Environmentalism Needs to be Tolerant of Scepticism: Freeman Dyson
Posted by jennifer, January 2nd, 2009 - under Opinion.
Tags: Philosophy
“THERE is a worldwide secular religion which we may call environmentalism, holding that we are stewards of the earth, that despoiling the planet with waste products of our luxurious living is a sin, and that the path of righteousness is to live as frugally as possible. The ethics of environmentalism are being taught to children in kindergartens, schools, and colleges all over the world.
“Environmentalism has replaced socialism as the leading secular religion. And the ethics of environmentalism are fundamentally sound. Scientists and economists can agree with Buddhist monks and Christian activists that ruthless destruction of natural habitats is evil and careful preservation of birds and butterflies is good. The worldwide community of environmentalists—most of whom are not scientists—holds the moral high ground, and is guiding human societies toward a hopeful future. Environmentalism, as a religion of hope and respect for nature, is here to stay. This is a religion that we can all share, whether or not we believe that global warming is harmful.
“Unfortunately, some members of the environmental movement have also adopted as an article of faith the belief that global warming is the greatest threat to the ecology of our planet. That is one reason why the arguments about global warming have become bitter and passionate. Much of the public has come to believe that anyone who is skeptical about the dangers of global warming is an enemy of the environment. The skeptics now have the difficult task of convincing the public that the opposite is true. Many of the skeptics are passionate environmentalists. They are horrified to see the obsession with global warming distracting public attention from what they see as more serious and more immediate dangers to the planet, including problems of nuclear weaponry, environmental degradation, and social injustice. Whether they turn out to be right or wrong, their arguments on these issues deserve to be heard.”
*************
From ‘The Question of Global Warming’ by Freeman Dyson, http://www.nybooks.com/contents/20080612
Freeman Dyson has spent most of his life as a professor of physics at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton.
Photograph of the pond and waterfall was taken near Wentworth Falls in the Blue Mountain by Jennifer Marohasy in 2008.
Well P O’Connor – farmers as nouveau environmentalists doesn’t pass the giggle test either.
After 200 years of land degradation and resource rundown you’re now doing some boutique reveg and fencing – well whoopty doo.
Don’t worry mate – it’s just our tax dollars propping you up. Farmers are so sceptical that they need billions in drought aid over decades – and YOU’RE SCEPTICAL – ROTFL !
you pathetic little man Luke!
SJT: ““Faith” is the ability to believe in something for which there is no evidence.”
Where’s the evidence that the glorified random number generators, aka GCM’s, can accurately predict the climate?
Sod: “we are currently DOUBLING the amount of that “tiny2 thing in the atmosphere. think about it!”
No we are not. In any case, 2 X very little = very little. Double the amount of rainfall in the Sahara and nobody would notice.
OTOH, halve the amount of atmospheric CO2 and plantlife would start dying out on a massive scale.
Curtis, Charles Sturt University, did research in the Goulburn/Broken Catchment and found that most of the Landcare type work was done by the larger landowners, not the hobby farmers who one would think had the spare money and the Green leanings.
here is a piece by Curtis:
http://www.gbcma.vic.gov.au/downloads/MGRiverHealthReport/Management_of_water_ways_and_adjoining_land_in_the_Mid-Goulburn_River.pdf
There were significant relationships between adoption of CRP, including fencing erected and number of trees/shrubs planted and involvement in government programs. Given the relatively low rate of implementation of fencing and the low level of confidence in fencing-related CRP, the research team raises the concern that there may be limited implementation of this, and possibly other CRP, outside direct program investment by government.
land owners protect the river side, when the government PAYS for it. simple truth. your source. again.
Luke: “And yes the AGW climate science continues on despite the best efforts…..”
Of course it would, with governments propping it up with massive amounts of taxpayers (our) money.
“you can drown in too much water”
You’re talking the difference between 0.04% and 100%
“too much salt will also kill you.”
A massive increase in salt intake will kill you, however too little salt will kill you just as effectively.
“Where’s the evidence that the glorified random number generators, aka GCM’s, can accurately predict the climate?”
Read the IPCC reports. GCM’s are only a part of the case for AGW, and they are tested against known temperature records.
P O’Connor
With Luke and sod as examples of mainstream environmentalists, farmers are to the 21st Century what Jews were to the Nazis. No such thing as a good …
We commit crimes against the environment if we feed our critics, and crimes against humanity if we do not.
SJT: “…and they are tested against known temperature records.”
And (continually) adjusted with ‘fudge factors’ AFTER THE FACT.
Show me ONE model which actually PREDICTED the current decade’s stasis/downturn in global temps.
Luke:
“-its just our tax dollars propping you up”
You wouldn’t by any chance be in the employ of da gummint somewhere, because if your job is blogging, does that really contribute to the weath of the nation?
Wow! Guys, I produced 30 blog posts today. Just might flog a few to some, err, farmers.
The Bird’s on to you! The new economic paradigm could involve the letting go of Luke. Sorry maate, ever tried fencing, marking sheep, rattling a can, farting in a jar?
WJP, now that was funny! “Sorry maate, ever tried …, rattling a can, farting in a jar?” May I ask have you? And why?
Well you pseudo-sceptics are a hoot – there’d be more tax dollars propping up Birdy as he wastes his time with faux attempts at elections. He would have tried harder but he was on shift work – hohoho ho ho
I guess you rednecks would be the handful that voted for him. You’re probably angry that you couldn’t get any further to the right ….
Anyway – excuse me if I’m sceptical about farmers being “environmentalists” – let’s see massive soil erosion, soil acidity, salinity, woody weeds galore, and feral pests – vast injections ongoing of tax dollars in drought aid and landcare – and for what improvement? I’m SCEPTICAL – LOLZ !!!
But golly we after 200 years we thought we’d fence a bit that’s left off.
Sod,
Secular religion is a “contradiction in terms” but in this context it is more likely an oxymoron, which is a contradiction used intentionally for rhetorical effect. So I can live with that.
As to the claim that many sceptics are also environmentalists, I can attest to that (I being one of them) but it is also true that many right wing people detest the environmental movement, and they are often the same people that have jumped on the bandwagon of climate scepticism.
Sod says : “there is a strange correlation between being a sceptic scientists and being the age were people tend to get slightly senile. FACT.”
Since when are “strange correlations FACTS? With equal resoluteness I could claim there is a strange correlation between gullibility and global warming alarmism. And then claim it as FACT.
Secular religion is a “contradiction in terms” but in this context it is more likely an oxymoron, which is a contradiction used intentionally for rhetorical effect. So I can live with that.
i could live with that as well. the problem is, that the term actually is the only evidence, that Dyson has. and at that point, the contradiction becomes problematic.
As to the claim that many sceptics are also environmentalists, I can attest to that (I being one of them) but it is also true that many right wing people detest the environmental movement, and they are often the same people that have jumped on the bandwagon of climate scepticism.
well, i would (carefully) claim to be an environmentalist as well. but the claim was about “passionate environmentalists”.
now a greenpeace activist would be the first person on my mind, who fits that term. most people don t, and surely NOT “many sceptics”.
Since when are “strange correlations FACTS? With equal resoluteness I could claim there is a strange correlation between gullibility and global warming alarmism. And then claim it as FACT.
strange correlations are facts, as are less surprising correlations. here is my offer: i ll name you one old “sceptic scientist”, for every sceptical passionate environmentalist you name me
luke, little Will and silly sod and the rest of the AGW advocates still do not address the issue I raised above; that issue is this; AGW is based on the idea that there is a best natural state [eden] which is made inferior and reduced in value by man’s activity; 2 questions emerge from this:
The first is, what is that ideal state which is despoiled by mankind?
The second is, what is an acceptable intrusion/disruption by mankind of that ideal state?
cohenite “AGW is based on the idea that there is a best natural state [eden] which is made inferior and reduced in value by man’s activity…”
the AGW lads should come up to Canada right now and experience how far we have moved from Eden. This is without a doubt the coldest winter in a long time. In December, we had more snow than we’ve had for 40 years, back in the good old days when winters were colder.
I’ve heard all the arguments about trends, and how one bad winter is meaningless. Maybe if those types were here right now they’d get it that theory is theory and that actuality is something else. I heard some idiot claiming the other day that the snow was a product of global warming. Yeah, right!! What about the cold required to produce the snow…is that a product of global warming as well? And where does the cold come from in Canada? Why, it comes from the Arctic, where all the warming is taking place.
It’s in the – 30’s C in the Canadian prairies right now, which is not unseasonably cold, but it demonstrates exactly what the 0.6 C ‘average’ global warming means. Nothing!!
Lukes pathetic attempt at analysis is this?
“….Anyway – excuse me if I’m sceptical about farmers being “environmentalists” – let’s see massive soil erosion, soil acidity, salinity, woody weeds galore, and feral pests – vast injections ongoing of tax dollars in drought aid and landcare – and for what improvement? I’m SCEPTICAL – LOLZ !!!..”
If you own something you look after it. That is why private property ownership is a cornerstone of our economic success over the last 400 years.
If everyone owns something no-one cares and it is used and abused. How many national parks are looked after and cared for? Very few.
sod “are you guys trying to showcase your lack of understanding of CO2? yes, mankind is currently doubling it. yes, it will have an effect”.
cohenite is trying to point out that man is doubling only his contribution, which is about 3% of all CO2 in the atmosphere. The other 97% comes from Mother Earth…from the oceans and the land. Even though we have supposedly doubled our contribution, that 97% has barely budged. Roy Spencer puts it more succinctly. We humans contribute 1 molecule of CO2 to 100,000 molecules of air EVERY FIVE YEARS. That’s based on the IPCC CO2 density of 380 ppmv. What they don’t tell you is that 97% of that 380 ppmv is natural CO2, not man made.
Those figures come from the IPCC itself, as cohenite has pointed out. It is you who is showcasing his lack of understanding of CO2 by hanging onto a doubling of essentially nothing. Ask yourself what the variability is in the 97% that comes from natural sources.
J. Hansford “… In my opinion it is better handled within the idea of Christian compassion…”
I am not arguing against your Christian statements, so please don’t take what I am saying in that vein. I do take issue with your statement about ‘Christian compassion’, however, as if it is different than natural compassion. We humans are born with the capacity for love and compassion and Christians are only one group who try to express that. Love and compassion are part of our intelligence, which operates separately from our normal conscious thought process. In other words, we have the capacity for intelligent action, like love and compassion, but we often override it with learned thought processes and experiences.
This notion of environmentalism as a religion came to me originally from Michael Crichton. I took exception to Freeman Dyson railing against socialism, seeing socialists as being behind the global warming hysteria. That position from Dyson suggested a lack of compassion from him and I commented to that effect in my long retort. Michael Crichton, on the other hand, I regarded as a sensitive, compassionate man. His comments about environmentalists was far more intelligent than what I read in Dyson’s comments. Crichton practiced what he preached, being environmentally conscious himself.
With regard to environmentalism as a religion, I have been unkind to those genuinely religious people who live a life based on compassion by inferring that all religious people are zealots. I certainly did not mean that.
As J. Krishnamurti and the theoretical physicist David Bohm pointed out in their dialogs, the root meaning of ‘religious’, is ‘to be serious’. To practice anything religiously is to practice it seriously. As J. Hansford pointed out, compassion is a basis of Christianity, but one would find that hard to accept when observing the practices of certain religious people. Compassion is a feeling that comes when we observe the plight or the struggles of another, whether human or animal. It cannot exist in the ego-state, where the focus is on our own needs and desires.
When I refer to environmentalist as religious fanatics, I’m refering to those religious types who force their belief systems on others to the exclusion of compassion. They have no feelings for others, and no tolerance. In this global warming debacle, top scientists such as James Hansen, and David Suzuki, here in Canada, have suggested people be jailed for being skeptical of the popular global warming paradigm. Greenpeace goes out of its way to break the laws in countries and rub peoples’ noses in their skepticism. I find that little different than the practices of certain religions where people are ostracized for failing to believe in a particular brand of religion. How one can proffer to be serious and compassionate, yet turn his/her back on another for essentially nothing, is beyond me.
I’m sure there are environmentalists who have compassion for others but I’m not hearing any of them speaking out. Just as no scientists from the HIV/AIDS school of thought stepped forward to protest the cruel treatment of Peter Duesberg for his skepticism, no AGW advocates are stepping forward to protest insensitivity towards global warming skeptics. That’s part of the reason why I see them as being akin to religious fanatics.
SJT flapped: “The only reason there is so much extra CO2 in the atmosphere is our burning fossil fuels.”
and you knew this how????
any evidence for this giant leap of logic?
because Hansen and the IPCC said so???
must be some version of Papal infallibility operating here? yes?
CoRev: “Now that was funny….”
,
I was merely suggesting some career options for Luke should his luck run out. Haven’t we all faced a bit of adversity from time to time and dare I say disappointment?
And yes I’ve done fair share of fencing of the barb wire kind, and no matter careful you might be, you never escape unscathed. I’ve marked heaps of cattle (as in de-bulling), sheep are a special case in that, oops ( watch out Luke! don’t swallow that one!). As for rattling a can, we are forever being accosted by street corner fund raising critters, who are not averse to abusing non donators. And farting in a jar is the ultimate in recycling, bit inconvenient, but hey, it’s the cause!
[...] Denialist Church of True Believers If you believe the folks at Jennifer Marohasy’s environmental blog, Anthropogenic Global Warming has been thoroughly [...]
Dear Jennifer and commentators,
In Australia we use Australian English not American English. Therefore we spell “sceptical” with a “c” and not with a “k” as the Yanks do in “skeptical”.
And yes AGW is certainly a secular religion with the non-scientist Al Gore as High Priest and non-climatologist Tim Flannery as an acolyte. Both of them are doing ever so nicely from promoting their snake oils that Mr Gore recently made a $35million investment in his own name with an Investment Bank in the USA as well as buying a huge gas guzzling motor-yacht. All this when he had only $2million registered in total assets when he campaigned for the US presidency some 8 years ago. He also now has several mansions which are continuously floodlit at night. All aboard the gravy train!!!
There is a new film coming out in 2009 that clearly demonstrates the link between environmentalists’ efforts to prevent DDT from being used in developing nations and an increase in malaria related deaths. The film’s title is Not Evil Just Wrong.
To view a preview of the film, visit the following website and click on link on the
link that says “Must See Film of 09.”
http://www.hootervillegazette.com
Documentary films such as this usually do not get the publicity they deserve. There are concerns that environmentalist will attempt to have this film banned in many area. Please help us get the word out. Thank You!
The Hooterville News
Gordon Robertson January 4th, 2009 at 9:19 am
You just demonstrated your complete lack of understanding of the CO2 cycle.
The best estimates I’ve seen are that human caused CO2 is about 3.5 to 4% of the total that goes into the atmosphere each year. Roughly half of that amount is the extra CO2 that stays in the atmosphere each year currently. Of course that does not mean that half the human generated CO2 stays in the atmosphere, just that the natural systems for whatever reason cannot sink all of the extra human caused amount, hence the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is increasing. Now it may be that warmer oceans are releasing some dissolved CO2 or that other natural sinks are not working as effectively as previously or it may be that the rate of production of human generated CO2 is greater than the natural sinks can cope with. In any case the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is increasing and if we burn enough coal ,oil and gas will likely double.
The issue is what this will do. We have estimates that range from very little to catastrophic with the catastrophic end depending on a string of assumptions of dubious veracity.
Then we must decide on a response. There does not seem to be any large scale evidence that our technological civilisation can survive with drastic cuts in energy use so the problem becomes one of finding alternate sources of energy that do not depend on burning oil or coal. If you really, really believe CO2 is a problem you should be campaigning for a large scale urgent program to replace coal burning power stations with nuclear power stations. Wind and solar don’t cut it.
As for your love of unions, I’ve been a member of a couple in my time for a short while. Can’t say it did me any good but I’m sure some union officials were making a nice living.
You have of course seen the bank accounts of your union leaders and their families and so can make the statement that the union is clean.
The UAW seems to be doing their members a lot of good, no? Likely negotiate them out of a job by crashing the business. Nice!
As for where I found out about unions – by reading the papers. We had one union “running through ” businesses in Victoria a few years ago causing damage and intimidation, in another case a small business with no union members working there was picketed and prevented from operating to try to force its employees to join the union. It wasn’t so long ago the Australian waterfront was cleaned up after years of unconscionable rorts which put up costs for eveyone in the country.
Do you seriously think that anyone would take any notice of a union if there wasn’t the intimidation and not so subtle threat of violence which the police will do nothing about in this country?
SJT and Eyrie:
What, then, caused natural CO2 sources and natural CO2 sinks to track each other so closely as to keep atmospheric CO2 levels more-or-less constant over the hundreds or thousands of years before man started burning fossil fuels?
Robust answers, please.
To view a preview of the film, visit the following website and click on link on the
link that says “Must See Film of 09.”
http://www.hootervillegazette.com
Documentary films such as this usually do not get the publicity they deserve. There are concerns that environmentalist will attempt to have this film banned in many area. Please help us get the word out. Thank You!
i urge everyone to watch the trailer of this on youtube. it makes the claim that scientists are inventing catastrophic scenarios. (funny, they don t.)
on the other hand, the film (and denialists in general) nearly ALWAYS talk about the catastrophes that would follow a minor reduction in CO2 output.
(you will notice how cheap and bad the film is when watching it. “normal people respond to al Gore”. very useful part of the scientific debate!)
Weeping whilikers; sod, you can’t be real; admit it, you’re a committee.
Peter; “Robust answers, please.” That’s a bit unreasonable when you’re assertions are hardly robust; consider;
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_TDdxO2FHJPs/SQ2wsVEvoxI/AAAAAAAAACs/DGM5SR0OWWQ/s1600-h/Sea-level_Ice_Temperatures_CO2_20ka_Graph.png
Or this;
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/eemian.html
Or this;
http://www.junkscience.com/images/paleocarbon.gif
Whenever I hear anyone use the term “social justice” these days, I’m certain that I’m reading an idiot. People who talk about abstract, relatavistic and opinion based concepts like “social justice” as though they had real and objectively based existence make me shudder. I fear them as much as people must have feared church inquisitions in the middle ages. While Dyson correctly identifies environmentalism as a new secular religion, he seems to be blind to the secular religion within his own world view.
SJT “The fact that you and others have fallen for Spencers deliberately misleading logic just shows how dishonest he is in this debate”.
What is misleading about taking IPCC figures and breaking them down into visualizations we can understand? Gore went the opposite route, trying to terrify people with gigatons of CO2 being emitted and no mention that 50% is absorbed right off the bat. He failed to point out that gigatons are not even as spit in the ocean compared to the size and mass of the atmosphere (The average mass of the atmosphere is about 5 quadrillion metric tons). A quadrillion is 10 to the 15th power; a billion is 10 to the 9th power.
Spencer took IPCC figures and painted a picture of what it actually means in molecules. It was the IPCC revealed that anthropogenic CO2 is only a fraction of the natural CO2 produced by our lands and oceans. They actually used those words in AR4. They also provided a graph that cohenite linked to. It was the US Department of Energy that made the IPCC graph into a table. What was the IPCC hiding by not providing a table and percentages? Using the IPCC graph and/or the DOE table, one can easily calculate that man-made CO2 is about 3% of all CO2 produced. Why were they trying to keep that from us?
The IPCC also spat out the CO2 atmospheric density of 380 ppmv. They did not explain anywhere I have seen that the 380 ppmv represents the 97% natural CO2 + the 3% man-made CO2. In other words, man is adding about 11.4 parts of CO2 per million parts of air. All Spencer did was convert the parts per million to molecules per million, which is very basic science.
He subdivided the 380 molecules per million of air to 38 molecules of CO2 per 100,000 molecules of air, using simple math and dividing by 10. Then he multiplied the 38 molecules by the average increase of CO2 in the atmosphere due to man, which is about 0.6% per year. That came to 0.228 molecules of CO2 per 100,000 molcules of air. To get a round number, he multiplied by 5 to get 1 molecule of CO2 added by man to 100,000 molecules of air EVERY FIVE YEARS.
Where is the dishonesty in that? Spencer took IPCC number and broke them down into units that could be mentally visualized. Anyone with a science background knows you could get 100,000 molecules of CO2 on the head of a pin, but how many pinheads of air are there in the atmosphere. That’s the whole point.
Gore wants us to freak out because several billion tons of CO2 have been put into the atmosphere by humans. Several billion tons is still 3% of the total number of billion tons put in the atmosphere by the lands and oceans.
If the 97% of existing, natural CO2 did not create global warming, how is it possible for an additional few percent added by man to create a problem? If anyone is misleading anyone here, it’s the IPCC, Al Gore and all the AGW advocates who play with big number without telling the whole story.
Bushie from Burnet “In Australia we use Australian English not American English. Therefore we spell “sceptical” with a “c” and not with a “k” as the Yanks do in “skeptical”.
Hey, Bushie…wouldn’t that make the pronounciation ’septical’, as in septic tank? We know a sceptre is pronounced ’septre’, although Scottish is Skottish. It has a lot to do with the kind of vowel that follows. Usually an ’sc’ in English, followed by a soft vowel, like ‘e’, make the ’sc’ soft (scene, sceptre, science), whereas following a hard vowel it becomes hard (scab, scant, Scot, scum, scorn).
I hate to tell you this, but your derivation comes from French and Latin. Since Canada is bilingual (French and English), we Anglos have had it up to hear with French being shoved down our throats. Most of us have nothing against the French (Quebecois) it’s the legislation requiring both French and English be used on many things. If you don’t mind, I’ll stick to the Yank version, and be skeptical.
I hope you don’t spell ’sketch’ as ’scetch’. :-)
Eyrie “In any case the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is increasing and if we burn enough coal ,oil and gas will likely double”.
I understand your carbon cycle ‘theory’ perfectly well. If you look at the DOE table 3, page 26 here:
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/FTPROOT/environment/057304.pdf
It’s all laid out for you. This data applies to the 1990’s, but even in AR4, that’s the best you’ll get from the IPCC as well. They seem to have forgotten to update.
The DOE tells us 11700 MMT of CO2 were added to the atmosphere per year. That’s about 11700/793100 = 1.5% per year. Spencer uses the figure 0.6% per year and you’d have to ask him about that. As a scientist, I’m sure he’ll have his reasons. How many years will it take to double the CO2 in that case? That’s assuming all those figures are correct and that the carbon cycle operates as they claim it does.
According to Jaworowski, an expert on ice core proxy methods, the IPCC are corrupt. Even if he’s only half right, that’s not good news. We all saw what a mess they made of the hockey stick and how they tried to cover it up in AR4. He has questioned their figure of 270 ppmv of CO2 in the pre-Industrial era, claiming it could be 50% higher. Part of his reasoning is that ice under tremendous pressure, and methods used to extract it, remove a significant number of isotopes from the ice, so the CO2 density reads lower. If he’s right, or only partly right, what does that do to your carbon cycle? Jaworowski insists the IPCC cherry-picked the 270 ppmv value, ignoring other impelling data and theories
The IPCC used to spread innuendo about an imminent disaster, but this year they suggested there’s no hurry. That’s all I’m saying. I’m for reducing emissions, just not in a panic, where terrible mistakes could be made and where people could suffer economic hardships. Remember that CO2 is still a trace gas in the atmosphere at about 0.03%. Doubling it wont make much difference because the science behind it, based on computer models, is plain wrong. Considering that the atmosphere has a mass of several quadrillion metric tons, what difference do you think 11000 MMT per year will make over a century?
Spencer produced his 1 molecule of man-made CO2 added to 100,000 molecules of air every five years to demonstrate the magnitude of the problem. 11,700 MMT of CO2 per year sounds like an awful lot, but broken down, it’s 1 molecule of CO2 added to 100,000 molecules of air, every five years. That is part of your exponential carbon cycle.
With respect to unions, our leader is paid based on the journeyman rate. Our journeyman get about $65000 Canadian a year, meaning he is paid under $100,000 a year. I know the guy personally and have known him for 20 years. He doesn’t come across to me as the kind of sleazebag crook you have in mind.
Eyrie “Do you seriously think that anyone would take any notice of a union if there wasn’t the intimidation and not so subtle threat of violence which the police will do nothing about in this country”?
That’s the point you don’t seem to get. A unionist has nothing but the strike and his willingness to do what it takes to make that strike work. No one could stop Hitler with negotiations and unfortunately it came down to extreme violence to get the job done. If you rely only on negotiations, employers will play different games to put pressure on you. If they don’t think you’ll fight back, they’ll run all over you. They’ll ultimately use the courts, who will use the cops and fines to hurt you. Of course, the courts are run by laws which are passed by anti-union governments influenced by unscrupulous employers.
It’s a game, and the media plays its part by painting the unionists as gangsters or bikers. Of course, people like you buy into the media drivel and wont go talk to unionists to get their side of the story. I know there were crooked unions around and there still might be. I know workers have used unions to hide behind to get good money and do nothing to earn it. Those are not the unions or unionists I have come to know. Most of the jobs I have worked on are run by skilled guys who put in a good days work. The guys we work directly under, like A and B foremen, are union too, and they make sure you keep your nose to the grindstone. The part played by the union and the contract is to make sure they don’t push your face right into the grindstone on behalf of the employer.
I have worked non-union a significant protion of my life, and have not had a lot of complaints. Then again, I was working in a technical field where relationships were cordial between employer and employee. That’s not often the case on construction sites. For some reason, construction bosses tend to be pushy and insulting. I could not imagine enduring them without a contract and a union to back that contract, but even with both of those, life on a construction site is not always a piece of cake.
When you have your manhood insulted on an ongoing basis, only to drag your butt home, dead tired, and have to show up nexy day to do it again, you can become a little testy after a while. When your contract expires, and your employer starts treating you as a twit, offering you cuts in salary, benefits and conditions, and threatening you with scabs to replace you, violence can rear its ugly head. The media always blames it on the unionists and portrays them as troublemakers. Then again, what would you expect from some pussy who makes his living criticizing people and gets his job only because he kisses the butts of the employer creed?
I’m a contractor now, even though I keep up my union membership. I have always understood the employer’s point of view and needs, and have been willing to give a good days work for the dollar he pays me. I would never abide a slacker working for me or someone who wasn’t willing to earn his wage. At the same time, I don’t expect to pay a guy a salary he has trouble living on just so I can enjoy a higher style of living. The employers in our bargaining unit are all millionaires. They haven’t suffered in the least paying us union wages and benefits.