academe
Distinguished Member
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- Feb 14, 2008
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It matters for the following reasons: 1. Quality control is often not the same. 2. Third world factories often employ child or slave labour. 3. Environmental controls are often nonexistent. 4. There are virtually no consumer protections on content of materials or truth in labeling. Just because that shirt made in Thailand reads "100% cotton" doesn't mean it's 100% cotton. 5. Many times the purchase of products from these nations continues to empower the tyrannical governments leading to further oppression on local people and international strife.
These are very common arguments and I'm not disputing that these things may be true. What I'd like to know is how prevalent some of these unethical practices are today, in 2011, as opposed to in the 1980s or 1990s. Perhaps some of our members from East Asia could chime in? I thought the comments from the Tailoring Director at Henry Bailey Ltd in the LL thread were quite interesting: http://thelondonlounge.net/forum/vie...t=9664&start=0 Why is there always the assumption that every single factory in China or newly industrialised countries are uniformly implementing bad labor practices? What about our dear friends the Italians??