Here is some stuff to get angry about

[sabotabby]

You know, in case you were feeling complacent today.

Tony Kushner, one of my favourite playwrights and deserved winner of the Pulitzer Prize, was denied an honourary degree from CUNY for his views on the Israel-Palestinian conflict. I dunno about the whole idea of honourary degrees, to be honest, but if one is going to grant them, nuanced political opinions ought not to be the reason.

From Barbara Ehrenreich:

The CUNY board's decision came after board member Jeffrey S. Wiesenfeld objected to Kushner's statements about Israel, excerpts of which Wiesenfeld claims to have gleaned from various websites (Wiesenfeld's citations have been described by blogger Mitchell Plitnick as having been sourced from the notoriously reactionary pro-Israel propaganda purveyer, Camera.org). Wiesenfeld does not claim to have sought out the original sources of the statements he cites, lending credencem to the objection that he willfully has taken Kushner's comments out of context. Wiesenfeld has since argued, in an unrepentent op-ed posted on the Jewish newspaper site Algemeiner.com, that Kushner's views should be labeled anti-Semitic.

Lest you think that the new Conservative majority is going to be remotely moderate, check out this article on their proposed crime bill.

Here’s what the Library of Parliament says about the bill on its website: “Clause 5 of the bill provides that the offences of public incitement of hatred and wilful promotion of hatred may be committed by any means of communication and include making hate material available, by creating a hyperlink that directs web surfers to a website where hate material is posted, for example.”

Okay, so if I link to a site that has hate material on it, I'm guilty of a hate crime? I link to the Toronto SUN and the National Post pretty frequently! I am so screwed.

The latest from Foxconn, the sweatshop where all of your cool gadgets are made: workers must sign a statement promising not to kill themselves and pledging to "treasure their lives". That's because the horrible conditions in the company are so brutal that workers regularly kill themselves rather than put up with 96-hour weeks, overcrowding, and frequent humiliations. (Don't read the comments on the BoingBoing link. There are a lot of libertarian sweatshop apologists on that thread.)

So how was your day?

Comments

[90pointmetaphor.livejournal.com]

And remember, in the new Rob Ford Reality™, groups like QuAIA are hate groups.

[icedrake.livejournal.com]

Not to dismiss any of the concerns, but I really feel there's insufficient information available about Foxconn's situation. I am especially not convinced that the suicide rate is sufficient indication of problems specifically at Foxconn. There may be other indicators, and it may well be that Foxconn is exceptionally brutal with its employees, but all the coverage is so focused on the suicides that actual context is lost.

The WHO lists the suicide rate for China as 13/100,000 for males. According to Wikipedia, Foxconn employs over 920,000 people (AFAIK most, if not all, are male). Extrapolating from the Guardian article, the company-wide annual suicides and attempted suicides should come in at around 86, or 9.4/100,000.

The 5.4% monthly employee turnover rate is a much better indicator of problems, in my view. If this is a constant throughout the year, the company replaces two thirds of its staff every single year.

But then, I don't have the numbers for any other high-tech manufacturer in China, so it's really difficult to say whether Foxconn is actually worse, on par with, or better, than companies in the same industry -- or in China in general.

[frandroid.livejournal.com]

I understand what you're talking about, but even if this is the norm in China, if we can put pressure on Apple to have their contractors better, this can have an impact there, and then we can put pressure on other electronics companies to do the same.

[icedrake.livejournal.com]

Not just Apple, then: Foxconn supplies pretty much every major electronics company you can think of, and Apple isn't even the biggest of the lot.

My point isn't that we shouldn't put pressure on Foxconn's clients to improve the OEM employees' working conditions. But if we're going to single out Foxconn, or Apple, we should do so for good reason -- whether it be by targeting the worst offenders or by applying pressure where it will be most effective.

I just noticed that Foxconn is the largest private employer in China, which certainly makes it a worthwhile target, even without taking into account the export-focused nature of its business. I withdraw the objections in my previous comment; I wrote it without sufficient knowledge of the situation.

But why specifically Apple? Sony, HP, and Samsung all had more revenue than Apple last year, and all sell directly to the consumer, so should be sensitive to consumer pressure. Of those, HP is headquartered in the US (though I'm not sure that matters), and the rootkit debacle has shown that Sony does bow to customer pressure.

[frandroid.livejournal.com]

I think it's hard to put pressure on Foxconn, because we're not direct customers of them. As long as Apple. Sony, Samsung, etc. keep buying from them, it doesn't matter what bad press they get. You could say that it matters to Apple that its suppliers don't get bad press, but that only matters if customers put pressure on them. So in the end, I think exposing the Foxconns of the world is essential, but the pressure to stop doing business with them comes at the consumer level. It's the same with coltan mined by children funding war in the DRC: we're not going to change this by putting pressure on the coltan smelters in Australia or wherever, we're going to change this by putting pressure on their customers in the consumer space.

Apple is a particularly good target because it earns the majority of its profits from 4 product lines: iPods, iPhones, iPads and laptops. It's possibly the least diversified hardware company of its size in the world, and thus the most amenable to be targeted and weakened by activists. The other companies that you mentioned are too big, have too many corporate, military and government customers buying their hardware for consumer campaigns to be really effective.

[icedrake.livejournal.com]

It's interesting that you mention Coltan -- I just recently did an article on it, though I was coming from the other side of the equation, talking to producers and industrial users of tantalum. Do you know much about the sort of pressure that drove the change? The world's largest users and refiners of tantalum are keeping away from DRC-sourced material, supposedly through industry-driven initiatives.

I see what you mean about Apple's sources of profit. With that in mind, I agree that Apple is the most promising target for direct consumer pressure.

My next question would be, what are effective ways of applying said pressure? I'm afraid all of my experience has been in political, rather than consumer, activism.

[outcastspice.livejournal.com]

so, re the proposed crime bill, this is messed up! thank you for telling us about it!

Pixel and i have just spent like an hour discussing this! But we both agree of course that posting a link to hate speech shouldn't be considered hate speech itself.

From Hate Speech Laws in Canada - Criminal Code of Canada

Under section 319, an accused is not guilty: (a) if he establishes that the statements communicated were true; (b) if, in good faith, the person expressed or attempted to establish by an argument an opinion on a religious subject or an opinion based on a belief in a religious text; (c) if the statements were relevant to any subject of public interest, the discussion of which was for the public benefit, and if on reasonable grounds he believed them to be true; or (d) if, in good faith, he intended to point out, for the purpose of removal, matters producing or tending to produce feelings of hatred toward an identifiable group in Canada.

[metawidget]

Oh, right, there's the pinkos-only clause: Charles McVety will pinky-swear that anything hateful he or any of his friends says is in fact religiously motivated.

[pofflewomp.livejournal.com]

I find the Foxconn thing somehow quite horribly fascinating. It just so very seems to be taken from a scary science fiction dysutopian hell. But isn't. Which means the scary science fiction dysutopian hell is here. And probably has always been here, hence the writing of such things to alert us to their presence. Oh dear. I was trying to think the world was all about pretty hedgerows and excitingly tall trees rustling their leaves in the wind. AAAAAAAAAARRGH !

[troubleinchina.livejournal.com]

... Wait, I thought the first thing Harper was going to do was to get rid of hate speech laws because they oppress Ezra Klein or something.

[culpster.livejournal.com]

> So how was your day?

Awesome! Thanks for asking.

[dobrovolets.livejournal.com]

There's worse on the Wiesenfeld thing: In an interview published today in the New York Times, the khazir effectively said that Palestinians are not human. He has no business being in charge of anything, let alone a major urban public university system. At this point I couldn't care less whether CUNY finds some weaselly way to backtrack on giving the Kushner the degree. Wiesenfeld needs to resign.

What's killing me in all this is that I have information that, if brought to the attention of the right people in the right way, could make another scandal around his name. But if I were to fumble it, I could easily be the one to lose my job.

[springheel-jack.livejournal.com]

This, after he got Kristopher Petersen-Overton fired for his teaching. It is not possible that any university should have a man like Weisenfeld as a trustee. He has to go.

[dobrovolets.livejournal.com]

Petersen-Overton's been rehired, and Brooklyn College made the expected denials that he was never actually fired, it was just a "temporary non-reappointment" while they sorted out the class schedule, etc. etc.--and the CUNY system is just dysfunctional enough that this may be true, though I doubt it. Though if you read the text of Wiesenfeld's comments on Kushner, he couldn't help himself and had wedge in another jab at the poor adjunct at the end of his remarks.

He's a typical political appointee bully-boy.

[springheel-jack.livejournal.com]

Here's another CUNY trustee who should resign, on grounds of appalling ignorance:

“I have no idea who Mr. Kushner is; I don’t know his issues,” said Valerie Lancaster Beal, a trustee.

[dobrovolets.livejournal.com]

Another Pataki appointee, whose highest academic credential is an MBA. Ignorance is not a disqualification for a CUNY BoT member: It's a prerequisite.

[metawidget]

I thought the Cons were angry about human rights tribunals for being too broad in their definition of hate and discrimination… or is there a pinkos-only clause in Clause 5?

[radiumhead.livejournal.com]

and if you sign the form saying you wont kill yourself, then you do, they will do.....what, exactly? Bring you back to life and sue you?

[curgoth]

It's to prevent the family from suing foxconn and denying death benefits, etc.

[radiumhead.livejournal.com]

they can really do that???

id argue (if i was the lawyer for the family)-that guy was fucking crazy obviously, he fucking killed himself, any shit he signed is void.

[frandroid.livejournal.com]

The family wouldn't have to hire a lawyer in the first place if this clause wasn't there, benefit would likely flow to them more easily. See how amazing this is.

[smhwpf.livejournal.com]

Scary stuff.

The good thing about the Kushner case is that it's drawing protests well beyond the 'usual suspects'. There's a big article in the UK Guardian on it. The way I see it, the pro-Israel establishment is desperately trying to plug the holes in the wall of Jewish uncritical support for Israel, and getting more and more repressive (in a first world sense) in its methods, but is fighting a losing battle.

The Foxconn thing is surreal and awful.

[terry-terrible.livejournal.com]

Here's another thing to be enraged about:

Say you're a 250 lbs. cop and you're confronted by the situation of a 115 lbs., 15-year-old girl who is walking away from you after you've told her to stop? Well, of course the obvious solution to this situation is to rush her at a full run and knock her face-first into a concrete wall. It's just common sense.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/excessive-force-shocking-video-of-az-police-officer-tackling-young-girl/

Trigger warning : video of unprovoked cop violence on a teenage girl

[icedrake.livejournal.com]

The good news is, they're investigating it instead of making conciliatory noises and sweeping it under the carpet.

Oh, and... Don't read the comments.

[lisechen.livejournal.com]

Christ, and I thought Canada was supposed to be more or less sensible. I am so sorry your country is being fucked.

Also... oh, BoingBoing. I love you, BoingBoing, but man, there are some assholes in that place.