The WGA Strike or "stupid is as stupid does"

Okay, so now you all can hate me. This post will give you permission since I am about to seriously go against the grain of what most people hold sacred. That's right. I'm talking about unions.

Personally, I think unions are un-American. They go against the very essence of the constitution and the basic precepts of capitalism. It seems that, as Americans, we each have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We do NOT have the right to keep a lot of people out of work for the good of the few. No, that's a skewed GOP ideal that is typially used in tax reform to keep the rich, well, rich and the poor even poorer. Unions do the same thing. They fight for rights and profit shares for all their member, but most of the time, the fruition of those battles will only serve to benefit the very few elite personnel who have big paying jobs. It sucks, but rather than use that catch all to end this post (even though I want to stop writing now), I will elaborate.

In a nutshell, the WGA is on strike for two reasons. One, they want a cut/"profit participation" of internet sales from the product they wrote on. Two, they want a similar cut from DVD sales. All of this is being compared to the last big strike in the 1970's when they were lobbying for a cut of "cable" broadcast sales (this was when cable pretty much began in a formal way). Long story short, they didn't do too well then and, hence, suffered later (okay, so a very few amount of people suffered later, but they're all big shots now so they yell louder). The elite few in the WGA feel that this battle is similar to that one whereas, if they don't get what's coming to them now, they will all suffer later. WRONG!!!!

First of all, writers in the guild already get a share from DVD sales. They just want more. The rational? The studios are making billions on DVD sales and are only cutting writer's in to the tune of millions. They want more. This is not a union issue. It's a greed issue. If they wanted more, they should have asked for more in their contract when they did their deal in the first place. Just because they had a lame agent at William Morris doesn't mean thousands of people should go on strike. More so, this issue actually addresses very few writers. It's just the few weaslthy writers who are lucky to have screwed their way to the top (major network shows) who are all bent out of shape, but they guise it under the "we're standing up for the little guy" premise and that's where I have to draw the line.

You see, back in the day unions actually did some good. They fought against child labor, low wages for too much work and other well, let's say more universal issues that actually DID affect the common man. This WGA crap simply does NOT. In fact, it's the common man who suffers because of this strike, ie the young writer who is doing everything he/she can to make it in a dog eat dog kind of industry where 'who you know' and if you can make a joke every third line on a page is more important than good writing skills. Most of those "common" people barely eek out a living as writers, but because of this strike that won't cause them any benefit, they now can't work at all. But what about the future, I hear you thinking? Screw the future is what I say. To them , the future is whether they will be able to pay their rent or car payment that month. That's the reality, but as long as it's all for a good cause...oh yeah, it's not.

Here's what the writer's elite have forgot. They forgot they get paid thousands of dollars a week to write bad dialog for bad shows with no plots and barely a premise. But that's not good enough for them. They still need to make sure they get 3 cents for every show purchased off iTunes and about 4 or 5 times that (about 15 cents) more for every DVD sold. Now I get it. It's even more stupid than I originally thought.

Here's the deal, everyone. The writers who actually do have work should consider themselves lucky they're working at all because when their show gets canceled (because of the strike or if some sponsor deciding to support the troops), they may never work again and, if anything is a guarantee that a show will get canceled or the writers from a show will get replaced with non union workers, it's a strike. But perhaps there's a light at the end of this tunnel.

Given that most television shows are complete dribble and appeal to the senses of a 5 year old, this strike may prove to be just what the public needs. If everyone who is on strike gets fired, new writers will be hired and those "newbies" may actually be funny. Maybe we'll all laugh more when we watch the boob tube? Maybe we'll even get more meaning out of it. Who knows?

What I do know is that, while I remain a die hard liberal (and American) and am neither pro studio nor pro writer, I certainly wouldn't mind having something better to watch on TV.