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Comment by nerdponx | Hacker News Reader

Unfortunately it's not physically possible to be neutral on this issue.

It's not analogous to never giving people change on the street because you donate to soup kitchens and mutual aid orgs (or whatever). If you don't support unionization, you are effectively undermining it. This isn't meant to be some kind of woke purity test. It's just the facts of how a market operates.

Every individual that is willing to work without supporting a union, is an employee that hurts the power of that union, because that's one less unit of labor that the employer has to rely on the union for.

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Absolutely not. Not increasing its power is not undermining it. It's neutrality. Stop changing definitions to suit your political goals.

We have enough "with us or against us" going on driving violence to let more slide.

I was careful to explain my reasoning in my post, but maybe it wasn't stated clearly enough.

Consider a company for which programmers are fungible, and 5 programmers are required to keep the company running at full efficiency. If one programmer quits in protest over union-busting activity, all it takes is one other equivalent programmer on the labor market to agree to take the job. The existence of 1,000 other pro-union programmers in the labor market are completely irrelevant, as long as the company knows they can find one union-neutral programmer. Morever, the union-neutral programmer is equivalent to an anti-union programmer from the perspective of the employer.

It's "with us or against us" because of the nature of the labor market, not because of any desire to be toxic or exclusionary or whatever. This is literally the whole reason that picket lines exist. You're either a scab or you're not; that's definitional, not rhetorical.

> You're either a scab or you're not; that's definitional, not rhetorical.

No, I'm an unaffiliated potential worker. Scab is a derogatory term. It's not surprising unions are losing support with that attitude.

You're thinking you have a right to the job and that by not supporting you I'm taking it away. You don't though and from my point of view a union is a threat of violence (try crossing a picket line) and is one tiny step away from domestic terrorism. You're demanding to take a job that could be mine but you're not willing to negotiate to win it. Turning a free-market opportunity for me into a political struggle where I'd need to win my way into the 1000 through your support. No thanks.

Every little thing Unionists do is about punishment and control, you can't even not downvote someone's honest opinion. Imagine if your job was controlled by such politics and you had to kowtow to the right opinions just to keep it.

We don't have to imagine. This very article is about employees who were illegally fired for not kowtowing to the right opinions. These politics do control your job, whether you want them to or not.

No, because I don't lie about peeing in a bottle at my job and make trouble.

But if there was a union there'd be a never ending parade of shit I'd have to watch out for. Like having to pretend that we have to piss in bottles rather than using the washroom or else having my stuff vandalized and maybe being beaten in the parking lot. Unions use lies and violence to get their way, been there, had enough of that.

What was reasonable in the early 1900s against literal Pinkertons with guns, because of acid leaching into the mine in a company town a hundred miles from anywhere, is now ridiculous and you should try turning down work you don't like instead of making up these stories.

Isn't it a bit of a stretch to build the definition of what a union is by using anecdotes as building blocks? One could argue the same for pretty much any other organized group (companies, governments, ...) yet we don't define their function by individual actions.

In summary: People don't usually form unions to beat others in parking lots, you know.

Right, they don't form unions to beat people. But pretty much every union involves implicit threats of being beaten in the parking lot. Certainly having your stuff stolen from your locker and broken or left in the toilet. As long as there are picket lines people will hit those trying to cross them. Talk to a unionist and see, they're very free with these stories.

It's not the goal but when you've convinced yourself you're fighting the good fight I guess you take the gloves off.

For the record, Amazon has admitted the peeing in bottles story was true: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/04/amazon-admits-it...

No, and this is more union deception. You're trying to conflate employees doing warehouse work (where they have bathrooms) with contract drivers who choose to pee in bottles. Everyone knows the warehouse pee story is made up or you'd stop grasping at straws.

Why, oh why, must socialists lie?

You just didn't specify warehouse workers. But anyway, there are corroborating accounts of that too: https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/16/17243026/amazon-warehouse...

Warehouse workers are the ones trying to unionize so all stories about drivers are irrelevant. You know this. I shouldn't have to specify.

Re your source, 1) The verge is currently lying about the warehouse/driver distinction so their credibility is very low, 2) the claims were anonymous or second-hand, and 3) they aren't saying there weren't bathrooms - but that people were trying to improve their speed.

Literally nothing that supports the need for a union. Nobody claims to have a medical reason that they needed to use the toilet and having been forbidden, or even had pay docked. That would be illegal under OSHA guidelines and they'd have just reported it as such at the time. Courts are extremely friendly to these suits from workers but apparently they never actually happened.

> “From their point of view, we don’t have the right to be ill,”

Nope. Illegal. If that happened there'd have been a lawsuit.

> “I had a fit at work and was taken to the hospital. The next day, someone rung me and asked why I was not in work. I explained to them, but it was still marked, ‘no call, no show,’”

Um yeah, you didn't call or show. That you (may have) had a valid reason to leave yesterday doesn't translate into not having to let them know if you're coming in today. Not a valid complaint.

> But despite having legally compliant break times, workers noted they had to walk quite a distance from their main work area to the break area, which greatly diminished how much time they had left to rest.

If you're required to take your break in a designated area then the time to travel there is not part of your break. If some manager got this wrong and stuck to it, it's a reason for a complaint and a maybe a lawsuit which the employee would profitably win. Maybe this happened, but all companies can make mistakes and the fix is easy.

It's not that they can't just want to unionize. That would be fine. Pointless, but fine. What's not is the lies. Their case for abuse clearly has no merit.

Parent's point was that by working for a company without supporting a union, you are giving that company leverage against the union.

That is where the neutrality is lost.

I reject your absolutist ideology. If it's a forced choice of with your or against you, then you've asked for against.

Edit: With them or they'll do anything from downvote you to set your car on fire. This is why people don't believe you, or support you.

Look at the modern intellectual arguing the equivalent of Wickard v Filburn. Anti-union would be going out of my way to lobby my government to forbid unions. Neutral is just not supporting you because I can't tell if you have a valid case or not. As for being a coward, that's the modern unionist screaming slurs at other workers and beating them up in the parking lot.

The sad truth is that original unionists, who fought for safety in mines, etc, are being conflated with marxists who are really anti worker.

I would posit that you aren't rejecting any ideology, you are being presented with the fact even inaction is a political choice, and that seems to upset you. That's okay, there are a lot of facts about reality that upset me, too!

Unfortunately facts don't care about our feelings, and no amount of sulking about it will change the fact that so called union neutrality is an anti-union position. Not only is it anti-union, but kind of a cowardly anti-unionism, at that. It's wanting to be both anti-union, while also wanting to accept none of the social consequences that come with that position.

What you are describing is bullying, plain and simple. Similar to the other commenter I’ve seen unions use the same tactics as well.

Your 'everything is connected, inaction is action' argument is only compelling if you can provide a counter-example. A place where your rule breaks down. A rule without exceptions, in a complex domain, is just wrong.

Yes, we all breathe the same air. But at what point is you not fighting my battles with me reasonable disinterest - neutrality - rather than an active choice to hinder me? Clearly if you don't know me, and if you don't know the facts, etc...

I obviously reject it sooner than you, but if you don't reject it at some point then it's ideology and I reject that out of hand.

A union gains leverage by monopolizing the sale of labor to a company; a company gains leverage when they can buy labor elsewhere. If you don’t support the union, you are necessarily chipping away at their monopoly. There’s no action whereby your choice doesn’t change the balance of power between the two.

Did you try to catch a serial killer today? If not you helped kill their victim.

Now either explain the limit to that logic or turn yourself in to the police.

The limit to the logic is that it only applies where you are forced to choose between zero sum options.

Yeah, like deciding between spending your limited time on here or hunting a serial killer. Zero sum, son.

You don't seem to have realized that you aren't the first group to use these arguments and tactics, or how badly they fail. Sadly only after exacting great societal consequences though.

Here's the point you are missing:

Neutrality can only be achieved by refusing to support both the union and the company.

If you are working for the company without joining the union, then you are supporting the company's anti-union efforts.

Remember, no one is forced to join a company just like no one is forced to join a union.

> Not increasing its power is not undermining it.

This might be true if you were describing a situation with three parties: a company, a union, and you - affiliated with neither. But as almost all unionization takes place after people have already entered an employee/employer relationship, the neutrality has been lost; you are, by default, on the side of the employer if you are not a part of the union, and having employees not in a union does weaken the bargaining position of the union since it's relative representation that matters.

> Stop changing definitions to suit your political goals.

Don't forget to call the kettle black, while you're at it.

If you're working for a partnership I agree, but if you support businesses being organised as limited liability corporations but not corresponding organisation of labour, that's not neutrality.

"Violence", you say? What violence is that? Is it taking place in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen, Somalia, Korea, or maybe somewhere else, where we don't yet admit we have troops fighting?

Oh, sorry, you were talking about people having heart attacks while climbing the steps of the capital building. Never mind, carry on. Americans complaining about violence is like plants complaining about oxygen.

https://thegrayzone.com/2019/01/15/us-military-160-countries...

JFC talk about a "you're with us or against us" mentality. I tend to be somewhat neutral on unions (depending on the context I think they're sometimes good and sometimes bad), but your rhetoric has pushed me further towards unions being bad.

I already wrote a response to the sibling comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26703472

> your rhetoric has pushed me further towards unions being bad.

This sounds vindictive and selfish to me. I wish it wasn't this way. Personally I'd rather just play video games and screw around with Idris than get involved in labor disputes. But to turn against unions because someone who is vaguely pro-union said something that kinda offended you? Come on.

Usually when someone says something like this, I assume they were never pro-union in the first place.

"So-and-so said something I don't like, so now I've changed all my political beliefs to be the opposite of theirs" is something real people don't actually do. It's more likely that their political beliefs were always the opposite of so-and-so's and they were just looking for an opportunity to admit it.

You don’t imagine that “unions are good because of X, Y, and Z facts” is a more compelling argument to anyone anywhere in the middle spectrum than “if you don’t like unions, you’re a selfish asshole” or “if you’re not with us, you’re against us” and that difference in compelling nature would influence someone’s support of unions?

It’s not like any of us emerged from the womb with a strongly decided opinion on unions, but rather we developed one over time by deciding on the arguments advanced and whereby bullying arguments and behavior of intimidation often push people away from support.

> You don’t imagine that “unions are good because of X, Y, and Z facts” is a more compelling argument to anyone anywhere in the middle spectrum than “if you don’t like unions, you’re a selfish asshole” or “if you’re not with us, you’re against us” and that difference in compelling nature would influence someone’s support of unions?

I'm not the OP, but to answer your question: frankly, no - in general it seems to often be the case that the factual merit of an argument is not really important in influencing opinion.

That the argument you mention ("if you don't like unions, you're a selfish asshole") has any influence at all is proof enough of this; note that it makes no direct statement about the merit of unions themselves, and yet is presented as an example of an influential argument about the value of unions - and rightfully so, based on your reaction and the reactions of other people in this thread.

Furthermore, I think it's fairly naive to think that "we developed [our opinions regarding unions] over time by deciding on the arguments advanced," as though it were always a conscious process or that a broadly fair view of unions was widely disseminated with which to make an informed decision. After all, why would it be?

There's an old legal aphorism that goes, "If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts. If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have neither on your side, pound the table."

If I believe that and see someone pounding the table, I can make an inference about the ability of their position to stand up to scrutiny. I might be wrong in that inference, but IMO the lawyer with the facts or law on their side does their client a serious disservice if they choose to just bang the table.

I think you're missing the point.

If someone comes at me, attempting to persuade me that their side is the right one, but their persuasion style is to be adversarial and say I'm a shithead if I don't pick their side, I am more likely to reject their side.

This has little to do with the "facts are stronger" argument. I agree that many people do not pay attention to objective facts, and instead make decisions based on emotional factors. And that's exactly what would be happening here: this type of adversarial argument would give me a bad feeling, and I would reject it.

Beyond that, you can still make emotional arguments that use facts as their foundation. I would respond much better to something like "75% of your co-workers have shit wages, and a union can help them get fair pay; don't you want the best for your colleagues?" That sort of argument isn't all positive, as it tries to make the other person feel guilty, but it's a much better argument than "if you don't want to join the union you're an asshole".

> I think it's fairly naive to think that "we developed [our opinions regarding unions] over time by deciding on the arguments advanced," as though it were always a conscious process or that a broadly fair view of unions was widely disseminated with which to make an informed decision.

I don't think anyone's claiming it's a rational, conscious process. Very much of it can be emotional and subconscious. But the result is still the same: if you tell me that I have to "support the union or else", I will -- consciously and rationally, or subconsciously and emotionally: it doesn't matter -- gradually develop a negative opinion about unions.

I think this is the trap a lot of people (myself included, sometimes) fall into: they want people to evaluate their arguments on their terms, how they themselves would evaluate them if they were the recipient of them. But that's not how it works. People evaluate arguments in their own way (regardless of whether the argument is intended to evoke a rational or emotional response). If you want to make an argument, you need to focus on outcomes, not on your own personal preferences as to how things should turn out. Tailor your argument to the recipient. Sure, for some people the "you're either for us or against us" type argument might be the most effective. But it's not for everyone, and it can alienate people as well.

> "So-and-so said something I don't like, so now I've changed all my political beliefs to be the opposite of theirs" is something real people don't actually do

Yeah that's not what happened. The commenter in question clearly said "your rhetoric has pushed me further towards unions being bad" from the original position of ambivalence. If I'm being honest, I'm similarly ambivalent about unions and the rhetoric has pushed me in the same direction as well. It's not just this one comment that pushed me on its own, it's a small trend I've noticed in pro-union advocacy that I've noticed.

And frankly, whether someone's political beliefs have truly changed from such rhetoric is not very important, this kind of rhetoric poisons friendship. Political beliefs and movements need friends that actively support it, not people who quietly agree that something is probably technically true. Ever heard of "you're not wrong, you're just an arsehole"? Keep this up and you'll have a fantastic non-coalition of people who may quietly admit that you're right on some things but will never associate/support you or your movement. How you say something matters a lot, this is just the basics of diplomacy.

If such a simple opinion "pushed" you into the unions-are-bad camp then you were never on the fence in the first place.

> JFC talk about a "you're with us or against us" mentality... your rhetoric has pushed me further towards unions being bad.

It's a remarkably odd choice to refer to OP's comment as "rhetoric" in this case given that the remark "it's not physically possible to be neutral on this issue" is a literal statement of truth.

Generally, neutrality implicitly supports the status quo; it's a choice like any other, whether you acknowledge it as such or not, and as OP pointed out it is literally true that if you have the option to be part of a union and you aren't, the bargaining power of that union is less than it otherwise would be.

I suppose you'd have to clarify what you meant with respect to your own decisions - have you ever even had the option to join a union? Because if not, then I could see how you might be able to see yourself as "neutral" as it's not an issue that has directly affected you. But if you did have a choice then presumably you made a choice one way or the other, in which case "neutrality" isn't something you can actually claim.

I think it's entirely reasonable for someone to believe that the net result of a union in a particular place would be a negative for employees. They may be wrong, but holding that view doesn't automatically make them a bad person.

Maybe that does mean "you're with us or against us", but I'm pretty sure that kind of rhetoric only works to persuade people on the middle school playground, not in real life. At best, it will serve to convince weak-minded people who make decisions based on fear of being called names.

If you're going to try to convince me of something by telling me I'm an asshole if I don't agree with you, that's only going to push me away. That's just a fact, and if you want to convince me your opinion is the correct one, you need to focus on finding the argument that will give you the outcome you want, not the argument that lets you vent your frustration, even if "you're either with us or against us" is technically true. Because I don't care; if you're going to present your argument in that way, I'm very much fine being against you, even if I'd otherwise be sympathetic to your cause.

For the record, I'm fairly pro-union, though I do believe they can cause more problems than they solve in some situations. I'm commenting here because I'm really tired of people snatching defeat from the jaws of victory through self-destructive argumentation.

That is a very illogical line of reasoning.

Disclaimer: I've made a career side stepping unions in various industries (public unions for hospitals, transportation/trucking unions, medium-sized online retailers on the cusp of unionization).

Unions have given corporate a new legitimacy.

The 'human abuse' component in unions is quite substantial. Internal groups tend to formulate inside unions capable of influencing decisions, leaving a minority without real representation (primarily new union members who don't get grandfather clauses, this minority becomes the majority with no power due to legacy senior union members; seniority is measured by hours worked, not expertise or merit keep this in mind).

Many times this abuse is for personal gain like getting the easier jobs or influencing the hiring process to get their friends/family jobs for example.

I make it my job to get chummy with senior union reps. By using my leverage to help a union rep get his cousin hired (through influencing HR or interviewing managers), I have shielded myself/the company from potential genuine grievances (forging allies). The cousin/whatever is probably aware of the game as well and knows not to rock the boat too, double-plus-good. This is more common than most would want to admit.

Another neat trick to controlling unions: once enough of the legacy employees, who can sway the unions decisions with their SENIORITY (the golden word), fall to your side all one has to do is hire lots of people who don't speak English. The legalese in most union handbooks is worded for lawyers really.

Older union guys don't care about the new blood to inform them what is and isn't okay. Being human they also appreciate that someone else is doing the hard jobs they don't have to.

Ever wonder why unions don't fight to make union handbooks easy to read? Because that would REALLY hurt corporate. Doctors and engineers are forbidden to unionize because they can read. Straight up.

Regardless unions are damaging to labour forces. They reduce efficiency, competence, shatter budgets, destroy the ability to become an entrepreneur (because money isn't tight enough gotta also pay union dues on top right?) and ruin any form of scheduling/time management arrangements. Once a bad culture sets in it is near impossible to root out (its easy for bad culture to set in when alcoholics can't be fired and must be given multiple chances; morale drops for the rest of the employees when they witness such things).

It's one thing to petition for humane working conditions, it's another to get paid for not working and boy did I see lots of the latter.

Don't listen to me, take a part-time summer (or night) job for the public sector with a union. Witness the absurdity yourself.

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