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Technorati32 Picketers Arrested Outside Disneyland In Labor Protest
ANAHEIM, Calif. - Cinderella, Snow White, Tinkerbell and other fictional fixtures of modern-day childhood were handcuffed, frisked and loaded into police vans Thursday at the culmination of a labor protest that brought a touch of reality to the Happiest Place on Earth.
The arrest of the 32 protesters, many of whom wore costumes representing famous Disney characters, came at the end of an hour-long march to Disneyland's gates from one of three Disney-owned hotels at the center of a labor dispute.
Those who were arrested sat in a circle on a busy intersection outside the park holding hands until they were placed in plastic handcuffs and led to two police vans while hundreds of hotel workers cheered and chanted.
The protesters were arrested on a misdemeanor count of failure to obey a police officer and two traffic infractions, and were expected to be booked and released later Thursday, said Sgt. Rick Martinez of the Anaheim police.
Bewildered tourists in Disney T-shirts and caps, some pushing strollers, filed past the commotion and gawked at the costumed picketers getting hauled away. The protest shut down a major thoroughfare outside Disneyland and California Adventure for nearly an hour.
"It's changing my opinion of Disneyland," said tourist Amanda Kosato, who was visiting from north of Melbourne, Australia. "Taking away entitlements stinks."
The dispute involves about 2,300 maids, bell hops, cooks and dishwashers at three Disney-owned hotels: the Paradise Pier, the Grand Californian and the Disneyland Hotel.
The workers' contract expired in February and their union says Disney's latest proposal makes health care unaffordable for hundreds of employees and creates an unfair two-tier wage system. The union also says Disney wants to create a new category of part-time employees who would receive greatly reduced benefits.
"The other hotels around the area all have health care that is provided by the boss and have been able to get wage increases," said Ava Briceno, president of Unite Here Local 681, which represents the workers.
"At the other hotels in the same classification, for the same work, the workers get paid $2 to $3 an hour more."
Disney spokeswoman Lisa Haines said that Disney and the union are in negotiations and nothing has been finalized. She said workers have protested 14 times but sat down to negotiate only 11 times in the past six months.
"Clearly we're disappointed that Unite Here Local 681 has spent more time protesting," she said. "Publicity stunts are not productive and are extremely disruptive to the resort district."
Before the arrests, the picketers marched and chanted outside Paradise Pier, holding signs that read, "Disney is unfaithful," and "Mickey, shame on you." They were joined by community activists and religious leaders from local churches.
Luz Vasquez, who works in the bakery at Disneyland Hotel, said she can't afford to lose many of her benefits. She said it's already hard to care for her three grandchildren and aging mother while earning $14.32 an hour.
"Disneyland is being unfair with us because we're fighting for our health care and they're trying to take it away," said Vasquez, 45. "They're trying to cut our hours and take away our seniority."
Co-worker Diane Dominguez, 50, said she was worried about losing health care because of the heavy labor involved in lifting mattresses, moving furniture and making dozens of beds a day. She also said rising prices and the cost of gas were eating into her salary of $11.11 an hour.
"The most important is health care. We need that and they want to take it away," she said.
At the heart of the issue is a free health care plan that has been provided to Disney hotel workers through a trust fund that Disney and other unionized hotels in the area pay into.
Briceno said that in exchange for the free medical plan, union members agreed in previous contracts to a lower wage for hotel workers in the first three years of their employment.
But Disney now wants to eliminate the free health plan for new hires and wants to create a new class of workers who put in less than 30 hours a week, said Briceno. Those part-time workers would receive no sick or vacation pay and not be given holidays, she said.
The company also wants to increase the number of hours full-time employees must work before qualifying for the health plan, she said.
"At the end of the day what it means is that workers are going to be priced out of health care," she said.
Haines said the majority of other employees at Disneyland pay for a share of their health plan, even though the resort shoulders about 75 percent of the overall cost. She said it's important to negotiate a contract that's fair to those other unions, too.
"We do remain hopeful that we can reach an agreement that's both fair and equitable, providing that union leadership is reasonable and realistic in its approach," Haines said.
© 2008 Associated Press
22 Comments so far
Show AllJbrad - Very interesting story. I had heard the Walt Disney [man and company] was not good to his animators. How great to have had a father involved in Bambi, Fantasia etc. The animations from that time were often works of art.
To paraphrase Kanye West "Walt Disney does not care about working people." His choice of movie themes gives it away. Most of the leading characters are royalty. Doesn't he know that monarchy is soooo 18th Century. We have a hard time figuring out how to counteract the "Princess" thing with little girls we know.
Corporate controlled vacation? No thanks. All hotels should be small mom n pop operations. Think about it. Who wants to be an employee of and who wants to do business with a corporation? Do not subject yourself to economic dependence on the "Happiest Corporation on Earth".
If you wish upon a star
And white and rich is who you are
Anything your heart demands
Will be brought to you
If your skin is color cream
No demand is too extreme
When you wish upon a star
As wealthy do
Fate is kind
To those with bucks
Everyone else
She vigorously *ucks
Like a bolt out of the blue
Fate horns in and runs you through
When you're poor or dark of skin
Your nightmares come true.
15.00 per hour is about right for a minimum wage. Any less and we have two countries, one rich , one poor.
What the hell is this world coming to when you got to arrest Tinkerbell?
The Disney corporation actually has a long-time history of being anti-union, dating back to the days of Walt. Try Googling the "1941 Disney strike" for various accounts of the bitter 5-week cartoonist strike. Walt never forgave the members of his 'happy little family' who joined the picket lines, and he could be a vindictive little man. My father, Jack Bradbury, was a Disney animator at the time (having worked on various classics like Snow White, Fantasia, Bambi, and Pinochio), and he chose to join the strike. When the strike was finally settled, one of the conditions was that strikers were to be allowed to return to work. My father received a notice to go back to work, spent a few uncomfortable hours in his office with no work assignment, and then, the same day, was given notice that he was fired and was to leave immediately. He walked out of the studio with Art Babbitt, one of the strike leaders, who had similarly been called back only to be fired again. Walt Disney despised unions.
You see, Disneyland is indeed the zenith of fraud's religion. It promises a false existence for people who indeed fail to mature and grow into a world of life's reality. Rather than "face" what must be overcome to become -- simply wish within a capitalist kingdom of trivia and "fantasize." But the truth is to appeal and charge hefty entrance fees to the culture of infantasizing. Align and stand in line for a life following Mr. Toad's wild ride. Wish and wish away within a "small world" -- not one which thrives in accordance to an expanding universe of yet to be accepted realities.
America has indeed become a place where fraud and numbness can be bought for a price. It's the contemporary "E" ticket to a contrived heaven! Open the gates -- to a well gated community of plastic and botox existence. Anyone with the money can purchase the dissociative life! We'd bring envy to best of the darksided Pirates of the Carribean! Heave ho! Downward she and we go!
What would you expect from such a Mickey Mouse organization?
Their position seems totally Goofy to me.
Fourteen bucks too much!? Have you lived in OC? I lived in nearby Fullerton and was paying $550 a month sharing a one bedroom apertment with my cousin. I can't imagine having kids on that amount in OC.
And they arrested and cuffed Mickey Mouse!
Disneyland is a huge supporter of the Military Industrial Complex. They propagandized the american public on the 'necessity' of supporting a nuclear arms race back in the 50's.
Creating a new subclass of impoverised, union denied workers... will help provide poor, desperate and willing human fodder for the MIC's phony empire building 'war on terra'.
M ilitary
I ndustrial
C omplex
K iller
E gocentric
Y esmen
M ust
O rgasmically
U nconditionally
S upport
E mpire
freia, it's not about the exact amount, it's about unfair anti-union techniques. The fact that they make more than non-union workers is a given. Also, bear in mind this is in Anaheim, not exactly a low cost of living area. Apartments run $800+ monthly... on the low end. At $10/hr you're spending more than half you income on housing alone, nevermind transportation and food. The bottom line if, the resorts are turning a huge profit, and can afford to pay their workers a competitive wage for the area and field, yet refuse to do so while also trying to cut benefits.
Yeah, there are people that are even more fucked than these people, but that doesn't mean this isn't a problem, and it certainly isn't as rosy as you're trying to make it sound.
Disney is a scummy company in its overseas clothes and toys manufacturing. That is my main objection. But really, as much as I usually side with my working class brethren, complaining about making $14.32 an hour is bellyaching. This is not poverty. It is actually about 4.32 over the living wage of $10 per hr and almost 10 bucks over the minimum wage. There are millions of marginalized employees making considerably less. I realize that the person making that has various family issues, but that is not something the company can fix. This is what our goverment should fix - e.g. assistance with childcare and eldercare. Sadly our government is blowing this money in Iraq.
Would it be out of place to remind people that Disney employed Nazi war criminals?
So why should Fascist tactics surprise us?
I've been to Disneyland. The areas around it are sterile business parks. The pollution is awful. And if you are near the place at night, fireworks -every- -single- -night-, 365 days a year gets awfully boring. I was there for a week, and tuned them right out.
And other than the costumed performers, who are paid to act nice and polite, the staff are about as friendly as the average minimum wage McDonald's burger flipper. I hope Jim Kuntsler never goes there. He would have an aneurysm at the sterile corporate feel of the place.
So long as the corporations can abuse public servants for private interest, workers rights are a lost cause. Until it's at least as easy to unionize as it is to incorporate, and the unions get at least equal protection, the preachers of capitalism are merely hypocrites, saying "freedom to associate for me, but not you."
Also, the language for what they were charged with piqued my interest. "Failure to obey a police officer?!" At least they being honest about the fact that they're authoritarian fascists, I guess.
i've been active or close to union organizing in the trades for the past 30 years. unions have arrived at their current dreary condition because members thought they could do without them. 'the union makes us strong,' and nothing else.
Disney is creating a Sub Prime working class. A new low paid class without healthcare and an older soon to be fired class. It's as simple as ABC - avoid the Tragic Kingdom.
Te most instructive part of this story isz the picture of the local constabulary hauling off the demonstrators. One of the reasons why orgnaized crime and labor unions have had such a close relationship was because the police (who are suppossed to be serving all the people)have become the unpaid muscle of management.
All the unions were doing was finding their own muscle to defend themselves. This could all be brought to a screeching halt were the Taft-Hartley act repealed and the NLRB be given back the enforcement teeth it once had.
See Rev. Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping stage a steath invasion of Disneyland in the film "What Would Jesus Buy?"
http://liberationvideo.blogspot.com/2008/07/what-would-jesus-buy.html
What is the annual profit for the company and what type of devidend she gives to her share holders? If they are losing money, I can understand but if they make huge profit then, you know, don't be too greedy. Happier employees will give you the assurance that you count on them. But again, this is U.S.A a pretty capitalistic country. No room for the social democratie thinker. sadly enough.
If it weren't for the union my father's work would have fired him because he has a back condition and had to sit down 10 minutes for every hour on his feet. They gave him the job security to keep working.
Ever since then I have been a staunch union supporter.
Now my wife's workplace is trying to organize. Unfortunately we live in small city Missouri and people have been convinced that unions will cause lower wages and lost jobs. The amount of animosity toward unions here is stunning considering almost none of these folks have worked in a union shop.
i had hoped that the bigger employers would have seen the writing on the wall---that a single-payer national health plan would directly and positively affect their bottom lines---but the rat (as disney is known by some of its employees) appears not to have received the memo.
or could it be that disney is selflessly putting the interests of its class above its own quarterly profits?