Union-bashing is the real new black
by Chris Kirkland
Wow — aren’t those unions a piece of work these days? Even after everything they’ve gotten their grasping, groping, greedy little hands on?
I mean really: 40-hour work weeks, with mandated breaks EACH AND EVERY DAY if you work a certain number of hours (and have a boss that doesn’t intimidate you into “signing” away those rights, even though that’s illegal)? Workplace health and safety? Workers’ compensation for injury? Employment insurance? Mandated vacation time or pay? And for the love of crap, A MANDATED MINIMUM WAGE?!?!
C’mon, people — we all know they’ve gone too far. Much too far.
Sure, WE ALL enjoy every one of the above rights, whether we’re union employees or not, because unions fought for them. And true, like many of you I’d be one paycheque away from bankruptcy if I lost my job, except for that employment insurance thing.
But seriously: it’s not like it’s the 1930s and we need an “On-to-Ottawa” trek for the new millennium, right?
Nope, not at all. Unless, of course, unions are under attack — both in this province and in Canada overall — at a level unprecedented since the early 20 century. And unless, of course, the only reason anyone could believe any of the above ranting is that we’ve collectively been brainwashed by the right-wing elite that continuously spouts lines like “waste of taxpayers’ money!”, “holding the taxpayers hostage by striking!”, or “We need to cut the fat/stop the gravy train/end the entitlements!!!”
If that’s the case, we might want to consider yanking our collective heads out of our collective asses, and start finding some ways to collectively counter the anti-union propaganda we’ve been fed, and swallowed with such naivety.
Just a thought.
