real choices: stop before you shop

20 hour workdays. regular beatings. child labour. indentured servitude. rape.

Details
The children are forced to work 12-14 hours a day, with some shifts going 20-hours. In all of September, these child laborers got just one day off. For the grueling long shifts, they are allowed only about four hours of sleep on the factory floor before being awakened and put back on the machines, sometimes collapsing from exhaustion. Their wages are as low as six cents an hour. They are routinely slapped or beaten if they don't meet their production goals, make mistakes, or even take too long in the bathroom. - "At the Western garment factory, which made fleece jackets for Walmart, there were 14 or 15-year-old kids working 18 or 20 hour shifts," he said. "They worked from 8:00 in the morning until midnight or until 4:00 a.m. And they did this seven days a week. They did not get paid for first four months of 2006, they did not receive one cent in wages. They were working as slave labor. When they passed out they were struck by rulers to wake them up. There were four girls who were raped by management." - "You're supposed to say that this factory is closed on Fridays and that no one works here at night. If anyone tells the buyer otherwise, then the company will fire them.” - He admits factory workers sometimes do have to put in extra long hours, for instance when deadlines are looming and fabric deliveries are late. They have little choice, he says, meet the deadline or American companies could take their business elsewhere. - "We used to start at 8 in the morning, and we'd work until midnight, 1 or 2 a.m., seven days a week. When we were in Bangladesh they promised us we would receive $120 a month, but in the five months I was there I only got one month's salary and that was just $50." - Hazrat Ali, 25, who worked from September 2004 to March 2005 at the Al Shahaed factory, said he sometimes worked 48 hours in a row and received no pay for the six months. - "If we asked for money, they hit us," he said.

Culprits
Sears. Walmart. Kohl's. Fila. Victoria's Secret. Express. Ralph Lauren. DKNY. Calvin Klein. Banana Republic. The list goes on.

Hope?
This is the garment industry and how most of your clothing is made. I'm not one for sensational accounts, but the injustices involved in making our clothing has angered me a great deal.

When we buy without questioning from stores that outsource to sweatshops, we are participating in these injustices. The ignorance and complacency of the elite (because by the fact that we have computers and are literate, are the elite), is causing the suffering of the masses.

Plenty argue that sweatshops are a necessary step towards development in third world countries. Or that without these factories, these workers would be worst off. But how much worse can you get than this? These workers' lives could be substantially different with a hardly perceptible impact on cost. I am seriously angry! It's times like these when I can begin to understand why God's anger burns against the violence on the earth. There is no excuse for these abominations. Workers can be paid more without actually cutting into profits. There are better ways to "globalize". American retailers (especially the large ones) need to put more pressure and oversight to ensure good working conditions in sweatshops. And as the end customers to these products, we're in a unique position of power to pressure retailers to action.

A few thoughts:
"If the American retailers paid only 25 cents more per garment, the total in Bangladesh would be $898 million- more than eight times current US aid."
Or as Dov Charney, head of American Apparel, a garment company that pays its workers double minimum wage + benefits, once mentioned: "My labour cost in LA is about 60 cents a T-shirt. In a prison in China it's zero cents. But when you're selling T-shirts for £18, what is 60 cents? It's nothing."

On the bright side, there has been some news of progress, though abuses continue. If anything, this shouldn't excuse us from forgetting about it, but should rather give us more hope that there are huge improvements in this generation that can be made, and that our actions are all the more important. It may not happen overnight, and it may require a long, patient effort, but changes can be made.

Action (please consider it!)
Any or all of these will be of help (You may not do any of it perfectly but it's better to have 10,000 people who are imperfectly committed and vocal than none at all):
1. Don't shop at places that use sweatshop labour. There are a list of reputable retailers at the bottom of this entry that I will eventually add to my sidebar. (On a personal note, Mariya and I have been commiting and trying our best to not buy sweatshop made clothing. If you'd like to join us, in encouraging one another and giving each other ideas about cool places to shop, please post a comment or email me :) ).
2. Spread the word. Raise awareness. Post this on your blog. Write more blog entries.
3. Write letters. Call customer service lines...especially to the larger retailers that have more bargaining power. Get involved with activism groups.
4. Buy Fair Trade or union made clothing. That way you can actually support third world development.
5. If you're a college student or lacking in funds, and can't always afford the slightly higher prices that these stores offer, try Goodwill or the Salvation Army. Great prices, always good finds. And even better: they employ people who were formerly in prison, or are disabled, giving them an opportunity to work and earn money.

Places to shop
American Apparel
Zara (Here's a cnn article on their business model)
Moo Shoes (Vegan and sweatshop free!)
Goodwill
Salvation Army

More articles on the topic
Dateline NBC: Human cost behind bargain shopping
JORDAN: An Ugly Side of Free Trade - Sweatshops
Children Found Sewing Clothing For Wal-Mart, Hanes & Other U.S. & European Companies
A quick overview of different companies and their ethical practices
More articles found here at the National Labor Committee:
http://www.nlcnet.org/news_room.php


*Note: This is not to say that I'm some super ethical shopper. I have my ignorant and complacent moments too. I walk into the store and see something that looks pretty and feels good and I forget about the lives, or the loss of lives that went into the making of that garment. Or, I find myself desperately in need of underwear, and feel like I can't bite the budget to pay more. My attempt to not buy anything made in sweatshops has been recent (the past year), and it's been and still is a process. Though one thing that I have found encouraging, is the longer I do it, the easier it seems to become, and I am looking to get involved with more letter writing/activism.
**Something else to consider, though please don't use it as an excuse for buying from places that use sweatshop labour. (If enough of us do it, then they will have to change. The question is -- will enough of us care enough to change our habits?): "One misconception is that the sweatshop problem can be avoided by not buying from a few major brands. As Hearson notes: 'It's not about the big bad guys any more. Now it's more about moving the entire industry. The difficulties are structural.' Instead of trying to achieve a level of purity in their personal purchases, he argues that consumers need to pressure companies they patronize and large buyers like universities to make more concerted efforts to raise standards--for example by participating in initiatives such as the Ethical Trading Initiative in the UK and the Workers' Rights Consortium in the US. As one important aspect of this, corporations must make a commitment to help employees improve substandard factories, rather than 'cutting and running' when abuses are reported. 'We have to recognize that a company that is doing well on the issue is not necessarily sweatshop-free,' Hearson says. 'It is one that is acknowledging the problem and engaging with worker groups and other stakeholders. If we want improvements across the industry, it's not going to happen overnight.'" from http://www.democracyuprising.com/articles/2006/fair_trade_sweatshops.php