The whole "voting against your own interest" is hugely paternalistic and anti-democratic. People have their own set of values and interests. As an outsider without knowledge of the people to accuse them of voting against their own interest because they did not vote the way you wanted them to is the height of arrogance.
I didn't intend to be arrogant at all, I am legitimately confused. The two jobs that I was in a union, the union was massively beneficial to my life. That is where my perspective came from.
Just because the union was beneficial does not mean it was better to have it around than not to. You only experienced one side of the coin in those situations.
I know it is just my experience, so it's very anecdotal evidence at best. And that was my point - that is my experience, which is why I'm confused by the massive vote against unionization. I, personally, do not understand it and would like to.
Personally, I've never met someone who knew workers that was fundamentally surprised by their decisions. It was always the people who only talked, read and wrote about workers that were flabbergasted. Source: worked as a consultant for a union in Europe for a decade.
That's why I asked for someone with direct experience to comment. I am confused, based on my own viewpoint and experience with unions.
>I've never met someone who knew workers that was fundamentally surprised by their decisions.
I don't, genuinely don't understand this sentence. What is workers? Who are workers? What group of people would you consider workers? I've been part of two unions, both of which benefited me, personally, immensely. These were knowledge jobs and not hands-on jobs. Am I a worker? My father is very blue-collar manufacturing and he has been both anti- and pro-union, depending on which shop he worked for. Is he a worker?
I don't understand what you're saying. Honestly. It sounds like you're the font of some mystical knowledge about a mythical group of people. What do you mean by your statement? I don't get it.
Workers are people who work in the rougher jobs, blue collar if that's what you prefer. White collar unions are very different in my opinion.
My experience is this: I've worked with people who were workers and then transitioned to working for the union, either because they were natural organizers, or because they had accidents that made it hard to work their job (a surprising amount of them had lost a finger or two). When they spoke about these kinds of things, like votes or organization rates, they were quick to give plenty of reasons why their colleagues would make some decision because they knew all the arguments and feelings.
The other type I met at the union was college educated, usually political science, spoke a lot of class consciousness and collective interests and had never worked the jobs the union represented. When you talked to them, they didn't understand why workers made some choice, it was always some nicely worded version of "they're not smart enough to make the right choice" or "somebody fed them lies".