[HN Gopher] Nike Statement on Xinjiang
___________________________________________________________________
Nike Statement on Xinjiang
Author : lawrenceyan
Score : 93 points
Date : 2021-03-27 17:41 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (purpose.nike.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (purpose.nike.com)
| onethought wrote:
| Do people not see this as agg-prop?
|
| Like are we really buying into an issue that's been around in the
| open since 2012 - suddenly it's unbearable and how can we do
| business with evil folk like this!?
|
| This just so happens to come up during US-China talks. The US is
| by no means clean here either...
|
| Frustrating that we all fall for these clearly geopolitical
| driven narratives
| slashdot2008 wrote:
| How can anyone doing business with China look the other way on
| Xinjiang simply by saying "our factory isn't there". Every one of
| us buying goods made in China is enabling their behaviour by
| showing that we would rather make more money or would rather have
| cheaper electronics and plastic crap than standing up for the
| human rights of the people in Xinjiang who are the focus of the
| CCPs genocide.
|
| I think it is a pivotal moment for this generation to show what
| our principles are, if we have any.
|
| As a Canadian I wish our Prime Minister Justin Trudeau would more
| directly speak out against China's poor behaviour and offer some
| temporary support for businesses that would be impacted. Sell the
| grain and pork to someone else for less and I would gladly see
| part of my tax dollars go to make up the loss for the Canadian
| farmers.
|
| edit: responses with counter points to help me understand your
| point of view, or if I am out of line, would be more helpful than
| downvotes.
| lvs wrote:
| The fact that you're being silently downvoted suggests this
| generation does not want to be cornered on what its moral
| principles are. Disappointing.
| slashdot2008 wrote:
| I'm in the market for new flat screen TV. Hopefully I can
| find one made in South Korea or even Japen, and will pay a
| premium for it. A pitiful sacrifice to make from someone who
| can easily afford it.
| stupendousyappi wrote:
| Not much of a sacrifice, the best OLEDs are currently made
| by LG, Samsung and Vizio.
| lvs wrote:
| Even so, there's a limit to how much the consumer can do,
| given how interconnected supply chains are. Your TV may
| ultimately be assembled in SK, but it will definitely be
| sending revenue to China for myriad internal components. A
| boycott is a challenging thing to implement at the consumer
| level with modern supply chains. It's unclear what the best
| mechanism to apply moral shame should be, especially when
| political action is only interpreted cynically as economic
| competition.
|
| (...And I'm being silently downvoted just as you are.)
| SpicyLemonZest wrote:
| It's an entirely reasonable question, but I just can't quite
| get on board with the consequence of collectively punishing the
| Chinese people for Xinjiang. I won't do business with the
| Chinese government, certainly. But if a team of Shanghai
| developers makes a game I really like, I'm not comfortable
| boycotting them for their government's sins; it seems both
| unfair to them and unlikely to help anyone.
| pueblito wrote:
| What will it take for you?
| cheaprentalyeti wrote:
| Most of us _don't have any choice_ but to do business with
| China at one point or another during the day, especially if
| we're poor. Especially if we want to own a piece of
| electronics, necessary if you want to (for example) apply for
| unemployment insurance. (it's all electronic in this state, and
| they _shut down_ all the local unemployment offices). Or make a
| phone call. (Maybe I'll get lucky and wind up with the cheap
| cell phone brand made in Vietnam instead of China. Woo hoo,
| they haven't ethnically cleansed people in thirty years, and it
| was a lot less than China did in the same time period. So moral
| superiority!)
|
| This isn't meant as a response to you, I'm just stating the
| situation as I see it.
| DasIch wrote:
| I haven't downvoted you but there are a couple of problems
| here.
|
| > How can anyone doing business with China look the other way
| on Xinjiang simply by saying "our factory isn't there".
|
| In many industries not doing business with China is synonymous
| with not doing business. Many supply chains go through China,
| this is not something you can easily change.
|
| Additionally capitalism incentives companies to focus on profit
| over ethics. You can't expect companies to act against that.
| That's why regulation is important to limit what companies can
| do to what is acceptable.
|
| Your expectation here is just not realistic.
|
| > Every one of us buying goods made in China is enabling their
| behaviour by showing that we would rather make more money or
| would rather have cheaper electronics and plastic crap than
| standing up for the human rights of the people in Xinjiang who
| are the focus of the CCPs genocide.
|
| Placing blame on consumers is extremely problematic because it
| assumes people can make a choice here. That is not a reasonable
| assumption. Consumers probably don't have the necessary
| information about the product (and supply chain!), so they
| can't make an informed decision not to buy a product on this
| basis. Even if they had this information, they also may not
| have the financial means to afford making a choice on that
| basis.
|
| We have effective mechanisms to define and enforce rules, it
| involves governments taking action through creating and
| enforcing laws. Putting blame on consumers ultimately shifts
| responsibility away from people who could do something
| meaningful about the problem to people who cannot.
|
| > As a Canadian I wish our Prime Minister Justin Trudeau would
| more directly speak out against China's poor behaviour and
| offer some temporary support for businesses that would be
| impacted.
|
| Trudeau merely speaking out against China, also wouldn't help.
| Sanctions might help and Canada is actually one of several
| countries that has created sanctions over the treatment of
| Uighurs.
|
| I'm sure this is not your intention but effectively you're
| arguing for actions that have no chance of actually solving the
| problem. This is also a common political strategy by
| neoliberals who are opposed to government intervention on
| ideological grounds. So one might be inclined, to think that
| you pretend to be offended because it's unacceptable not to but
| don't really want it solved either.
| slashdot2008 wrote:
| Thanks for the insightful reply.
|
| The pandemic has highlighted the fragility of global supply
| chains and the downside of being dependent on others for
| critical goods. They are cheap when they are plentiful but
| they become unobtainable when they are desperately needed.
| That, China's beligerent diplomats, and their decision to
| ignore the Hong Kong treaty will hopefully be the impetus to
| reduce reliance on China's supply chains by developing and
| supporting other sources even if they are more expensive.
| Perhaps even local sources given that friendly faces seem to
| be able to to turn on you once they have some leverage, and
| it is difficult to re-start an industry once that know-how is
| lost forever.
|
| As the son of an economics professor I never thought I would
| argue for subsidies for uncompetitive natioanlized industry
| but it turns out there is some additional benefit other than
| the goods produced on a given day.
|
| Politicians need support for hardships they may bring upon
| us, such as reduced profits, more expensive goods, and
| subsidies for local industry, that may be the result of
| sanctions and moral high ground.
|
| I think "vote with your wallet" campaigns and boycotts can be
| a good indicator to politicians that their voters have the
| stomach for the sanctions, just like a demonstration or march
| in support of the Uighurs would.
|
| Even ineffective measures that show your support for a cause,
| such as wrapping a t-shirt around your face to avoid
| spreading covid-19 particles that are the same size as
| asbestos fibres and can sail right through, sends a message
| that you are willing to make some sacrifice for the greater
| good at the cost of some personal discomfort.
|
| I support goverment intervention, but I think the government
| needs to see they have the will of the voters behind them.
| Thanks again for your thoughts!
| dehrmann wrote:
| > As a Canadian...
|
| Detaining Meng Wanzhou is something.
| katbyte wrote:
| your comparing a legal obligation to extradite someone who
| has committed fraud to our ally to stand trial to genocide?
| throwawayfire wrote:
| > I think it is a pivotal moment for this generation to show
| what our principles are, if we have any.
|
| It's already known that this (political) generation doesn't
| have these principles. Government contracts rarely consider
| anything beyond the cheapest offer. Corporations are obligated
| to maximise their profit above all other considerations.
|
| It's the West's (including Canada's) morals that have got us
| here - we simply export our bad behaviour to other countries,
| so that we don't have to see it.
|
| Overall, nobody is going to stop importing clothes made in
| China, because there isn't sufficient industry elsewhere in the
| world. We closed it, and exported it to China, because it was
| cheaper.
| slashdot2008 wrote:
| I think of my grandfathers, one who was in world war 1 and 2,
| and the other in world war 2, and their whole generation
| marching off to war to put their lives on the line to stand
| up for what is right, and I can't imagine anybody I know
| doing that unless they joined the military out of high school
| because they didn't have any better options.
|
| edit: I can't reply for some reason. (oh it's because parent
| is flagged). If there was resistance in Canada to going to
| war in world war 1 and 2 it isn't part of the history that is
| taught to us. I imagine since there was no draft in Canada
| only the willing went.
| Mediterraneo10 wrote:
| Did a whole generation really just "march off to war to put
| their lives on the line"? While of course there were people
| who volunteered, in the USA the majority of soldiers
| fighting in World War II were conscripted - they went
| because the state told them they had to go. And there was
| still a lot of isolationist sentiment and reluctance to get
| involved in the war in Europe even after Pearl Harbor. Are
| the figures not similar for Canada?
| magicsmoke wrote:
| It doesn't matter, because history is probably one of the
| most effective forms of social control. Think about how
| complicated modern day events are and how difficult it is
| to shift through the mountains of perspectives to
| understand the whole picture. Now throw in decades of
| time difference with fragmented and hard to decipher
| primary documents, and you end up with a story that has
| to be interpreted by expert historians/storytellers,
| installed into the self-identity of generations of
| students, and used to shame individuals into matching the
| mythical sacrifices their ancestors supposedly took
| without any complaint. It's miles ahead of organized
| religion in terms of persuasiveness because any grain of
| truth in the historical story is magnified into the only
| possible truth without nuance or uncertainty. To go
| against the stories we tell ourselves is to go against
| all of society itself. If the body tells you to die in
| stomach acid because that is your role as an epithelium
| cell, and it's what generations of your ancestors have
| done, what can you do but die doing your job?
|
| There was a point where I really enjoyed reading
| histories. Then I dug too deep and found too many
| inconsistencies, and I realized that if I were to track
| down every detail to the end I would go mad or worse, be
| a history PhD. The only way I could recover that original
| enjoyment was to treat every historical book as a work of
| fiction and marvel at how well they're able to hack its
| way into the social subsystem in our brain that allows us
| to form societies.
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| The war was pitched in Canada as "a duty to defend
| England, the throne and the motherland". This did not sit
| well with French Canadians, who inhabited the country
| since the 1500's and were heavily discriminated against
| by the British[0][1].
|
| Still that didn't stop heroes like Leo Major[3]
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burning_of_the_Parliame
| nt_Buil....
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expulsion_of_the_Acadia
| ns#:~:t....
|
| [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A9o_Major
| p1necone wrote:
| The rest of the world didn't join world war 2 because of
| the atrocities being committed by Nazi Germany, they joined
| because Germany started invading neighboring countries.
| slashdot2008 wrote:
| Thanks for bringing this to my attention
|
| >A major turning point in Nazi policy toward Jews was the
| coordinated attacks by the Sturmabteilung (or SA, the
| original paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party) against
| Jews and Jewish institutions and businesses throughout
| Germany and Austria on November 9-10, 1938 - an event
| known as Kristallnacht or the Night of the Broken Glass,
| due to the large amount of shattered windows at Jewish
| properties in its aftermath. At least 91 Jews were killed
| in the violence, and 30,000 were arrested and interned in
| concentration camps (but not extermination camps). Over
| 900 synagogues and 7,000 Jewish businesses were severely
| damaged or destroyed.
|
| https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/holocaust-remembrance-
| day/whe...
| sch wrote:
| In Canada, the term to search for is not "draft", but
| "conscription". You will see that there is resistance to
| conscription regularly through the nation's history. (And
| it certainly used to be part of the history that was taught
| to us in Ontario.)
| slashdot2008 wrote:
| absolutely there is a resistance to conscription in
| Canada, but was there a resistance to going to war or did
| everyone sign up due to duty and social pressure to "do
| the right thing"?
| hetspookjee wrote:
| It indeed is very interesting. I still wonder when the news
| came out that Europe received wigs sourced from Uyghur hair,
| how lax the response actually was. Here in the Netherlands the
| then minister announced they were unable to provide any more
| transparancy on the whereabouts of packaging because they
| argument was made that it would be in conflict with the duty of
| confidentiality of the customs. Sure the wigs reached some
| traction, but nothing was done.
|
| Can you imagine how the world would respond if someone was
| selling wigs sourced from Jews from concentration camps? No way
| that the confidentiality of customs would be weighing heavier
| than.
|
| I too wish Europe would take a stronger stance against China,
| but unfortunately the immense dependency of consumerism made
| possible by China's cheap labor makes that a very unpopular
| move. I find the analogy with climate change rather strong as
| well: To make the actual change necessary, people will have to
| change some habits. To hold your moral ground against China you
| will have to accept that prices of products will rise,
| similarly that if you want to stop polluting everything, you
| have to accept that stuff will become more expensive as not
| polluting everything simply just costs more. Dumping whatever
| toxins you have on your hands is cheaper than actually getting
| rid of it in the right way, and so on.
|
| I believe that whatever succesful strategy to combat climate
| change en masse will be the same strategy to combat these moral
| blindfolds for economic gains, and in the end I believe it's
| tackling the problem at the source: lower prices of production
| in the local environment to lesser the dependency on China.
| Leary wrote:
| 2020: Nike cancelled by Trump supporters
|
| 2021: Nike cancelled by China
| mkolodny wrote:
| In case anyone's not aware of what's happening in Xinjiang, this
| is a great Last Week Tonight episode about it:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17oCQakzIl8
| hungryhobo wrote:
| Here is also a great first hand resource:
| https://youtu.be/4N385vKhXYQ
| 88840-8855 wrote:
| Skechers report - no forced labour in Xinjiang MUJI - no forced
| labour in Xinjiang nike - no forced labour in Xinjiang adidas -
| no forced labour in Xinjiang
|
| At the same time this whole Xinjiang stuff reminds me of dozens
| of destibalization operations by the Americans in countless
| contries.
|
| I went to Hong Kong in 2019 during the protests to join them and
| to see with my own eyes what was going on. I met with the
| protesters and spoke with many of them.
|
| It was NOT the same what the media was reporting here.
|
| Once covid is over, I will travel to Xinjiang and also see for
| myself, because I started to believe that this entire anti-China
| movement is a very smart way of setting up of a new cold war.
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| Not sure I'd trust companies with a vested interest in denial
| to communicate objective truth.
| dj_gitmo wrote:
| This is not an open and shut case. The organizations
| reporting this, The Australian Strategic Policy
| Institute(Aussie defense department), and The Victims Of
| Communism Foundation(!), are not unbiased nor are their
| methodologies uncontroversial.
| SyzygistSix wrote:
| The Australian Strategic Policy Institute is also funded by
| the US State Dept, Raytheon, and Northrop Grumman.
|
| I don't doubt there is genocide and repression in Xinjiang
| but propaganda from propaganda outlets muddies the water.
| hungryhobo wrote:
| Could it be that the US is the one with vested interest?
| katbyte wrote:
| _everyone_ involved has vested interest, and china isn't
| exactly allowing anyone to go take a look?
| dj_gitmo wrote:
| China has not restricted access to Xinjiang. You can
| visit if you like. Most western visitors report that
| security is high in some areas, but foreigners are
| allowed to visit. Just walking around won't necessarily
| tell you the whole story obviously, but the notion that
| you can't visit is false.
| https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-xinjiang/wary-
| of-xi...
|
| Edit: I searched "visit Xinjiang" and found this from
| 2021 https://www.lostwithpurpose.com/why-we-didnt-like-
| traveling-...
| sthnblllII wrote:
| Does anyone remember when the US backed Sunni extremists in
| Afghanistan to counter Soviet influence in the region?
|
| http://www.historyisnowmagazine.com/blog/2021/3/7/how-americ...
|
| Or when the US backed Sunni extremists in Syria to destabilize
| Bashar Al Assad and provoke regime change?
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timber_Sycamore
|
| Or when the US provided air support for Sunni extremists in Libya
| (the "No Fly Zone") to topple the government of Colonel Ghadafi?
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Kunming_attack
|
| Why is the US media so concerned with Uygur rights and so
| unconcerned with Palestinian rights?
|
| https://ifamericansknew.org/
| amznthrowaway5 wrote:
| All true, still doesn't excuse the Uyghur stuff.
| powerapple wrote:
| No jobs for 13 million Uygurs, hoping that they will overthrow
| the government. The same thing US is hoping to achieve in NK
| and Iran.
|
| I don't trust these NGOs, especially after watched the Netflix
| documentary about fishing. It is just another way for someone
| from a well connected family to make money and fell good.
| monocasa wrote:
| Or even if they can't overthrow their government, at least
| destabilize the province enough to be a thorn in China's side
| as they try to push their belt and road initiative. It'll be
| hard for China to require increased security out of their
| partner countries when they don't have their own house in
| order, with Xinjiang being the entry point for the road in
| China.
| hd4 wrote:
| Another 'whatabout' to criticism of China. This happens
| literally every single time there's a thread critical of China
| here. Every single time.
| monocasa wrote:
| It's not whataboutism to show that these sorts of claims when
| coming from the US tend be from a dishonest perspective, with
| larger geopolitical goals and outright fabrications in the
| claims themselves.
| dunefox wrote:
| Whataboutism at its finest. Nice try, Winnie.
| lucian1900 wrote:
| Particularly since ETIM, the terrorist group responsible for a
| string of deadly attacks in China, has links to both Saudi
| Arabia and the NED (a CIA front). The same group sent thousands
| of fighters to Syria to fight on the side of ISIS.
| sthnblllII wrote:
| Correct. To be clear, I don't support genocide (as if that
| needs to be said) but the US media demonization of China is
| obviously geopolitical motivated and if its as successful at
| convincing the American public as Iraq's "WMDs" were, it
| could eventually be used as a causus beli.
| redisman wrote:
| The US doesn't want war with China. Especially not for the
| human rights of muslims. US and China both reap the
| majority of the rewards of the current system of trade. Why
| would either country want hell on earth as opposed to the
| status quo?
| lucian1900 wrote:
| The US's domination is based on the petrodollar. China,
| Iran, Russia, Venezuela (and in the past Libya,
| Afghanistan, etc.) started to trade (particularly oil)
| using other currencies. Even the EU is headed that way
| with both Iran and Russia.
|
| It is in the interests of US and allied monopolies
| (especially oil) to prevent this at all costs, since it
| would remove the main tool for extracting
| disproportionate profit from the impoverished world and
| enforcing sanctions on anyone that resists.
| redisman wrote:
| I don't think that's true. Sure the petrodollar might be
| a small boost but it's hardly what's propping up the
| super power status. The US has a ton of soft and hard
| power still.
|
| Military, internal market, businesses, banks, the justice
| system, etc are all orders of magnitude more important
| for the hegemony
| sudosysgen wrote:
| The trend of the status quo is for the US to lose
| hegemony.
|
| The US _REALLY_ doesn 't want to lose hegemony. If you
| read between the lines of what Pompeo or Blinken this is
| a great fear of the US.
|
| This is why the status quo is not acceptable for the US.
| The US will not let go of the very enviable position as
| global top dog easily.
| heavyset_go wrote:
| Strange how these billion dollar companies keep getting tricked
| into innocently profiting from slave labor.
|
| It seems to me like the only way for a company to know if forced
| labor is used in the production of the goods they sell is for
| someone else to catch them red-handed.
| mangix wrote:
| Why do you think they're getting tricked?
| client4 wrote:
| The previous comment is thinly veiled sarcasm.
| Flatcircle wrote:
| This is probably gonna get messy once the top of CCP see this.
| ComputerGuru wrote:
| They already did and it already has. (This isn't new.)
| ohazi wrote:
| This wouldn't have been published unless that was an explicit
| goal. But Nike's strategy doesn't seem particularly effective,
| and the outcome is predictable.
|
| Top CCP brass will be outraged at the insinuation that anything
| disreputable is going on, will drone on about "how dare Nike
| try to shame the honorable reputation of the virtuous and hard-
| working and well-meaning and morally super great Chinese
| people," will probably accuse Nike of anti-Chinese racism, and
| then will try to "Cancel Nike" within China and in their New
| Silk Road sphere of influence (i.e. Economic Sanctions with
| Chinese Characteristics).
|
| You can't call out a bully that obsesses over appearances and
| feigns outrage like this. If you've ever had the misfortune of
| working with someone like this, you'll know that calling
| bullshit on them doesn't work. They'll take offense, they'll
| throw a fit, they'll sabotage and self destruct. It's juvenile
| and exhausting, but they just can't accept that you're not
| buying their crap. It's the same story here. Antagonizing
| doesn't work.
|
| We need to find another way to exert pressure on China and the
| CCP that doesn't immediately trigger this "embarrassed and
| outraged" response. At work, you might pretend to be this
| bully's friend, feed them a different idea, convince them that
| it's their idea, let them champion this idea, make a big show
| of everybody praising them for how brilliant it is, etc. (and
| then look for a new job, because that's fucking exhausting
| too).
|
| The stakes are really high here. A bully like this at work that
| has power and can't be fired can destroy the company, but this
| bully has nukes and wants to invade Taiwan. If they _really_
| start to feel like the entire world is trying to shame them, it
| 's going to end in disaster.
| indigochill wrote:
| > ...you might pretend to be this bully's friend, feed them a
| different idea, convince them that it's their idea...
|
| I thought I'd read somewhere (but can't find the source now)
| that around the Cold War or thereabouts, trade with China was
| seen as a way of "exporting capitalism" to undermine support
| for communism there. If so, that... hasn't worked.
|
| I'm not convinced the west actually has any leverage on
| China. They own the US's debt, they have access to rare earth
| metals necessary for computer manufacture, and they're the
| backbone of worldwide manufacturing. Any pressure applied
| (trade sanctions?) will just come back the other direction
| (oh no, actually we need that trade to maintain our way of
| life).
| NicoJuicy wrote:
| China has been chosen as the manufacturer of the western
| world.
|
| While it's a big thing they need, I'm not convinced that it
| is impossible to shift a lot of that influence to India.
| Who would probably make a better partner ( not sure).
|
| Other than that, I don't see much options.
| ohazi wrote:
| > If so, that... hasn't worked.
|
| Yeah, I think the "pretend you're on their side" strategy
| might work once or twice before they're onto you, so if you
| can't get them permanently out of the way by then, you're
| finished.
|
| > I'm not convinced the west actually has any leverage on
| China.
|
| Unfortunately, I think I agree. I'm not convinced the debt
| thing matters very much, but as things stand, we are hosed
| without China's manufacturing base, and double plus hosed
| if TSMC is captured or destroyed as a result of a Taiwan
| attack.
| dnautics wrote:
| > They own the US's debt
|
| Currently the world leader in US debt holding is not china,
| but japan.
|
| > actually we need that trade to maintain our way of life
|
| Currently the number 1 trading partner with the US is
| Mexico, not china. The US economy is overwhelmingly
| domestic, too with something like 10% via foreign trade.
| And china's labor costs no longer make it competitive in
| terms of "making the average us resident's prices low".
|
| The place that will get screwed is europe, which DOES do a
| ton of trade with China, as we will see in the upcoming
| months with the closure of the suez (most us trade does not
| use the suez, only about 10% of oil from saudia arabia, and
| most us oil production has shifted to domestic, IIRC it's
| like 5% foreign or something like that)
| mycologos wrote:
| > Top CCP brass will be outraged at the insinuation that
| anything disreputable is going on, will drone on about "how
| dare Nike try to shame the honorable reputation of the
| virtuous and hard-working and well-meaning and morally super
| great Chinese people,"
|
| Tangential, but can any native Mandarin speaker chime in on
| whether the translations of CCP communications -- which, like
| the parent comment's hypothetical example, often read with
| the screechy yet formal outrage of, like, the king's devoted
| manservant -- are actually accurate? The only other thing I
| can think of like that is communications from North Korea. I
| have to imagine it's deliberate on _somebody 's_ part.
| magicsmoke wrote:
| Part of it might just be that the CCP's translators don't
| have a good grasp of English and end up picking unfortunate
| translations.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurting_the_feelings_of_the_C
| h...
|
| This is better translated as "damaged how the Chinese
| people feel about..." but instead comes off as the Chinese
| people having the emotional tolerance of a grade schooler.
| Unfortunately, it seems it was actually first used by state
| media in 1959 instead of originating from a foreign
| translation of the Chinese statement.
| ohazi wrote:
| Wow, your translation is enlightening... Thanks!
|
| I find it hilarious that this _phrase_ , of all things,
| has a Wikipedia article -- I guess that just illustrates
| how notably ridiculous it sounds outside of China. I
| wonder how much damage that disconnect has caused over
| the years.
| RyanShook wrote:
| It's easy to make excuses like "we don't source from the forced
| labor part of the country" or "the whole world's supply chain is
| tied to China." Both statements are true but when we consider how
| we're indirectly supporting a country that is actively committing
| crimes against humanity it has to make us stop and do some
| serious soul searching.
|
| When it was obvious China's wages were below minimum wage in the
| US I said that's free markets at work. But what's happening in
| Xinjiang isn't anywhere close to free market labor. It's the
| opposite and I keep trying to but can't think of any excuse for
| it.
| ithkuil wrote:
| The danger of soul searching is that you might find none
| chadcmulligan wrote:
| There's the Capitalist peace theory - countries with strong
| trade won't fight each other - its bad for business.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalist_peace
| Natsu wrote:
| That's the thing, it is hard to disengage. I know that the
| China sanctions seem to have helped move that along
| economically, but it's hard to even know where every little
| thing is sourced from and so much is done in China.
|
| But I do know that, at least for my shoes, they were made by
| Tim & Mary, not by someone toiling in a factory with nets to
| keep them from jumping out the window. It's not much, but it's
| something.
| onethought wrote:
| Much like prison labour in the US right?
|
| But no one seems to care about that.
| [deleted]
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