I don’t believe other labor unions liking you is a required criteria for being a labor union.
But calling yourself a “union” doesn’t make it so. Unions protect their membership from each other as much as from abuse by management. Police “unions” protect the abusers within their membership and attack the victims.
That’s why they more closely resemble a criminal motorcycle gangg than a real union.
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Police unions are protecting their member’s interest though. Their members want bad cops protected because so many of their members sympathize with crossing the line and fear being targeted themselves.
Being a union and being a gang aren’t mutually exclusive. Labor unions aren’t always good nor do they necessarily represent the interests of greater society or other labor unions.
I’m not talking about police “unions” protecting cops who abuse the public. I’m talking about cops who abuse other cops. You can’t justify that as following their members’ wishes because the victims are members.
This isn’t a case of “No True Scotsman.” Police unions don’t actually act like unions.
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Do a majority of police unions’ members want their union to protect them from other members? Just because members of other unions do doesn’t make it a defining characteristic of a labor union.
A labor union is simply a group of workers joining to advance their common interest. What those interests are is defined entirely by members themselves.
It sure sounds like the argument is that No True Union would behave like them to me.
From the US Department of Labor: (emphasis mine)
A labor union is a group of two or more employees who join together to advance common interests such as wages, benefits, schedules and other employment terms and conditions. Joining together - or “acting collectively” - workers represented by unions have a powerful voice that strengthens their ability to negotiate with their employer about their concerns. Higher wages, health insurance, vacation days, paid sick leave and retirement benefits are a few examples of what workers achieve through their unions. Workers also pursue other enhancements - such as flexible scheduling, protections against harassment and safer working conditions - that improve the quality of jobs and workers’ well-being.
Unions are membership-driven, democratic organizations governed by laws that require financial transparency and integrity, fair elections and other democratic standards, and fair representation of all workers. Learn about the laws that govern unions:
My understanding, and I’m willing to be corrected, is that while police unions vote for leadership, they don’t vote on policy. And it’s quite clear that they don’t provide protections against harrassment or look after individual member’s well-being. They don’t provide fair representation of all workers. So they don’t fulfill the most basic definition of a labor union according to the DoL.
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You know, I figured this would have played out the same way that the only time a high-finance person does real jail time is when they rip off other really rich people. You rob rich people, they throw all the books at you. You steal from a police union, the cops are going to enjoy having you be a guest of theirs.
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Same is true here in Chicago. By law police departments (in IL) have to post their entire salary file (WITH FULL NAMES) online. I once looked up a jagoff of a neighbor who is a captain in the CPD and he was, at the time, making $30K more than me, and I was pretty well paid myself then.
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I think you’re misreading that.
It’s giving examples of things workers can pursue that improve the quality of jobs and workers’ well-being, not defining labor unions based on their attainment.
Further, what members believe improves the quality of their jobs or their well-being may not match what you or I believe would. I believe regular therapy sessions would help everyone’s well-being, but it would be silly to argue that the vast majority of labor unions aren’t labor unions because they don’t provide it.
The fair representation bit is about not being biased or bigoted. If a member insults the President, is a pregnant left-handed foreign black female Muslim lesbian or even refuses to pay dues in some states, the union still has to represent them the same as every other member.
Members of the union in question, the Sergeants Benevolent Association, votes on labor contracts so they very much vote directly on policies. If they want the contracts to include protection procedures against their fellow officers, they could vote against the contracts. Or vote for new delegates because representative democracy is still democracy.
The “fair representation of all workers” is not an example; it’s part of the definition. And no matter how you spin it, that is not what they do:
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If something is missing one or two examples of a typical thing of that type, then it could still be something of that type. If it’s missing most of the examples, it’s probably something else.
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How do you think the other cops he’s imprisoned with (especially other sergeants that are members of the union he led) are going to feel about someone that ripped them off?
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Well, as cops often say “don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.”
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Historically, no, a lot of us don’t count them as a labor union. For a really bleak test consider a rowdy picket line. A real union member, say the Teamsters or SEIU won’t cross the line. A scab will cross the line. A cop will beat the strikers to death to help the scab across.
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It’s what allowed him to be prosecuted in the first place, despite being a cop, I guess, but he’s still benefiting from all sorts of privilege.
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