CrimsonPermanentAssurance
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Jul 28, 2026 1:45 AM
CrimsonPermanentAssurance
22929
890
21
clonedeeznuts
And we have a supreme court that sides with obscene money. WCGW
ObjectivePragmatistWithHope
Apopos...
JahSureYouBetcha
My dad was a union shop steward for 27 years. We were never a wealthy family, but I had full health insurance coverage through the age of 26.
Howlingowl
Most unions are rich…
MasterBountakun
It forever fascinates me that so many Americans have been conditioned to always believe the one with the most power in a given situation shouldn't be punished or scrutinized. Somehow, it's not the corporations that can exploit anyone at will, it's the workers. Somehow, it's not the people who can convince your local government to build data centers that the majority votes against it that are destroying communities, it's the immigrants.
SpaceMarineWithAnUrgeToPurge
PostalHeathen
randomdrifter54
My problem is that there exists some hamstringed unions that do fuck all. Like i want unions but ive seen some where no union was possibly better. I dislike unions that are like a corporation in of themselves. Example: Envoy's(deals with american airlines regional travel) ground service union had a contract that hard set yearly raises. Then covid happened. They raised the hiring wage but the yearly raises did not. So it resulted in there just being no more yearly raises. This was 2022. Its still
jtwood
“The bourgeois doth protest too much, methinks”
NightOwlRally
Sometimes a latex condom isn't enough. If they're wanting to go raw right off the bat, that's a red flag.
Like my Papaw always told me, "Don't ruin your life over ten minutes of numbness."
KingKrabvoldIV
‘The Teamsters have entered the chat.’ - but seriously, unions are great and we need more, but these type of blanket statements are trash and it’s clear people haven’t thought it through.
iktome99
I have an administrative position with a union that is somehow ran by Teamsters. Pretty wild to see things like "Apply for the James Hoffa Scholarship", but they did get us a nice raise package over the next 5 years
hsalonen3000
There is a slight nuance, when your dock workers can stop 90%+ of the import/export of my country (Finland). That is why some of them make as much as I do. I have M.Sc. in CS and relevant work experience, they are unskilled (meaning no long education required).
Subsound
Idk, the heavy equipment they use, pace they work, and often the complexity...I would easily put their education and experience required at a high level.
onlyhalfghost
well if it's so easy, why did you go through all that to get a master's instead of just doing dockwork, poindexter?
TooMehToCare
Come visit my country, South Africa, and see how unions help corrupt politicians destroy it. Nuance is important. Ignoring it makes you no better than the MAGA idiots.
TooMehToCare
Nice, downvotes for pointing out an actual reality. You guys are idiots and you deserve idiot presidents like Trump. You have the political intelligence of a spoiled toddler.
CrimsonPermanentAssurance
Corrupt unions are the side with the money then, same advice applies
TooMehToCare
I guess if you pander to such gross simplifications, you shouldn't be surprised when idiots rise to the top of political systems. Maybe Trump is the president you all deserve...
B1tchtastic
All excessive wealth is built on labor exploitation. If the government protected citizens from labor exploitation rather than enabling it, would unions be required? What workers need are advocates, not yet another person in power taking advantage of them. A good union can provide advocacy where the government fails in its duty to its citizens, but a bad union is a criminal organization demanding protection money to do nothing.
sadurdaynight
A govt that protects workers acts like one big union. So, yeah, specific unions wouldn't be as necessary, but could still help guide specific worker rights in certain industries.
astrangehop
Sure! And enforcing things that unions have won us in the past like mandatory lunch breaks, overtime pay, etc is something cool the government is great at.
The problem is — the corporations get to negotiate with the government with large lump sums of money and the workers either have to do it individually, or as a political party. & from what I understand — most of the labor parties of the world are garbage.
astrangehop
Imho yes. Protections is too simple a term — The shareholders and management have an incredible amount of power as a collective — the union is a collective of workers that is able to bargain with them on semi equal terms. The business knows that not running costs them lots, paying fair wages looks less bad to shareholders. HOWEVER
astrangehop
The union also protects you as an individual. Harassment claims can get swept under the rug and get you fired, unfair termination akways looms. A union rep at every he meeting, a lawyer if you need one etc is huge. The government would never provide these things.
Unions also bargain with institutions like health insurance abd can get incredible rates compared to a single business. Etcetc.
Fireninja404
there can be bad unions, for example, police unions that protect murderers simply because they have a badge
cenfou2tout
You guys have strange unions... in france there are union that are in every or most of the professions.
For example I am in a union that has a components in the police, or in the transports, or education... thus if there is a problem, it's the problem of everybody !
FlippedOut
There are also corrupt union officials as well but it doesn't make the members or organisations bad. There are also times when unions are not in the right, especially in the public sector where they waste public money.
OnlyWantToSayOneThing
That's just when the collective bargaining isn't collective. So much of humans woes come from giving the power of the people to 1 unchecked individual and hoping they represent you properly. Any union where you're forced to vote a certain way is simply a sparkling lobbyist
insaaanity
It is an example of the metaphor of money being a stand-in for power breaks down. The meme is mostly right, but wrong on a technicality, bc the side with power is the one who is typically wrong in any dispute. It's just that the money typically makes up a lot if not the vast majority of that power.
FiftyShadesOfMascarpone
If the mafia had a union, it would likely protect murderers from the law too. Police unions in the US are evil simply because American police are a bunch of murderous and corrupt thugs.
ThrowAwayAcct0000
Police are about the only union I can think of that is blatantly evil.
Badprenup
In that circumstance, the police union is the side with the obscene amount of money.
insaaanity
Cops vs the government? Not saying the conclusion is wrong, but your argument is missing a step or two, as they are *on* the side w/ obscene money rather than being it.
Badprenup
Absolutely Cops vs the government. There have been many attempts by local, state, or federal government to reign in police powers or hold them to higher accountability, police unions are often the largest obstacle of those changes. They've been doing that in the US since the first police unions and have been escalating rapidly since the civil rights movement in the 60s.
The Knapp Commission in the 70s was fought against by police unions (watch Serpico, great film), it's a good starter example.
Goldensands
Tell that to their equipment budget
insaaanity
Which is money given *to* them rather than their own fortune. And the people driving that budget allocation are the ones w/ the power here.
Don't get me wrong, cops are their own massive can of beans, it's just prudent to keep in mind that they didn't pop into our lives in their current form out of nowhere with nobody's interest putting them there.
Goldensands
Cops are class traitors who have sold their birth right to be the wage slave that oppresses other wage slaves. That's the form they are now, and in america that's all they've ever been. ACAB and can go
Arbitrarynamehere
Police unions are not unions. Cops are agents of the state. Cops do not own or control the means of production in any sense. It's just a more organized gang.
KingKrabvoldIV
I don’t think you understand what a union is.
Arbitrarynamehere
If you don't understand organized labor, don't lecture me on it
KingKrabvoldIV
This isn’t a lecture, you’re applying a definition to something that is wrong. Policing is a form of labor, period. This police unions cannot be excluded for convenience.
Arbitrarynamehere
If one union mobilizes to disrupt every other union, they aren't a fucking union
OsbornThorsguard
I dont disagree that the current form of police unions in the US are bad, but what you are saying is also wrong. Police are workers too, and will be exploited by the employer if they dont self-advocate. Having unions for government workers is necessary, since the government makes the rules and therefore has greater capacity than private companies to exploit its own workers "lawfully". The only counter to this is united action from workers. That being said, corruption in unions has to be 1/2
OsbornThorsguard
Investigated and rooted out for them to be effective. An effective police union should advocate for more training and help for its members, as well as assistance for them in areas they are not meant to handle, i.e. mental health services and wellness calls. Instead current police unions see it as their job to hold on to, and protect, their worst members when they have done objectively wrong things. That is obviously not how it should be.
CrimsonPermanentAssurance
Police Unions quietly support less training because its a useful defense in a court of law to say an officer who broke the law wasn't adequately trained. "How was he supposed to now he wasn't supposed to shoot that guy, he wasn't trained enough!"
QuiMoritur
I disagree. Unions are formed as part of the conversation between the moneyed owner class and the working class about production and profit. The relationship between cops and the state only superficially resembles that. One of a union's greatest points of leverage is work stoppage; if cops go on strike, what isn't produced? I'd sooner say that soldiers should have a union.
OsbornThorsguard
Yes one of the jobs of a union is to negotiate compensation for labor, in the case of private companies this is often in relation to profit, but for government it is simply in relation to the market as a whole. Government jobs dont produce profit in any sense, but the governments workers need to get compensated fairly for their labor, meaning their should have similar conditions to employees in the private sector. Unions are necessary for this negotiation. Police and soldiers should have unions.
Arbitrarynamehere
I'm not saying there can't be government unions.
Cops do not produce anything besides fuel for the private prison system. They are not productive in any sense. They do not make any decisions about steering the direction of their labor.
Police unions are not unions.
OsbornThorsguard
Unions are not about producing things, unions are about giving workers the power to bargain with the employer through collective action. You can feel that the current state of police in the US are not being productive for society, but that doesnt mean the they arent workers. Workers need unions. And like before, i fully agree that current police unions in the US are terrible and should be reworked. Two things can be true at once.