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News conference participants like Millbrae teacher Curtis Washington, San Mateo President Craig Childress and South San Francisco teacher Carol Stearman were so riled up, they stayed late to call voters at the Alliance for a Better California phone bank. Expressing their dismay at the demeaning animation were Ravenswood President Dixie Johansen and South San Francisco teacher Wendy Smithers.
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"We're not union thugs," said a group of Bay Area teachers at a news conference reacting to a piece of animation on the governor's website promoting the passage of Proposition 75.
The cartoon showed a couple of shady characters upending a teacher and shaking money out of her pockets in order to finance the campaign against the governor's initiatives.
"It's degrading and insulting," said Wendy Smithers, a South San Francisco teacher. "It degrades women, it degrades teachers in our profession, and it's just insulting to our union's right to organize and our right to speak out. The governor needs to stop. It's a no-brainer."
Golden Gate Service Center Council Chair Steve Savage and nearly a dozen Bay Area teachers came together in solidarity to protest the depiction "of our members as union goons shaking down a teacher."
"These are the faces of the California Teachers Association," he said, pointing to his colleagues. "We are not thugs. We are the teachers of California's children."
Asked what they expected of their political opponents in the hardball political arena, Savage answered, "We expected to be treated like professionals."
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Steve Savage from South San Francisco and other Bay Area teachers tell what it feels like to be labeled as union thugs on the governor's website. |
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Also from South San Francisco, Candace Gianni studies the pro-Prop. 75 spam Don Heinsohn received via his Union City school e-mail. |
