From: zeleny@husc10.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books,talk.politics.misc,talk.politics.theory
Subject: Freely Negotiated Contracts (was re: Homophobia)
Date: 12 Jan 93 08:01:02 GMT
Article-I.D.: husc3.1993Jan12.030103.19233
Organization: The Phallogocentric Cabal

In article <1993Jan12.043836.6227@Princeton.EDU>
roger@astro.princeton.edu (Roger Lustig) writes:

>In article <1993Jan11.230134.19209@husc3.harvard.edu>
>zeleny@husc10.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:

>>roger@astro.princeton.edu (Roger Lustig) writes:

>>>zeleny@husc10.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:

>>>>roger@astro.princeton.edu (Roger Lustig) writes:

>>>>>msmorris@watsci.UWaterloo.ca (Mike Morris) writes:

MM:
>>>>>>What is so wrong about letting the employment contract be freely negotiable
>>>>>>between both parties? 

RL:
>>>>>Can you say "horse and rabbit stew"?  When the employer has thousands of
>>>>>times more resources, the freedom in the negotiations is entirely his/hers.

MZ:
>>>>Pardon me for insinuating myself into this exceedingly polite discussion,
>>>>but hasn't the ever-so-aptly named Roger ever heard about unions?

RL:
>>>I sure have.

MZ:
>>Then, perhaps, you would be kind enough to retract your utterly
>>groundless claim that, "[w]hen the employer has thousands of times
>>more resources, the freedom in the [labor] negotiations is entirely
>>his/hers"?

RL:
>Why?  The If-Then statement holds whether unions exist or not!  

You are being disingenuous.  If your conditional statement is to be
taken as a meaningful reply to Mike Morris, the implication is that
you are supplying a reason for answering him in the negative, and so
assumeing the antecedent condition to obtain.

RL:
>Now, if there is a union in play, then the ratio is not 1000-1 or
>whatever, but this is not always the case.

However, it is very often the case.  Now, would you care to return to
the original question?

RL:
>Speaking of begged questions, how did unions come about?  That's right,
>through government intervention.  Until the government recognized the
>right to organize, workers did so at the risk of losing their jobs or
>worse.  See under "Pinkerton."  Or "Anaconda."  Or even "UAW."

Say what?  The government, at length, elected to *tolerate* organized
labor.  Methinks you ought to go back to your college history books.
One big hint: it all started in Europe, in 1848.

RL:
>>>	      I also know that, in times past, private armies were 
>>>raised to put them down, that just twenty years before I was born
>>>major violent battles were fought by organizers, and that it took
>>>a fair amount of governmental intervention to stop this.  Recently
>>>the government has again taken up the cause of union-busting.

MZ:
>>All the more reason to emphasize the merits of unions in contractual
>>negotiations of employment terms.

RL:
>No kidding!  But remember that the establishment of unions has historically
>occurred only under circumstances which Mike disapproves of.

What nonsense.  "Whatever is not forbidden, is permitted", has always
been the rule of the legitimist worker movements.  On the other hand,
there was also the dynamite.  Keep in mind that _laissez-faire_ comes
hand in hand with _laissez abattre_.  With your pantywaist politics,
this country would still be in thrall of the oligarchy.  Not that the
present, mediocratic state is much of an improvement...

>Roger

cordially,
mikhail zeleny@husc.harvard.edu
"Le cul des femmes est monotone comme l'esprit des hommes."