Partly

The WGA strike is big news in a lot of the LJ's and forums that I'm on. It probably goes without saying that I'm all for the writers. I know that the stars get all the press and that without good actors even the best scripts suck. Hell, look at Shakespeare -- sometimes the best scripts require good actors. But without the writers, the actors would have nothing. Writers, by the very nature of their work -- behind the scenes, not the focus of any popular awards, never given publicized credit -- are unknowns. Because the common thought is "Hell, anyone can write" they are devalued as a profession even before their ideas and words appear on a screen. That "valuelessness" is compounded in an industry that values gore, glitz and glamour over substance. And even worse and industry that doesn't realize that the "gore, glitz and glamour" has to start out in a writer's mind or you get nothing.

The writers deserve to be well compensated. They deserve to have access to the same type of copyright protection and royalty rights that any other writer has. The WGA needs to look to the future and demand that they get paid whenever someone uses their words to make money.

As usual, however, I look beyond the immediate concern of compensation and I think that this strike is important society as a whole, not just to the WGA members and those who work in the entertainment community. Hence my choice for icon: Save the writers, save the world. There are two main philosophical issues that this writer's strike speaks to. I'm breaking into two posts not to spam my flist, but because they are two very separate thoughts.

( The value of unions in America. )

Continued in part two Critical Thinking