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Guild officers unnerved by actors' internet free speech

Officials of the Screen Actors Guild were thrown off balance when union members rejected their proposal to merge with the American Federation of Radio and Television Artists. After spending an estimated $2 million in a massive campaign of direct mail and telemarketing, they failed to convince the required 60% of the voters. It must have been infuriating when the merger opponents, who spent little, won out simply by using the internet.

How to choke off that annoying use of the internet? Sue somebody! They couldn't sue the dissenting members who enjoy clear cut free speech rights under the LMRDA. And so they devised a way to send a chilling message to members by suing a nonmember.

Their federal suit charges that the nonmember, John Vulich, sent out bulk e-mail urging SAG members to reject the merger with AFTRA. Vulich, the complaint charges, is an "employer" whose e-mails were an "illegal and harassing" attempt to influence the union vote, and that this somehow compromised the membership's right of self-determination. Ominously, the union web site threatens "that other names may be added to the suit" as defendants.
If an interested employer ---one that employs or might employ screen actors ---- truly sought to influence a union referendum, it might justify an aggressive union reply. But Vulich is an award-winning make-up artist who employs a few other artists, but no SAG members.

Moreover, he claims that he had no intention of personally intervening in the merger dispute; he simply sent out the e-mail as a favor to a SAG member who had been campaigning against the merger on the internet but whose service provider, he says, canceled his account after the SAG threatened it with a lawsuit.

The union's warning that other defendants may be named seems like an obvious ploy, intended to intimidate members' who might be ignorant of their strongly protected free speech rights. Actually, it would be foolhardy for the union to add members to the list. Doing so, would likely prompt the judge to toss out the case, which SAG has little chance of winning in any event, and could subject it to punitive damages.

However, SAG's obvious goal can be served without winning in court. Won or lost, SAG's suit seems intended to intimidate members who dare to use the internet to oppose its policies. That intention would explain why its website boasts how effectively the union used subpoenas against Yahoo to trace the e-mails to Vulich. The message is clear. Don't rely on the supposed anonymity offered by the internet. Big Brother is watching.

Articles on the internet and union democracy:
Surrendering to the internet: Democrats in spite of themselves?
IBEW president Hill upholds Canadian member's rights
Union officials "condone and endorse" attack on member's internet free speech rights
Round 2 in the internet battle in AFSCME DC37
In AFSCME DC37 - A round in the internet battle
Danger of democracy on the Internet? Kill it!
Whose "IBEW" is it? An Electrician on the Internet.
Results of the 2005 AUD Best Rank-and-File Website Contest
Union democracy online survives two lawsuits
Online Guide: build an effective rank-and-file website
SEIU Pulls plug on "Labor's Future" discussion
52 Playing cards = fearsome "Local 52"
Using the Internet for Union Democracy
AUD's Best Rank-and-File Websites of 2004
Matt Noyes on AUD and the Internet
2KB of free speech? ACLU & Public Citizen sue in IBEW Local 46 election
Making a splash: SEIU's Unite to Win and the "free and open debate" on Labor's future
SAG officers unnerved by actors' internet free speech
Free speech irritates UFCW
Free speech in NWU
IATSE 600: Internet democracy triumphs over super centralization
Cyber-democracy: your legal rights online.(handout)

See also:
AUD's 50 Guidelines for building an effective rank-and-file website, and the sample homepage.
The labortech tag on del.icio.us.

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