Skotnes said,
"Their attack on us has been so effective that what we stand for is so
muddled in the minds of the public, that people see us as a 'special interest.'
They don't see us as representing the workers."UAW Region 5 Education Rep Keith Skotnes addressed a big Summer School crowd in Norman, Oklahoma, on June 7. He introduced the topic of "values" in politics, and said that anti-union forces were distorting the meaning of the word, as they have with many others, by "framing" the discussion so that only certain ideas are permitted. He blamed the corporate-owned media for cooperating with rightwingers. He gave the example of "trial lawyers" as a concept that has been demonized. In other words, Americans associate "trial lawyers" with something bad, whereas in fact they are actually the only people who will represent workers legally. "Corporate lawyers" are never demonized; only trial lawyers!
Other Phrases that have been deliberately confused are "tax hike" and "tax cut." The first is "bad;" the second "good." However, public discussion never includes the idea of "tax hike for whom" or "tax cut for whom!" Thus, rich people keep getting the cuts and poor people keep getting the hikes during the confusion.
Skotnes said,
"Their attack on us has been so effective that what we stand for is so
muddled in the minds of the public, that people see us as a 'special interest.'
They don't see us as representing the workers."
The rightwing strategy is to "frame" the issues so that all discussion takes place inside the frame that they have imposed.
As Skotnes concluded, the union leaders in attendance adjourned to small group classroom discussion groups. There, the unionists studied handout literature and brought their own ideas into the discussion. They quickly decided that real values for working people and all Americans have more to do with being able to feed our families than they do with pie-in-the-sky "pushbutton" issues or "framed" discussions. They pointed out the tremendous hypocrisy of the recent media campaigns against our ability to think and choose for ourselves. On the last day of Summer School, reporters from each group brought back summaries of the group discussions.