Noam Chomsky on Institutional Stupidity

[Melchior]

All over the US! Right-to-work laws are being passed to open up these places.

Get your facts right, right-to-work laws are not about 'closed-shops', there are no 'closed-shops' in the US. These laws are about forcing unions to legally represent those who are not paying union dues, i.e. non-union members free-loading upon those who pay their dues. I can well understand how Chomsky opposes such a thing.

No, what happens is you have to pay dues even if you are not a member and want nothing to do with the unions.

[Arising_uk]

No, what happens is you have to pay dues even if you are not a member and want nothing to do with the unions.

Not disagreeing as it is your country but where do you get this from, as everything I read says closed-shops or union shops have been illegal since 1947 in the US? Whereas what I read about these 'right-to-work' rules are that they are to require the unions to legally represent those who are not members of the union, i.e. don't pay subs, if they have a union agreement in place with the employer.

[Melchior]

No, what happens is you have to pay dues even if you are not a member and want nothing to do with the unions.

Not disagreeing as it is your country but where do you get this from, as everything I read says closed-shops or union shops have been illegal since 1947 in the US? Whereas what I read about these 'right-to-work' rules are that they are to require the unions to legally represent those who are not members of the union, i.e. don't pay subs, if they have a union agreement in place with the employer.

No, not so far as I know. The 'right to work' laws, so far as I know, prevent unions from collecting dues from non-members.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-to-work_law

Basically, absent such a law, unions can make agreements with employers to compel employees to pay dues as a condition of employment.

[Hobbes' Choice]

The only question is whether Chomsky has the intellect of a slug or a snail. That he is a coward and a liar and a scumbag motherfucker goes without saying.

Idiot - you can't tell the difference between an argument and a row. I suppose a person with the brain of a flatworm, looking up at those a greater intellect, a slug is so far above you, that you can conceive of nothing higher.

So obviously a brain-dead idiot moron like yourself is best qualified to be able to judge.
Fuck off back to your Fox-News programming, like the automaton that you are.

You typify the ease with which the consent manufacturing media is able to convince and manipulate morons, like yourself, who can't wait to participate in their own exploitation.

I don't watch 'Fox' whatever that is. Is that something on television?

Yeah it's the rectangular thing, in your living room, with the pretty pictures that keep moving.

[Melchior]

Do you really think I watch TV? I hate TV (other than Perry Mason reruns).

[Wyman]

What's a good book to read by Chomsky? I know virtually nothing about his work and I hate having such huge holes in my education.

[Melchior]

What's a good book to read by Chomsky? I know virtually nothing about his work and I hate having such huge holes in my education.

You should do no such thing. It will rot your brain.

[Arising_uk]

What's a good book to read by Chomsky? I know virtually nothing about his work and I hate having such huge holes in my education.

Take your pick;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noam_Chomsky_bibliography

Chomsky is basically an anarcho-syndicalist or libertarian-socialist.

[Melchior]

What's a good book to read by Chomsky? I know virtually nothing about his work and I hate having such huge holes in my education.

Take your pick;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noam_Chomsky_bibliography

Chomsky is basically an anarcho-syndicalist or libertarian-socialist.

Now you see the violence inherent in the system!

[mickthinks]

Basically, absent such a law, unions can make agreements with employers to compel employees to pay dues as a condition of employment.

Like mandatory State Bar Associations, you mean?

[Melchior]

Basically, absent such a law, unions can make agreements with employers to compel employees to pay dues as a condition of employment.

Like mandatory State Bar Associations, you mean?

No, assembly workers are not licensed. There is no similarity. I am not sure whether lawyers should be licensed, but that is a separate issue. You are confused and confusing the issue.

[Wyman]

Bar associations and tests are for the protection of the public against substandard lawyers. Unions are for the protection of the workers from their bosses. The government naturally represents 'the public' since that is its primary function. Unions are not government entities - if they were, they would be created democratically - i.e. by an elected legislature. If the legislature creates a law by which union membership is mandatory, I have no problem with that. With right to work laws, apparently those legislatures chose the opposite course - what's the problem?

[Melchior]

Bar associations and tests are for the protection of the public against substandard lawyers. Unions are for the protection of the workers from their bosses. The government naturally represents 'the public' since that is its primary function. Unions are not government entities - if they were, they would be created democratically - i.e. by an elected legislature. If the legislature creates a law by which union membership is mandatory, I have no problem with that. With right to work laws, apparently those legislatures chose the opposite course - what's the problem?

It is impossible to reply to your response.

[Wyman]

I was replying to mcthinks. Sorry.

[Hobbes' Choice]

I was replying to mcthinks. Sorry.

If you hit the {"} quote button at the top right of the post you are responding to then people can figure out who you are talking to.