Friday, April 9, 1999: Ignorance is bliss

[NonsenseWords]

I admit it. I giggled.

[Cactus Jack]

DCS is always using brand names as an example of why cool people are evil, but really, what clothes do not have a brand? I'm pretty sure everything in my closet has something on the label that says who made it. It may not be a famous brand but the shirt didn't just grow off of a tree.

I'm also sick of people saying sweat shops are bad. Sure sweat shops suck but they are a step in industrialization. You start with the sweat shops which are better then the alternative, and once standards of living have risen the workers demand better pay and working conditions. You can't expect employers to start off with everything nice in a country that doesn't have the conditions to support those kinds of facilities.

[Muninn]

DCS is always using brand names as an example of why cool people are evil.

I think it's not that being annoying and stuck up comes from brand names but popular kids tend to go for such clothes as a way to flaunt themselves. And I'm making a distinction here between cool and popular as well as evil and annoying, which is the vibe I got from these comics.

You start with the sweat shops which are better then the alternative, and once standards of living have risen the workers demand better pay and working conditions.

I can't cite any sources, but I wonder just how often this can happen, especially in the places where sweatshops are notorious. Unless the state improves itself and nudges the companies to some degree I'd think the enticement of profit from cheap labour in a less fortunate country won't have the corporations jumping to change much.

I recently saw a documentary about child labour in the chocolate business that specifically named Nestle as turning a blind eye to it. There were injury-ridden children working in the forest, seperating the coca from their husks then sending them to the port where more children were used to load them to be sold to wherever. The many smaller traders didn't keep a paper trail because they don't work with as large amounts as the larger ones so it's not easy to track down where or how they got their coca.

[Tom_Radigan]

You start with the sweat shops which are better then the alternative, and once standards of living have risen the workers demand better pay and working conditions.

I can't cite any sources, but I wonder just how often this can happen, especially in the places where sweatshops are notorious. Unless the state improves itself and nudges the companies to some degree I'd think the enticement of profit from cheap labour in a less fortunate country won't have the corporations jumping to change much.

Two known places where it did happen: Great Britain and the United States of America.

[Bocaj Claw]

Shoes? What does Avery know of shoes?!

Given the stated nature of Millie's quest, it's remarkable that she spends even four panels talking to Avery.

Sometimes I used real brand names, with Avery, and other times, like here, I made them up.

[Tom_Radigan]

Shoes? What does Avery know of shoes?!

Even if he never wears them himself, he's seen people who do.

[Cactus Jack]

can't cite any sources, but I wonder just how often this can happen, especially in the places where sweatshops are notorious.

All current industrial nations.

[Muninn]

Well that makes it even worse then. You'd expect such "civilised" places to be above that.

[Tom_Radigan]

Well that makes it even worse then. You'd expect such "civilised" places to be above that.

There are far worse places than sweatshops, even in industrial nations.

[nickspoon]

Most modern industrial nations were not producing cheap goods for wealthy foreigners. I would not yet call it a precedent. Certainly China is emerging from the sweatshop age, but I wouldn't call it fully modernised.

[Cactus Jack]

They were producing cheap goods for wealthy domestics.

[Tom_Radigan]

Most modern industrial nations were not producing cheap goods for wealthy foreigners. I would not yet call it a precedent. Certainly China is emerging from the sweatshop age, but I wouldn't call it fully modernised.

Put it this way-you preferred China during the Great Leap Forward or the Cultural Revolution?

[Muninn]

Well that makes it even worse then. You'd expect such "civilised" places to be above that.

There are far worse places than sweatshops, even in industrial nations.

That's no reason to leave them unregulated and have some sort of control against companies exploiting them.

[Cactus Jack]

The regulations will come into place as worker's power in the country grows. As it is, if the choice between jobs is working in a sweatshop or subsistence farming, the sweatshop doesn't look all that bad.