#ACTRA : Belabouring The Pointless

ACTRA Bulletin Sept. 6, 2022

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Labour Day solidarity

ACTRA members marched loudly and proudly in Toronto and Winnipeg’s Labour Day parades yesterday—demanding respect for performers, and an end to the ICA’s unlawful lock-out.

Here they are at the end of the parade, after making the case that the creative class is the working class: 

There are only eleven people in the photograph that was taken in Winnipeg. That’s if you count everybody in the photo.

The young Black guy in the red shirt and the old white guy in the light blue short-sleeved shirt aren’t wearing an ACTRA hat.

The young Black guy in the red shirt could have been driving the ambulance that’s parked on the street and the old white guy in the light blue short-sleeved shirt could have been waiting for that ambulance for all anybody looking at that photo would know.

Loud and proud??? It’s awfully difficult to imagine those eleven ( possibly only nine ) people making as much noise as ACTRA is asking everyone to believe.

What have they got to be proud about? Less than a dozen ACTRA members showed up for the photo-op at the end of the Winnipeg Labour Day Parade. That’s something to be thoroughly embarrassed about.

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In Toronto, they also received messages of support and solidarity from elected officials, including federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, the Interim Leader of the Ontario NDP Peter Tabuns, and Liberal MP Julie Dabrusin:

( from the Toronto Labour Day video above ):

Jagmeet Singh - "Happy Labour Day. Listen, I heard about the lockout and I gotta say one of the fundamental things that we need to do when we're negotiating is to be at the table. So, we need to have the employer come back to the table. I support you on those efforts. 

And I want you to know anytime you're fighting, every battle that you fight it is for all workers. Anytime a worker's brought down, anytime a worker's locked out, and you fight back, you're standing up for all workers. 

Your fight is so important. I stand in solidarity with you. 

If we fight, we win. I stand with you, we will win. Solidarity, brothers and sisters." 

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What a load of garbage. 

Jagmeet Singh is selling the lie that ACTRA told him about the ICA locking ACTRA out. 

He doesn't know any better because he doesn't want to know any better.

Or he does know better and he's stooping to lying for the sake of a photo op. 

ACTRA, the union that Jagmeet Singh is shamelessly paying lip service to, is prohibiting union members from working on commercials that are being made by ICA agencies. 

The ICA agencies didn't blacklist ACTRA. 

ACTRA blacklisted them for objecting to being put at a financial disadvantage. 

ACTRA wants the ICA agencies to come back to the table gagged and bound. 

That's not a negotiation. That's a prisoner of war scenario. 

ACTRA's precondition that the ICA can't bring up, let alone ask for, the same deal that ACTRA has been giving non-signatory agencies for the last 15 years destroys any semblance of a negotiation.

What does Jagmeet Singh support exactly? 

What about all of the non-union performers in the Canadian commercial industry who aren't members of ACTRA? 

Those non-union performers exist in spite of ACTRA not because of ACTRA. 

ACTRA is intent on wiping those workers out of existence. ACTRA is fighting to kill off their place in the Canadian commercial industry not fighting for them. 

ACTRA's not doing the non-union sector any favours in ACTRA’s ongoing quest to put non-union workers out of business. 

If the grandstanding, photo op loving politician Jagmeet Singh had bothered to do a bit of research on the union that he's vouching for he would have learned about the AABP, the ACTRA union members who end up with less than minimum wage per hour in their pockets after they pay their background agent's 10% commission + HST. 

The AABP ( who are recognized as union members in ACTRA's constitution ) are prohibited from working on non-union productions. 

If Jagmeet Singh had done his due diligence and had a conscience, he would chastise ACTRA publicly for denying the ACTRA union members who are making less than $20,000 a year the freedom to work on non-union productions when they aren't being offered work on union productions. 

The average yearly income for an ACTRA union member who works in commercials is less than $6000 according to ACTRA Toronto mouthpiece Wendy Crewson. 

Jagmeet Singh has gone on at length about how he has been discriminated against because of his appearance. 

What about the ACTRA union members who look just like Jagmeet Singh who have been missing out on employment opportunities in the Canadian film, television, and commercial industry because of their outward appearance? 

They aren’t getting hired to work on ACTRA productions and the leaders of ACTRA are doing everything in their power to prevent those unemployed BIPOC ACTRA union members from earning an income on non-union productions that would be interested in hiring them.

We aren’t seeing those BIPOC performers in ACTRA-sanctioned productions or in non-union productions. It’s as if they don’t exist.

Who exactly does that serve? It certainly doesn’t serve the BIPOC performers who aren’t being seen anywhere as a consequence of ACTRA’s representation.

Is whatever financial turmoil they may be going through as a consequence of not being allowed to earn an income elsewhere when they aren't getting hired to work on ACTRA-sanctioned productions the stuff of fantasy?

If it is the stuff of fantasy than the leaders of ACTRA are undeniably full of sh*t.

They’re playing a key role in the lack of representation of BIPOC performers while exploiting the absence of BIPOC performers on the big and small screen.

Who’s going to save the BIPOC performers who aren’t being seen on the big and small screen from ACTRA, their supposed saviour?

Jagmeet Singh is to ACTRA what Omarosa Manigault was to US President Donald Trump.

Omarosa Manigault betrayed people who look like her in the hopes of winning favour with US President Donald Trump for her own political gain just as Jagmeet Singh is betraying people who look like him to win favour with ACTRA for his own political gain.

I can't help but remember that Cain and Abel were brothers too whenever I hear a manipulative self-serving politician like Jagmeet Singh say the word "brother". 

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( from the Toronto Labour Day video above ):

Julie Dabrusin - "Hello everybody! Whoo ! Happy Labour Day to everybody! 

Time and time again I see ACTRA out there standing up for our creative workers,not just actors, but all creative workers right across our country. 

ACTRA is strong. ACTRA is important. And today is the day to celebrate and be an activist to make sure that we support our actors and our creatives every day. So happy Labour Day, ACTRA. You are amazing. Thank you."

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( from the Toronto Labour Day video above ):

Peter Tabuns - "Good morning,ACTRA. And it is good to see all of you.

Friends,friends, organizers, activists. 

If people don't organize it, people don't unionize it, if they don't fight, they don't eat.

If they don't unionize, if they don't fight, they don't organize, they don't have a roof over their head.

What you have shown is that actors deserve the respect, that workers deserve the respect. All that you do makes life better for all of the rest of us.

Friends, so good to see you here today. End the lockout now!" 

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Would that be the roof of a tiny shed with a crescent moon on the door or the roof of a small tent in a public park?

Or is Peter Tabuns talking about the roof of a van down by the river? 

How many people in Toronto are paying less than $6,000  a year rent?

That's the amount that the average ACTRA union member who works in commercials makes a year according to Wendy Crewson.

Didn’t you read the Wendy Crewson opinion piece in the Toronto Star that ACTRA has been telling all of your ‘friends’ in ACTRA to read, Peter ?