Here is a link to an article recently published in Scrap and Recycling International. An Asia-based reporter, Adam Minter, visited one of our "Fair Trade Recycling" partners in Malaysia. He reports on what he saw. Hint, it wasn't "primitive".
Saturday night, I was reading this while watching History Channel, which had a documentary on sexual mores, flappers vs. puritans, and the war over sexual information in Hollywood.
I realized that using the power of shame and guilt to get people to stop doing what is natural is as old as the Scarlet Letter. The shaming of people for trading with Geeks of Color is not that different from the war on sexuality, waged less than a century ago in the USA, or laws against interracial marriage much more recently. Once again, it's being played out in bills submitted to USA Congress. From wikipedia:
The analogies seem apt. Jim Puckett = Anthony Comstock. Robin Ingenthron = Margaret Sanger (the philosophical Hugh Hefner, a century ago). Will Hays Asst. Joseph Green - the first Green Bill.
"Recyclers are applying the Fair-Trade model to used electronics, demonstrating that exports for refurbishing and re-use can meet developing countries need for low-cost products -- And facilities the that do the work can meet Developed World standards."
I realized that using the power of shame and guilt to get people to stop doing what is natural is as old as the Scarlet Letter. The shaming of people for trading with Geeks of Color is not that different from the war on sexuality, waged less than a century ago in the USA, or laws against interracial marriage much more recently. Once again, it's being played out in bills submitted to USA Congress. From wikipedia:
"Comstock's ideas of what might be "obscene, lewd, or lascivious" were quite broad. During his time of greatest power, even some anatomy textbooks were prohibited from being sent to medical students by the United States Postal Service.
"Comstock aroused intense loathing from early civil liberties groups and intense support from church-based groups worried about public morals. He was a savvy political insider in New York City and was made a special agent of the United States Postal Service, with police powers up to and including the right to carry a weapon. With this power he zealously prosecuted those he suspected of either public distribution of pornography or commercial fraud."My organization is trying to get people to export and trade with Geeks of Color with better information, documentation, record keeping and accountability (per the article), kind of like Margaret Sanger and many others were trying to educate Americans about sex. Today, we accept that sex is something to be cautious about, but the Victorian ideas Comstock was enforcing died with his protege, J Edgar Hoover.
The analogies seem apt. Jim Puckett = Anthony Comstock. Robin Ingenthron = Margaret Sanger (the philosophical Hugh Hefner, a century ago). Will Hays Asst. Joseph Green - the first Green Bill.
