No More Unity Gaslighting. We Demand Better.

Hello activist friends. If you’re like me, you wonder why our leadership is so out of touch with our needs. At the Delegate Assembly, Michael Mulgrew let us know we were not even allowed to ask that our health expenses be reduced.

Yesterday, one of his minions sent me a personalized invite to write about my “second act.” (Because obviously, before I started teaching, I was no one and never did anything whatsoever.)

Life begins at retirement, it says. Whatever preceded it was even more irrelevant than what preceded teaching, and teaching, of course, is not relevant at all. What’s the big deal about, oh, teaching history, literature, math, science, language or any of the other nonsense we’ve pissed our lives away doing?

And hey, don’t be insulted that Mulgrew and his minions think teaching is a waste of time. After all, they’ve spent most of their careers running as far away from it as they could. How many teachers sit high up in a Wall St. adjacent skyscraper office, making deals that diminish the health care of tens of thousands? How many teachers even work in rooms that are cleaned regularly?

That brings me to my second act (or third, depending upon whom you ask). I’ve spent a lot of my retirement resisting the very people whose jobs, ostensibly, entail protecting my rights. For example, I was kind of surprised when I got a letter threatening me with civil and criminal penalties for parodying self-crowned King Michael Mulgrew. Is that what I pay dues for?

Before I retired, I was well aware that Mulgrew was trying to demean the health care I’d been promised for the almost forty years I worked. At first, I was willing to give Medicare Advantage a try. It was the Bestest Thing Ever, according to Mulgrew. Then it fell apart, he negotiated another deal, and it was Even Better than the Bestest Thing Ever. Who can argue with logic like that?

That’s when I started paying closer attention to Marianne Pizzitola and the NYC Organization of Public Service Retirees. At first, I was a little put off by suggestions retirees should be “grandfathered in” to real Medicare, as that would’ve left me in the cold. I still don’t love that idea (and thankfully haven’t heard it lately). I feel responsible for those who follow me. Call me crazy, but I think teaching is the best job there is, and I want to keep it that way.

Regardless, there was more to what Marianne was doing than that. She led a movement that successfully blocked the Unity-MLC move to charge us for the coverage we’d been promised free all of our careers. Her org blocked the co-pays they wanted to illegally impose on us, right up until Mulgrew and minions rewrote the GHI contract to permit it.

Mulgrew now claims to oppose Medicare Advantage, but battles tooth and nail for the right to sell us out whenever he deems it convenient. He claims our battle to protect our benefits violates collective bargaining. Not only do we have neither voice nor vote in collective bargaining, not only do we benefit from it not at all, but Mulgrew actually pays people to lobby against our efforts.

That’s where I find myself as a retiree. I won’t bother writing a story for NY Teacher. They wouldn’t print anything I wrote in a million years.

My voice doesn’t fit the Unity narrative. Does yours?

Given that, it’s ironic Mulgrew says his opponents spout “fairy tales.” I’d argue he’s projecting his own shortcomings on us, and that’s more the province of NY Teacher. It’s essentially a propaganda sheet. If you follow NY Teacher, you learn everyone loves Michael Mulgrew, everything he does is perfect, and his “very smart people” deserve to make double what teachers do, even if they’ve signed oaths to do Whatever Michael Mulgrew Says.

No more demanding your benefits remain undiminished. Instead, Mulgrew demands we should run changes by his hand-picked health committee, full of sycophantic at will UFT employees who know, if they dare cross Mulgrew, they will be sent back into (Gasp!) a classroom!

I know how classrooms can be. I worked in them for over 39 years. Most of you have done much the same.

At the RTC meeting, Mulgrew went into depth on in-service issues, while once again affirming he would oppose our efforts to help ourselves. Then, he once again reverted to his delusional assertions that UFT treated retirees better than other unions do. If that’s true, why is he lobbying against us? Why is he making us pay pharmacy premiums most city union Welfare Funds cover for their retirees?

Do the sycophants with whom he surrounds himself really enable him to believe such absolute nonsense? Evidently they do.

Unity says they “do the work.” Wrong. WE do the work.

We don’t need “leaders” who care only about themselves and their own advancement. We don’t need leaders loyal to a caucus rather than membership. I know a little bit about leadership. I was chapter leader of a large school, and learned the hard way what “member-driven” really meant.

I understand that all power derives from the members. I understand that if members overwhelmingly ask for something, i.e. supporting 1096, that we get out and do everything we possibly can to make that happen. I understand that we need to unite with organizations that share our goals.

Unity, to some extent, understands that too. That’s why Unity’s Leo Casey has written multiple baseless diatribes personally attacking Marianne Pizzitola. That’s why Unity passed a resolution against “union interference.” Heaven forfend that, as our ostensible leadership actively campaigns against us, we unite with other city workers who will help us achieve our goals.

Unity thinks we’re a bunch of stereotypical old fogies, playing shuffleboard or dominoes, screaming at kids to get off our lawn. They not only tolerate these stereotypes, but celebrate highly-compensated employees who indulge them.

Michael Mulgrew and minions are mounting a full-force gaslighting campaign, asking we trust him blindly and stop fighting for our rights. It’s not only insulting to our collective intelligence, but also one of the most directly anti-union initiatives I’ve ever seen.

We need strong voices, and we need you to stand as you are able against this nonsense. That’s why we organized Fix Retiree Benefits. That’s why we need to know what you think, and that’s why we invite you to join us next Sunday night as we kick off our campaign to defend our rights.

I’ll be there, and I can’t wait to see you there as well.