SUBSCRIPT... Ahhhh... the pain should feel sooo good! Chicago's morning tabloid's editorial writers fantasize about what they'd like to do to Chicago's teachers (and their union)...
The Chicago Sun-Times may have fired its photojournalists, backed union busting everywhere, and made a joke of the Chicago Tribune by changing the newspaper's stock name to TRONC -- but new jobs are opening for editorial fantasists at the tabloid that once called itself "The Bright One." On Friday, July 1, 2016 the Chicago SUN-TIMES editorial board published an opinion piece entitled “Now Let’s See Teachers Union Share the Pain”. A close reading of the opinion of Chicago's morning tabloid brings to mind images of a dominatrix in a dungeon, leashing, and then ordering around -- Chicago's teachers!
This sado-masochistic screed, that glorifies and revels in “pain,” declares that the State of Illinois is "feeling the pain..." Chicago property tax payers "will feel the pain..." Governor Rauner must be feeling the pain, they write. And so it is now time for the Chicago Teachers Union to join in this twisted orgy, or rather, in their words, the “begrudging spirit of shared sacrifice”… and of course … feel the pain.
But let’s look beyond the leather fantasy. The perverse rhetoric goes on to focus on the CTU in a cynical attempt to stoke anti-union animosity. But why not be direct and say what they really intend? The “editorial board” is demanding that public school educators take another cut in compensation. A cut that comes on top of a stolen 4% raise, on top of an uncompensated extension of the workday and year, on top of job cuts, school closings, cumulative pension attacks, health insurance increases and daily paperwork overloads.
The twisted vignette then goes on to indirectly acknowledge the Board of Education’s role in underfunding the Chicago Teachers Pension Fund by $9.6 BILLION dollars but quickly adds, “that ship of blame has already sailed”. In other words, we should not demand that the person that robbed our house and nearly destroyed it pay reparation, we should just “get over it’ and move into a cardboard box.
Chicago Sun-Times owner Michael Ferro (above right) has usually met privately with Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, but at times a photographer catches the two together. Photo originally in Chicago Reader.But finally, to descend from the ridiculous to the truly absurd the article next entertains a dystopian fantasy of CPS declaring bankruptcy, parents abandoning Chicago public schools, and Chicagoans evacuating the city for the suburbs. Then of course the author goes on to deride two real options for a true and authentic “shared sacrifice”: a progressive state income tax and a LaSalle Street tax on high speed trading, quickly “debunking” them with ideological and unsupported claims. From the tenor of the screed, it’s obvious that the author really rejects these options because they are … painless.
This whips and chains dungeon mentality simply provides a silly perspective on a serious issue: a narcissistic peek into a private hell … WHACK !!!
