These Hands
This is an effective advertisement by the UAW.
This is an effective advertisement by the UAW.
It's no secret that I'm a fan of Cory Doctorow. I do like Mike Masnick and the work he does on Techdirt. I don't always agree with them but they can make compelling arguments. I appreciate hearing an alternative viewpoint that is smart rather than just contrarian for the sake of it.
Cory appeared on the Techdirt podcast this week to talk about his most recent book "Red Team Blues". A lot of the conversation covers ground that has been dealt with in other interviews.
What stuck out from this conversation comes towards the end of the episode. Doctorow talks about the using the infrastructure that unions and organised labour had built in the preceding decades to participate in protests. He speaks of his experience as those structures were degraded and eventually dismantled.
Once those structures are gone then everything gets so much harder. There isn't a solid foundation to build on. It takes time to build something solid. Digital tools have helped to regain some of the ground lost over the past 40 years.
Mike Masnick has an undergraduate degree labour relations. He suggests that the internal corruption of the unions meant that they needed to be burnt to the ground before they could be rebuilt.
I'd agree with Doctorow's retort the the labour movement should be improved instead of jettisoned.
Once that ground has been taken or that institution destroyed, it is so difficult to get back to where you once were. The opportunity cost can be extremely high.