I say without any reservations that there is an illness in Unity. Presently, its members sense only the "stillness in the wind" and they think it will always be so. They think they can stand without the support of the rank and file. The rank and file of today will become the retirees of tomorrow and many are intensely unhappy. I say Unity is living in a house of cards. They may laugh. And, they may forget that the Berlin Wall has been smashed and the Soviet Union has crumbled. They may refuse to look to Chicago. There are lessons to be learned from history. I would advise them to consider the Windy City before their house of cards tumbles before their disbelieving eyes..... NYC Educator,Read the entire post by Arwen at http://nyceducator.com/2014/05/retiree-driven-unionism-and-unitys.html#disqus_thread
Wherefore art thou yon Unity slugs and trolls?
You know, it takes a blatant selling job on the contract - which seems to take place once a decade (1995, 2005, 2014) for people who generally don't feel much disrespect for people they know in Unity to get the message - that just about every single one in Unity - the idiots and the decent - drink the Kool Aid. While are some know what they do, many others actually believe in their own shit. It leaves independent thinking people scratching their heads - and somewhat frightened at the kind of people running the UFT right down to the school level.
I know Arthur points to walls coming down - Berlin, the Middle East-- it happens often in a flashpoint. If there are no organized structures in place - even underground, chaos can reign.
That is why - even though I am not always optimistic, I feel MORE must build structures capable of picking up the pieces if things do begin to crumble. And I also feel that the days of division between opposition forces had to come to an end. (I don't include New Action until the day comes when they join MORE). ICE and TJC learned their lesson after a decade of not really working together - and we learned to work together in GEM - a short-lived transition group it turns out where many people felt comfortable working together.
One simple example of the benefits. When I get a question from a teacher I send it to Jeff, James (ICE), Kit, Peter (TJC) for expert advice.
Ahhhh, Synergy - I love that word.
In fairness, I did not write that post. My co-teacher/ blogger, Arwen E. did.
ReplyDeleteI really don't think many of them give a damn what going to happen 10 years from now. They are mostly senior people who are cashing in now.
ReplyDelete