On calling strike breakers "scabs"
I haven't shouted the word "scab" at someone crossing the picket line, because it's not my style, and because we're advised to engage in very polite persuasion. However, I have been adversely affected by strikes where I've gone on strike and others have crossed the picket line, including people who voted for action, people who were happy to take what money we did win despite their action. Their actions hurt me.
People who expect the union to look after them but then go into work when there's a strike on, and people who don't join the union until they're in trouble, have had aI have had more abuse from people going into work than I've dished out, including an incident which another colleague who went in commented on next day - she thought HE was really rude.
I've been called c* and bitch etc in arguments, often very hurtfully. But scab isn't a swearword, it is a short, simple and negative word used to criticise the choice made not to support your colleagues in action.
I might not speak it but I think it, I might not say it aloud but I defend the rights of those who do.
I like Between the Wars - one of Billy Bragg's own compositions about trade union struggles.
On the same original recording he sang a version of Which Side Are You On?
"My family suffer but it hurts me more to hear a scab say 'Sod you Jack'//Which side are you on?"
It was written by a woman in a US mining area in the 1960s - the scene of struggles between workers and companies. She herself faced threats and incidents which looked a lot like attempts to murder her and silence her permanently so she couldn't speak out about and organise against what mining companies were doing.