What contempt they hold us in!

I feel for Torontonians, caught up in the midst of a fight none of them ever had fault in provoking. The recent actions by the TTC unions trascends the shocking, let alone the wrong.

The CBC, who I'd expect to attempt distortions of reporting in favor of the unions reported, instead, the exact actions and the exact words of the union leaders. Wildcat strikes are an affront to common sense and general sense of duty, but justifying a surprise walkout with these words is frightening:

Union leader Bob Kinnear said giving longer notice would expose workers "to the dangers of assaults from angry and irrational members of the public."

"We have a legal responsibility to protect the safety of our members, and so does the TTC," he said.

Personally I feel offended, as a member of the public, that someone else deems me irrational and angry because a service I would come to expect if I lived in Toronto is suddenly denied to me without any warning. Be I on a date, on business, on a pub crawl or any other activity requiring transport the trade unions would leave me stranded and defenceless. It wouldn't help if I were drunk or broke either when the subway doors were suddenly slammed in my face.

The public is rational, and them getting angry is a legitimate reaction to the strikers' outrageous behavior. Needless to say violence is out of the question, so Mr Kinnear assuming those angels of his constituents would be attacked by angry hoards of assatanated passengers is further proof of the deep and utter contempt in which trade unions hold those outside them.

Throughout many countries trade unions have morphed from defenders of the dignity of labour to the last bastions of privilege and defence against competition and fairness. Whether they may have a point or not (they might well have), the Toronto Transit workers have no right to hold the whole city hostage. Their latest actions deprive their cause of any residual legitimacy they might have had, and immediate mass dismissal would be the mildest reprisal for their acts.

During the London Underground strike that forced the city into a standstill there was a campaign for all shops and enterprises to deny service to the transport union leader for making everyone's life so miserable. Torontonians should do the same too.

Make a sign like the one at the top and place it on the front door of their shop, pub, restaurant, anything. Just to show Bob Kinnear what an angry public can do to make his life as miserable as he makes theirs.