• -☂️-@lemmy.ml
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    4 days ago

    lukewarm take: unions are there to protect the boss, not the worker.

    100 years ago when workers were dissatisfied, they had no other escape valve than kicking the boss’ doors down and fucking him up in front of his family. unions are the compromise.

    this kind of thing doesn’t go well for anyone involved.

    • ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net
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      3 days ago

      Unions are helpful in teaching people how they can have power collectively, and how to wield it and organize.

      Admittedly many unions now are corporate captured (teamsters as an example), but more revolutionary unions like the IWW are much more useful in regards to actually getting people to become class conscious, and more apt to prefiguraton.

      An example in practice is how the FNT and CAI unions in Spain were able to organize their communities when the government institutions crumbled during the Spanish civil war, resulting in a well functioning anarchist society in Catalonia.

    • jaybone@lemmy.zip
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      3 days ago

      You had company towns, where everyone was in debt to the company store and so your neighbors shared the same gripe against the boss. And the boss didn’t live too far away, since jets didnt exist.

      Now your neighbor works for a different company, and your boss is 1000 miles away.