Re: A sobering encounter (So now what?)

[kcronin -at- daleen -dot- com]

This morning I received this e-mailed reply to my most recent contribution to this thread. I thought that it was thought-provoking, and that it raises an interesting (if controversial) issue that I don't think we've discussed here since the market changed. So here's the message, edited to maintain the anonymity of the person who sent it to me:


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Oh, please. Talk about naive. This, go-it-alone, self-made man meritocracy nonsense has been everyone's excuse to avoid facing the truth about an employer-dominated workplace since serfdom was in fashion. The truth is, it's simple economics. A union is the working stiff's only defense against the power of an entire *industry*. Do you really believe that "market forces" will force badly written documentation off the market? HELLO??? Have you ever heard of Microsoft? They've been producing crappy *software* for decades, never mind the documentation, and "market forces" haven't done them in yet. When you hold the whip hand, the herd goes where you tell it to. 

Until writers unionize and demand collective bargaining, until they abandon the comforting delusion that they are white-collar professionals instead of the hired help they're treated as, we will be fighting one another for jobs and respect, and calling it "market forces" until all documentation is just XML output from code. If we want to set professional standards tech writers have to live up to, and that hiring managers can trust, we need a journeyman and apprenticeship program. We need honest certification and maybe even licensing. And we need collective bargaining.

The STC is not a union--yet. Maybe it should be.



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