The Writers Guild Matters

And that Ain't a Good Thing

They want to Sovietize the creative process. As the posturing between the WGA and the Producers gets down to the nitty gritty we finally find out what it is that the totally Hard Left union really wants. They want to control content in every media. Period. They want the right to be able to shut down production over content they don't like. They want to force everyone connected with a writing function, no matter how slight, to join their union. In other words they want the right to force people who are in other unions already (the IATSE) to pay dues to the WGA and drop their affiliation with other unions WHETHER THEY WANT TO OR NOT. The Guild has failed miserably in their efforts to get people writing cartoons and reality shows to join their union voluntarily. So now they want to compel people who do not want to join to "be allowed" to join.

But worse, they want to create a Soviet style of control over all production through a demand that The Writers Guild have "oversight of the fair-market value of intracompany transactions that might affect writer pay." Besides the obvious subjective definition of words like "fair market value"or "intracompany transactions that might affect writer pay" this is an effort by hard line leftists to control all scripts and all content. Any and every excuse to shut down production over "transactions that might affect writer pay" will mean that the unions control the company.

The producers would be totally nuts to sign anything like that, even if forced unionism is judged to be illegal. Trust me, there is much more at stake here than money. This is the Left attempting to get a stranglehold on political expression.

That's what winning looks like. Now try this one on. SAG, the 80,000 member actors union, will never sit still for writers making script demands that they can't make too. And the 10,000 member Directors Guild ain't going to sit around and have a bunch of writers or actors control scripts.

This is all insane.