Nike Sweatshops

M

MJ12

The Freeman
Joined
Mar 15, 2007
Messages
12,841
Reaction score
62
Long, but very interesting, we watched this in class today. I knew it was bad, just not that bad D:

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=5600443

I know many of you grumpkins will be annoyed when he starts talking about catholicism, but he's just mentioning it's hypocrisy to the catholic belief system to endorse this.

edit: oops, meant to put it in the video section, oh well.
 
The basis of capitalism has always been cheap labour.

Only socialism will solve this.

I hope the workers of these sweatshops take over their factories, establish workers power through soviets and put those who exploited them on trial for crimes against humanity.
 
Hahah, make my shoes bitches!

(note: I am not a callous bastard, I didn't watch the OP video, and I don't wear Nikes)
 
Solaris said:
The basis of capitalism has always been cheap labour.

Only socialism will solve this.

I hope the workers of these sweatshops take over their factories, establish workers power through soviets and put those who exploited them on trial for crimes against humanity.
Click to expand...

You never fail to amuse me :)

But no, only consumer awareness will solve this. It's consumer awareness that makes or breaks capitalism as an ethical system. And don't bring "but consumers don't care!" because if that's the case, socialism would fail even harder because it relies on the willingness of everyone.
 
PvtRyan said:
You never fail to amuse me :)

But no, only consumer awareness will solve this. It's consumer awareness that makes or breaks capitalism as an ethical system. And don't bring "but consumers don't care!" because if that's the case, socialism would fail even harder because it relies on the willingness of everyone.
Click to expand...
So does the present system.

Take a random person through a sweatshop and I bet 90% of the time they would say that what was happening was wrong. Yet they perpetuate the system that makes it necessary, they do nothing.
 
Plus, I thought the whole point of capitalism is that it enmeshes everybody in a constantly reciprocal system of slavery whereby each man must oppress his neighbour in order to bear his own burdens.

That's what he* said.

*Marx
 
Which I think is true. I think our current systems of government seem to be inefficient and unjustly penalizing of large amounts of people. I don't think we're going to step from what we have today to utopia but I hope we see a somewhat radical shift in the way we do government in our lifetimes. Of course it could always swing the other way and we'd be in concentration camps or blown up.
 
A good shoe starts from the ground up. At Ares we make high-quality footwear. In fact you can find Ares running shoes in over 140 countries all over the world. In the past there is been some criticism about our workers. That is why I'm here at one of the Ares factory's so you can meet some of them.
Excuse me sir, do you enjoy your job here?

"It's fun, we get to play with knifes."

Is there a real sense of teamwork?

"My friend Joey sowed his hands together."

You're learning some real skills. And what about the salary and benefits?

"Yesterday, I made a Dollar."

See, that is the kind of dedication that we at Ares have to our employees and the quality of our shoes. Ares' running shoes, always running from something.
 
ITT: We say what brand of shoes we wear.

New Balance.
 
F*ck you all. Nike's running sweatshops? Well, boo hoo. If Nike wasn't doing it, these people would be living in squalor the likes of which you have never seen. People take these jobs because it's better than every other alternative. Every time you refuse to buy a product because it was made in a sweatshop, you are sending these people back to their less-than-minimum wage jobs.
"Yesterday, I made a Dollar."
Click to expand...
A dollar means two full meals rather than empty belly. But what do you care.
 
This is not a devil-you-know that anyone reasonable is prepared to accept when the company could, in fact, play no devil at all.
 
Solaris said:
So does the present system.

Take a random person through a sweatshop and I bet 90% of the time they would say that what was happening was wrong. Yet they perpetuate the system that makes it necessary, they do nothing.
Click to expand...


As long as there is a market for unethically made cheap shoes then there will be the potential to supply it. It's not the markets' fault, it's the consumer who is at fault.
 
Mr Stabby said:
As long as there is a market for unethically made cheap shoes then there will be the potential to supply it. It's not the markets' fault, it's the consumer who is at fault.
Click to expand...
Unethically made? Sweatshop workers get paid as little as they do because that's all that labour is worth in a third world economy. When you boycott these "unethically made" products, you force those workers to go back to tilling their farms or an industrial job that pays even less.
 
99.vikram said:
Unethically made? Sweatshop workers get paid as little as they do because that's all that labour is worth in a third world economy. When you boycott these "unethically made" products, you force those workers to go back to tilling their farms or an industrial job that pays even less.
Click to expand...
That's all their labour is worth?

No, it's just that the cooperations can get away with paying them so little. Their labor if worth a lot, without it Nike would have nothing but a brand name. They could still pay reasonable wages and make large profits, just they can make more profits if they pay less.

It's neither right nor just.
 
Kyorisu said:
Or further advances in the world of automation.
Click to expand...
Actually, that would cost way too much money for these companies that outsource tbh. Unless factories become fully autonomous, (i.e. robots to repair the robots that makes the shoes, and robots to repair those robots etc.), the companies responsible for this kind of employment would have to hire highly-paid technicians and engineers to keep up maintenance.

I for one, welcome our sweatshop overlords. :E

Oh yeah, outsourcing sucks and the reason why these companies resort to sweatshops is because said companies can avoid U.S. OSHA regulations, taxes, child labor laws, etc.

If anything, the blame should be placed on the countries responsible for a lack of reasonable outsourcing policies. The underpaid sweatshop workers need to raise their pitchforks at their governments, not the countries that outsource. When you look at it this way, it's these governments that should be held under the judicial spotlight. Not to say the U.S. needs some outsourcing policies of their own, because they do tbh. There'll hardly be no manufacturing in the U.S. one day and ultimately, it'll be the U.S. middle class with no high-tech skills that's gonna suffer. All the U.S. steel industry has already been outsourced from the U.S. to China for the most part.
 
Solaris said:
That's all their labour is worth?
Click to expand...
Yes. You have no idea how valuable a dollar is in a third world country.

Just for perspective, a plumber gets paid about 2-4 dollars for fixing a leak.

Solaris said:
Oh yeah, outsourcing sucks and the reason why these companies resort to sweatshops is because said companies can avoid U.S. OSHA regulations, taxes, child labor laws, etc.
Click to expand...
I'm sorry that your middle class has low value skills, and as a result are replaceable. Lost your job? LEARN SOMETHING NEW. Tards.

Outsourcing happens because someone else out there is willing to do the same job at a lower cost. Get used to it, because there's no stopping it.
 
Yes, they do the same job at a lower cost. No, they do not do the job at a lower cost because they're more willing, the cost is lower because the economies of two nations are in many ways not the same. And yet we rely on the whole, the nation, to support ourselves and the way that we live. As do the people of other nations with their own. The status of one nation's economy affects all inhabits therein.

Outsourcing is an act of corporate greed, and this you can not deny. We as a populous are willing to accept that a corporation is indeed profit driven, but should we allow a corporation to rid of the workers so easily who labored to create it? I don't understand your criticism, it's as if you deny the workers of all credit and time they have invested at all. I'm sorry, but we are human beings with only one life to live, and there are millions of middle-class workers who spend more time at labor for a means to live, than they do at leisure. When a human being invests so much of their waking life into the work they produce for a company, the least the company can do is provide job security for the life it borrows for it's own support.

This is something I find common among ideological capitalists, and something Marx scorned as well. The capitalist mind allows for a devaluation of human life, to disregard it as some expendable force, while at the same time stroking chins in favor of the few at the top of their game.



OT: Wow, this is turning into a political debate fast. Shame on Nike; I never liked their shoes anyways. Poor build quality, and rarely look all that nice.
 
abolish the count chocula. buy only coco puffs i say.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

MFL
Fascinating look at the ongoing psychological evolution of flat hieirarchies.
Replies
2
Views
2K
Tollbooth Willie
Tollbooth Willie
Back
Top