Last week, The Writers Guild of America (WGA), a labor union that represents the thousands of writers working in the TV, film and entertainment industries, filed a lawsuit against the largest talent agencies in Hollywood for unfair wage practices. 

While the lawsuit cites several instances of behavior from these agencies they believe to be illegal, it is a routine known as “packing fees” that has served as the main point of contention between the WGA and The Association of Talent Agents (ATA).

“Packaging is a decades-old practice under which agencies may team writers with other clients from their stables for a given project. With packaging fees, an agent forgoes the usual 10 percent commission fee paid to them by individual clients; in its place, they are paid directly by the studio,” New York Times reporter John Koblin explains.

The WGA has found that the weekly earnings of writers declined 23 percent between 2014 and 2016. A large part of this problem, they believe, can be attributed to packaging since they incentivize agents to work to the advantage of studios. Lowering a writer’s earnings can increase their own, so packing fees create a conflict of interest. 

“This is indefensible,” Meredith Stiehm, a plaintiff in the lawsuit and the creator of the CBS police drama Cold Case said during a press conference. “An agency should make 10% of what their client makes—not 20, not 50, not like in my case, 94%.”

In addition to filing the lawsuit, the WGA issued a new code of conduct and required all union members to fire agents that could not comply with the condition that barred packaging fees.

Some writers—large names such as Stephen King—have explicitly expressed support for this mass firing. Others, though—like Shalom Auslander—liken it to holding writers “hostage” since networks will only hire members of the WGA to write their shows.

“This PR stunt of forced mass firings is merely that, a stunt, and one that hurts writers,” Auslander wrote in a public termination letter to his representatives. “Not the 800 fabulously well-to-do showrunners who signed their Letter of Support, of course…Having used agents their entire careers to achieve their well-to-do-ness, these folks now insist we fire ours. For our benefit.” 

In this respect, Auslander is correct. This removal of agents from the hiring process will no doubt disadvantage writers still in the process of starting up their careers. 

But, this does not make WGA’s task of establishing higher pay for writers and more transparency within the industry any less worthwhile. Instead, it makes it more important.

Artists today face a harsh reality. They are underpaid, undervalued and unseen, despite their contributions. Everywhere, the belief is put forward that for an artist to be authentic, the creative process must be put above all else. Consumers hold this assumption, so artists are expected to sell their work for free or at cheap prices. Artists fall for this flawed mentality, so money becomes a hush-hush topic in industry circles. No conversations are held about how much writers should be earning, so the artist is taken advantage of by their employers. 

This happens time and time again until one of two events occur: the artist is hired by someone that knows their worth and will pay them accordingly or the artist runs out of food to put on the table and has to let their passion fall to the wayside. The world is left worse off. 

It’s grim, but it’s the unspoken reality every artist knows to be true the instant they make the choice to pursue passion. 

This lawsuit is important because it has the potential to begin to change how writers are treated in Hollywood. If successful, it would be a monumental step towards recognizing that writers are the backbone of film and TV. The industry as a whole would benefit because when artists have enough means to focus on their art and feel that they have a community that supports them, the results are astounding. 

It is wrong that union members had little say in whether they wanted to fire their agents or not—many are now more likely to face unemployment than they were before. But, the WGA took this radical course of action because they needed the publicity this stunt would cause. Without it, the lawsuit would have gained little to no visibility, and they would have a much harder case to win. 

A temporary discomfort is worth enduring if it will lead to tangible change. Tradition and righteousness are not equitable, so these toxic practices should not be accepted on the grounds that it is simply how things have always been done. In cases such as these where the disadvantaged group possesses no leverage, disruption must occur for people’s voices to be heard.