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Admit it. You love nice, cheap clothes. And you don't care about child slave labour
The Guardian ^ | 07/28/2013 | Gethin Chamberlain

Posted on 07/28/2013 7:34:27 PM PDT by SeekAndFind

Until three years ago I did not believe in magic. But that was before I began investigating how western brands perform a conjuring routine that makes the great Indian rope trick pale in comparison. Now I'm beginning to believe someone has cast a spell over the world's consumers.

This is how it works. Well Known Company makes shiny, pretty things in India or China. The Observer reports that the people making the shiny, pretty things are being paid buttons and, what's more, have been using children's nimble little fingers to put them together. There is much outrage, WKC professes its horror that it has been let down by its supply chain and promises to make everything better. And then nothing happens. WKC keeps making shiny, pretty things and people keep buying them. Because they love them. Because they are cheap. And because they have let themselves be bewitched.

Last week I revealed how poverty wages in India's tea industry fuel a slave trade in teenage girls whose parents cannot afford to keep them. Tea drinkers were naturally upset. So the ethical bodies that certified Assam tea estates paying a basic 12p an hour were wheeled out to give the impression everything would be made right.

For many consumers, that is enough. They want to feel that they are being ethical. But they don't want to pay more. They are prepared to believe in the brands they love. Companies know this. They know that if they make the right noises about behaving ethically, their customers will turn a blind eye.

(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: clothes; slavelabor
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To: DManA

>> Admit it: If you aren’t a communist you are a selfish pig.

I’m a selfish pig.

(Hey, just following orders.) :-)


21 posted on 07/28/2013 7:59:04 PM PDT by Nervous Tick (Without GOD, men get what they deserve.)
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To: SeekAndFind; a fool in paradise

Sunday Feel Bad About Yourself sermon. And that from a wit named Chamberlain. How’s Herr Ribbentrop these days, Mr Chamberlain?


22 posted on 07/28/2013 8:00:09 PM PDT by Revolting cat! (Bad things are wrong! Ice cream is delicious!)
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To: SeekAndFind

Typical leftist hysterics driven by childish ignorance.

While I feel sympathy for anyone living in a developing nation and experiencing the often brutal “growing pains” of a poverty stricken and rapidly changing economy, banning child labor is one of those liberal feel-good crusades that more often than not ends up causing heaps of ignorant harm.

You see, children have to eat too. Sometimes children may end up being the primary breadwinners in an impoverished family. What do you think happens when some self-righteous limousine liberal comes along and forces out the only honest employers in an area?

Well, for one, you’ll have a lot of starving, out of work children. Two, and this is truly horrible, what we’ve seen from poverty-stricken developing nations where the textile industry has been forced to stop employing children, you typically see a massive spike in child-prostitution.

In the end, human misery and suffering is increased by an order of magnitude simply to make a bunch of comparatively rich liberals feel good about themselves.

Perhaps it would be wiser to actually support the economic development of a nation, by encouraging western nation to import goods from said nation, especially from industries that facilitate further industrialization and advancement of a society.

With sufficient profit that textile mill today may grow into a machine shop in the years to come, and perhaps an assembly-room floor for electronics after sufficient economic and industrial development. Forcing out a nation’s only industry and forcing people to sell agricultural products or their own bodies in order to survive just compounds the human evils involved.


23 posted on 07/28/2013 8:02:29 PM PDT by jameslalor
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To: SeekAndFind

Cheap???

Isn’t the Fed creating new $$$ like crazy?


24 posted on 07/28/2013 8:04:47 PM PDT by sickoflibs (To GOP : Any path to US Citizenship IS putting them ahead in line. Stop lying about your position.)
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To: SeekAndFind

Compassion is engendered by faith, not government mandates. The left occasionally opens their eyes and say, ‘my gosh, where have Christian values gone?’ Without calling them Christian, of course. Secular morality in their imposed secular world baffles them.


25 posted on 07/28/2013 8:05:45 PM PDT by Spok
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To: SeekAndFind

The Guardian= The New York Slimes of London.


26 posted on 07/28/2013 8:16:28 PM PDT by AlexW
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To: SeekAndFind

From the expired TJIC.com:


Say that we had first contact with some super (economically) advanced aliens.

…and pretty soon they set up factories here.

…and I was offered a job in one of these factories, doing software engineering.

The pay is $400k/year.

The work week is 20 hours long.

The work environment is far better than I’m used to – great internal decoration, well tended plants, a zen-like water garden near my desk, massages every other day.

…and then left-wing alien “sentient being rights activists” started protesting, because I was being forced to work for less than a quarter of the prevailing wage in Alpha Centauri, and my work hours were twice as long as the legal norms in Alpha Centauri, and I didn’t have every mandatory benefits like “other other year off”, and “free AI musical composition mentoring”.

…and then left-wing alien “sentient being rights activists” wanted to make it illegal for my employer and I to contract with each other at mutually beneficial terms.

…then I would be rip shit that some elitist who had never visited me, or knew of my actual alternatives on the ground presumed to decide that I shouldn’t have this opportunity.

Which brings me to my core point: Chinese factory conditions may not be the exact cup of tea for a San Francisco graphic designer or a Connecticut non-profit ecologist grant writer … but they’re, by definition, better than all the other alternatives available to the Chinese workers (or the factories would find it impossible to staff up).

Butt out, clueless activists.


27 posted on 07/28/2013 8:17:50 PM PDT by ctdonath2 (Making good people helpless doesn't make bad people harmless.)
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To: dfwgator

I’ve thought the exact same for years! These stupid pompous asses would rather have these factories close and put the people out of work than have them work for whatever they’re being paid. To them, no job, if it pays a low wage, is morally superior to working for what they consider to be “slave wages”.


28 posted on 07/28/2013 8:24:02 PM PDT by 2nd amendment mama ( www.2asisters.org | Self defense is a basic human right!)
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To: SeekAndFind

So what do you do? Fire all the children and now they have no income and they die or beg.


29 posted on 07/28/2013 8:24:48 PM PDT by the_daug
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To: ctdonath2

Well said


30 posted on 07/28/2013 8:32:00 PM PDT by RightGeek (FUBO and the donkey you rode in on)
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To: SpaceBar

“Unless the author wrote this article completely naked, chances are they were wearing an article of clothing manufactured in an asian sweatshop.”

I worked for a company which had a factory in Vietnam. I was there in the mid-90’s. I guarantee you that most factories owned by companies from other countries ARE NOT sweatshops. For the most part, the sweatshops are the factories owned by the Commies in their own government who do not value their people but only their output. This author is an idiot and has probably never been outside of Britain.


31 posted on 07/28/2013 8:36:56 PM PDT by Rembrandt (Part of the 51% who pay Federal taxes)
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To: SeekAndFind
Want to help? Or just talk?

We heard about eight-year-old Vivienne Harr's single-handed effort today in church to take a stand against child slavery. (I don't go to a liberal church. The preacher made the point about one child making a difference in the world.)

Why not take time to view the video, then make a purchase?

Vivienne has set a personal goal of selling lemonade (from her take-a-stand set up in a park, and online) to raise $150,000 to help end child slavery. She has raised $90,000 toward her goal.

32 posted on 07/28/2013 8:40:31 PM PDT by righttackle44 (Take scalps. Leave the bodies as a warning.)
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To: DManA

In many of these 4th world hell holes it’s either the sweat shops or the brothels.

CC


33 posted on 07/28/2013 8:53:35 PM PDT by Captain Compassion
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To: Blood of Tyrants
Do you insist on buying US made clothes or clothes made in worker friendly factories? I don’t because I know it is a fruitless task.

Actually, as much as I can, I do, and I can.

My dress shoes (Allan Edmonds) are Made in the USA.

My running shoes (New Balance) are Made in the USA.

My casual shoes (Ecce) are made in Italy.

My hiking boots (Lowa) are made in Slovakia.

My flip flops (Reef) are made in Brazil.

A quick check of my clothes shows pretty much the same. And I don't spend huge amounts of money on clothes and shoes, and my gear is top-notch and lasts a long time.

Dont' paint as an impossible task that which is quite possible.

34 posted on 07/28/2013 8:54:56 PM PDT by Yossarian
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To: SeekAndFind

Yes I like cheap products and why does the author want to impoverish these third worlders by denying them work??


35 posted on 07/28/2013 8:57:16 PM PDT by GeronL
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To: SeekAndFind

As with many situations there are pluses and minuses here.

The kids work a lot but they and their families also get things that they wouldn’t have a chance otherwise to get. The artificial sheltered life of Western society may be nice in a way, but it also can make Western society arrogant. With China I’d be more concerned about the inhumane way that China enforces its already inhumane and self destructive population policy through things like charting the women’s menstrual cycles right on the company bulletin boards. What nominally Western company believing in Judeo-Christian morality wants to be a party to this?


36 posted on 07/28/2013 9:01:45 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Whatever promise that God has made, in Jesus it is yes. See my page.)
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To: GeronL

The author would rather they lie around the hut with hunger pangs.


37 posted on 07/28/2013 9:03:10 PM PDT by Lurkina.n.Learnin (If global warming exists I hope it is strong enough to reverse the Big Government snowball)
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To: SeekAndFind
Last week I revealed how poverty wages in India's tea industry fuel a slave trade in teenage girls whose parents cannot afford to keep them.

Slave trade in that they are literally bought and sold and paid no wages or "slave trade" in that their wages are not what you think they should be?

38 posted on 07/28/2013 9:03:53 PM PDT by Harmless Teddy Bear (Revenge is a dish best served with pinto beans and muffins)
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To: Harmless Teddy Bear

And they forgot how America got to greatness, it wasn’t always through sheltering everyone in sight.


39 posted on 07/28/2013 9:06:08 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Whatever promise that God has made, in Jesus it is yes. See my page.)
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To: SeekAndFind

India is growing into a robust economy and has for many years relied on these low paid jobs to keep the economy going. Even though it may be hard for us to imagine working for low wages I am sure if that was the only choice we had we would be grateful for it.


40 posted on 07/28/2013 9:06:37 PM PDT by melsec (Once a Jolly Swagman camped by a Billabong.)
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