#workplace organizing

[tips-from-a-tech-worker]

Working on a zine series...

So far I have completed one entry and am well on the way through making the second. Thought I'd post them here for feedback, but also just to share them around.

Organising 101: Mapping: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pw-qCwhI-tfURKlRopPCdKcAKvnWIJEDgdooX22V078/edit?usp=drive_link

Organising 101: Talking to co-workers: https://docs.google.com/document/d/14bwTNW_UqZ3Uf12ugcSjS6AUWcmL398Y_QoNE1bbFak/edit?usp=sharing

Let me know what you think!

Additionally, I am currently without a job, and if anyone wants to send me a little something something as a tip.. I wouldn't say no to it..

[macmanx]

This is a huge win for workers everywhere. These meetings are a vile tactic that’s deeply disingenuous. By requiring workers to attend, companies wield their economic power to force workers to listen to anti-union rhetoric. And that’s exactly what the NLRB argued in the ruling, which involved a case against notorious union-buster Amazon.

Unfortunately, it’s just the mandatory nature of these meetings that’s been outlawed. Now bosses have to make them voluntary, giving employees the choice of whether to attend without fear of reprisals like losing their jobs or being disciplined.

[sunflowervol69]

anyone have experience unionizing their workplace and wanna share some tips hehe

[macmanx]

Shout out to @organizeworkers!

[captainjonnitkessler]

Do you guys notice how when Shawn Fain, president of the United Auto Workers union, started planning a general strike, he did it by a) targeting his messaging towards unions with the ability to safely and effectively strike in large numbers, b) laid out a clear, actionable plan for those unions to follow (setting contracts to all expire at the same time, since many unions cannot strike while under contract), c) is using union contracts to set clear, actionable demands that can be met in order to gauge success and provide an end goal, and d) started organizing FOUR YEARS before the proposed strike date to give people the chance to plan accordingly, because it takes a really freaking long time to get tens of millions of people organized?

You notice how he didn't do it by slapping a message on Twitter saying 'hey nobody go to work on Monday, that'll really show 'em'?

[devsgames]

I'm sorry but for people who cheer on mass game industry layoffs because they think it's some kind of upheaval that is going to "topple the AAA industry" or "teach them a lesson": I hate to break it to you but AAA studios have a metric shitload of money and despite what their press releases say, they really aren't hurting as much as they'd have you think right now. Thousands of jobs lost is a temporary setback to them; if it was actually a last resort move they wouldn't have all simultaneously put themselves in a position where they had to do it in the first place. These studios have been around for decades and will continue to be around, and they will continue to operate just as they have for the last thirty years because they have huge vaults and no morals. They aren't learning a lesson from this because most of them saw it coming but would never admit that.

Know who is being permanently impacted by games layoffs?

It's the indie studio making sick ass games you'll never get to play because they laid everyone off when a publisher tried to save money by pulling all their funding. The hundreds of workers who woke up one morning and found out they suddenly have no job to put food on the table for their children. The international workers who were let go from the job that supplies their visa that helps them stay in the country. The thousands of students who now have to compete over a pool of a dozen job openings, who will work in studios where all the senior staff and leadership who would normally be there to help mentor them into their roles were fired. The disabled workers who now no longer have health or insurance coverage for their survival. The workers who didn't get laid off but survived to see all their friends and coworkers lose their livelihoods for completely arbitrary reasons and whose morale has all but been completely obliterated. The workers in the Global South working for outsourcing companies who were relying on cancelled projects from AAA studios to put food on their tables.

So whenever you're inclined to assume that the suffering of workers is somehow teaching rich people a lesson, remember that no, it doesn't actually and almost never will. All it does is teach thousands of talented workers in the video game industry that games were never - and will never - be worth it.

[macmanx]

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy violated labor laws when making “coercive statements” about unions during interviews conducted in 2022, a judge for the National Labor Relations Board ruled on Wednesday.

[macmanx]

Don't let this happen to you:

@organizeworkers can help:

Thought I would share this here. Image is a clickable link that will take you to the account that posted it! ID in alt text. If anyone wants to pop it out, feel free.

[scooplery]

i see soooo many posts on here about Doing Activism but they've never even spoken with a rank and file union worker about it!! get in touch with ppl who are already organized!!!!!! labor unions should be your first phone call. they are already doing the work you want to be doing!!!

[solarpunkwarlock]

I really want to talk about how important it is for us as a people to start making proper city design a priority. I also want to talk about how the privatization of land is the first major barrier to having proper city design.

A lot of seemingly complex issues and tasks can be simplified or made easier to deal with by organizing our cities: Food distribution, commute times, housing, neighborhood safety, public transportation, business/practice regulation, emergency preparedness, general accessibility, mental health, access to medical services, public health, and probably a ton of other things I can't think of right now.

All of that and more could be made much easier if we organized our cities with things like mixed-use-development, the standardization of public transport over personal vehicles, a grid structure, prioritizing walkability on surfaces safe for the disabled (sidewalks over cobblestone), designating districts for certain kinds of services, mandating better minimum (and maximum) size requirements for homes, requiring a certain percentage of greenery or some form of nature for every square footage, and other tactics that I'm probably not even aware of since I'm no city planner.

All of this gets shit on when land can be privately owned, though. Businesses, rich folks, the greedy, and the ignorant buy land without any planning in mind for their community which leads to disorganized, unoptimized, and community-unfriendly cities/towns. Our efforts should always generally lead to the betterment of our community over the selfish betterment of our private circumstances.

[macmanx]

And if you don't know where to start, the good folks at @organizeworkers are happy to help!

US labor is learning they have more value and more power with each union strike.

Collective bargaining and worker solidarity are the antidote to corporate tyranny and worker exploitation.

[dailyanarchistposts]

Abolishing Capitalism

None of these options are long-term solutions. We live in a civilization based on the separation of society into haves and have-nots. This cannot be allowed to continue.

The entirety of potential political and social structures don’t balance on the axis of capitalism (and democracy, somehow always lumped with capitalism) and state communism. Capitalists would love for you to believe that, of course, because state communism is so clearly a terrible idea; they would love for people to think capitalism is the only alternative to Stalinist atrocity.

Capitalism is an atrocity, however, as a quick survey will let us know. Capitalism (the idea of not working for your money, but instead siphoning the wealth produced by others) has led us to the very brink of planetary ecocide with its mindless search for profit (a feature included even in the dictionary definition!).

Many people have theorized ways of eradicating the rampant criminality of capitalism. Socialism isn’t actually a dirty word, and can mean a whole host of things, many of which are as far from Stalinism as a system could possibly be.

But the simplest one is this: we, as small communities (often overlapping ones), can make decisions for ourselves by the means we best see fit. We can feed and care for ourselves and each other. We can work in ways that make us happy, we can work for projects that actually concern us. If we don’t let the ruling class rule us, we won’t be ruled. If you ask me, I’d call this system anarchism. Other people might call it different things like autonomism or horizontalism or just decentralization, direct democracy, or common sense.

But in order to do this, we have to take back the means of production. The rich have the things they have because they are dirty stinking thieves, whether they know it or not.

just a friendly word from some anarchists

[ahb-writes]

(from Inside Job, S1E04: "Sex Machina")

[birdears]

i dont think u can overstate how much i need to fuck chilchuck tims

[macmanx]

And, once you reach this realization, @organizeworkers can help:

when the media uses phrases like “the union is demanding higher pay” they want you to think hey wait i wish i got paid better you’re telling me these whiny writers are refusing to work? i’m way worse off than them and i still go in to work every day!

they want you to stop there and stew in your resentment instead of following the logic forward to hey maybe if i had a union i would have better pay!

and they say stuff like “working conditions” for the same reason because they know it conjures the image of a sweatshop or something and you’re like well that’s absurd writers work in offices how bad could it be they don’t have “working conditions”

they want you to stop there and stew in your resentment because you also work in an office instead of thinking about what the word “conditions” means and whether you are allowed to take off work to be with your newborn child

don’t be fooled by this shit. don’t buy into the idea that people work in any field solely for the love of the game yes even when it’s a literal game (writers work on those too). work is work! money can be exchanged for goods and services!

[feartoxinjelloshot]

thinking of doing a starfire design for fun bc shes the teen titan who i have the most design ideas about. i see so many good starfire redesigns every day & i eat them like candy & they inspire me