JOE FRESH : CONSUMER BOYCOTT

More on Joe Fresh boycott call: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/dailybrew/canadians-vow-boycott-joe-fresh...

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/04/26/joe-fresh-boycott-bangladesh-fac...

Ottawa Shitizen opines: "Don't boycott Bangladesh" http://www.ottawacitizen.com/opinion/columnists/boycott+Bangladesh/82960...

Huh? An action targeting Joe Fresh, whether it takes the form of a boycott or something else, doesn't necessarily mean wanting no imports from that country - it is calling retail clients to accountability.

Workers might consider a form of politics where one of the objectives is to extract oneself from the work flow.  When people are mired in the production processes I don't know if the term 'worker' as an honorific is still applicable in terms of what the labour is contributing to.

I'm going to superstore to get some more shirts.

I would never suggest doing this, but it's probably something someone somewhere has considered. So don't do it, even though it's very easy and the chance of getting caught is miniscule, please don't do this:

1. Pour some bleech into a sports water bottle

2. Go to Joe Fresh and rub bleech on clothes while examining the goods

3. Leave

4. Repeat

cormann2 has been shown the door. Nothing more to see here, folks.

Flymeetsointment, your charm is seriously starting to wear off. Is this part of a weekend bender for you? If you can't post without insulting people, I'm afraid you won't even make it til Monday to brag about it. :(

Catchfire wrote:

Flymeetsointment, your charm is seriously starting to wear off. Is this part of a weekend bender for you? If you can't post without insulting people, I'm afraid you won't even make it til Monday to brag about it. :(

I actually have a few posts that are of a non-confrontational nature. Nice trivialization of persons with addictions though occifer. And your petty threats do not concern me, one thing I have learned from 4Chan is that it's the IDEA, not the poster, that should be attacked. Those with an invested identity may be confused but:

We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us

Hi Gabriel, no, I'm not techie at all. I work using a computer, but that is it. Perhaps you can ask someone who is how to make part of your Facebook page "public" so people can read that section without belonging to Facebook.

I hesitate even to look at the latest news from Dhaka...

Companies like Loblaws (And I don't think they are the worst of them) buy clothes from off shore not just because the cost of labour is as low as it can be without technically qualifying it as slavery, but to avoid any kind of liability from such labour practices.

They feel they can distance themselves by saying "we abide by the laws of Bangladesh",  or feel insulated because they are just an unwitting customer-- heck, just like you and me.

But they put their name on the tag.  What they pretend not to know, they should have known.

Maybe instead of writting our own M.P.'s and other members of "Team No Help", we should be contacting the Bangladesh authorities and helping them with extradition of any Canadians connected to this particular industry?

Hi Tommy! Thanks for the advice.

lagatta wrote:

And they are supposed to live how?

Its true that almost every form of 'work' is bonded to the existing production processes, along with everything it entails.  If we were to begin a search for or to devise a term that would serve to differentiate anti-capitalist work from the type of work legitimized by capitalism, we'd need to search high and low for the examples.  I'm sure they exist in some form.  I might argue that after years of hearing about the abuses of sweat shop capitalism and expecting our democratic representatives to address the concerns once and for all to no avail, shoplifting can be seen as an example of work that incidentally provides the only tangible response against worker exploitation, at least by comparison with the official nothing.  It could be argued that one of the merits of shoplifting is in the fact that it ultimately produces a negative, incremental impact on freedom in the consumerist societies via the introduction of increased levels security and repressive measures, which may serve to render more visible our position within it.

http://business.financialpost.com/2013/04/29/shoppers-turn-blind-eye-to-...

"Shoppers turn blind eye to Bangladesh tragedies as cheap clothes win"

the sad part is the only reason people feel the need to buy cheap mass produced crap is because the companies that are selling it to us have so reduced our wages that people are forced to either buy cheap or make do wih less/none.

which (as their market research shows) means people will opt to buy cheap regardless of the human cost.  same with our own labor problems here, same with environmental problems and everything else.  

I have serious doubts about turning this into an individual consumer's choice issue - or an individual boycott against a particular brand or company chosen at random out of all the culprits, as is suggested in the OP.

If this disaster happened in Canada, on a serial basis, we would blame the government(s) for not enacting or enforcing safe working and building conditions. We would expect our political parties to demand and achieve legislated minimum protections. In fact, the 1980s saw major gains on that front in Canada through "right to refuse" and similar legislation.

In my opinion, the blame for worker genocide in Bangladesh lies first, with Bangladesh, and second, with Canada. Our demand should be: No imports of clothing from Bangladesh (or prohibitive tariffs - however we decide) unless and until there is satisfactory proof that safety  measures are being implemented and enforced.

We can try to educate consumers as well, and even organize targeted boycotts. But why should Canada allow the import of goods drenched in the blood of workers?

And lagatta, I share your concern for the livelihood of Bengali workers, but we don't have to facilitate murder, any more than we had to facilitate apartheid when countries of the world finally started boycotting South Africa and helped the liberation forces bring that evil regime to its knees.

I agree with Unionist on this.  Best to put pressure on government to do something about this situation.  The situation being that it seems that companies can import goods from abroad without any concern of the working conditions from which they source these goods.  Since companies don't seem able to create decent sourcing policies on their own, then government must step in.  So yeah, I'll still try to buy from thrift shops or look for locally produced goods where possible, but I've also written letters to our government about it where I requested a response.  There was also a good link that onlinediscountanvils provided:  What you can do about the deadly factory collapse in Bangladesh

mark_alfred wrote:

Best to put pressure on government to do something about this situation.

I must have missed your post in [url=http://rabble.ca/babble/labour-and-consumption/garment-factory-collapse-... other thread[/url]. Your letter is great, and the sentiment is right on.

Krop is no doubt correct about where the parties in the House stand on issues of free trade. But I'd rather hold their feet to the fire than try to educate Canadians to individually do the moral thing. It shouldn't be a matter of choice.

Hmm, time for a second thought from my post above.  If workers in Bangladesh don't have the right to refuse unsafe work, then the number of audits done by Joe Fresh may not make a difference.  So while it's good that Loblaws Joe Fresh is talking openly about this and willing to have people on the ground doing audits of the workplaces there, perhaps Disney is correct to just declare it an unworkable situation and leave.  Of course, does simply leaving help workers in Bangladesh achieve better conditions?  Hard to know.

I usually go with what the workers in any country are saying through their organizations.  So I supported the boycott of South Africa because it was called for by the locals fighting the apartheid regime. I also support the boycott of Israel for the same reason. So far I have not heard what the workers in Bangladesh want.

However I find the idea that low paying dangerous jobs in third world countries lift people out of poverty to be just ridiculous. The workers there get used up and thrown into a dumpster when they can no longer work the grueling hours and keep up with the body, mind and soul destroying pace set by their "liberating" corporate masters.

Indeed and so far I have not heard them calling for a boycott. However I always try to avoid buying stuff form the worst of the bad countries so I have never really bought stuff from Bangladesh given the numerous accidents at plants there over the last number of years. Anyways it is hard to boycott what you don't normally buy.

I am sure we have all bought stuff from Bangladesh. It may not be on the label, but the fabric could easily have come from there. And if not, it most certainly came from a place where the next tragedy may occur.

And in any case, the solution is not to try and wall it off like some plague-infested household.

I get the intent, but in a global economy it is impossible to try and contain stuff like that. I agree with Unionist's analysis at #31 even if I don't agree entirely with the solution.

I don't have a problem with boycotts, or pressuring companies to do their due diligence, even though I'm not convinced that is the right tactic here. After all, we are talking about a failure of building codes, which is a bit more nebulous than barring windows or employing underage workers.

But to claim that we are disconnected from this system? Good luck there. If it isn't in your shorts it is probably in your cup of coffee (don't forget the sugar), your gas tank, or your supper plate. We are all involved.

6079_Smith_W wrote:

I don't have a problem with boycotts, or pressuring companies to do their due diligence, even though I'm not convinced that is the right tactic here. After all, we are talking about a failure of building codes, which is a bit more nebulous than barring windows or employing underage workers.

It was not a just a failure of building codes. The workers were told to leave the factory because it was unsafe and the companies that they worked for told them they couldn't. Of course if they wanted their families to be without the meager pay check they might have been able to quit and walk away but that is not a choice that is indentured servitude. I think most people understand that as a Hobson choice.

I find the media portrayal of the Bangladesh capitalists who put the lives of people at risk for profit very different that the portrayal of US capitalists who were responsible for the Texas explosion that took many lives.  In Texas they put a dangerous plant into an area surrounded by homes and were negligent in its design and maintenance. As well they didn't even pay for proper insurance so it seems that as in Bangladesh the victims may not get compensated either.  No one in Texas seems to be even calling for criminal charges against the owners let alone the death penalty. White capitalists killing people negligently is an accident Bangladesh capitalists doing the same thing is criminal.

Quote:

“The bottom line is, this lack of insurance coverage is just consistent with the overall lack of responsibility we’ve seen from the fertilizer plant, starting from the fact that from day one they have yet to acknowledge responsibility,” Roberts said.

Roberts said he expects the plant’s owner to ask a judge to divide the $1 million in insurance money among the plaintiffs, several of whom he represents, and then file for bankruptcy.

He said he wasn’t surprised that the plant was carrying such a small policy.

“It’s rare for Texas to require insurance for any kind of hazardous activity,” he said. “We have very little oversight of hazardous activities and even less regulation.”

On April 17, a fire at the West Fertilizer Co. in West, a town 70 miles south of Dallas, was quickly followed by an earth-shaking explosion that left a 90-foot wide crater and damaged homes, schools and nursing home within a 37-block blast zone. Among those killed were 10 emergency responders.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/attorney-texas-fertilizer-plant-t...

[url=http://qz.com/83804/it-would-only-costs-an-extra-25-cents-in-clothing-pr... would only add 25 cents to clothing prices to have safer conditions in Bangladesh[/url]

Quote:

just how much more expensive would our clothes get if factories in Bangladesh were safer?

There aren’t many clear-cut studies on the matter because it would depend on how much the retailers passed on the price increases to customers, as opposed to taking a hit to profit margins. Scott Nova at the Worker’s Rights Consortium, a Washington, DC-based advocacy group, made this calculation:

We have a general cost estimate for the renovations, upgrades and retrofitting of buildings that is needed across the industry in Bangladesh to make the factories safe. The figure is $3 billion. That translates to about 8 cents per garment at factory price.

That $3 billion, Nova says, would go toward properly constructed fire exits and fire escapes, emergency lighting, proper alarm systems, electrical rewiring, closure of structurally unsound buildings, and the relocation of factories to safe structures.
The impact to retailers’ profits, he argues, would be minimal:

For a major retailer, with 5 percent of its production in Bangladesh, which is typical, the increased cost would be about four one-thousandths of a percent of total corporate revenue.