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Shame on us Americans for supporting child labor in India

ManSnake

ManSnake

Diamond Member
Article 1

Article 2

Exploiting children is wrong. By buying "Made in India" products, we are indirectly supporting those that willingly exploit children in India. It's a fact Wal-Mart is profiting immensely on the cheap products made by slave laborers, Indian children, who are forced into labor, and regular female Indian slave laborers.

I would recommend you think seriously next time you buy products with "Made in India" on it. We are supporting this grave human rights tragedy with each product we buy. Too bad greedy Wal-Mart execs don't care about this.

What is the difference with this and the slave products that were made by black slaves in America in the 1800's? NOTHING.

Shame on you Wal-Mart
 
Originally posted by: ManSnake
Article 1

Article 2

Exploiting children is wrong. By buying "Made in India" products, we are indirectly supporting those that willingly exploit children in India. It's a fact Wal-Mart is profiting immensely on the cheap products made by slave laborers, Indian children, who are forced into labor, and regular female Indian slave laborers.

I would recommend you think seriously next time you buy products with "Made in India" on it. We are supporting this grave human rights tragedy with each product we buy. Too bad greedy Wal-Mart execs don't care about this.

What is the difference with this and the slave products that were made by black slaves in America in the 1800's? NOTHING.

Shame on you Wal-Mart
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I think the last thing I bought that was made in India was a Madras shirt and that was in 1961! I don't think Walmart even existed back then.

 
yea i actually saw some made in pakistan clothes at mervyns.. haven't seen india in a while..atleast noticed it.
 
As much as I dislike the idea of child labor, two points come to mind.

First of all, child labor is not slave labor. The kids get paid and are not forced to work. Now if they are slaves, that's different, but I don't think that's the case here.

Secondly, how does combatting child labor by not buying those products help? So the kids don't work there and their family starves. I agree that child labor isn't that great, but in many of those countries, the kids need to work to help provide for the family. If the situation could be improved, I'm all for that. But simply shaking our fingers at people and telling them to stop using child labor isn't going to fix the problem. Child labor is indicative of a larger problem that needs to be taken care of first.
 
There's some child labor in India, but that does not mean all Indian products are made with child labor.

Child labor happens (everywhere) when people are very poor. In a lot of places in India, there are no schools. Kids have the option of working or starving. However, India's GDP per capita is growing very rapidly. Child labor is declining as parents make more money, schools become more widespread, and the kids don't need to work in order to eat. Over time it will become less prevalent.

If you want to know what products to avoid, don't buy any fancy rugs/mats, etc., made in India or otherwise. Those are the products that are most commonly made by child labor in 3rd world countries.
 
I posted this in the China thread, but I think it fits here as well:

The working conditions in these countries are terrible, no doubt about it. However, for the vast majority of the workers, these jobs are a step up from the next best option that they would have to otherwise resort to. Boycotting the companies that employee these people is about the worst thing that could possibly be done to improve their situation (unless you think living on the street, most likely as a prostitute if they are women, is an improvment).

I am also an engineering student, and there are 5-6 students in my classes from India and China, and they all say the same thing.

People also seem to forget that EVERY country goes through a "sweatshop" stage at one time or another. Hell, just look at England during the industrial revolution, or go read "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclaire that discusses the meat packing plants in Chicago during the early 1900's. The more China, India, and numerous other countries continue to get involved with the high tech and world markets, the sooner working conditions will improve.

... or we can all just stand around blaming Wal-Mart. Sigh.
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I was going to make this thread yesterday, but didn't have the time for it.

I have a handful or articles from news organizations and Amnesty International.

 
Originally posted by: daniel1113
I posted this in the China thread, but I think it fits here as well:

The working conditions in these countries are terrible, no doubt about it. However, for the vast majority of the workers, these jobs are a step up from the next best option that they would have to otherwise resort to. Boycotting the companies that employee these people is about the worst thing that could possibly be done to improve their situation (unless you think living on the street, most likely as a prostitute if they are women, is an improvment).

I am also an engineering student, and there are 5-6 students in my classes from India and China, and they all say the same thing.

People also seem to forget that EVERY country goes through a "sweatshop" stage at one time or another. Hell, just look at England during the industrial revolution, or go read "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclaire that discusses the meat packing plants in Chicago during the early 1900's. The more China, India, and numerous other countries continue to get involved with the high tech and world markets, the sooner working conditions will improve.

... or we can all just stand around blaming Wal-Mart. Sigh.
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Yea. I'm sure you "friends from India" are you sure you haven't been reading too much Dinesh D'Souza?
 
Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
kids gotta eat man...
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that argument is just a cop-out imo. By purchasing and approving of sweatshops, you're not helping that kid, you're helping the company that sold it to you (ie: Gap) and the manufacturer (whoever Gap subcontracted their manufacturing to). Now Gap says that they're not responsible for this other company's actions in regards to its employees, and they're right. We can't expect them to watch over the well being of other companies' employees. BUT, what a consumer can do is choose not to shop at Gap, and if Gap notices that they're bottom line is hurting, that's when consumers get the exec's attention.

I think what really needs to happen is for people to be educated about the reality of it. Because the way I see it is that the big reason why companies would pay such ridiculously low wages is to boost their margin. Generally clothes sell at 50% gross margin, so from a 100$ shirt, the store that sells it to you makes about 50 dollars before taxes. This GM, afaik, includes the employees' wages at the store, and all the store's expenses, because these things have been budgeted for. So what I'm saying is that if the company was willing to make 40 percent after expense profit, they would still make a killing, the execs woud still have their limos and jets, but they could put that 10% they're "losing" and pay the factory workers decent wages and proper working environments.

Now I'm not saying that we should just be socialists and take all the money and split evenly and all that non-sense. What I am saying is that corporations should understand that every human has certain fundemental rights.


edit: i just used gap up there as an example, there's alot of companies like them
 
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