NO to unions...for us!

["Fabien Vais" <phantoms -at- total -dot- net>]

Andrew said:

> snip>
> The best protection from exploitation is education, skill, and
> determination. In the absence of that, I guess a union is your only
> choice.

I agree with Andrew. My best bet keeping a full-time job is NOT having a
strong union, but counting on my own education, experience, talent, and
determination.

Several years ago, I was working as a full-time technical writer in a large
company. Although no one in my immediate office was unionized, some people
in other offices were, and one day, we got a memo saying that a "glitch" had
occurred about 4-5 years ago, and that our positions were "supposed to have
been unionized" back then, so the union wanted to "lay claim on our
positions" to set the record straight. Can you believe this?

Our first reaction was saying that it wasn't fair, and that it would now
cost us union dues, etc. Then we realized that if we stood firm and REFUSED,
perhaps we had a chance of not being sucked in.

We therefore held a couple of meetings of our own, and made one simple
demand to the union. PROVE TO US THAT WE WOULD GAIN SOMETHING BY JOINING THE
UNION. So they spent the next month or so "courting" us, hoping that we
would join. They were totally unable to do so.

The only thing that kept on coming up again and again was JOB SECURITY. But
we told them that we didn't need their security. We already had job security
(many of us had been there for years...), and besides, our experience was
our security.

To make a long story short, the union was incapable of making a case, and
had to back down.

And everybody lived happy ever after, far far from unions...!

Fabien Vais



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