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OfflineOracle Of Delphi
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Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor.
    #6968809 - 05/26/07 09:17 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

Ive been up since 6:30 am est so bear with me.
i watched a piece on chinese sweat shop labor last night on PBS. over and over again wal-mart was mentioned as one of the biggest buyer of chinese products. Ive known this for some time, but it is different to actually see the people who are making those $7.99 jeans.

I do not shop at wal-mart. theres isnt one by me, im in Queens, NY, but mainly because i do no support the suffocating of small business.

Most of these chinese labors are kids, like 14 - 17 working 14 hours and up to 24 hours a day depending on the order. pay is withheld frequently, they are practically held captive in the factory/dorm, and they can never catch up. and these are good working conditions. bad is in the Marianas, where after 'work" they have to be escorts for Businessmen. forced abortions are routinly carried out to keep the workers in top money earning condition.

is this just how the world works? am i naive at 33 to think we as a people can ever overcome this? i am a person who works at a shit job making a very low wage. i have a college degree but can never find good work in this economy. i dont have a lot of spending cash, but try my best to buy clothes that dont come from china, which is no small feat. i am forced to buy a lot of goods that are of chinese origin just because there is nothing else.

i walk through chinatown frequently and see the people toiling for the tourists. ancient men shining shoes for 25 cents. 90 year old women selling handpainted dolls for a dollar. kids no older than 12 or 13 manning stalls selling cheap sunglases and belts to fat tourists all day long well into the night.
it's all very sad.

i dont know why i posted this, guess i am just venting.
OoD


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OfflineRonoS
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Registered: 01/25/01
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Oracle Of Delphi]
    #6968817 - 05/26/07 09:20 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

I hear what you are saying...but look at the flip side of the coin for those workers....at least they have a job, in a country with billions of people, it can't be that easy to find a job...ANY job, so I suspect that they are grateful to have the chance to at least earn a wage.


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"Life has never been weird enough for my liking"

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InvisibleChiefGreenLeaf
Registered: 01/11/07
Posts: 1,596
Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Oracle Of Delphi]
    #6968823 - 05/26/07 09:22 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

It's frustrating to actually see how messed up the world really is. You think people could change, but it just seems like this type of thing is always going to be exploited to its fullrst by corporate whores.

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OfflineOracle Of Delphi
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Rono]
    #6968836 - 05/26/07 09:26 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

rono,
i think thats the saddest part of all - they are grateful for these slave jobs - most of the people who live in the hills are starving to death. so a lot of them migrate to the factories to send a few yuan home to help. it turns out that most of them just end up working them selves to death in the factories.

i was infuritaed as an american business group came to the factory to take a tour. the owners coach the workers to lie and smile and say how good it is working at the factory - the stupid woman who made me want to shoot my television was smiling like a jerk as she walked through these squalid dorms and was like, "oh how wonderful the workers can live and work here! and they can take their lunch home to eat. how convienent for them." she was then asked if she wanted to go to the canteen to eat lunch. the smile fell from her face, and she moved out of frame.
they cut to another scene,
i hope that bitch falls into a hole and dies.


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InvisibleAroundtheSon
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Registered: 01/11/07
Posts: 4,427
Loc: Midwest.
Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Oracle Of Delphi]
    #6968876 - 05/26/07 09:43 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

It is sad, but I'm poor, and Wal-mart's prices suit me well. :nonono:

No winners in this game.

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InvisibleFunkyLoFi
Existing

Registered: 07/18/05
Posts: 1,542
Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Oracle Of Delphi]
    #6968889 - 05/26/07 09:50 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

Virtually no clothing is produced in the U.S. anymore.

Sad, but true.


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All the people you knew were the actors

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OfflineDigs
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Registered: 07/06/03
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: AroundtheSon]
    #6968891 - 05/26/07 09:50 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

AroundtheSon said:
It is sad, but I'm poor, and Wal-mart's prices suit me well. :nonono:

No winners in this game.




how are the people with jobs (both in china, and the people that walmart employs) not winners? lol

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OfflineHB
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Oracle Of Delphi]
    #6968905 - 05/26/07 09:57 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

this is the reason I became actually angry while working at the last place I worked. I was fully aware that the production floor was treated half as well, if not less, than the "design department" floor. all the white college grads with no artistic ability whatsoever get the fancy badges that let you through locked doors and also get special lunches and birthdays and so on and so on ...

and all the mexicans/hispanics on the floor get treated like dirt, work crazy long hours with no extra pay, get paid below anybody else, etc etc ... I couldn't fucking stand it. these are real fucking people with real feelings ... I looked beyond it for a while but it truly got to me by the end.

I also read an article about how my ex-company was associated with a lawsuit over children in India sweatshopping for Wal-Mart/Disney/etc. ... the whole deal you described in the Original Post ...

it makes me feel sick that so many people in this world make their living off of fucking other people over. I believe in SOME sort of karma, but maybe not everybody has instant karma. maybe those who fuck up this life royally but don't see their harm immediately might find themselves in their next life as one of the people they harmed. maybe the karma comes back when they're least expecting it.

or maybe the universe truly IS moral-less and unbiased, and bad people ARE truly somehow just as necessary as the good people, and we just have to deal with it.

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Invisiblemyndreach
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Digs]
    #6968906 - 05/26/07 09:57 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

I've boycotted Walmart since 2002 or so.

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OfflineRedstorm
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Oracle Of Delphi]
    #6969083 - 05/26/07 11:19 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

At least the people at these sweatshops have employment. They weren't forced to work there and they are being paid (albeit poorly), so they're not slaves.

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InvisibleSilversoul
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Registered: 01/01/05
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Redstorm]
    #6969144 - 05/26/07 11:36 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Redstorm said:
At least the people at these sweatshops have employment. They weren't forced to work there and they are being paid (albeit poorly), so they're not slaves.



"The government is not best which secures mere life and property--there is a more valuable thing--manhood."
- Mark Twain



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OfflineRedstorm
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Silversoul]
    #6969154 - 05/26/07 11:38 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

Good thing I don't really care what Mark Twain has to say about anything other than Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn.

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InvisibleSilversoul
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Redstorm]
    #6969163 - 05/26/07 11:39 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

Too bad. He was one greatest American minds ever conceived.


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OfflineRedstorm
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Silversoul]
    #6969171 - 05/26/07 11:42 AM (16 years, 10 months ago)

Also, I didn't really think about it, but that quote is pretty much irrelevant. We're discussing Wal-Mart here, not the Chinese government. Corporations have no obligations to do anything other than secure profits for stockholders and follow the law of the country they are operating in.

If you're saying this is the problem for the Chinese government to deal with, I will agree there.

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InvisibleSilversoul
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Redstorm]
    #6969275 - 05/26/07 12:05 PM (16 years, 10 months ago)

Actually, it's not even so much about government, but rather the repugnant sentiment that paying people is an excuse to treat them like shit.


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OfflineRedstorm
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Silversoul]
    #6969292 - 05/26/07 12:09 PM (16 years, 10 months ago)

I really don't think it says that or even implies it. If anything, it says that government should protect people from that behavior. Judging by that quote, it seems reasonable to expect that Twain would have been outraged by China to allow it to go on, not that Wal-Mart is doing what a business is meant to do.

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Invisiblespud
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Registered: 10/07/02
Posts: 44,410
Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Redstorm]
    #6969297 - 05/26/07 12:10 PM (16 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Redstorm said:
Good thing I don't really care what Mark Twain has to say about anything other than Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn.



Hahaha
:thumbup:

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InvisibleSilversoul
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Redstorm]
    #6969301 - 05/26/07 12:13 PM (16 years, 10 months ago)

I'm not talking about the quote. I'm talking about what I was responding to. I was simply using the quote because of the spirit in which it was made. And I'm sorry, but businesses do have an obligation to uphold the dignity of others, just as we all do. It may not be a legal obligation, but it is certainly an ethical one.


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OfflineDrCamacho89
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Oracle Of Delphi]
    #6969327 - 05/26/07 12:18 PM (16 years, 10 months ago)

It's ironic you're from Queens.  One of the reps of Queens, Carolyn Maloney, is real big on cracking down on Sex Trafficking after those travel agencies were busted in Jamaica Estates selling asian sex tours where businessmen were traveling through different towns of Asia fucking kids...

This world is disgusting!!!!!!!  :rolleyes:


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"The Highways of Life are Paved with Flat Squirrels who Couldn't Make Up Their Minds"

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InvisibleRandalFlagg
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Re: Sweatshop Labor - Walmart and being poor. [Re: Oracle Of Delphi]
    #6969336 - 05/26/07 12:21 PM (16 years, 10 months ago)

1.  These workers willingly work in these factories.  It is not slavery.  They are free to leave at any time.

2.  The opportunities available to these people are such that these factory jobs are much higher-paying and much easier than what they would have been doing normally (farming).  Believe it or not, working in these factories is better than their old way of life.

3.  Their lifestyle and hardships are difficult for us Westerners to fathom because we are so pampered.  Yet, China is going through an industrialization on a massive scale (much like America did in the Industrial Revolution).  Once they become a modern nation they will live just as comfortably as us Americans do.  But, in order to get there it takes a lot of grunt work.  :shrug:

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