On Mon, 20 Oct 2003 20:49:15 +0200, "szozu" hoppbunny at hotmail dot com
opined:


"animaux" wrote in message
.. .


Fortunately, many, many people in my age bracket 45-50 are coming into
this age
from growing up in the 60s, where conscience raising was prevalent. There
is no
way I can buy merchandize any more which I KNOW is being made by either
children, or very poor people.

I understand your motives, but If you won't buy things made by very poor
people, how are they supposed to survive? It's usually necessary for the
whole family to work just to keep alive. I don't know if you've ever
travelled in poor remote areas, such as the Andes, but people there who are
lucky enough to have a couple of chickens don't eat the eggs; they sell them
so they can buy things like flour which will provide more bulk and fill
their stomachs.

Childhood can be viewed as a luxury provided by well-to-do societies.
Children have traditionally learned to work alongside their parents as soon
as they were able to help.

In a similar vein, I've heard people say that if they were to move to an
underdeveloped country, they couldn't imagine hiring a maid, since they feel
it would be a demeaning position for the maid; yet in actual fact, they
would be resented by the locals, who would view them as "rich" yet not
contributing to the economy by providing at least one person with a chance
to feed their family.

Lana


I suppose it's a double edge sword. On the one hand, many of the pieceworkers
who make virtually nothing to produce what it would cost a lot of money in the
states to produce, count on those pennies. It's such a complex issue. Then
there's the convenience of Walmart and box stores which are definitely the
largest suppliers of goods made by virtual slave labor.

I have no answer, and you have made many good points. It's not easy to discern,
I will concede to that.

Victoria