Originally Posted by
Lewbronski
Since I've been here, every TA and major issue to vote on has been accompanied by an enormous sales job from SWAPA, up to an including TA2 from last cycle. The coup de grâce on that one was our former union president essentially guaranteeing that it would pass by explaining, "I'm not telling anyone how to vote. But I'm voting yes." That's the guy who many here still lionize and who ushered in the substandard contract we now work under.
Whenever the TA comes, it will be difficult for SWAPA BOD members, exec's, and staff, many whom have put years into crafting the TA to not look upon it, at least subconsciously, as their baby. That always has and will make them defensive and touchy in response to criticism of the brain child they have birthed. It has been like that every single time regardless of how "different" SWAPA claims to be.
There always has been a ginormous wave of, "What? You don't trust SWAPA?", from the membership in response to any questioning or criticism of whatever the agreement is in question. Age 65 was like that. The -800 SL for no additional pay was like that. The SL for FAR 117 was like that. And every TA has been like that.
Eh, I was going to edit out the bullet points from this quote, but it ends up all being too important.
We here on the forums (and social media in general) have made huge strides in beginning to recognize and call out examples of the "exceptionalism" cult at SWA, but we often forget to turn the mirror on ourselves (I.e.: swapa).
Swapa suffers from the same deep indoctrination of exceptionalism that has pervaded SWA for the past 52+ years. As many have eluded, there are those of us who, some unwittingly and some sycophantically, talk about the things that make swa and swapa unique to a fault.
You can see it in the relatively innocent examples of berating of people who criticize SWAPA, the defense of using TFP, the building up of our work flexibility, and the yearly W2 thread. You can also see it in the more nefarious sea-gulling (not a word?) of the Toms on, again, TFP, DTC, SWAPA 2.0, sick and disability, and our insurance options.
I try not to subscribe to any of that (and am thus that labeled as a Debbie downer, never-happy, etc.). In order for us to grow as a union and as a pilot group, we HAVE to be willing to look in the mirror and reasses.
Swapa has made great strides since the days of TA1 and earlier, but Lew isn't wrong that many players are still in the game. That's not necessarily a bad thing, because people can and do change, and there's certainly marked progress, but we have to continuously go back and assess how people and the union as a whole are doing.
Look at the people defending the TFP-block hour conversion change out there as an example. At what point do we say "you know, I thought it was always in our benefit, but now given that the company can just arbitrarily decide to change the number, is it really worth it?" At a certain point, the transparency of a simple method of comparison might well be worth it. It's certainly worth the discussion.
To throw out a bunch of other clichés: trust but verify, "that's the way we've always done it", ABCD->, etc.
SWAPA may have gone from 1.0-2.0 on the last TA but it's far from perfect. I know there are those who are trying to change it from within, but we as a pilot group need to constantly keep the pressure on to adapt to a changing company and environment.
How many versions of software do you know of that stop at v2.0?