Well, you're taking a singular vertical slice. How many plastic widgets and doodads in your house were made by an effective slave in China? What about clothes - from sweatshops in vietnam, bangladesh, etc.? We periodically see sensational stories where workers slip tragic notes into goods, but that's about it. On top of that, what about the animals we've hurt systematically? In the industrial revolution, we rendered millions of penguins into oil (400ml each). Now, industrial farms raise animals in horrific conditions and we are responsible for who knows what else for convenience and abundance?
Realistically the advanced world has been running on outsourced atrocity for decades, and we're all a bit complicit.
All that said, I would welcome additional supply chain scrutiny. I don't see a point in a consumer saving not very much money to enable child labor.
The ideology(s) that enables rich westerners to pick and choose what supply chains to care about based on politics and feel justified in their double standards is a far greater threat to me than some guy half a world away who's bribing local officials to let him discharge toxic waste into the water I get my sardines from.
Unrelated nitpick: We've been running on outsourced atrocity since all of human history.
I think it's valid to point out that this is part of a larger systemic issue as opposed to a singular localized one. Which doesn't necessarily preclude the comment from being whataboutistic.
But generally whataboutism refers to comments that try to deter from the original issue by saying "X does it too so it's alright until they stop too". I didn't read the initial comment that way.
Yes, thus the XYZ part of my comment explaining what issues they were trying to deflect with (those issues aren't even in the same industries)
They essentially said "what about... the textile industry, the shipping industry, the farming industry"
Okay? Those are issues, we'll discuss those when an article is posted about them. But currently the battery supply chain child slave labor issue is TFA.
The point was not that it's ok for the mines, the point was that there is nothing unique about them, and there isn't much justification for focussing on them. Not to shield them from scrutiny, but to avoid making them into a distraction from child labor and slavery in general.
If you drummed up a big movement to deal with the problem of child slave labor in lithium or cobalt mines, what good have you done for the world or the kids? The same kids are still at the same risk tomorrow as they were yesterday, they just wind up in some other kind of operation, or in the extreme case maybe their only value (to those people) becomes as organ cattle. Great job!
It's a distraction to pick a specific example like that and present it as some kind of unique problem. What specific work they are put to is not the problem, it's the fact that they are enslaved at all.
It's also to say that "the green revolution is fueld by trafficked child labor" is a mischaracterization, because it is not fuelled by child labor, it merely includes child labor.
The cotton industry in the US was fuelled by slaves, because the labor was 99% done by slaves, not merely that there were some slaves.
The green revolution is such a large thing that 40k children are hardly a drop in it.
Defending child slavery to further the goal of cheap batteries for one.
The Transatlantic Slave Trade involved more than the slaves in Western colonies harvesting raw materials, generally slavery was not used in the rest of the manufacturing process in Europe.
Just because you outsource slavery of a specific process of production doesn't mean you aren't involved in slave trade.
The solutions are to sanction the country doing it as to not reward their behavior and find another means of production, or label those companies involved as terrorists and rescue those children, or pressure the government to shut it down. Or a combination of those.
If your industry cannot adapt or live without slavery then good riddance.
So far your defenses have been:
> Might as well exploit these children, they'd be tortured anyway so there's no point in discussing this!
> Only one part of the supply chain is fueled by child labor, so it's not that bad
It's like you learned "whataboutism" and jumped at your first chance to use it. Still got it totally wrong. What part of this comment is deflecting? Seems to be just adding additional info.
No it's literally whataboutism. I know people here usually use it wrong when they disagree with a comparison or analogy, but this is not the case.
They didn't expand on anything about the article or topic or use it to compare the issues or find contradictions in logic, they just laundry listed other topics that are known and non-disputed.
This article is about exposing a lesser known but large issue of mass child slave labor (40k+) in the battery supply chain.
Most of the things they listed aren't even in the same industry supply chain (textiles, farms, shipping), how are they relevant?
it was partially in reply to the OP's dead comment blaming this squarely on democrats, and the entire thing struck me as weirdly myopic. It is whataboutism, because I think ascribing blame to a team isn't really helping.
I agree that comment was bizarre. Outsourcing and disregard of human rights abuses in supply chains are not remotely limited to the US Democratic party. Especially since the article itself talks about China.
ok but so what??? the comment is dead and was dead when this post was only a few minutes old. most people don't even know you can see dead comments, so why is it so important to talk about it? the article isn't about democrats, no one else is talking about democrats, so why are you? can't we talk about the bad things described in the article?
"Realistically the advanced world has been running on outsourced atrocity for decades"
And the most suave punters are very keen to embrace energy technology that promise no downsides today as they can be kicked onto future generations beyond their own lifespan. Make sure not to look behind these nuclear curtains.
>How many plastic widgets and doodads in your house were made by an effective slave in China?
Or US, which, differently from China, has, in 2022, an entire official slave business, reportedly being an important part of some states' economy. But it's always China that gets mentioned; isn't that strange?
Yeah, I'm always surprised how country with slavery literally enshrined in its constitution is always so critical of the issue. It is like they are all hypocrites and don't focus first fixing their own crimes.
If not working in a mine, these children will be working subsistence agriculture, which is equally as back-braking.
The underlying problem is an excess of manual labor in Africa, caused by excessive birth rates. Take fertility rates down to sub-replacement like they are in the rest of the world, and mining will just be automated.
Did you ever consider that in "sub-replacement" populations they still send poor people down the mines, as that is way cheaper than robots?
Never mind the perpetual political destabilization of that region because our oligarch owned nations want the natural treasures buried beneath that African soil for cheap. It's their own fault for having babies. Djeez.
> Did you ever consider that in "sub-replacement" populations they still send poor people down the mines, as that is way cheaper than robots?
As long as the poor guy can choose to work something better wages and working conditions will reflect this (or the mine will shut down). See Europe after the black death.
No. It's not. It's basic supply and demand. You see this every time there's supply side constraints on labor. Usually they're geographic and short lived but big ones sometimes happen too.
> The underlying problem is an excess of manual labor in Africa,
In what fucking world holy shit. Good lord, seriously. Labor IS PEOPLE. There is no such thing as an excess person.
The underlying problem is an economic system that allows/depends on the exploitation of vulnerable and precarious labor. If you're going to justify this then grow a spine and do it, don't deflect it back on the people being hurt the most saying they should cull themselves for our moral convenience.
Excess labour supply doesn't necessarily mean excess people...
Just that there might not be enough resources to meet the needs of population. Such as food and water. Thus purchasers of labour will get away by providing minimum. If there weren't such big excess supply they would need to provide more or provide better conditions.
I'm sure it is happening, but I strongly suggest you seek mental help. If you believe that an entire political party, whose voters constitute more than half of the country, is a terrorist organization and whose voters must be hunted down, you have been severely radicalized and are disconnected from reality.
Aaaah thanks, seems I really should turn that on. I always assumed it would still insert some [deleted] parent or whatnot if you leave it off. Was really confused by all these top level comments written like replies.
This was apparently about American Democrats, but fits equally well to CCP. I'm guessing both came from the same kind of propaganda, but with a different logo, for a slightly different target group.
The title is a bit exaggerated, but the problem is real - how much of the "clean" high-minded Western solutions rely on the backing of the practices that would be appalling and impossible to tolerate in the West, to be practical? Energy production - and production in general - has its risks and its costs, and there's a very real tendency of solving these problems by just shipping them away to the places where the press does not reach and consider them solved. The shining (or stinking) example is the "recycling" system based on collecting plastic waste in the West, and shipping it to South-East Asia, where huge part of it is just dumped into the rivers. Another example is energy policy, where "clean" Western energy is relying on very non-clean sources and practices.
More accurate headline: China employing slave labor in the Congo
There's plenty of battery material mined in other countries like Australia, Bolivia, the US, and Canada. Nothing intrinsic to anything "green" about it. This headline is good click bait though.
If it wasn't so sad the handwaving going on here would be really funny. Just because it's green and "for the greater good" child slaves suddenly aren't _that bad_
I really hate when politicians feign interest in human rights when they clearly have some other agenda, and what's even worse is that voters eat that shit up. Clearly this representative is either advocating for mercantilism or is against electrification and doesn't give a damn about child labor. If you want to stop child labor, then provide more aid to African families so they don't have to send their kids off to the mines. These families aren't stupid. They're desperate, and taking away a option from them without providing another won't make them any less desperate.
The most egregious example was during the Iraq War, politicians suddenly started caring about the Anfal genocide, even though that occurred while America was friendly with Saddam Hussein because they shared the common enemy of Iran.
Because of... things like... this?? Or am I misunderstanding and the question is "why should I care about the misery at the other end of my consumption?" Which, I got my reasons and I hope you can find some of your own too.
> why should I care about the misery at the other end of my consumption?
Close. I do care but I think that the Congo's government should care. It just seems like a difficult ask for each consumer to worry about every supply chain they touch. Seems maddening to try.
Perhaps I should care because these governments are corrupt and cannot, or don't want to, protect their people from exploitation? I suppose it doesn't need to be perfect to be worth doing.
> It just seems like a difficult ask for each consumer to worry about every supply chain they touch. Seems maddening to try.
This is an intentional component of this system that enables this sort of exploitation. Each individual feels (to some extent justifiably) that it is someone else's duty. Each is just doing what is best or necessary for them, not necessarily happy about it, but the mine foreman has a family to feed, you think congo's government should deal with it, the petty bureaucrat knows if they change it they'll lose their job or worse. Everyone acts as they believe they should or must and now here we are.
Some believe it is their moral obligation to do so. I, personally, believe that "blaming myself for the worlds problem" is a step to becoming a more mature (accountable) person in our society.
I also believe that corporation will do literally anything to make a profit - including slavery - and the only thing that stops them from doing so is because they stop being profitable. Knowing this allows the consumer to pressure the company to align with their values or loss their business.
Realistically the advanced world has been running on outsourced atrocity for decades, and we're all a bit complicit.
All that said, I would welcome additional supply chain scrutiny. I don't see a point in a consumer saving not very much money to enable child labor.