The slavery imposed upon the Mexican people by the last few U.S. administrations must be ended. The Clintons have had as much to do with the NAFTA horror (and related subsidies) as the Bush family — making conditions for Mexicans on both sides of the border — as abominable as anything experienced by “servants” of the South prior to our Civil War.
Just try to find out via googling what products from what companies are flooding our country… from Mexico. For your general information. Or because you want to boycott. It won’t be easy. Online one finds, primarily, information about maquiladoras which might help those interested in investing in sweatshops and the like. Virtually nothing an activist can put teeth into.
If you fancy that you would have been an abolitionist 150 years ago, I submit that you’ve got an agenda to embrace with regard to maquiladoras. Whether or not the war in Iraq ends tomorrow. Whether or not all of our troops are withdrawn from foreign shores. Whether or not the sweatshops of India are addressed by Congress, and the GAP and NIKE labeled for what they actually are among informed adults. No matter what the “weather” is in Politically Correct Circles.
A cry from The South goes out to you.
Veteran border rights activist Enrique Davalos told historians Mike Davis and Justin Akers Chacon recently:
Maquiladoras combine traditional ways of exploitation…with new, intensive ways of exploitation based on high-speed productivity. Working in a maquiladora means [living] in poverty with no hopes of getting better…. Average daily wages in Tijuana…are about six to seven dollars for ten working hours. This is enough to pay only 25 percent of the very basic expenses, without including rent and education. So maquiladora workers are condemned to live in shantytowns without piped water, power, sewage or trash collection. Temperatures in Tijuana fluctuate from 30 to 110 degrees Fahrenheit, but 66 percent of the houses don’t have piped water.
The maquiladoras are risky and unhealthy labor places. Most of the companies force the workers to deal with dangerous chemicals with no training and no appropriate protection. As a result, labor diseases and accidents are common…. Workers ruin their eyes, lungs, hands, backs and nervous systems after a few years…. In addition, workers without fingers and hands are not rare, but workers’ negligence is always used to explain recurrent ‘accidents.’ In fact, maquiladoras not only deteriorate workers’ lives, they also pollute their families and communities. Ejido Chilpancingo is a neighborhood located near to Otay, one of the most expensive industrial parks in Tijuana. Because of maquiladora pollution, residents of Ejido Chilpancingo are exposed to lead at levels three thousand times higher than U.S. Standards.
From p. 118 of No One Is Illegal: Fighting Racism and State Violence on the U.S.-Mexico Border. It’s a Haymarket book out of Chicago by Justin Akers Chacon and Mike Davis.
So much for the “unique status” of lead toys from China.
The fact that with NAFTA Mexico has become almost entirely dependent on the U.S. for trade shouldn’t stop us from researching which companies benefit from this abominable form of slavery. No more than we should justify wearing diamonds because “at least we’re providing ‘some’ jobs for the Congolese, better than what they would have otherwise.” Or, well…you know the mantra.
Even the Chinese are now exploring ways in which they can exploit the NAFTA stranglehold on Mexicans for their purposes. For getting around U.S. trade restrictions, etc.
Over 1.3 million small farmers forced into bankruptcy during the decade 1994-2004, coupled with “mandatory migration northward” for 15 million more in agriculture in the near future, provide a clear picture of why the Zapatistas had their uprising.
These are numbers and a force that cannot be stopped by a handful of Minuteman vigilantes or a U.S. version of the Berlin or Israeli Wall.
Bill Clinton launched a new standard for border militarization with his Operation Gatekeeper in 1994, and Bush pushed through a $32 billion Homeland Security bill for 2006 designed to provide enormous increases for border enforcement. Then there’s Arizona’s Operation Safeguard, Texas’ Operations Hold the Line and Rio Grande the bipartisan Kennedy-McCain bill, Bill Richardson’s co-opting, Hillary Clinton’s threats….
But none of that will work.
It won’t work because of the simple fact that Slavery doesn’t sit well with Nature.
The only question is whether or not YOU are going to do something about this. You don’t have to be a John Brown here, but all this certainly begs for a few more Thoreaus and Stowes.
Why not start with putting an end to some of your purchases?