WmTrevor,

Obviously it's overwhelmingly a human issue.

But, as I've mentioned, how can feminists, who would trumpet progress in our society, ignore the system (and its cruelties) which facilitates the liberties and choices Western women enjoy?

Equally as obvious is the fact that we can't be mindful of everyone in this world and their conditions as we go about our daily life.

But when a whole paradigm is constructed on the bedrock of "other people" being exploited - for our benefit.

Well.......?

Dear Poirot,

I don't mean to infer that these women are
not being exploited. Of course they are.
Or that nothing should be done by us.

I recently watched on TV the plight of women
in Bangladesh and the factories and sweat shops
there, the appaling working conditions that these women
have to put up with for the measley sums they're
being paid. And this is being done by well known
and "respected" companies out in the West.

However these women can't worry about other
matters when their children are dying from
thirst, hunger or war. They take whatever is
available in order to try to survive. So it's
a complex situation.

In the Bangladesh story - at least one outcome
was achieved by human rights organisations demanding the
improvement of working conditions in these factories.
And having the improvements passed into legislation. That is
a step in the right direction. Of course enforcing this
legislation is a difficult task. However, we in the
West can apply pressure
and publicity to these multinational organisations in the West,
letting people know just where their products are
being made and under what conditions. Apart from doing
that I don't know what else can be done.

Realistically, we know that the motives
of these companies are purely selfish - to exploit
cheap labour and resources on an international
scale for the benefit of a handful of stockholders
in wealthy countries.

These huge organisations have developed more quickly
than have the means of applying social control over
them. Dedicated to the pursuit of profit and subject
to the authority of no one nation, run by a tiny elite
of managers and directors, they represent a disturbing
and growing concentration of global power and influence.
Not sure how much influence we can exert on them in the
West. But as you rightly point out - we are obligated
ethically to at least try.

"Well.......?"

Yes, thank you, Poirot, and relaxed and comfortable. But not, I don't think, so self-satisfied as to be beyond redemption.

"But when a whole paradigm is constructed on the bedrock of "other people" being exploited - for our benefit."

The bedrock of Ancient Greek democracy and the traditions underpinning Western civilisation was that 90% of the population was literally and figuratively enslaved so that 10% could prosper, ruminate and philosophise... so, nothing new about the human paradigm of personal benefit.

Remember, in the 'good old days' it used to be permissible to kill slaves as long as they were your own. So some conditions have certainly improved.

Unless you are a slave owner.

I didn't ask anyone to leave the subsistance existence of their village or rural community for the favelas or slums of a city, to toil in conditions I would regard as exploitative. But I would hope they have the freedom of choice to return if such an existence is intolerable.

Whenever Mum cooked something inedible (her egg and asparagus cassorole was infamous) and six children would refuse to eat it all up and she would rebuke with "There are millions of children in Africa who'd be grateful for that" our teenager-mentality response was to challenge her to name any two or three.

These days you could probably Google those names... makes a difference of perception.

But even after eating our food those 'millions of children' hadn't, and were still hungry. But Mum stopped complaining.

WmTrevor,

Yep, one would think that the shanty towns and favelas are filled with people who made their way to the city outskirts out of choice.

Some do, of course, and many are born into these settlements, but for others.....

I suppose technically it is "a choice" to relocate when your home environment is appropriated by those with bigger fish to fry.

http://www.narmada.org/gcg/gcg.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/liberia/10104422/Liberia-and-the-vanishing-rainforest.html

Often it's enacted by a government at the behest of structural adjustments dictated by the West's doormen the IMF or the World Bank et al.

It's one thing not take any blame for the poor and subsistence circumstances of people in third world countries.

It's entirely another to exacerbate them for our own "wasteful" lifestyle.

Just sayin', of course....

The agenda is to bring about a form of world socialism [employment equality] by creating employment in third world countries and dismissing highly payee first world employees and so create equal work and pay opportunities. The world will become a happy medium with equal employment and unemployment worldwide managed by highly paid bureaucrats. Australia is going down the path of becoming the worldwide mean. It means open borders and level playing field in manufacturing, and the social mean in gender status.

The western world likes a bargin and third world can now afford those same bargains, even if they cannot afford enough food. Poverty is commonplace in African nations but almost all have the latest in mobile phones. They live in mud huts and entertain themselves with the latest TV's.

Not exactly, Poirot.

>>I get that you're saying that it's all a "process". First we get the exploitation and the unbelievable cruelty - and then the spring flowers grow.<<

I was framing it more as "first you have demand, then you have supply".

If you wish to flagellate yourself over the fact that you have created that demand, that is your prerogative. But different parts of the world have developed at different rates, and the nature of commerce is that it is largely synchronized with that development.

>>Westerners who remember the stories of how men and women were treated during the industrial revolution - kids in factories and mines who were stunted, locked in , beaten, starved etc (all true).....can think it will all be hunky-dory somewhere down the track<<

Not for them, of course. But their great-great-grandchildren certainly benefited from their - entirely voluntary - choices. Which, I suspect, was in the minds of those satanic-mill factory folk all along. And, quite likely, is currently in the minds of Bangladeshi women making similar decisions today.

Human beings have always been quite keen on finding a way of life "better" than the one they have. It is not really up to you to make the decision as to what exactly is "better" for them.

The underlying irony is, of course, that these people rely heavily upon our prosperity, to help them create theirs.

Will it be better for them, do you think, when we can't afford their products? Which could happen, if our economy slows at the same time as we are exhorting them to raise their prices.