Wednesday, February 22, 2006

Garbage.

The following is generally oversimplified and much too short. But I don't want to bore you more than I do anyway...

In Germany, public services are on strike. They fight against a rise of the weekly working hours from 38 to 39.5 hours (or something in that order), so roughly 18 Minutes per working day. That's why garbage is lying around in the streets, why kindergartens and schools are closed.

In my, maybe naive, understanding, a strike is thought to be something you use against your employer, something to pressure your employer. Which is a valid weapon to get yourself heard and to get your rights garantueed. So, whom do they hurt in this case? Children, Parents, basically everybody. Except: the employer, who is "The State". And who does not get hurt by definition. The State does not bloody care. Next elections are in three years, by then everybody forgot about it. Government is a big coalition, opposition is ridicully to non existent, and even if they would be there, hey, they are opposition, so they are generally moaning about. Publicity you get from the strike: look, those idiots fight for a ridiculous cause, using arguments which are void (If you hear them, you wold note that they are definitvely void, as you can use them also to argue against the unions...)

Whom does that strike do good? Maybe the unions, because they had too much money... Politically, these strikes are the dumbest I have seen in a long time (OK, university politics is dumber by far, but that is a different world of students and professors trying to play real people and failing miserably). Time to move on, maybe time to get into the 20th century. The 21st seems still too far. Nowadays wars are fought on different levels, the old methods don't work if you are lucky, and fire back if you aren't.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Nils: com esse raciocínio nunca vale a pena lutar por direitos laborais (ou outros) contra o Estado, porque "o Estado" não existe e não quer saber de ninguém. E, assim, vamos cedendo devagarinho, 18 minutos agora, 30 amanhã, perdendo em 10 anos os direitos pelos quais se lutou durante 100. É a crise, os novos tempos, o século XXI, já não se fazem greves e reivindicar está fora de moda. Infelizmente, não me ocorrem formas de luta mais eficazes. E a ti? Os sindicatos serão muito estúpidos, corruptos e inábeis politicamente, mas parece-me que ainda são dos poucos a defender o lado certo... Se calhar é só a mim, que sou comuna!

nuno said...

Pois, camarada... Já devias calcular que os comunas haviam de comentar isto...

Realmente não concordo contigo. Talvez seja verdade que a greve não resulta (o que não me parece: tu estás a falar disso, portanto, até resultou). De qualquer forma, concordo com a mariana: sem ser a greve, o que é que os amigos do lixo podiam fazer? Provavelmente tu nem sabias que eles achavam que tinham um problema. Até me convencerem do contrário, estou com eles! A alternativa é estar do lado dos mesmos sacanas que também me lixam a mim...