Is the ‘s’ word really a bad word?
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Is the ‘s’ word really a bad word?
Strikes are the collective union of workers refusing to attend their jobs due to disagreements with their employers and/or the conditions required by the authorities above them. This often has negative connotations. To date there have been many strike related incidents especially in the UK. The question is, should strikes be allowed?
As we previously mentioned, there have been many strikes circulating in the UK. Some key examples are the: NHS, Teacher and TFL strikes. The NHS workers have been striking due to the understaffing, lack of respect and professional autonomy. Teachers and others in the education system strike for their lack of funding from the government and inadequate recruitment of teachers. Lastly, TFL workers are striking due to job cuts and disputes over their pensions. After analysing the causes of these particular strikes in greater depth, we can see a similarity: underpaid wages.
Striking is a form of protest, which is a democratic right we all have. By striking, workers can gain better remuneration by working together in a union. If workers are unhappy with their wages they have the right to strike. For example, teacher salaries in England fell by an average of 11% between 2016 and 2022. Therefore, they have every right to protest against what they find unfair.
However, there can be some downsides to striking. Such as, the negative impact it has on the public due to the lack of usual services. For example, on account of the 11,509 medical staff who were absent, 13,797 appointments and procedures had to be rescheduled, according to NHS England. This shows that striking can cause massive disruption for the public’s daily lives.
Even though it can cause disruption, we believe that workers should be able to strike and challenge authority when an issue arises. In the 1970’s, miners were striking over disputes about pay. During this time, there was a high inflation, similar to the current cost of living crisis. In the end, they had achieved an annual pay rise of 27% compared to the government’s wage restraint policy target of 7% to 8%. We have used this example to show how strikes can achieve goals over what was primarily expected.
We’ve discussed the meaning, we've discussed different views, and we’ve stated our opinion. So, back to our original question, is this “s” word really a bad word?
Comments (1)
I disagree with you..... never a word can be bad. A word works both as the positive one as well as the negative one. Its upon us how to use it as positive or as negative.
For example; The letter 's' works both as 'strike' and 'smile'.
Can say strike is a negative one and smile is the positive one side of the letter 's'.
One more correction is that 's' is a letter not a word.
I respect your opinion but as it says in the standpoint we are referring to the word strike. And yes words can be seen as either positive or negative but the word ‘strike’ has negative connotations as said in the essay. Also your correction is not correct. We asked the rhetorical question “is the ‘S’ word really a bad word” and by saying “the ‘S’ word” of course we are referring to a word beginning with the letter ‘S’. We never labelled the letter ‘S’ as a word.
I agree with you because no word can be bad, it always depends on how we use it, therefore strikes can have its positive side as well as its negative side.
Yes and I agree no words can be completely ‘bad’. But as CLEARLY written in the essay there are POSITIVES and NEGATIVES of the word and action STRIKE. If you read the essay then you would notice that we talk about both the positives and negatives of strikes, and so no matter how we used it in our writing, either way the argument and use of the word would be balanced as we portrayed both sides. So in conclusion, we never said the word strikes was all bad we said that if you think of ‘strike’ it just generally gives negative connotations.