”Made in China” Ping.
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Posted on 11/20/2007 7:49:22 PM PST by JACKRUSSELL
(NEW YORK) -- (PRNewswire-USNewswire) -- At a press conference today in front of Saint Patrick's Cathedral in New York City, Charles Kernaghan, director of the National Labor Committee, released a 73-page report documenting the brutal sweatshop conditions under which crucifixes are made for Saint Patrick's Cathedral, Trinity Church and the Association for Christian Retail at the Junxingye factory in Southern China.
Holding up a crucifix made in the Junxingye factory and sold at Saint Patrick's and Trinity, Kernaghan said, "This crucifix was made by young women -- several just 15 and 16 years of age -- who were forced to work 15 1/2 hours a day, from 8:00 a.m. to 11:30 p.m., seven days a week, toiling for months on end without a single day off.
Workers were routinely at the factory over 100 hours a week. Before the crucifixes had to be shipped to the U.S., there were also mandatory 22 1/2 to 25-hour all-night shifts from 8:00 a.m. straight through to 6:30 or 9:00 a.m. the following morning. Workers were paid just 26 1/2 cents an hour, $2.12 a day and $10.61 a week, which is less than half China's legal minimum wage. After deductions for primitive company dorms and food, the workers' take-home wages actually drops to just nine cents an hour."
The report, titled: "Today, Workers Bear the Cross" details:
-- Primitive dorm conditions with workers sleeping in narrow, double-level metal bunk beds. Dorm walls are filthy and smudged with black, while spider webs cling to the ceiling. The bathrooms are so damp and dirty that moss grows on the floor.
-- Workers describe the company food as "awful." The soup is just water with a few vegetable leaves and drops of oil floating at the top.
-- Workers are stripped of their rights, denied paid maternity leave, sick days and holidays.
-- Anyone missing a day is docked 2 1/2 days wages.
-- Workers fear they may be handling toxic chemicals, paints and solvents--which sting their eyes and cause skin rashes--but they are not allowed to know the names of the chemicals they are working with, let alone their health hazards.
Kernaghan said, "I don't believe that Saint Patrick's Cathedral or Trinity Church had any idea of the abusive and illegal conditions under which their crucifixes were made...but I feel certain they will now respond immediately and with compassion." Kernaghan will ask Saint Patrick's and Trinity to help clean up the factory in China and to guarantee that the legal rights of the workers will finally be respected.
Kernaghan commented that something has gone terribly wrong, "The Association for Christian Retail has decided, en masse, to follow Wal-Mart to China, where they can exploit defenseless workers and pay them pennies an hour to make their religious goods. These are workers who have no freedom of religion, no freedom of association, and no human or worker rights protections."
"Especially during the holiday season," he continued, "the American people can draw a line in the sand, refusing to allow crucifixes and other religious items to be turned into just another cheap sweatshop commodity. As things stand now, there are enforceable laws backed up by sanctions to protect corporate products and trademarks, but no similar laws to protect the legal rights of the young people around the world who made the religious or other goods we will purchase this holiday. This is morally wrong and must change.
The report includes production orders and photos, including images of an assembly line, the dorms and crucifixes made in the plant which were smuggled out of the factory. (Photos will be made available upon request.)
The Junxingye factory also produced licensed collegiate goods for the Universities of Michigan, Rutgers, Auburn, Brigham Young, South Carolina, Montana, Washington, Colorado and others.
To access the new report, go to: Today, Workers Bear the Cross
Right next to the American Flag factory, no doubt.
Permanent klinton china MFN status......permanent klinton chinese illegal campaign donations
I wonder what William Jennings Bryan would have to say about this
Welcome to the Workers’ Paradise. Comes the Revolution, we’ll eat strawberries in February.
Sad, but probably true.
My vote goes for the next Patton....if we have one left.
Kick ass, don't bother with taking names....just kick ass on some third world dick heads and some third world countries that have the audacity to presume they are even close.....
Just get it over with and start the ass kickin', that all will understand.
Too harsh for some weiner's out there, I'm sure.
Too bad.
As in too bad you don't understand what it takes.
Bad working conditions? That’s just a cross they’ll have to bear.
Well, guess nobody saw this one coming... /sarc
You’re clever by half.
You will get your just dessert.
That, I assure you.
-— Primitive dorm conditions with workers sleeping in narrow, double-level metal bunk beds. Dorm walls are filthy and smudged with black, while spider webs cling to the ceiling. The bathrooms are so damp and dirty that moss grows on the floor.-—
And the workers are severely punished if they try to clean it up... :^)
That’s absolutely horrible.
WTF? Why is it the consumer's obligation to clean up the factory? Why doesn't he take his stupid case to the Chinese!
The church's only obligation is to quit buying Chinese crap.
In the mid-90’s, I worked in Vietnam. I had a car and driver since my company forbade us driving in VN. I paid my driver $100 per month (standard rate); he worked 6 days per week. Sweat shop wages?
He was very happy to have the work. He acted as a Union steward would and hired his wife as my maid/cook, his son and nephew as guards for my house. Each also earned $100/month.
Everyone was happy.
Except, of course, U.S. and Euro liberals who want to impose a different standard of living on a developing country. (Isn’t that colonialism, of which they always accuse us?)
Taking that route would immediately make those people subject to wacked-out liberal policies and make them mooches off the population. As it was, they were happy, productive, had plenty to eat and no complaints.
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