Not to want to be referred to as ‘Comrade’

[Shellacbabe]

I work for a university and many uni staff are on strike this week. I am not a member of the union so am not on strike, and disagree with a few of the things that the strike is fighting for, but my main gripe with the union is that many members still hail each other as ‘comrade’. Can we agree that communism is dead, and that’s a very good thing, and referring to people as ‘comrades’ has no place in a modern society?

@Shellacbabe

Universities are 100% educational charities! Check the small print on your website.

And as for the 35% pay rise, if you can demonstrate clearly that the pension cut is a 35% drop in pension income, then show the unis that they are cutting your overall remuneration package by a set percentage and ask for that in pay rise. Most companies each year tot up the value of your pay and bonus and pension and health insurance and life insurance and say ‘look at what your pay is worth’. If I was a union I’d do this before and after the pensions changes to demonstrate a clear cut in the value of the overall package and ask them what they are going to do about it. If you want to get rid of the pension that’s fine, but you’ll have to make up the overall package elsewhere. It’s a stronger argument than trying to cling onto db pension scheme which the unis don’t want to do due to the uncertainly of trying to furnish such a risky liability.

And my privilege is having skills that the uni vitally needs but are also in extremely high demand in the private sector so I could get another job tomorrow if I wanted to. Unis are an interesting place to work but extremely badly organised which is tiresome. It’s that which will see me move back rather than any pensions concerns.

Having seen your comments and the ways you misconstrue these issues, I am really concerned about your "skills". If universities are badly run, it's because there are people like you having such views about the actual work that goes into by academics that have devoted their entire life in serving students and developing research.

It’s a joke. Someone very senior and the embodiment of rampant capitalism uses it too.

I’m sure, despite your Union bashing, that you are happy to enjoy from the benefits that unions have won for workers. Like weekends off, paid holidays, sick pay etc. Or is that all too commie for you?

Or is this thread just an excuse to rehash your frankly puzzling terror of Corbyn (it only took two posts!) who hasn’t been Labour leader for 2 years and who most certainly isn’t a communist.

Don't be an arse. Are you actually in the UCU or are you in another union possibly admin tittle tattling about the lecturers having a day off again?

And op it really doesn’t sound like the problem is that you’ve studied too much history. Quite the opposite.

And I hope you don’t use this sneering tone at work because it very clearly demonstrates your contempt for your colleagues.

Intensely disingenuous to say the pension offer would be good in the private sector. I gave up my private sector job which came with a projected higher salary, benefits and bonus, in part because of the pension. University made me a future promise: that pension is my deferred pay. Now it’s being withdrawn. My pay hasn’t kept pace with inflation. I could accept that if I was still being given the pension I signed up for but now I’m hugely financially penalised for all the goodwill I’ve given them.

I don’t even mind that there are people not in the union, who don’t suffer the financial cost of striking, but take the benefits that we’ve all given up our strike days for. I consider it my duty as a citizen and a comrade to do it. But it really pisses me off when they whine about and denigrate industrial action. Happy to take the benefits without acknowledging any of the sacrifice we make for you.

@Graphista

an educational charity, which is what universities are.

Are they?!

The unions can do what they like, but they’d make much more progress if they cut the socialist nonsense and broadened their base a bit.

That "socialist nonsense" got you:

Pensions - at all!

Weekends
Bank holidays
Annual leave
Sick leave
Sick pay
Maternity leave
Maternity pay
Protection from being sacked for no reason at all
Protection from being sacked for being a woman, disabled, non British, Non white
Protection from being sacked for refusing to sleep with the boss
Health and safety protections
Equal pay legislation...

Among MANY MANY other benefits

Why are you looking down your nose at it?

But maybe I’ve studied too much Russian history and it’s coloured my use of the phrase

Maybe you'd benefit from studying some working class British history!

tbh you don't really seem to understand what unions are.

Just what I was thinking

But that seems to be increasingly the case these days and more and more people are looking down their noses at unions while employee rights are getting absolutely hammered and social mobility is being squashed!

We need unions now more than ever!

Bet you’ll happily take the benefits that we union members fight for

Ohhhhh yes!

I hope you refuse any pay rises and improvements to working conditions that the unions win, then?

Don't be daft! This type of person always accepts even feels entitled to pay rises etc that have been fought for by others more willing to put themselves out

What do you think defines a socialist op?

Why do you think you aren't one?

The sensible thing is to accept it BUT instead concentrate on asking for a 35% increase in pay to compensate.

And exactly who do you think is more likely to achieve that? Unions!

You don’t think that if lecturers started leaving in droves wages might start rising to keep people?

Nope

Exactly I will never understand the fools frankly whom have benefited so much from Socialism (public services like the fire and police service, public transport and NHS and the social security system too), shitting on it at every turn, none so blind as those who refuse to see.

Good morning, Education Minister, what are you doing on mumsnet? I have other terms I'd prefer to use when referring to you and your grasping Tory mates. I would never call you comrade.

Exactly I will never understand the fools frankly whom have benefited so much from Socialism (public services like the fire and police service, public transport and NHS and the social security system too), shitting on it at every turn, none so blind as those who refuse to see.

Because they have never knows how it is to be without it. Ignorance bred out of privilege.

The state of the pension scheme doesn’t bother me at all. I’ve had 25 years working in the private sector and it’s better than anything I’ve had before.

god your "I'm alright, Jack" coupled with the very low bar you set for the public sector is pretty scary for someone in academia.

As is your complete lack of understanding what actual socialism is, and trying that ol' chestnut of "the USSR was shit, therefore communism is shit"

It's a pity we can't force people with your attitude to accept the pre-unionised T&C the rest of us fight for

also for pp above: IME union members don't go round calling other people comrade willy nilly (i live in Gemany, info from our trade union comes addressed to GenossInnen which i love. Comrades, basically) unless they are either at a meeting or on a picket line or other union business.

In fact (completely at a tangent) i may put Comrade in my email sig if I'm asked to add pronouns

@Shellacbabe

I just think many people associate hard left political views with the word ‘comrade’ and in using the word they alienate possible members who might not think Jeremy Corbin was the messiah.

I definitely have no political feelings towards the word whatsoever, HTH

Wow! The comments here are just downright nasty and reflects the attitude of academics who fail to understand the work that professional services do to keep a university going as part of a TEAM effort. It's elitist snobbery at its worst. As a PS staff in a university I work hideous hours but because we're not academic people here sneer because we're deemed not to understand the complexity of language and how it's evolved. I'm glad the unions exist as most of my colleagues have been bullied by academics at one time or another. The university turns a blind eye because they are REF returnable.

FWIW the term comrade is cringey. I'm a labour voter and think social democracy is a good thing. As an aside I wonder how many people cherish freedom but would lack the desire to pick up a weapon and fight for that right when it is threatened? There will always be people to benefit/suffer from the passions of others.
Scab......what a dreadful term! I think the sneering is being done from those on here using those word
OP has a right to disagree with a term she finds inappropriate - the supposed extrapolation of what that means is fantastical.
There are so many issues with these prolonged strikes including the financial impact for those who can't afford it - these SCABs put their family's food and heating ahead of an issue they can't even think about right now because a pension is unaffordable. The lack of empathy/reasoning amongst 'comrades' for any viewpoint that doesn't fully subscribe to their perspective is shocking - and displayed here in full glory. Shameful....

the nastiest thing anyone has said is that they hope OP has the guts not to take the benefits the union members win.

But yet again what this thread does show is how little people understand what unions do, what actual socialism/communism is and how pensions work.

And if your working conditions are shit and hard and you don't get the support you need from your bosses: join a union.

@Jammallama

Wow! The comments here are just downright nasty and reflects the attitude of academics who fail to understand the work that professional services do to keep a university going as part of a TEAM effort. It's elitist snobbery at its worst. As a PS staff in a university I work hideous hours but because we're not academic people here sneer because we're deemed not to understand the complexity of language and how it's evolved. I'm glad the unions exist as most of my colleagues have been bullied by academics at one time or another. The university turns a blind eye because they are REF returnable.

FWIW the term comrade is cringey. I'm a labour voter and think social democracy is a good thing. As an aside I wonder how many people cherish freedom but would lack the desire to pick up a weapon and fight for that right when it is threatened? There will always be people to benefit/suffer from the passions of others.
Scab......what a dreadful term! I think the sneering is being done from those on here using those word
OP has a right to disagree with a term she finds inappropriate - the supposed extrapolation of what that means is fantastical.
There are so many issues with these prolonged strikes including the financial impact for those who can't afford it - these SCABs put their family's food and heating ahead of an issue they can't even think about right now because a pension is unaffordable. The lack of empathy/reasoning amongst 'comrades' for any viewpoint that doesn't fully subscribe to their perspective is shocking - and displayed here in full glory. Shameful....

You will find, I am afraid, that it's rather the other way around re empathy. The comments made from the start by OP were always about how academics live in a different world, that we make unrealistic demands etc etc. It's comments such as these that make hard-working academics upset as they are just awful stereotypes about academia. As for participating in the strike, it's of course everyone's right to decide. Just because it's a legal right though, that doesn't mean that it's also morally accepted not to participate. Btw, the union has a strike fund for those that are struggling financially.

@Brefugee - it really isn't.
I understand all of those things perfectly well; I just have a different perspective to you. Your viewpoint or understanding is not an absolute truth of a system or function. You are absolutely entitled to it but it doesn't make you right.

"I cringe at the word comrade, it's a signifier of being middle class". Thus irony died here.

@Paeonia

It's comments such as these that make hard-working academics upset as they are just awful stereotypes about academia.

As are the stereotypes here about PS staff and belittling their role as 'admin'. Stereotypes full stop are lazy. My point is that universities need academia and PS to function effectively and belittling one group is tiresome.
*
Additionally* - the hardship fund is woefully inadequate and is the reason people aren't striking - this was the focus of a thread last year. Calling those who can't strike a scab because of financial pressures is disgusting.

[quote Jammallama]@Paeonia

It's comments such as these that make hard-working academics upset as they are just awful stereotypes about academia.

As are the stereotypes here about PS staff and belittling their role as 'admin'. Stereotypes full stop are lazy. My point is that universities need academia and PS to function effectively and belittling one group is tiresome.
*
Additionally* - the hardship fund is woefully inadequate and is the reason people aren't striking - this was the focus of a thread last year. Calling those who can't strike a scab because of financial pressures is disgusting. [/quote]
I personally did not call anyone a scab do I assume you are not referring to me. As for the fund, please don't assume that those that are striking are not facing exactly the same pressures that those that decide not to strike face. Both I and my husband are academics following many years of insecure contracts etc. and we are certainly impacted by not being paid.

@Paeonia - I wasn't referring to you personally at all. It was a general comment about the posters bandying about an abhorrent term and minimising the reasons for declining to strike.

I am just so fed up of divisive academia/PS baiting - also evident here.

You’re not in the union so it’s got nothing to do with you. They can call each other what they like. You don’t have to approve.

Yeah very odd, but lefties are, so don’t be surprised. Just laugh at them.

@Shellacbabe

I work for a university and many uni staff are on strike this week. I am not a member of the union so am not on strike, and disagree with a few of the things that the strike is fighting for, but my main gripe with the union is that many members still hail each other as ‘comrade’. Can we agree that communism is dead, and that’s a very good thing, and referring to people as ‘comrades’ has no place in a modern society?

I take it you will refuse to accept any enhancements to your pay and conditions that the union gains then?

I would have laughed in his face. I'm in my 60's and remember the havoc unions wreaked on this country

I’m 58. I wish our unions were stronger and hadn’t been decimated by shit Tory governments. Imagine getting paid a decent wage?!

@RedHelenB I asked that too, but OP hasn't replied. 🤔