Photo Credit: Damir Spanic
That was his answer. Moments earlier I had asked him if he thought it was right that workers were going bankrupt from medical bills. This was the husband of the hospital worker we had come to see that day in Junction City, Oregon. As we walked back to the car I remember debating in my head whether or not this was a bluff. Having grown up in New York, it wasn’t exactly a big deal to see a gun; most of my friends owned them at one stage or another. However, would this person actually get a shotgun to intimidate union organisers?
The question was answered as the man appeared to the left of the car holding his shotgun in the ready position. I never saw or heard him load a round, it probably wasn’t loaded but every American knows that you don’t fuck with someone on their property who has a gun. Surprisingly, the emotion that I recall feeling the most was anger. I was infuriated that this person berated us at his front door, slammed the door in our face, only to emerge with a shotgun. That’s not a fair fight.
Long ago I came to understand that a significant part of my role as an organiser is to make people uncomfortable. An organiser’s job is not to make friends with workers – it’s to develop them. We are there to challenge people to take control of their life through strategic action. This is an uncomfortable process that comes with aggressive reactions from workers at times. This again, I accept. I don’t have a problem with conflict and I don’t take it personally. Any accomplished organiser understands that the messenger is always shot, however that’s usually a figurative statement.
During all my years organising workers I probably made the mistake of thinking I had seen it all. Once again, I was wrong. As I reflect back today on that man standing to my left with a shotgun, I couldn’t help but think about the experiences and social conditions that led to him reacting the way he did. Why was he so threatened by us? Why was he so afraid? What happened to him? I think these questions are worth asking. It’s so easy to dismiss people like this as ignorant rednecks who don’t know any better, however that is rarely the case in my experience. He had his reasons; he was sending a clear message. I still wonder if a better version of me on that day could have established a connection with him…I would love to try again.
Inside the house was this man’s wife who worked at the hospital we were organising. She would have been underpaid, under-employed and at risk of significant medical bills if she got seriously ill. The hospital’s own medical insurance was not sufficient for anyone, and more than one worker had gone bankrupt because they needed medical care at the hospital they worked at. When their insurance refused to cover the majority of medical costs, they found themselves unable to pay the outstanding amounts. Their employer would then garnish their wages and bankrupt them – lovely system eh? In any event, we never got to speak with the worker inside – she wasn’t allowed to talk to us. I can’t help but wonder what her life is like today.
Thankfully, I wasn’t alone that day and as a joke each year Amanda and I celebrate our ‘Shotgun Anniversary’ on Facebook. This year I ended up contacting her about this and we speculated on the conditions that may have led to this situation. We reflected on our own experiences with poverty, with scarcity, and constantly being guarded against external threats. Defend. Be aggressive. We remembered the language he used at the door, that ‘unions destroyed his family and America’. This was deeply rooted fear and it went well beyond this individual, it would have been interesting to hear the whole story.
That’s what I’m most frustrated with – that I was caught off guard; I was not prepared for that situation. That’s bad organising. Sure, he had a gun, and that could never really be planned for. But in reality the gun was not the issue, the gun was a tactic to solve a problem – we were that problem. We represented something he would not face that day, something he could not face. Many people do this regularly; I myself did it for years. We don’t really want to face the music; we just want to get through the day. By knocking on his door we forced his hand, he had no choice. If I had to guess I think that alone was the issue – just facing reality, feeling powerless, feeling cornered perhaps.
One of the things I drive into new organisers is that they must become comfortable with being uncomfortable – this includes making workers uncomfortable at times. At some stage each organiser will have their first experience asking workers to take action against their employer. This is not easy because that action will likely be met with employer retaliation and workers are not necessarily safe from that. We can talk about legal rights until we’re blue in the face, but anyone who’s been around knows the aggressive employer playbook – break the law, pay the fine, send the message. The role of an organiser is to prepare workers for that reality. Workers may not know much about unions or how we operate, but every worker seems to understand the risks to organising a union at work.
So this brings me back to the man with the shotgun. What was his story? What didn’t I know? It makes me think back to years earlier when I had a conversation with a family member who was very anti-union. Whenever the subject of unions came up we would both avoid it because we knew neither person was going to shift in their view. Agree to disagree. However, late one night when he had a few beers I asked him what he didn’t like about unions. He goes on to tell me that he helped unionise his hospital about 10 years earlier. He was on the organising committee and led his fellow workers to victory and first contract through a nasty battle with his employer. He continued – he felt the union abandoned them, that they were left unprepared for the battles ahead, that he felt taken advantage of. This shocked me. I assumed his anti-union position was baseless. What I found out was he unionised his hospital from scratch and fought off an anti-union boss campaign in the process. I learned another great lesson in organising that night – everyone has a back story, find it.
No one wakes up one day and decides to be anti-union. People live their whole life racking up experiences that shape their personality, views and choices. As the saying goes – workers are made of clay, not glass. People learn things as they experience them and anyone is capable of change given the right circumstances. This is why we campaign, to provide the platform and motivation for workers to rise to the challenge, to overcome their fears. Those workers in Oregon persevered and built a strong union, winning a National Relations Board Election by 19% margin and a very good first agreement 11-months later. That man with the shotgun ended up getting better health insurance and his wife got a significant pay rise.
So what do I take away from this experience? Some people simply cannot face the challenges in their life and anyone who threatens that will be met with force. And that’s okay, not everyone is going to have the courage to take action. I still believe that door knocking is the ultimate litmus test of progressive organising; it’s by far the most difficult aspect of the job. It also wields the best results in my experience. It’s interesting that every organiser seems to have the same reservations around door knocking the first time they do it, and every organiser I ever worked with shifts in their views after their first good conversation. Asking a worker if you can come into their home and talk to them about forming a union is never easy, but when you do get on that couch you’re able to have a conversation you’ve never had before. Barking dogs, cute kids and aggressive husbands are all part of the experience.