Show me the union!

About a decade ago, before everyone knew what scientology was and Katie Holmes hadn’t even become Joey Potter, Tom Cruise played the role of Jerry Maguire. After a few too many drinks, he wrote a mission statement. Maybe I’m drunk on the feel good thoughts of the day, the moving speeches by labor activists, NYU professors and public figures, the buzz of collective action. For what ever reason, I feel compelled to put pen to paper, so here is my mission statement.

As I mentioned today in Washington Square Park, I am an unlikely labor activist. I do not like to rock the boat. I do not like to be a bad girl. I am the type of person who can still make herself physically sick thinking about the time she was caught talking in 4th grade and lost a point on the star chart. So why am I here? Why am I striking? And why the hell am I writing this?

Tonight I was at the GSOC meeting – I was the one who shouted out at the end, “I’m staying on strike, come join me!,” and I apologize for speaking out of turn, but I feel passionately about a lot of these issues and hope that by putting my thoughts down I might aid the dialogue, offer support to others and advance the goal of solidarity.

We are facing the toughest task since we walked out on November 9th, the task of staying out when we know exactly what is at stake. But what really has changed? We voted to authorize a strike. We did not vote to authorize a strike as long as there are no consequences. The university has only made explicit what we have anticipated all along – that our pay will be docked. I understand that the reality of this makes things more difficult for many of us, particularly the international students and stand-alone teachers. Everyday we can think of reasons not to strike or go to the picket line – the long, cold, hard hours, the desire to get our own work done, our sense of responsibility to our students – and now we have one more very important one. Many of us are looking to one another, wanting to know how many of us are out, how many are thinking about going back, etcetera. These numbers are important, but they only cover up the underlying issue of the proverbial party – I’ll go if you go. What we need now more than ever is to understand and legitimate our fears, and figure out how we can move beyond them. At the meeting tonight, we started tearing each other apart, and this is the worst possible thing that can happen at this point. We are fighting for the respect of the university, and we will never win unless we respect one another.

In spite of all the reasons not to strike, we need to remember all the reasons to stay out. We are fighting for a contract, and if we go back now we will lose that fight. There are also the issues of democratic decision making in the university more generally, and the encroachment of the big business model on the functioning of the academy. Beyond the university there are the issues of labor rights. Our actions are part of the ideological battles that are being waged at all of these levels.

Given all these reasons, I will repeat what I blurted out tonight. My name is Amy LeClair. I am a stand-alone instructor in the sociology department. I will be on the picket line Monday. Please, come stand beside me.

Many people support the strike but want more if we are going to continue to fight. Here is a list of things we can all do to push the strike forward:

1) Withhold your labor! This is the most important aspect of the strike. The recent communications from the administration have made it clear that the absence of our labor is having an impact. This is the crux of the strike.
2) Come to the picket line! Bring creative ideas of how we can spend our time there, get to know one another better, make the hours go by faster.
3) Go to a GSOC meeting! Many people tonight expressed their frustration with the approached we are taking. I am confident that the organizing committee is more than happy for suggestions. We are all very intelligent and creative people – let’s take that energy and channel it into helping one another, not picking each other apart.
4) Make friends! Reach out to those people in your department who are wavering or feeling discouraged. Talk to people in other departments. We all want to know what other departments are thinking, and if we are constantly in dialogue with one another we will not need numbers to tell us who is still with us.
5) Raise money! Economic hardship should not be the reason we end this strike. Talk to friends and family and ask them to donate some holiday money to our hardship fund. Change from a grande to a tall latte and drop that extra $0.35 in the box.

I was scared before the 9th. I did not want to leave my students in the classroom. I did not want to rock the boat. When I first read Sexton’s e-mail on Monday, I thought, “Great, we can go back to work,” because that was the easy thing to do, and because I was scared again. My fear diminished when I met with my colleagues in sociology last night, and my fears were further allayed when I saw the hundreds of people streaming out of Washington Square Park today to join us on the picket line.

The bottom line: they can take our pay, but they cannot take our pride. I am proud to fight to have my teaching recognized as labor. I am proud to be part of something bigger than myself, bigger than the union. I am proud to talk to people about the strike. Most of all, I am proud to stand in solidarity, because you, fellow GSOCers, complete me.

In solidarity,

Amy LeClair
New York University
November 30, 2005