QuakerInfo.com Forum

[oneputt]

I was reading the sweatshop discussion on the Simple Speech thread and wanted to ask some questions without disrupting the point of that thread.Please understand from the start that I am not supporting the practice of sweatshop labor.I don't even own stock ,so I don't even have an indirect financial link to this problem,beyond purchasing the goods for personal use.

My point is what life will be like for the workers if the sweatshops didn't exist.Has anyone thought out their objections this far down the road?I have found that with many of these "causes" that the people haven't thought past an immediate decision that allows them to feel good about themselves.For example,I have had discussions with animal rights people on the practice of euthanizing dogs and cats picked up as strays.They demand an end to euthanization,but don't have the slightest clue as to what to do with the extra 1000 dogs and 1000 cats a year that their animal control dept. picks up,who feeds them and whether life crammed in a little cage is better than being humanely put down.So here is my question.

If your next purchase,or refusal to purchase makes the difference in a sweatshop child named Jose losing or keeping his job,what is the correct thing to do?What did Jose do for money before the sweatshop?Is having to go back to that life better than the sweatshop?If all the protests had their effect and the corporations pulled out,will life be better or worse for those left behind?How many of them will go back to scavenging in landfills,or prostitution,or begging on the streets,or whatever it was they did before the sweatshops came in?Do we really think that all these people quit a good,safe high paying job to come to work in such an environment?

If your protests puts a kid back in a landfill scavenging,or on the street begging,or a woman back into prostitution,have you improved their lot in life?

[simonstl]

I think you're looking at this question from the wrong direction, though it's the direction from which most people would prefer to look at it, justifiying their decision to look the other way as they get more stuff cheaper.

The situation isn't a simple choice between protectionism and sending poor girls from the sweatshop into prostitution. For reasons beyond my comprehension, we've set up world trade such that freedom to ship goods from one country to another comes without any responsibility to see that those goods are manufactured in a way that protects workers and the environment.

A lot of people like to justify that by pointing out that the United States and other developed countries went through a period of similar exploitation, and calling that just part of the system. That cheerful rejection of kinder but more expensive options seems not to have noticed that manufacturing is moving ever faster toward cheaper and cheaper conditions, maximizing only the dollars returned for the dollar spent with little interest in side effects like growing stable communities.

As this cycle has accelerated, it has become less clear how much of a benefit it is to the places manufacturing passes through. Much manufacturing moved from the unionized north to the 'right to work' south to Mexico to China to India, and keeps moving. If you've looked at the labels in most store-bought clothing lately you'll see ever smaller and more impoverished countries.

The cycle doesn't have to run like this. Free trade treaties could be written with fair trade components about workers' rights, environmental protection, and health and safety issues. However, they aren't written that way, probably because those who have the most to gain directly from this trade aren't excited about covering the costs their activities inflict on their workers or their communities.

And that's where your simple question fails. There are lots of other options, most of which seem to get ignored in favor of the simple choice you present. It's a false choice, and more and more people seem to be realizing that.

So they realize it, and try to make a difference by shifting their purchasing decisions, and then they get knocked around with rhetoric about how all they're doing is making "an immediate decision that allows them to feel good about themselves".

Consumerism seems to have infected this culture so severely that choosing fairly traded goods is seen as a statement about the purchaser feeling good about themselves rather than a statement about the way the world should be. That's so far beyond depressing that it's hard to discuss.
_________________
Simon St.Laurent
http://lightandsilence.org/

[oneputt]

In other words,you don't care to think about the immediate result of your actions on the people that are getting the low wages for the work.Do you really think that they quit better jobs to get the one they are at now?

[Shay]

[simonstl]

[oneputt]

[oneputt]

[simonstl]

Yes, I did address your question directly:

[Shay]

[simonstl]

[oneputt]

[simonstl]

Fine, oneputt. If you insist on focusing exclusively on the people who are most absolutely screwed by the systems you and I are already supporting in their homelands, if I don't buy the piece they make and instead buy something slightly more expensive made by someone who actually got paid a decent wage to do so, that one poor person who's already thoroughly screwed might be just a little more screwed than they were.

Why don't they find another job? Because apparently no one cares enough to offer them something better.

You no doubt think I'm a heartless bastard for that, but since you don't seem interested in lifting a finger to help those folks beyond helping yourself to something cheap, I'm not particularly concerned about that.

Long term, I think I'm offering them something a lot better than you are. It means changing a lot more, though.

Peace be with you.
_________________
Simon St.Laurent
http://lightandsilence.org/

[oneputt]

[Shay]

[simonstl]