Ah, Pronoun Problems

by: Matt Stoller

Sun Dec 14, 2008 at 13:10


I notice a lot of 'pronoun problems' when it comes to business interests talking about the Employee Free Choice Act.

Washington apple packers are worried about their workers losing the right to private ballots when voting on whether or not to join a labor union, a chief lobbyist for the apple industry says.

It's nice to have a lobbyist for an industry talking about the interests of apple packing workers.  Of course, they often mix up 'us' and 'them'.

"People in the apple industry say they work hard to treat workers well and think they should have a private right to decide if they want to unionize or not," Foster said.

Get it?  They're all just one big group of people in 'the apple industry'.  Some of them pick fruit in the rain all day and some of them are cushy lawyer lobbyists, but they are all dedicated to apples and secret ballots.
Matt Stoller :: Ah, Pronoun Problems

Tags: , , , , (All Tags)
Print Friendly View Send As Email
Ah, Pronoun Problems | 15 comments
As A Former Member of the Apple Industry (4.00 / 3)
(It's not part of agriculture, i'ts an industry!  Who knew?)

Norhern Oregon division, where I picked apples with my brother (a fruit sciences/soil sciences double major at Cal Poly at the time) one summer, I can only say that if any of the owners ever gave a rat's ass about anyone working for them, that would certainly be front-page news.

My brother was there because he spoke Spanish, the owner did not, and somebody had to tell the workers where to go pick, among other things.  I was there because of my brother, who I'd not been close to for some years.  He had a couple of other Anglo friends with him, too, which made us a remarkably diverse outfit.  Mostly, there weren't any Anglo workers at all.

I was not terribly fast--pay was by the container filled--but unlike picking strawberries, for example, I could do the work all day long, I spoke a smidgeon of Spanish, and was appropriately self-depricating, so I fit in okay.  Plus, of course, my brother was quite popular as he helped solve all sorts of problems, so the goodwill rubbed off on me.  As a result, I look back fondly on that time.  The pay, however, not so much.

Maybe the lobbyist quoted would like to change places with one of those workers I toiled next to.  Straighten out his pronouns, as it were.

And, even if he couldn't speak English, I'm reasonably sure his replacement could keep his pronouns straight.

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3

Don't you love it (4.00 / 1)
when Repubs (which most business people who oppose organized labor are) suddenly starting hating on the "free market" when it allows people to collectively organize in order to drive up wages, and either demands that government step in to prevent these awful commies from destroying their businesses, or prevents government from helping them?

I learned a lot about this RW hypocrisy from reading Rick Perlstein's excellent book After the Storm, about Goldwater and the birth of the modern conservative movement, whose founders were hypocritical "free market" union-busters like Goldwater, whose family business owed everything to what was effectively corporate welfare when the federal government spent billions on military bases and infrastructure in Arizona, the southwest and southern California, and yet who, having benefitted from government handouts, used the same government to prevent the less fortunate from earning their wages honestly, sans handouts.

The modern conservative movement, like the GOP, is built upon a foundation of lies and theft.

"Those who stand for nothing fall for anything...Mankind are forever destined to be the dupes of bold & cunning imposture" -- Alexander Hamilton

[ Parent ]
Well, You See (0.00 / 0)
They hated the government for making them dependent.  (It was God what made them rich!) And they vowed to make sure that would never happen to anyone else.

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3
[ Parent ]
So who do they blame for their destroying the country? (0.00 / 0)
God? Or the country for forcing or tricking them to destroy it?

"Those who stand for nothing fall for anything...Mankind are forever destined to be the dupes of bold & cunning imposture" -- Alexander Hamilton
[ Parent ]
Who Else? (0.00 / 0)
Same folks they always blame--see Fallwell & Robertson after 9/11--latte-drinking liberal homosexual Jewish illegal immigrants!

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3
[ Parent ]
Yeah, god especially hates those! (0.00 / 0)
Even though he allegedly promised the holy land to, um, a bunch of "latte-drinking" (land of milk and honey), liberal (see my sig line), homosexual (ok, a bit of a stretch here, but what's up with Joseph's rainbow-colored suit and the "special" relationship between David and Jonathan--which admitedly took place centuries after said promise), Jewish (no explanation needed here, although the term didn't come into use until Judeans were all that were left of us sons and daughters of Hebrews), illegal immigrants (we weren't exactly invited into said holy land by its then-owners, of course).

Sigh, it seems that Jerry & Pat might have been right, after all!

"Those who stand for nothing fall for anything...Mankind are forever destined to be the dupes of bold & cunning imposture" -- Alexander Hamilton

[ Parent ]
Living in generally blue-leaning Western WA (4.00 / 2)
I seem to recall that a few years ago WA's apple growing industry, which is mostly based in solid red Eastern WA, was having trouble hiring enough seasonal workers to pick apples. I have no idea why. Perhaps it wasn't willing to pay high enough wages, or provide low-cost enough housing, to intice migrant workers this far up north?

I don't know much about the economics of the apple business here, which of course is one of the main non-industrial, non-tech, non-shipping businesses here (along with timber, potatoes, onions, wine, hops, etc.). But it seems to me that any business that cannot be profitable if its workers unionized in order to extract better wages, benefits and working conditions (which is no different a constraint than its suppliers being tough cost negotiators, or its competition forcing prices down, or government imposing fair regulations), has no business being in business in the first place. So is this really about economics, or plain old fashioned greed?

"Those who stand for nothing fall for anything...Mankind are forever destined to be the dupes of bold & cunning imposture" -- Alexander Hamilton

Is There A Difference? (0.00 / 0)
is this really about economics, or plain old fashioned greed?

Or are you one of those ideologues we've been hearing so much about lately?

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3

[ Parent ]
Sure there's a difference (0.00 / 0)
As I pointed out in the comment. Either a business is not in a position to be profitable in a genuinely "free" market, in which suppliers, competitors, customers and labor are free to negotiate and determine costs, prices and wages, in which case it has no business being in business, or else it is able to be profitable under such conditions (assuming that it's well-run, etc.), and is simply trying to extract artificially higher profits by preventing one of these constraints (labor, in this case), from having real power.

I'm not trying to justify union-busting in either case, of course, but am just asking whether busting a union is something that management feels is necessary to merely stay afloat, or something that it just feels like doing to artificially increase already adequate profits. The former reason is of course invariably given by management to justify union busting. I'm just wondering whether it's ever actually supported by the numbers (in which case, as I said, such a business has no business being in business, at least on a privately-owned, for-profit, as opposed to employee-owned, cooperative basis).

"Those who stand for nothing fall for anything...Mankind are forever destined to be the dupes of bold & cunning imposture" -- Alexander Hamilton

[ Parent ]
"Management" has no justification in the first place (0.00 / 0)
Don't make me do this again. ;-)
[ Parent ]
An opinion, among several (0.00 / 0)
Don't make me do this again. ;-)

"Those who stand for nothing fall for anything...Mankind are forever destined to be the dupes of bold & cunning imposture" -- Alexander Hamilton
[ Parent ]
profits are never "adequate." (0.00 / 0)
not in this neoliberal economy, where shareholders are in charge, and the maximization of profit is essentially a legal obligation.  now, this may not directly apply to smaller businesses, but the effects are felt throughout the economy....  
[ Parent ]
Part of the sickness of the existing economic system, of course (0.00 / 0)
Which is based on the belief that there's no such thing as excessive profit or growth, which, since it's obviously unsustainable on a macro economic level, inevitably leads to a boom and bust dynamic, and to the extreme levels of wealth and income redistribution that we've seen for the past 30 years. I.e. during booms, more and more wealth and income is redistributed to a smaller and smaller number of people, companies and countries, since it's the only way to maintain growth and higher profits. Which, when it reaches some maximal profit and growth level, beyond which it's impossible to go, but which greedy and stupid fools nevertheless try to go beyond, inevitably results in a bust cycle.

I don't think that either profit or growth are necessarily bad or untenable in an economy, just the excessive and unsustainable kind that we've seen in recent decades, that is invariably redistributed unequally in increasingly egregious manner, and obtained in immoral fashion.

I you can pick your apple and eat it too, no?

"Those who stand for nothing fall for anything...Mankind are forever destined to be the dupes of bold & cunning imposture" -- Alexander Hamilton

[ Parent ]
Pronoun Trouble (0.00 / 0)
Ah, see, it's not "he doesn't have to shoot you now."  It's, "he doesn't have to shoot me now."
Politely offer some tips on journalism... (4.00 / 1)
... to the writer of that one-side report.

The writer's name is Dan Wheat.
Phone: 509-664-7150
email: wheat@wenatcheeworld.com

One suggestion: include the views of apple pickers in the story

Ah, Pronoun Problems | 15 comments
Donate to Open Left







QUICK HITS

Friends of the Earth thanks the OpenLeft community for the ideas you generate and your contributions to the progressive movement.
As an anti-spam measure, there is a 24-hour waiting period after registering before new users can comment.
blog advertising is good for you
blog advertising is good for you
LIBERAL INSTITUTIONS
STATE BLOGS
SEARCH

   

Advanced Search

Home | RSS/XML Feed | Register | Contact

  © OpenLeft 2007-2009, Powered by SoapBlox