Steeeeerike!

In the past 3 months I’ve had to deal with two strikes, the first I've ever had to deal with. When the GAs went on strike, I was initially ambivalent. No matter how much I felt that the United Auto Workers should have been saving people's jobs in Michigan rather than supporting the Grad students at NYU who were only marginally employed by NYU, I guess they had a right to unionize. But what I really objected to was being used as a pawn by both the GSOC and the University administration. I don't appreciate being made to feel like a scab by using the library or being asked to be a snitch by the administration and report which of my classes are meeting off campus. I still have a class meeting off campus this semester and no, J-Sex, I'm not going to tell you which one.

I've been told (accused, really) by several people that by not supporting the GSOC strike, I was a lipstick liberal. I am liberal; I am pro-union, but I also have a mind of my own and I'm not going to blindly support any cause that claims to have the same political leanings that I do.

I feel completely differently about the transit strike. Don't get me wrong, there is no love lost between me and the transit workers. In a city full of bad service, the transit workers are paragons of the laziness, rudeness and unprofessionalism that New Yorkers have come to expect, but in an economy where workers' rights and privileges are quickly being eroded, unions are more important than ever. The range of objections to the strike have been particularly suprising in a city full of alleged liberals. The elitism of people with post-graduate degrees objecting to having salaries less than those of the transit workers has been particularly disappointing. Social Security and Medicare are not retirement plans, and someone has to pick up the slack. If this means a few days of walking a few miles in the cold, New York should suck it up.

It's true that a few old and sick people were seriously inconvenienced by the strike, but the rest of New York was more insulted than injured. The story of a woman giving birth in a taxi has been pointed to repeatedly as an example of the havoc that the strike has caused, but in truth, women don't make it to the hospital all the time. This week it made the news. Most New Yorkers don't support the MTAs desicions closing of token booths and the one-person operation of trains, but they're obviously unwilling to do anything to keep that from happening.