Hilary Moore: Talking unions, over coffee

A couple of weeks ago, an interesting e-mail arrived in my inbox. It was from a guy complimenting me on my column and asking me out for coffee.

For a moment, I basked in the heart-warming belief that I had so impressed someone with a mere 750 words that he couldn't wait to know me better. That was a nice feeling.

Then I read the e-mail more carefully and realized that he was a prominent member of the group pushing graduate student unionization at Penn. And as one fantastical reality-bubble burst, another grew in its place.

I was powerful. As the only graduate student Daily Pennsylvanian columnist, with a readership of roughly 30,000 every week, my voice mattered. With one step I was thrust into the mind-spinning realm of (potentially cut-throat) politics.

This was a deeply humbling thought. It was a privilege, and it was almost scary. At the same time -- I admit it -- I could taste the ego trip. Like the desperately sweet glaze on a warm baked pretzel just out of reach, it was there lurking beneath all my good intentions -- just waiting to corrupt me.

I found myself in Bucks County Coffee, sitting opposite a sparring partner of exquisite sophistication, charm and intelligence. His passion for unionization was so genuine, and his candor so disarming that I could never quite decide if he was winning me over or pulling the wool over my eyes.

We talked for well over an hour, with an intensity perfectly designed to refresh the mind and convince me of the righteousness of the struggle.

Which struggle is a worthy question, though. For him, it was the struggle of the workers for self-empowerment and a better wage. For me, it was the struggle of finding the truth within the dazzling display of well-informed self-conviction that was seducing (and accosting) me from across the table.

Could we both win here? Probably not.

I'm notoriously hard to convince. If everyone's going crazy about a movie I'll automatically assume it sucks. That may seem stubborn and arrogant, but it's the way I am -- a dissenter. Born kicking, I'll probably die a grumpy old woman nobody wants to have around. They'll write "cantankerous and disobliging" on my grave stone.

But the fact is, the quickest way to make me a card-carrying unionist would be for the entire campus to tell me it was a dumb idea. And I think that's where the problem lies. No one is saying that very loudly.

Don't misunderstand me, I am not against unionization. I'm against a one-sided debate on unionization.

The administration has made its stance well known, of course, but it will never convince the majority of the student body. Penn has reasons for preferring the status quo -- other than the well-being of its graduate employees -- that are just too weighty to be ignored.

What we need on campus is a well-organized, vocal student body who is against unionization. I've heard rumors that they're forming, but time is running out. After my coffee with GET-UP, I tried to find them -- someone with a voice -- and couldn't.

In the meantime, I've been approached by another member of GET-UP.

What we have right now feels like chaos. "Unionization" is everywhere, facts are everywhere, contradiction and precedent are everywhere. Stickers, posters, e-mails and opinion columns are everywhere. Unpleasant political maneuverings are everywhere, and the "truth" is very hard to find.

And the result?

Apathy. It makes the very group of people we're all trying to access sick to death of being "told stuff." Confused, frustrated, even bored -- eyes and ears are closing all over campus in helpless, or maybe totally intentional, defiance.

That would all be fine, except there's a vote coming up that could make millions of dollars of difference in our lives. It will cause an ideological change on campus, too. Don't ever think it's just semantics.

No graduate student in the bargaining unit can opt out of making a decision on the issues. The way the vote works makes that impossible.

In essence, if one more person than 50 percent of those who vote opt for unionization, then a union will be formed. If one fewer than 50 percent opt for unionization, then there will be no union at Penn.

There is no neutral vote. Not even a non-vote is a neutral vote, which means that all need to discard their cynicism, at least temporarily, and go out for long, discussion-heavy coffees with everyone else on campus until they can decide exactly what they think about it.

For the price of a coffee, you could end up being the one who makes that multi-million-dollar difference.

Hilary Moore is a third-year Ethnomusicology graduate student from Perth, Scotland.

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.