1920s workers attempting to set up the first car workers union were murdered, their protests met by soldiers, hired goons (hired goons?) and plenty of violence. Strikes are absolutely terrifying to business leaders and politicians and with good reason, when the workforce delivers a Fuck You like that it forces them to bow to their demands, and equally it is an example to other workers that within a union, with collective bargaining powers, they can get a better deal. Imagine that, workers being able to demand, and get, better working conditions. It's precisely the sort of scary thought that people would rather the proletariat didn't have. Science isn't about why, it's about why not. You ask: Why is so much of our science dangerous? I say: Why not marry safe science if you love it so much. |
| 19 Mar 10, 11:42 PM gentler_giant 2 yrs |
Agree with the much of what has been said, from TheMarquise on. But I think a lot of you are just underestimating the degree to which all those politicians and other talking heads get their rocks of by telling other people what to do. Or better still, what not to do. The idea they just might have to suck it up, after the last 25 years' mass repression since the miners' strike somebody mentioned, really seems to be bringing out a massive amount of moralistic poison and vitriol. A strike? Shock horror you would think from the reaction it was an act of perversion. |
| 19 Mar 10, 11:46 PM DancesWithPussycats UK(TW), 7 yrs |
This is all part of Walsh's long term strategy, to break union power so that UK cabin crew can be gradually replaced with crew members recruited from cheaper countries. International man of mystery |
| 19 Mar 10, 11:53 PM condemned UK(M), 11 yrs |
After the miners brought down the Heath government in the 1970's the tories plotted and waited and when Thatcher was elected in 1979 they were ready. The miners being the most powerful union in the country were the first nut to crack. It was personal and vindictive.Then it was the printworkers.Then the seamen.In the space of 4 years the three most powerful unions at that time were destroyed in effect.The workforce was cowed and then the minimum wage council was abolished,as the jobless figure peaked to record levels. Out of work?Take this job.Security guard in Salford.£1.50 an hour .....oh and provide your own dog and car.[Believe it or not this was a genuine job advert!] What do you mean it is unreasonable???....It's a job you ungrateful lazy oaf!Take it or we stop your dole!! What a fucking nation! |
