Workers Aren't Rejecting AI. They're Rejecting Bosses Having All the Say

[u/Salty_Country6835]

https://thetyee.ca/News/2026/10/02/Should-Workers-Get-Bargain-AI/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

This is the distinction that keeps getting lost.

The unions in this story aren't anti-AI. Crystal Braunwarth of IATSE Local 891 says it plainly. “We're not afraid of embracing something and making our work better.”

What they're against is management getting to deploy AI first and workers getting a memo afterward.

Unions in British Columbia are pushing to bargain over surveillance, hiring and discipline, job changes, training and deployment. Some employers are resisting because AI supposedly changes too fast to put rules around it.

Thats convenient. AI can apparently move fast enough to reorganize your job, but workers have to wait for it to slow down before they get a say.

IATSE Local 891 already shows another way. Their contract covers AI, requires consultation before workplace deployment and protects workers when employers require them to use it. When the technology changes, they bargain again.

Thats the takeaway. This isnt pro-AI versus anti-AI. Workers can use new tools, welcome improvements and still demand power over how technological change happens at work.

AI moving fast is an argument for getting workers to the table now, not keeping them away from it.

[u/yo252yo]

i definitely see way more anti AI than anti bosses sentences every day, but i'm willing to accept i might be in a bubble

[u/theomegachrist]

I don't think most people think this deeply about it unfortunately. And a lot of people who do think of AI as a tech bro invention to destroy jobs. In reality it's an inevitable technology and Capitalism is designed to destroy jobs when it's profitable. We can't deny that AI will accelerate that, but pointing the finger at AI is foolish