Class Warfare and the Unions

[FrodoSwaggins]

Just what it sounds like. Last night Communications Workers of America District 1 had a regional meeting with over 500 members (well over!). They discussed a lot of what Trump is doing. Most of the content was educational: a lot of CWA employees are conservative and even voted for Trump and they do not know the history of labor in America and they do not understand the threat to state and public workers that DOGE / Trump represents.
CWA talked about rallies and they told us all to keep calling and calling our representatives. They said, if your rep is a Republican, give 'em hell, if they're a Democrat, tell them they're not fighting hard enough. What they did not talk about was strikes, slowdowns, sickouts or any kind of collective action. They didn't even talk about shit like NOT documenting your job and refusing to cross-train / train replacements. 
So I put it to all of you, what advice can I send to the leadership at CWA? What should I ask for as a member? What should I ask them to do or support us on? Give me concrete suggestions, even radical concrete suggestions, that I can take back to CWA national.

[gorzek]

I would say to remind them that in the early days of unions, they had no legal protection at all. Their power was in simply being the people who could do the job, and presenting a solid front. Management had to negotiate because the union got good at keeping anyone else from taking those jobs. Management sometimes responded with direct violence, too.
All that's to say, most union success did not have any legal protection, so the fact that the law is largely moot should not be seen as a huge impediment to union action. If anything, it removes the variable of whether the government is going to back you up. Expect them not to; act anyway.

[antipelican]

Big unions are more interested in protecting their own interests than in motivating workers to real action. (That being said, I'd still much rather be in a union than not.) Can you do any interpersonal work with your union colleagues? Education around what happened in the Battle of Blair mountain can have some success with conservatives. The government was so cartoonishly evil against poor, working-class rural workers that it's pretty hard for even the most addled conservative brain not to see how fucked up it was.
What do you want your union and your fellow union members to do? Coming up with specific actionable points helps your case.
Does your contract have a no-strike clause? Because education around the power of strikes can be important, too.