Norma Rae had it right

Well you see, in your time of trouble, when The Man wanted you to work a 72 hour work week and was set to cram it down your throat whether you liked it or not, the union came through for you.

This guy, this union steward, he probably didn’t give a shit about Beagles. Maybe he cared about that whole union thing and the struggle and the ideals, but maybe not at all, maybe he got the job through his uncle or his brother in law, and it was just something that brought home a couple bucks. Even if the latter was true, he still knew if he fucked up he could lose the position and the couple bucks, so he did his job.

If there had been no union steward, if this had been one of those right to work joints the republicans so dearly love, when you walked out the door you would have kept walking and when they hired the new guy you know they would have told him that they fired the last guy, so if he wanted to keep his job he had better do what he was told without any lip.

I think we can all agree that these things start out well, a pissed off worker looks around at all the other guys also getting fucked over and thinks maybe if we all stand together we can stand up to the boss, and maybe we can make get a forty hour week and make them pay us overtime if we have to work longer than that. And maybe not just this mill, but the other mills in the area, and the state, and the nation. And maybe while we are at it, we can give the workingman of this country a better deal, break the railroad monopolies, break all the other monopolies, make the big city bosses count all the votes during elections, make laws for the people, not by fat cats making big bribes to our lawmakers. Blah, blah, blah, make a better world.

Well whose blood does not race with sentiments like that, who is not willing to risk starvation, to carry a picket sign in the sleet and the cold, to get his head busted by company goons? Well to be perfectly frank, not all that many people. Most people would happily take the forty hour week etc, but not if it meant getting their heads busted.

But there are enough whose blood rushes to make a movement and once you have a movement going there are those who join in, entranced by the stirring songs, the marches, the handsome red armband, and maybe you win. Well not all that stuff, hard to take the monopolies from the fat cats, and keep them from making bribes and all, but the forty hour week, and overtime, that is doable.

And because you got your head busted you get to be union steward, and the couple bucks that goes with it. But the bucks aren’t that important because you believe in what you are doing, and maybe when you stay the owner’s boot from some downtrodden guy’s back, you can’t help but give him a lecture on the history of the union and the guy nods politely enough, but you can’t help but notice that yawn.

And that new steward, he doesn’t even bother to give the guys the lecture. When you want to talk union to him, he’d rather be talking about the Cubs. When the company tries to bribe you, you tear up the check right in their faces, but you notice the new steward is suddenly driving a fancier car.

And then a new company says, you know what those union guys are nothing but troublemakers, tell you what, we will pay you union wages but without a union, so now you won’t even have to pay those awful union dues. Well who wouldn’t go for a deal like that? And then as long as you are making those fat wages, you might as well become salaried. You may have to work a little free overtime now and then, but you get to wear a suit. And then the overtime keeps getting bigger and bigger, and then all those guys around you get fired so you have to do all their work too and the free overtime is huge, and maybe you feel like you ought to storm into the boss’s office, but you know when you walk out, you will have to keep on walking.

Whaddaya think, could I have been a union organizer why back when? Wouldn’t have wanted to get my head busted though.