On Sun, 12 Nov 2000 19:19:58 GMT, johanw@vulcan.xs4all.nl (Johan Wevers) wrote:

>Rod Keller <rkeller@voicenet.com> wrote:
>>"Out of town agitators for the IATSE (stage hands) union showed up and
>>threw up an illegal 'organizing' picket line. This is against the National
>>Labor Relations Board rules. Without ever once asking for a meeting with
>>us, they struck our non-Union film and refused to let their twelve union
>>members cross the picket line.
>
>Is this some strange US law, that unions can tell their members where to
>work and where not to? Seems that the freedom one has in the US can be
>signed away easily with Stalinian contracts. Fortunately for me, such
>contract rules would be illegal here.
Well, yes, unions do have the right to protest non-union work sites in the US. It's all part of free speech.

The thing that is different about the way THIS job site was attacked is that the union workers had obtained permission from the union to work on it, and the workers themselves DID NOT support the picketing of their job site.

Sometimes union workers will work on a non-union contract, and sometimes at or near the end of the contract, they will strike in order to get union benefits. This is not all that infrequent. The situation in THIS case was different. The union workers on the job did not support the union pickets. In fact, their union, which had given the OK to work on the project, suddenly decided that it was OK to harm their own members in order to attack the production. THAT is very unusual. Unions do not usually decide to hurt their own membership in order to attack a production, and usually when they picket, it's part of a process to help their members get benefits that the members want. In this case, the pickets seem to be aimed at shutting down the production rather than at helping the union members.

The question that comes up is WHY did the union suddenly decide to hurt their own members. The circumstances show that the "church" was protesting this production, then suddenly they stopped and the union took over. To a reasonable person (yeah, I know, "being reasonable" is a "crime" in scientology) it would appear that there was outside influence in what happened here. While the criminal cult continues to hide the source of that influence, it's pretty clear by the circumstances where it came from.

Another "big win"[tm] for Scientology. They not only managed to make things difficult for an "enemy", they managed to make the attack appear to come from a different source. Unfortunately, like most attacks from the cult, this one was transparent enough that the source of it is obvious.

- Brent

there was NO "big win"for the cult because we replaced those that were forced to walk and FINISHED the movie in spite of it all (which of course upset the cult and FARTS to the max). To this day, Mary De"Gross" continues to call our crew members...our crew in turn calls us to laugh about the insanity of these jackals. PS. We have maintained wonderful relations with all that had to leave the day of the strike,thus,the cult cowards lost all the way around.

Best Regards, Patricia Greenway

>On 13 Nov 2000 02:20:22 GMT, tfcvp@aol.com (TFC VP) wrote:
>>>The question that comes up is WHY did the union suddenly decide to hurt
>>>their own members. The circumstances show that the "church" was
>>>protesting this production, then suddenly they stopped and the union
>>>took over. To a reasonable person (yeah, I know, "being reasonable" is
>>>a "crime" in scientology) it would appear that there was outside
>>>influence in what happened here. While the criminal cult continues to
>>>hide the source of that influence, it's pretty clear by the circumstances
>>>where it came from.
>>>
>>>Another "big win"[tm] for Scientology. They not only managed to make
>>>things difficult for an "enemy", they managed to make the attack appear
>>>to come from a different source. Unfortunately, like most attacks from
>>>the cult, this one was transparent enough that the source of it is
>>>obvious.
>>>
>>
>>Well, Brent, you're very astute in your description of this. The good news is:
>>there was NO "big win"for the cult because we replaced those that were forced
>>to walk and FINISHED the movie in spite of it all (which of course upset the
>>cult and FARTS to the max). To this day, Mary De"Gross" continues to call our
>>crew members...our crew in turn calls us to laugh about the insanity of these
>>jackals. PS. We have maintained wonderful relations with all that had to leave
>>the day of the strike,thus,the cult cowards lost all the way around.
>Do I understand you guys correctly? Did this "Union" force their
>members off the production? (I see the phrase "had to leave" used
>above...)
>
>I cannot fathom any way any worker in my country could be "forced" out
>of working for his/her employer by his fellows (which presumably
>constitute a "union" with him/her).
>
>What happens when a worker chooses to cross a picket line in the US
>today? Will he get shot, as in the old days?
If the worker crosses an official picket line, he may lose his union membership and be "shunned" by fellow union members. Since in many cases, it's the union that gets the call for workers on a job, a union worker who crosses picket lines is likely to find himself out of work.

I know that, for example (since I do TV camera work as a hobby), the call for work that I've gotten for Raiders/49ers football games comes from the union rep. The TV network calls the union, and the union calls people to work the game.

Making the attack on "enemies" appear to come from somewhere else is "scripture" of the "church". Hubbard knew that this was an effective tactic. Somehow getting union workers to attack other union workers, while the "church" sits by and laughs, must seem to the goons at the "church" to have been an "effective blow against the enemy".

Unfortunately for them, the production wasn't stopped, and we'll all get to see the results. Anybody want to place bets on whether "The Profit" gets more viewers than either of Travolta's last two movies?

>Sometimes I wonder about this "total freedom" that the $cientologists
>try to sell. Perhaps there is some sense of "value" in that, if you
>live in the US?
>>Best Regards,
>>Patricia Greenway
>Groeten,
>Boudewijn.

However, the fact is that most work for film crew is union. Some is not. "The Profit" chose to be non-union, and the union workers got permission to work the film. Then the union pulled an illegal strike with less than 2 weeks left to shoot, which was a critical time for the production but also meant that there was little time to mount a court battle regarding the illegality of the picket, without stopping production...so by the time the courts even considered this case, the film shoot was over and any injuntion that may have been issued would have been moot.

And "moot" is also a word that describes how effective IATSE was in stopping this film. All they succeeded in accomplishing was costing the union workers on the project their last 2 weeks of pay.

M Johan Wevers wrote:

> Rod Keller <rkeller@voicenet.com> wrote:
> >"Out of town agitators for the IATSE (stage hands) union showed up and
> >threw up an illegal 'organizing' picket line. This is against the National
> >Labor Relations Board rules. Without ever once asking for a meeting with
> >us, they struck our non-Union film and refused to let their twelve union
> >members cross the picket line.
> Is this some strange US law, that unions can tell their members where to
> work and where not to? Seems that the freedom one has in the US can be
> signed away easily with Stalinian contracts. Fortunately for me, such
> contract rules would be illegal here.
>
> --
> ir. J.C.A. Wevers // Physics and science fiction site:
> johanw@vulcan.xs4all.nl // http://www.xs4all.nl/~johanw/index.html
> PGP/GPG public keys at http://www.xs4all.nl/~johanw/pgpkeys.html

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