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My photographer Jim Stevenson spotted this anti-Membership First poster visible near a film production in Los Feliz today. Is this savvy or slimey? You be the judge. UPDATE: Opposing slate leader Ned Vaughn emails me: “Unite for Strength had nothing to do with this anti-Membership First flyer and I don’t know who’s behind it.”
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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I think the word you’re looking for is: S-T-U-P-I-D !
There’s infighting and then there’s destructive infighting. Clearly this poster is the latter.
Not exactly a classy, level headed, diplomatic party are the U4s?
I mean, this is like junior high stuff AGAIN – and after the bad judgment of releasing personal emails, too.
Now its true that someone who isn’t actually in U4 could have done this – but it doesn’t change the fact that demonizing and making the people currently in charge of SAG doesn’t help anyone.
If you want people to even consider you (not that there’s a chance from me after affected member voting – and YES I know it didn’t impact voting for officers, but sweethearts, it’s the money part we all want to be able to vote on!) then maybe you should explain in detail how the AFTRA/SAG merger would work and how it would be different than before when the details weren’t all worked out and people were in fear of getting worse pension and health and worse rates because of AFTRA being sub par in these areas.
If the merger brings all actors up to SAG standards in terms of payment and pension and health without raising dues and we could have one actors union, probably a lot of people would be for that – I certainly would be. But it’s not the dream that’s the problem it’s the pesky details of reality – and we’ve heard NO solutions, NO ideas.
And childish posters don’t make me think that your party has anything of substance, just that it likes to throw tantrums and throw poo at the opposition.
Sad.
These UFS bozos are trying to sell us on the idea SAG should merge with a bankrupt desperate little union that doesn’t care AT ALL about the welfare of actors. They only care about the money we can contribute to prop up the failing non-actor pension plan they messed up with bad investments.
And NEWS FLASH… the Trustees of SAG Pension plan (separate from the Guild) wouldn’t allow the failing AFTRA pension plan to merge with it in a million years – even if the two unions merged. We’d STILL end up having to pay into two pension plans. SAG needs to absorb the acting part of AFTRA, not merge, you fools. UFS has no business sense whatsoever.
Well, there ya’ go. This is the tone of respect with which UFS operates. First the limited voting act, now direct insults.
Even if they apologize after the fact, this would make TWO moves on the public front that show their limited scope of good judgment. It’s juvenile and impetuous. In a word, shameful. They ought to be embarrassed but they won’t be. Worse, they won’t understand why they should be, and that says so much about the “slate” as a whole.
Poor, poor decision-making.
Hahahaha! Very funny.
Real smart SAG members (or was it the AMPTP)? Disparage your chief negotiator during contract negotiations.
Idiots.
Nah, this is funny.
Nothing is as dispicable as Alan Rosenberg’s recent rant. This is just cute humor.
This doesn’t come from U4S. And it’s wasted money, too. No one’s going to look at this and be persuaded. It’s a lot of work for something that’s neither funny or effective. Someone has a LOT of time on their hands.
Dear Uttery Freakin’ Stupid UFS — if it were so simple to absorb the actors from AFTRA it would have been done a long time ago. But it isn’t going to happen and can’t happen. AFTRA sees its only way out of financial woes to undercut SAG and carve out a niche for itself. That will continue until most of TV is with AFTRA and a good part of our protections are gone. The only way to stop this all from happening is to merge. As far as the pensions are concerned, I think a more knowledgable and legal-minded person needs to comment on the various ways that could be handled.
i would say “sticky”. i live in Los Feliz and the other day this flyer with an adhesive back was plastered on the glass of my building’s front door by someone. no one can get it off. it’s like peeling off a price tag. Just left over ripped sticky paper all over the glass of our front door.
thanks.
It’s clearly not a writer’s guild election.
It is factually inaccurate to state either that AFTRA is “bankrupt” or that the AFTRA Pension Plan is “failing.”
Despite having a dues structure that caps dues at less than 1/3rd of SAG’s maximum dues, and without seeking a dues increase for several years, AFTRA has continued to operate in a financially sound and responsible manner.
At least two of the Trustees sit on both the SAG P&H and AFTRA H&R boards, and are well aware of the financial health of the plans, both in absolute and relative terms.
Both the union and the H&R Funds report annually to the Department of Labor on their financial status. Those reports are available for public review.
David Browde
Member, AFTRA National Board
Trustee, AFTRA H&R Funds
Joe brown-
“Disparage your chief negotiator during contract negotiations.”
ummmm what negotiations???
Uttery Freakin’ Stupid UFS-
“These UFS bozos are trying to sell us on the idea SAG should merge with a bankrupt desperate little union…
A desperate union is one without a contract that is working for 2005 wages and no plan to fix it….
I can’t decide which is funnier, the satire of the poster or the humor in the blogs.
The odds are long that an actual U4S member made this or even had knowledge of it. Frankly there is a VERY long list of people that MF has alienated over the last 10 years who could have done this. I guarantee it’s not the AMPTP who laughs every day that MF continues to divide actors because they LOVE this stuff.
The real question is:
Do you think that SAG can rip all actors from AFTRA (which make up the vast majority of AFTRA) by brute force? I don’t hear a plan for that one… just that MF will crush AFTRA.
How exactly is that going to take place? Will AFTRA just capitulate because MF asks? Somehow I don’t think so. The battle lines are clear (just look at all the posts here PLUS Alan’s rant posted here as well) that MF will continue to force AFTRA to negotiate on it’s own and compete for more and more jobs, including commercials.
That will mean Actors will be divided; Pension and Health will become even MORE difficult to get or maintain because earnings will be split; the AMPTP will be able to continue the “divide and conquer” strategy and ALL ACTORS WILL LOSE!
So, again I pose the same question to those who have NOT voted yet:
Do you think that MF can break AFTRA by force? Do you think that Actors should fight each other? Do you think that SAG has more clout in negotiations than it did 5 years ago? If you do, then vote MF.
If you think that Actors need to UNITE and come together to get the gains we all need then vote U4S.
That is it. Make a stand and let your voice be heard. VOTE!
Oh, goody goody gumdrops. u4w knows somebody who knows how to use Photoshop.
If only they knew somebody who knew how to present an actual argument backed up by facts rather than accusations and failed parody.
Pay no attention to the fact that they have yet to address Mr. Joliffe’s debunking of their arguments — with actual facts, yet! — they can’t be bothered to move beyond the tired refrain of “noun + verb + lies.”
Not to mention “(noun + verb + lies) x AMV”
Or Mike Farrel’s appalling refrain of “Membership First = 9/11 Terrorists.”
As a fanboy who doesn’t belong to the unions, I’ve got to say that Unite For Weakness has officially jumped the shark. Rather than refute Mr. Joliffe’s fact-filled data with data of their own, they offer no substance — they don’t even address Mr. Joliffe’s presentation of the voting record of SAG that clearly illustrates that virtually all of the SAG failures that u4w attributes to Membership first were actually committed by the Gilbert-Farrell administration (the previous incarnation of Unite For Weakness). They just have a garish poster best suited for Mad Magazine. Or a fake ad in the April Fool’s issues of Wizard Magazine.
— Rob
I’m not going to pass judgement declaring that one side is better than the other, but there is something I can say that fits both sides: THEY’RE SCREWED.
These divisions in SAG is just red meat to the AMPTP who are sitting on their carefully liposuctioned behinds and laughing their heads off at all this. And no matter who wins, SAG will not be in any shape to fight for a decent contract.
There is a stack of these on a table inside the Regency Theater on Fairfax.
While I view the poster more as satirical hijinx than anything else, I called someone on the UFS steering committee that I’ve known and respected for a long time. He insists that UFS had nothing to do with the creation of this, and I believe him. More than likely the creation of an over zealous supporter. More harm than good? Depends on how sensitive you are. Is it any different than Arlin Miller’s “satirical” photoshop creations that appear on his Membership First mouthpiece website? Not really. As for myself, a poster isn’t going to have any impact on how I vote. Tempest in a teapot.
Fucking hilarious and truthful.
Hit ‘em where it hurts, move on and create the unity that we must have as a merged and strengthened union, so that we never again get placed in a position where we can be played against one another by the other side of the bargaining table.
Those who respond negatively to this humorous & truthful poster are apparently satisfied with the current SAG sadministration and thinks we’re doing just fine. Take a closer look at the reality of the situation, will you please?
Oh my, actors are so screwed.
It’s no secret that I support UFS in this election but I have friends on the UFS side and on the MF slate as well. This morning I emailed one of the UFS candidates with whom I worked on a show and called him on the fact that this poster is a pretty low thing to do.
He assured me vehemently that UFS had NOTHING to do with this poster. He told me that UFS is staying on messsage and is being careful to avoid the personal attacks that are endemic to MF’s style.
I agree with Furious D. The whole SAG issue is a tragedy. The actors lose no matter what happens.
But, I do wish this whole board election thing to be over soon because we’re not going to be able to find out what is in the next chapter until a week after that is settled, which puts us at the end of September — a whole month more. We’ve got several weeks after that before any AMPTP deal could be done.
What is obvious is that if the AMPTP thought that Memebership First would give them a better deal, they would do it before United For Strength gets put into power. Even if they thought that UFS would broker the same deal as MF, they might just get the whole thing over with too.
This is very funny!!!! Yeah, baby!!!
SAG’s position after the election depends on the results of said election. A resounding victory for the Membership First slate will be a reaffirmation of SAG’s position on New Media and residuals. The AMPTP will see SAG’s in it for the long haul. The signatories have slates of big-budget movies on-hold, waiting for a resolution to the theatrical negotiations. Their bean counters and marketers will let them just how far they can push before it’s not worth it anymore, and at that point – and not a day before – SAG will have the deal it’s asking for.
A Unite for Strength victory – contrary to the claims of Ned Vaughn, et al – will embolden the AMPTP in their recalcitrance, and they will continue to refuse to be reasonable with SAG. The AMPTP will look at their math and the film release schedule through a different set of glasses, thinking – perhaps correctly – that SAG won’t have the stomach to hang tough on New Media. And given that the UFS types are closely aligned with the advocates of the AFTRA Schedule A deal, the AMPTP might be correct.
In short, Membership First is going to protect all actors doing signatory work in New Media and do more on residuals. Unite for Strength will hand the AMPTP AFTRA’s piss-poor deal to SAG. Given the moguls’ ongoing migration of content distribution to the Internet, such a deal would constitute the beginning of the end of SAG as a relevant force for actors.
SAG’s Hollywood Branch voters hold the very future of their union in their hands this year.