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Today's Document
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@tips-from-a-tech-worker
A tale of how one News & Star article drove me to discover that the Cumbrian news media landscape, and subsequentially the media landscape…
Not necessarily relating to union organising, but, I wrote this article to contain my thoughts after some reading around the local news landscape of my home county.
Hope it proves useful to someone!
Get trained. Get organising.
a short and scruffy essay attempting to pick apart some of the propaganda around "the police" as an organisation:
A babies first analysis of the Police Force.
coming over to here from bluesky to vaguepost about people over there lmao. there are so many people that call themselves "liberal" who are using as a synonym for "nice person" or "progressive".
"liberal", at least in a political sphere, refers to a specific ideological framework of "free markets", "right to private property", and "liberty" - which is a deliberately pretty vague concept. note that these are all principals that both major parties in the US political projects all venerate (in their own way to the people they deem rightfully deserving).
modern political projects tend to move away from the "small state, free market" approach, to a strong state which attempts to bring about market forces within more and more aspects of society. this is generally referred to as "neo-liberalism", and is the governing ideology of most western countries.
looking at US political parties again, and a great example of neo-liberal and liberal ideologies in practice, you might ask "well why do they disagree?" and the answer is pretty straightforward: on a lot of key issues, they don't disagree, and in fact reinforce one another on issues such as immigration (note that more people were deported per year under the biden and obama administrations than the first trump administration), foreign policy (see palestine vs israel, invasion of afghanistan, interference in political projects across the globe), economic policy (where both parties agree in broad strokes that private property and the "guiding hand of the free market" are gospel), and "security". largely they disagree on the minutiae. and where the democrats have pushed for a more "progressive" social policy, they have rolled these back quite rapidly on any criticism from their sister party.
similarly, looking at european politics, the EU has been constructed on the principal of neo-liberal marketization, pushing austerity and privatization policies on all its member states. and even states outside of the EU such as the UK and russia are largely governed by the primacy of private property and privatization.
all of this to say.. its all liberalism.. all the way down.. and its an ideological framework that, at least personally, i do not want to be near at all. privatisation and marketisation are two of the main reasons everything is getting increasingly worse for the working class, and to a lesser extend the petit-bourgeoisie. liberalism, and its children are actively harmful to the working class, be they minoritized, oppressed, or otherwise "othered".
i know some people who have called themselves "liberal" in the political sense, despite the fact they are anti-free-market, and incredibly anti-private-property. maybe its time to consider dropping that label and its associated political project(s).
this was very much an "on the fly" rant. there are probably points i could have made a lot clearer, but i largely just wanted to get this all out of my head because i saw someone i respect on bluesky dot com posting about how liberalism is really cool actually. despite being completely mistaken on what it was, that could have been resolved with a very very quick google search.
anyway fart fart, enjoy your day. join a union or a mutual aid organisation if you haven't already. and if there are none, gather some friends and start one up. it's probably way past the right time to do so...
Your boss and your landlord work together
As we see rents getting higher and pay completely stagnating we see an interesting interaction between our bosses and our landlords.
Fundamentally, your landlord charging you more in rent is good for your boss. In order to pay your higher rent, you will have to work more. Your boss will then leverage this, consciously or otherwise, to further exploit you for your labour.
You'll be "offered" overtime, often as a gesture of "goodwill", or even other work, often for horrifically low pay.
Here in the UK, landlords can request to see your income as a "guarantee" that you can pay your rent. They will then use this to argue that they can charge you a higher rent on your contract renewal. Of course, they were going to do that anyway, regardless of any increase in income.
Thankfully, there are ways that we can collectively fight back. Join a workplace union, and join a tenants union, and push back against these masters. There is plenty more than you can do, but I probably can't get away with saying it here...
They're working together, so can you.
Solidarity folks. <3
Personal post time again!
I'm fairly bad with opening up tumblr, but I have, after several years, finally figured out how Ko-fi works. I've set up a page there and will be posting updates on my organising zine series there (as well as here!).
Additionally, you can find ways to support me, and also buy some of my terrible art prints I have made.
Link here: https://ko-fi.com/henryishuman
I will be posting an update on part two of the organising 101 zine series soon!
Solidarity, folks. <3
You are not getting paid Kenough"
IWW (Industrial Workers of the World) sticker spotted in Devonshire, UK
today in "google AI is fucking useless because it hallucinates things that never happened", i bought a couple CVS thermometers that have both been acting up, tried to search if there had been a problem with the whole product line:
there is no record of this product recall. it did not happen. the date "feb 8 2024" is the date someone listed a thermometer for sale on ebay.
Google's trying to save you the time spent clicking on a site full of AI-generated SEO garbage by presenting the AI-generated garbage right up front! Such efficiency.
#so google probably uses chatgpt right? #because for some time now chatgpt has done this #become utterly insane and make up random bullshit #and nobody knows why
I was under the impression that we did know why: AI isn't actually a brain and can't actually think or understand information, so it has no concept of something being true or not, or what markers indicate truth or falsity, or how to synthesize information. It's putting a bunch of words in a jar, shaking the jar, and then dumping it out, and acting like that means the jar knows how to talk.
Like, in this case, OP asked for information about a recall. The AI knows that, throughout the entire internet, the word "recall" usually is surrounded by information like a date or a number, so it gives you a date and a number. It doesn't know what a date is or what it's for or what it means. (It also apparently doesn't know the difference between "recall" as in "removing a dangerous product from the shelves" and "recall" as in "remembering," since it smooshes the two together)
what's that thing again that you can put into ublock that blocks all the ai results from google?
On Github is The Huge AI Blocklist for UblockOrigin. You can import it, the linked ReadMe gives a description on howto.
[ID mostly by @homunculusalphonse : A photo of the Google search results for the phrase "cvs thermometers recall": "On February 8, 2024, CVS Health recalled its rigid tip digital thermometer with memory recall and fever alarm. The thermometers have a memory recall feature that stores the previous temperature. The item number for the recall is 375235991489." Both the links attached to this text are from eBay and Pinterest. This module does say "AI overviews are experimental", in much smaller font. /End ID]
The uBlockOrigin AI blocklist above is super helpful y’all.
Try this as well
https://udm14.com/
A quick way to get an AI-free search without any extra work.
I have redundancies at work just announced. Confused as hell. What can we do?
If you have a recognised union (or even an unrecognised one) that you are a member of, get in contact with them immediately. Odds are, if there is a mass redundancy, they will already know about it.
If there are more than 20 folks being made redundant, the redundancies are in one establishment, and the redundancies are being proposed in a 90 day period, then your employer is required by law to hold a collective consultation. Of course, quite often your employer will not know the law around this, and its worth arguing that you should have a collective consultation anyway. The consultation wont necessarily stop the redundancies, but it gives you time to plan.
Additionally, if anyone who is being made redundant is either pregnant, on maternity/paternity leave, or on adoption leave, then your employer must find alternate work for them if there is any available.
Your employer can only make people redundant if they have no more use for your role. If your employer is looking to use contractors, or alternate provisions to fulfil that role, you can make a fairly good argument that the dismissal is unfair or wrongful. Protections are weird in the UK around this if you haven't worked at a place for at least 2 years, but again with all of this, argue the point anyway.
Your employer probably wont know any of the law around redundancy and it is good to push that fact as a strategy. It is also very useful to be talking to all your co-workers in this process. Make sure everyone knows what is going on, their rights, and what you can all do collectively.
Ideally you will have done some workplace organising beforehand, but these things can happen unexpectantly.
Finally, if you do not have any union representation nearby, join a union as soon as you can (*cough* IWW *cough*). They may not be able to help you with something on such short notice, but it is another strategy to scare the boss shitless if they think you're going to be a problem for them.
See also: https://www.tumblr.com/tips-from-a-tech-worker/725120769477214208/how-do-i-improve-my-workplace?source=share
All of this information is available on the ACAS website, and you can contact them free of charge. Also recommend Citizens Advice as well. Sources used: - https://www.acas.org.uk/redundancy - https://www.acas.org.uk/your-rights-during-redundancy - https://www.acas.org.uk/redundancy-protection-for-pregnancy-and-new-parents - https://www.acas.org.uk/collective-consultation-redundancy - https://www.acas.org.uk/dismissals/unfair-dismissal - https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/work/redundancy/check-your-rights-if-youre-made-redundant/
Hope this helps!
*sigh* this is a kink account. I have 100% just fed into that kink. It's half 9 in the morning. I am tired. ;-;
If you're going to do this then tip me at the very least. :|
I have redundancies at work just announced. Confused as hell. What can we do?
If you have a recognised union (or even an unrecognised one) that you are a member of, get in contact with them immediately. Odds are, if there is a mass redundancy, they will already know about it.
If there are more than 20 folks being made redundant, the redundancies are in one establishment, and the redundancies are being proposed in a 90 day period, then your employer is required by law to hold a collective consultation. Of course, quite often your employer will not know the law around this, and its worth arguing that you should have a collective consultation anyway. The consultation wont necessarily stop the redundancies, but it gives you time to plan.
Additionally, if anyone who is being made redundant is either pregnant, on maternity/paternity leave, or on adoption leave, then your employer must find alternate work for them if there is any available.
Your employer can only make people redundant if they have no more use for your role. If your employer is looking to use contractors, or alternate provisions to fulfil that role, you can make a fairly good argument that the dismissal is unfair or wrongful. Protections are weird in the UK around this if you haven't worked at a place for at least 2 years, but again with all of this, argue the point anyway.
Your employer probably wont know any of the law around redundancy and it is good to push that fact as a strategy. It is also very useful to be talking to all your co-workers in this process. Make sure everyone knows what is going on, their rights, and what you can all do collectively.
Ideally you will have done some workplace organising beforehand, but these things can happen unexpectantly.
Finally, if you do not have any union representation nearby, join a union as soon as you can (*cough* IWW *cough*). They may not be able to help you with something on such short notice, but it is another strategy to scare the boss shitless if they think you're going to be a problem for them.
See also: https://www.tumblr.com/tips-from-a-tech-worker/725120769477214208/how-do-i-improve-my-workplace?source=share
All of this information is available on the ACAS website, and you can contact them free of charge. Also recommend Citizens Advice as well. Sources used: - https://www.acas.org.uk/redundancy - https://www.acas.org.uk/your-rights-during-redundancy - https://www.acas.org.uk/redundancy-protection-for-pregnancy-and-new-parents - https://www.acas.org.uk/collective-consultation-redundancy - https://www.acas.org.uk/dismissals/unfair-dismissal - https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/work/redundancy/check-your-rights-if-youre-made-redundant/
Hope this helps!
*sigh* this is a kink account. I have 100% just fed into that kink. It's half 9 in the morning. I am tired. ;-;
I have redundancies at work just announced. Confused as hell. What can we do?
If you have a recognised union (or even an unrecognised one) that you are a member of, get in contact with them immediately. Odds are, if there is a mass redundancy, they will already know about it.
If there are more than 20 folks being made redundant, the redundancies are in one establishment, and the redundancies are being proposed in a 90 day period, then your employer is required by law to hold a collective consultation. Of course, quite often your employer will not know the law around this, and its worth arguing that you should have a collective consultation anyway. The consultation wont necessarily stop the redundancies, but it gives you time to plan.
Additionally, if anyone who is being made redundant is either pregnant, on maternity/paternity leave, or on adoption leave, then your employer must find alternate work for them if there is any available.
Your employer can only make people redundant if they have no more use for your role. If your employer is looking to use contractors, or alternate provisions to fulfil that role, you can make a fairly good argument that the dismissal is unfair or wrongful. Protections are weird in the UK around this if you haven't worked at a place for at least 2 years, but again with all of this, argue the point anyway.
Your employer probably wont know any of the law around redundancy and it is good to push that fact as a strategy. It is also very useful to be talking to all your co-workers in this process. Make sure everyone knows what is going on, their rights, and what you can all do collectively.
Ideally you will have done some workplace organising beforehand, but these things can happen unexpectantly.
Finally, if you do not have any union representation nearby, join a union as soon as you can (*cough* IWW *cough*). They may not be able to help you with something on such short notice, but it is another strategy to scare the boss shitless if they think you're going to be a problem for them.
See also: https://www.tumblr.com/tips-from-a-tech-worker/725120769477214208/how-do-i-improve-my-workplace?source=share
All of this information is available on the ACAS website, and you can contact them free of charge. Also recommend Citizens Advice as well. Sources used: - https://www.acas.org.uk/redundancy - https://www.acas.org.uk/your-rights-during-redundancy - https://www.acas.org.uk/redundancy-protection-for-pregnancy-and-new-parents - https://www.acas.org.uk/collective-consultation-redundancy - https://www.acas.org.uk/dismissals/unfair-dismissal - https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/work/redundancy/check-your-rights-if-youre-made-redundant/
Hope this helps!
This is a bit more of a personal post, and maybe a bit out of the scope of this blog, but it's been something bothering me a fair bit in lefty spaces.
Also, odds are this has been hashed out before, and in much easier to understand terms.
Anarchists need to stop being liberals.
For context, I would describe myself as an anarchist, so understand that these critiques come from a place of love rather than destructive ranting. As well as this, I live on the british isles, and the left-wing scene here is well and truly pacified. I might winge about this more in the future..
As a side note, "anarchist" isn't a particularly useful term anyway, because it refers to a broad group of philosophies concerned with a critique of power, and each one of those philosophies can vary WILDLY.
Also, by "liberal" I am refering to an advocate of free-enterprise, free-markets, and private property.
There is a concept known as "political prefiguration", which broadly refers to ways of organising that reflect the future society that you wish to build. Do you want a future non-hierarchical society? Then you have to literally act as if you were in one. And the more you do, the better you get at it, and the more you understand how to develop through it.
So often I see so-called anarchists talking about owning a business and hiring employees. And sure, if you're the kind of anarchist that either doesn't understand what capitalism is, or you don't see it as an issue, then sure, whatever. But IMO you can hardly call yourself an anarchist when you own employees? You are putting yourself in an unnecessary position of power over them. And you will only ever learn how to exercise that power over them.
Additionally, I hear so-called anarchists come out with "I'll just wait for someone to tell me what to do." And again, you will only ever learn how to follow orders and take instruction. You will never learn to think for yourself. You'll never know how to work with others. You have to step forward and say "I want this" and you work with your comrades to figure out how to get it.
And I get it. I really do. The society we live in really doesn't teach us anything useful, and if it did, it would cease to exist as it does. And there isn't any easy way to survive in this world without exploiting someone, even if it is several degrees separated. But you need and have to try.
Talk to people in your communities, be that where you live, where you work, where you learn, or where you play. Pick an issue people care about. Work together to figure out how to fix it. And then do it.
And sure, I am making that seem easy. And believe me, it is not. But the first step is to try. PLEASE.
I debated posting this one. I am not sure how useful it is at all, and it is completely unstructured, and it hasn't been well put together at all, but I needed to get it off my chest somewhere.
Tips for trying
Meet your neighbors, yes it's scary but if you don't know your neighbors how do you know what they need.
If your religious talk with your spiritual leaders and community.
We need community if we want anything to work.
The Montgomery Bus Boycott only worked because people who owned cars got people to work without the bus.
Union strikes only work when those union dues and the union itself takes care and supports its members.
And because I know it's gonna be said YES YOU HAVE TO BUILD COMMUNITY WITH PEOPLE YOU DONT LIKE
This isn't a social club
This is a bit more of a personal post, and maybe a bit out of the scope of this blog, but it's been something bothering me a fair bit in lefty spaces.
Also, odds are this has been hashed out before, and in much easier to understand terms.
Anarchists need to stop being liberals.
For context, I would describe myself as an anarchist, so understand that these critiques come from a place of love rather than destructive ranting. As well as this, I live on the british isles, and the left-wing scene here is well and truly pacified. I might winge about this more in the future..
As a side note, "anarchist" isn't a particularly useful term anyway, because it refers to a broad group of philosophies concerned with a critique of power, and each one of those philosophies can vary WILDLY.
Also, by "liberal" I am refering to an advocate of free-enterprise, free-markets, and private property.
There is a concept known as "political prefiguration", which broadly refers to ways of organising that reflect the future society that you wish to build. Do you want a future non-hierarchical society? Then you have to literally act as if you were in one. And the more you do, the better you get at it, and the more you understand how to develop through it.
So often I see so-called anarchists talking about owning a business and hiring employees. And sure, if you're the kind of anarchist that either doesn't understand what capitalism is, or you don't see it as an issue, then sure, whatever. But IMO you can hardly call yourself an anarchist when you own employees? You are putting yourself in an unnecessary position of power over them. And you will only ever learn how to exercise that power over them.
Additionally, I hear so-called anarchists come out with "I'll just wait for someone to tell me what to do." And again, you will only ever learn how to follow orders and take instruction. You will never learn to think for yourself. You'll never know how to work with others. You have to step forward and say "I want this" and you work with your comrades to figure out how to get it.
And I get it. I really do. The society we live in really doesn't teach us anything useful, and if it did, it would cease to exist as it does. And there isn't any easy way to survive in this world without exploiting someone, even if it is several degrees separated. But you need and have to try.
Talk to people in your communities, be that where you live, where you work, where you learn, or where you play. Pick an issue people care about. Work together to figure out how to fix it. And then do it.
And sure, I am making that seem easy. And believe me, it is not. But the first step is to try. PLEASE.
I debated posting this one. I am not sure how useful it is at all, and it is completely unstructured, and it hasn't been well put together at all, but I needed to get it off my chest somewhere.
This is a bit more of a personal post, and maybe a bit out of the scope of this blog, but it's been something bothering me a fair bit in lefty spaces.
Also, odds are this has been hashed out before, and in much easier to understand terms.
Anarchists need to stop being liberals.
For context, I would describe myself as an anarchist, so understand that these critiques come from a place of love rather than destructive ranting. As well as this, I live on the british isles, and the left-wing scene here is well and truly pacified. I might winge about this more in the future..
As a side note, "anarchist" isn't a particularly useful term anyway, because it refers to a broad group of philosophies concerned with a critique of power, and each one of those philosophies can vary WILDLY.
Also, by "liberal" I am refering to an advocate of free-enterprise, free-markets, and private property.
There is a concept known as "political prefiguration", which broadly refers to ways of organising that reflect the future society that you wish to build. Do you want a future non-hierarchical society? Then you have to literally act as if you were in one. And the more you do, the better you get at it, and the more you understand how to develop through it.
So often I see so-called anarchists talking about owning a business and hiring employees. And sure, if you're the kind of anarchist that either doesn't understand what capitalism is, or you don't see it as an issue, then sure, whatever. But IMO you can hardly call yourself an anarchist when you own employees? You are putting yourself in an unnecessary position of power over them. And you will only ever learn how to exercise that power over them.
Additionally, I hear so-called anarchists come out with "I'll just wait for someone to tell me what to do." And again, you will only ever learn how to follow orders and take instruction. You will never learn to think for yourself. You'll never know how to work with others. You have to step forward and say "I want this" and you work with your comrades to figure out how to get it.
And I get it. I really do. The society we live in really doesn't teach us anything useful, and if it did, it would cease to exist as it does. And there isn't any easy way to survive in this world without exploiting someone, even if it is several degrees separated. But you need and have to try.
Talk to people in your communities, be that where you live, where you work, where you learn, or where you play. Pick an issue people care about. Work together to figure out how to fix it. And then do it.
And sure, I am making that seem easy. And believe me, it is not. But the first step is to try. PLEASE.
Working on a zine series...
So far I have completed one entry and am well on the way through making the second. Thought I'd post them here for feedback, but also just to share them around.
Organising 101: Mapping: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pw-qCwhI-tfURKlRopPCdKcAKvnWIJEDgdooX22V078/edit?usp=drive_link
Organising 101: Talking to co-workers: https://docs.google.com/document/d/14bwTNW_UqZ3Uf12ugcSjS6AUWcmL398Y_QoNE1bbFak/edit?usp=sharing
Let me know what you think!
Additionally, I am currently without a job, and if anyone wants to send me a little something something as a tip.. I wouldn't say no to it..
Working on a zine series...
So far I have completed one entry and am well on the way through making the second. Thought I'd post them here for feedback, but also just to share them around.
Organising 101: Mapping: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pw-qCwhI-tfURKlRopPCdKcAKvnWIJEDgdooX22V078/edit?usp=drive_link
Organising 101: Talking to co-workers: https://docs.google.com/document/d/14bwTNW_UqZ3Uf12ugcSjS6AUWcmL398Y_QoNE1bbFak/edit?usp=sharing
Let me know what you think!
Additionally, I am currently without a job, and if anyone wants to send me a little something something as a tip.. I wouldn't say no to it..
