And if you do get paid for your ideas/writing during the strike, that is considered scabbing and you will be barred from the WGA for life, as per this email from the Blacklist:
[Image ID: a typography edit that reads “if i cannot find trans joy I shall create it.” in white text over black squares. to the left is a stalk of bearded iris with three blooms. the flowers are overlayed with a green to purple gradient. the entire image is textured to look aged and photocopied. /End ID]
A woman whose epilepsy was greatly improved by an experimental brain implant was devastated when, just two years after getting it, she was forced to have it removed due to the company that made it going bankrupt.
Specifically, because she couldn’t afford to buy the implant from the company. They basically took her implant back to recoup their losses. This is what happens when you privatize healthcare and health research. The group providing her with this implant should not have been able to go bankrupt in the first place, let alone repossess her implant to pay off their debts.
This is what disabled people mean when we say that cyberpunk horror is just a reality for us. This woman was literally forced to undergo a surgery because she couldn’t pay to keep the implant already inside her brain. How long till companies start repossessing pacemakers and transplants?
You know your UPS driver. Maybe not by name, but you know them because you rely on them. You see them in your neighborhood every day, with their distinct brown package car, friendly face, and on-time service. Your UPS driver—plus hundreds of thousands of other UPS workers represented by the Teamsters—needs your support, understanding, and compassion. Because they’re in a fight for their lives.
Right now, more than 340,000 UPS Teamsters are negotiating a new contract with the world’s biggest delivery company. These are human beings who work long hours in extremely demanding jobs to provide for their families. They take pride in their work, with UPS drivers consistently finishing at the top when Americans choose their most liked and trusted professions.
They also sacrifice. UPS workers did not have the option to seek safe haven during the pandemic. As many Americans took advantage of work-from-home options, UPS Teamsters showed up for work without interruption. They made sure all of us, across the nation, got the goods and services we needed to survive. Toilet paper. Diapers. Groceries. Even vaccines, which UPSers delivered long before they were eligible to take them. UPS Teamsters made sure our supply chain kept running and our economy stayed afloat, sacrificing their own health to get the job done.
Since it’s not mentioned here, the union contract is set to expire at the end of the month, July 31. That is when the union says it plans to strike, though I’m sure it’s already affecting ship times.
This is a p big deal because alternative shipping companies cannot handle their usual work + the overflow from UPS. This upcoming strike is well documented, so it’s likely companies will attempt to redirect their needs to places like FedEx and… not much else to say but it will be interesting to see how it all falls apart.
People don’t like to admit it bcs cringe or w/e but Homestuck really did revolutionize the webcomic as a storytelling medium and I am endlessly frustrated that before webcomic artists could really stretch our legs fucking webtoonz swooped in, set a new, more restrictive standard, and then monetized and monopolized the ever living fuck out of the concept of The Webcomic until it drove away anyone who couldn’t be a professional quality manga artist for free, and now the only webcomics that actually feel like spiritual successors to Homestuck are so obscure they’re basically cult classics that you have to beg people to read.
Like it’s just so wild to be in high school and see Homestuck be like “we’re using like fifteen different artistic mediums to tell this story bcs we can” and be really fucking inspired by that, only to grow up and see basically every webcomic ever have to conform to One Single Standard or fucking perish.
Actually, I realized my real point here: we all need to make our art weirder. Please make weird art. I want more stuff like Prequel Adventure and 17776 and MyHouse.wad and I want it now. Capitalism thrives on conformity. We must be weird at all costs.
[Image: Art of a porcelain bee; it is mostly cream colored with blue and gold accents and a rose floral motif. Roses are growing up its legs and blooming on the sides of its abdomen, while rose vines curl around its thorax, alternating with gold stripes. The image is signed by the artist, Oddarette.
End ID.]
UPS drivers making more money will help all workers make more money.
Labor united helps all labor. Rising wages is not zero sum.
Don’t fall for ‘divide and conquer’ rhetoric from the Establishment. They fear the power and influence of worker solidarity.
Not only that but a Class A CDL can take thousands of dollars to get, and road experience comes as HARD LESSONS.
And it is freekin HARD to get on at UPS. I’ve been on the road as a driver for 2 years and I got ghosted by them. Plus they work in all (hot, storming, freezing) weather and all traffic conditions. GIVE THEM THE FREEKING $42 AN HOUR.
I had a company offer me $16 an hour for Class A CDL work. They would not have had the AUDACITY to lowball me like that if the going rate in the industry was where it should be. I’m making more than that frying chicken.
Wanna know why some store shelves are empty and there are still supply chain problems? Truckers don’t want to put up with your stupid ass in traffic to bring your “stuff” to the stores for $16 an hour.
so just because i ahve a rare and incurable condition where i can only understand human suffering thru the lens of showtunes and cartoons aimed at preteens means my posts about labor disputes aren’t insightful? tch [turns on my heel and like five pins fall off my little backpack with nothing inside except the leather journal i’m writing my fantasy novel in] [turns back around immediately] so yeah it’s sort of a chaotic found family story and it’s like really wholesome but feral AF and there’s a lot of queer representation
I think people have truly lost any ability to be patient with storytelling.
‘I don’t understand this’ They’ll explain it if you wait.
‘I don’t like how this episode left things hanging’ There’s a continuation next week.
‘This character is flat’ Wait for them to be fleshed out.
So many of the complaints I see about shows lately are people being confused by things THAT THE SHOW WANTS YOU TO BE CONFUSED BY THATS THE FUN OF MYSTERY AND FORESHADOWING YOU ABSOLUTE GOBLINS THE MAIN CHARACTER IS ALSO CONFUSED AND THEYRE GONNA DO A BIG REVEAL AND EXPLANATION LATER IF YOU WOULD JUST FUCKING WAIT
ALT
