The Darker side of Unions


So, a guy comes into his workplace drunk and toting a loading shotgun, hoping to give his boss a piece of his mind, or, failing that, a piece of a cartridge. Luckily, his boss was not around and the police came to arrest him shortly.

Our drunkard was fired.

Now he wants his job back, and here's the kicker, the union has decided to represent him! This in a nutshell sums up everything that is wrong with the modern union movement. Originally it was designed to protect the workers from exploitation at the hands of their employers. If a worker is being fired unfairly, then it is the obligation of the union to defend him if at all possible.

However, it seems that nowadays unions have dropped their old mantra of justice for workers and have instead acquired two new guiding principles:

• Robotic push to keep as many union jobs as possible under all circumstances, and to make sure that all union members keep those jobs regardless of incompetence.


• Left-wing political advocacy

I'll comment on union involvement in politics some other day. For now though, it must be understood that the union movement was never designed to help people keep jobs when they deserved to get fired. It was meant to defend the workers from arbitrary punishment at the hands of management.

The drunkard was not fired on a whim of management, he was fired with very just cause. The union should not only cease defending him, but should support his removal from the workplace.

Oh... and do you think this happened in the States? Nope, it was here in Canada, and the union that is defending their member beyond the point of stupidity is our beloved CUPE. (sigh)