The Vocal Majority (cont.)

Been too busy to mention this. Members of SAG-AFTRA have resoundingly approved a strike authorization for work in TV animation relating to streaming services. Back in this post, I wrote this…

The strike vote will pass, probably by a wide margin. I see just about all the important voice actors endorsing this stance and that's a solid indicator. These are the people the producers most want to hire, after all. As a general rule, the higher the vote to strike, the greater the chance there will not be a strike or it will be a brief one. The negotiators, who thus far have resisted making a satisfactory offer, will be more inclined to make one if the Strike Vote is 95% than if it's 80%.

The final vote was 98.27%, which is probably way more than anyone predicted. In any union situation, there are always some members whose hearts are with Management, possibly because their primary income flows from working there. You also invariably have some members who are fundamentally terrified of walking out on any possible work, no matter how little it pays. I remember at a WGA Strike Meeting in '85, one petrified member — a friend of mine, in fact — got up and said, "A vote to strike is a vote to take a torch and burn your home to the ground!" He actually believed that.

98.27% is amazing. I have no idea what the producers will do but they won't say, "We'll let 'em strike for a few weeks and then they'll come crawling to us to accept our terms." Which means there might be the kind of decent offer which will make a strike unnecessary.