Thank God McSweeney's is on the case.
My favorite bit from John Moe's "Ripple Effects of the Writers' Strike" --
Pet-store owners
Without the assistance of professional writers, such droll puns as "purrfect pets" prove impossible, leaving shopkeepers to describe their offerings as "perfect pets." This results in unrealistic expectations being placed on the pets. Eventually, an acrimonious pet/owner dynamic emerges that proves impossible to overcome. After a surprisingly short period of time, cats say, you know, fuck this shit and they leave. The human/cat arrangement, which, to be honest, has been on thin ice for centuries, finally collapses and the domestication of the cat ends.
Losing the fight for a fair deal on the internet is one thing, but losing the battle for the continued domestication of the cat? That shit is science fiction terrifying, my droogs.
H/T To Jeff Rentals
10 comments:
Okay, let's put the strike in the U.S. in another perspective for a moment. First let me say I'm a radical defender of writer's rights. But I didn't entirely agree with the position you espoused on that Q podcast for CBC. Basically, you said that Canadians writers would be moral reprobates if they actively sought work on a Canadian show that was in turn actively seeking a sale to the U.S. during a writers strike. Huh?!
I mean, really, speaking of PERSPECTIVE: what do you think the U.S. writers would do if there were a strike in Canada? Do you think they'd stop working on American shows that were about to be sold to Canada (i.e., almost all of the American network shows are sold to Canada).
And let's not forget how much the entire U.S. television industry despised Canada for the "runaway" production problem, to say nothing of all the roadblocks that the WGA and American writers put up for Canadian writers seeking work in the U.S.
As much as I'd like to believe it, writers are not one big happy family. And before we get too radicalized in our support of the WGA strike (which is fundamentally important for those writers, I agree), how about we get radicalized here at freakin' home?! I mean, there are still no minimum fees for animation scripts under the WGC. Residuals?! What's that. Sure we get a "production fee," but the fact is the producers continue to make money on shows for years while we have long since spent our relatively small script fees on groceries. And writers are continually cannibalized by producers who claim to be show creators while writers give away the farm for free--again a sorry lack of guild protection is offered in this regard. "Subject to negotiation" is NO protection.
So before we start cutting our heads off in support of American writers, let's take a page from their book and start getting a bit tougher on our own industry here at home, please.
Okay -- you're mixing and linkin like nine things here. Let's try to take em in order.
First, you kind of misrepresent the position I took on CBC. I think if you're on a show that has a U.S. sale, like the Best Years and what have you, then you're golden. That's also what I say in the CP article on the wire today.
Where I think it gets dicey is if you find yourself selling or getting greenlit based on a U.S.sale that likely would not have happened if there hadn't been a strike. And that would certainly probably encompass any Canadian show that sells to a U.S. net because there's been exactly one of those in 25 years -- Due South. If you want, you could convince yourself it was coincidence. I, personally, couldn't tell that lie to myself.
The definition of solidarity is not profiting from the labor situation down south. I guess so long as you're not technically breaching (you're writing for a Canadian show, you're writing for a Canadian producer) then you'd be fine within the letter of the law. And if you could live with that then great. I couldn't. And I wouldn't want to work with anyone who would -- because I do think that speaks to character and if you were willing to screw over people like that, I'd wonder when you were going to screw over me.
The "what do you think U.S. writers would do if there was a strike in Canada" is irrelevant. You can't hit your sister because she hit you. If it doesn't work in the back seat of mom and dad's car, it doesn't work here.
(besides the obvious thing: what would they be doing? nothing. The talented ones would be working in the USA. And if the hacks tried to come here during our strike, I would hope that the WGC would blacklist the hell out of the production companies involved and embarrass the living shit out of them.)
Same with the runaway production thing. Yup, that's mostly a madeup issue, but you really think that adding "scabbing WGC writers" to that flame is going to help?
Writers have NEVER been one big happy family. You just have to look back at the 1988 strike for that. What's unusual this time is not the fractures, it's the fact that there aren't many -- that IS unusual.
Finally, your point about taking on the issues that need to be taken on here at home is a great one - but it also has nothing -- NOT a THING -- to do with supporting the WGA.
Why can't you do both?
In fact, one of the whole reasons I started this damn blog in the first place is because I saw writers here doing none of the things you mention.
Maybe it is the catholic in me, I don't know. But splitting hairs in moral fights doesn't get you anywhere. There's plenty to fight -- both in the U.S. and Canada. But if you want me to back down for saying you shouldn't benefit from their woe for your own benefit?
Sorry, no sale.
Right is right, and wrong is wrong.
If you don't want to sing the Hallelujah chorus for the WGA, that's fine. Take your energy and put it toward kicking against the pricks here at home. No one's stopping anybody from doing that.
But goodness, how the heck is a writer supposed to parse apart the behind the scenes negotiations of a sale to a U.S. network of a Canadian show. I really don't think that's practical.
Anyhow we're probably speaking in theory here, because it's unlikely to happen (yet, unless the strike goes on for years, which it won't).
What I really believe is that the best way we can support the writers in the U.S. is not to cut our wrists, but to fight for just as much here in Canada so we have equally viable industries on both sides of the border. But again, if Canadian writers ever did strike (which they won't because that's just how weak we really are), then don't count on American writers stopping work on a U.S. show bound for a sale to Canada to "fill in the gaps in Canadian broadcasters schedules left behind by the three shows that are shut down by a Canadian strike."
It is fairly easy to parse out the sale to a US network on a new show. They are the big dogs in the room, giving you notes. They're the ones saying, "Can we set this in Chicago instead of Sarina?" They're the ones taking control.
Imagining what a WGA writer might do during a WGC strike and adjusting your principles accordingly is useless. US production wouldn't change in any way with a Canadian work stoppage. They wouldn't be sitting at the border, licking their chops, with the hope of that extra license fee from CTV. They already sell all their shows to Canada.
In Canada, a US sale changes everything. It is everyone's dream, but to do it now feels too much like war profiteering.
Will, I was gonna post another response but you did it better, and with pith, to boot.
I will say that I've had 3 or 4 development series with Canadian nets -- and I had a pretty good sense when they weren't getting picked up. And when they would.
Claiming babe in the woods is a bit much.
I really liked some of those movies where the scab football players finally got a chance to get into the big leagues and they got to show what they could do when given a chance, I found them quite inspirational, heck and when given the chance some of those scabbers and arena football hacks even stayed in the bigs and pleased fans for years to come.
Okay, fine. So you're going to walk out of a Canadian show as soon as it makes a U.S. sale, if such sale is made during the strike?
Then I only ask this: why not walk out of all Canadian shows now, since I'm firmly convinced that as writers in Canada we have MUCH more reason to strike. We are far less protected than WGA writers. We barely have an industry that acknowledges our existence. I'm saying if you're willing to strike (to curry favor with shows south of the border that might hire you post -strike?) then I say, let's start planning our walk-out of Canadian shows now and get some of the desperately needed concessions we need here at home for the much more beleaguered Canadian TV writer.
How bout better mechanisms and penalties with teeth to MAKE producers AND broadcasters actually pay on time (CBC is notoriously late paying writers, no matter what the contracts say).
How about minimum fees for animation?
The list goes on.
Just sayin' there seems to be an earnest willingness to walk out of a Canadian show in the rather ambiguous circumstance of a show being sold only to take advantage of the strike (versus a show that would have sold or has already sold anyhow? I'm not sure I buy that distinction), but there is very little willingness to stand up for ourselves here at home, where we're much, much weaker.
I'm all for writers rights. I just wonder if the U.S. writers would even CARE if we continued working on a show after a U.S. sale if they knew the conditions we worked under. When I describe to my U.S. compatriots what I get paid to write a half-hour pilot in development for a major Canadian network, they almost faint. It's really that low.
There's a definite apples & oranges comparison when you look at WGA v. WGC. That should go without saying, but maybe it's worth saying anyhow. And it's one I don't believe that is due to differences in Guilds as it is so much differences in industries.
Although not a member, I personally think that the WGC and its staff represents its members as well as they can. Minimum fees for animation? Yeah, but don't discount the trade off for negotiable rates (jurisdiction) which has considerably strengthened the guild. Backend? WGC gained on this in this contract, but if you wanted pure residuals rather than production fee + DGR, there likely are producers who would take it. Mechanisms and penalties? What do you suggest?
I'm not saying the plight of the Canadian TV writer is always happy one (nor is it obviously as rich a one as your compatriots south of the border), but placing that blame on the lack of radical action of writers, or those who represent them, in this country isn't entirely accurate, regardless of where they may stand with the WGA.
Where do I stand on the WGA: I say strike, sister, and don't stop until you get digital residuals because they're the future! I support them and want them to strike. But I'm not WGA here in Canada. I am a WGC member who has seen first hand how woefully under-protected we are. I love the WGC, and they do what they can, but the systemic "discrimination" against writers in this system benefits no one except producers' and broadcaster' pocketbooks. There is good argument to be made that writers should be making MORE of the budget than U.S. writers do (because maybe "profit" on government subsidized content is sometimes misguided--an entirely different conversation). Trust me, we're all on the same side here. I'm not saying I'd head south and try and exploit the strike for my own gain. I'm saying 1) let's keep our side of the street clean before letting too much blood for our fellow writers to the south who, honestly, don't give us a second thought, and 2) I would not advise the four writers who are lucky enough to be working on a show that makes a sale to the U.S.--during the strike or not--to walk off that show. Make hay. Our battles could be fought elsewhere while still showing reasonable solidarity with writers in other countries.
There's no sense going round the Mulberry bush anymore on this one. You want the two things to be linked, I don't see them as linked, except in the most basic (if they lose we lose eventually, if they win, we have something to fight for) kind of way.
There is absolutely nothing stopping you from going out and agitating for all the things you see as wrong with the Canadian industry tomorrow. You have my blessing. If your point is that I should be doing this, well, then, um. Great. No. I'll keep saying and doing the thing that I fucking believe, thanks.
And you don't see the distinction I make between a show that's going to get sold opportunistically, and a show that's in the can that may be sold (which we have no control over) or a show that already was on the air in the USA getting a second season (which might have happened anyway.) You don't see the distinctions, or want to get them, because... well... because either the real focus should be what's going on in Canada, or because you think there's nothing wrong with capitalizing on US writers being able to work.
Okay. Your opinion's been heard. Duly noted.
You can think I'm crazy calvinist and I can think you're really throwing up a smokescreen of MASSSSSIVE rationalizations, and we can still meet down by the old mill and sneak a smoke.
It's a simple difference of opinion. Okay, maybe not simple. But it still doesn't change a thing. You have to draw the line somewhere. You draw it where you want. I'll draw it where I want.
And neither line will mean a GD thing because all these producer pipe dream sales of Canadian product to US networks is never going to happen in a million fucking years.
I'd be flummoxed by one deal.
I'd be poleaxed by two,
and if THREE shows sold, well, then slap my ass and call me Judy!
It's agitprop. It's Nick Counter masturbation fantasy, nothing else. Not gonna happen. Not a factor. Bunch o bullshit. The end.
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