I am a Taiwanese living in London. And I need a favour from people who are not native Taiwanese. Here is why:
I was to get my usual sunday paper last sunday. But after what happened on the 5th of July in London, I felt that I ought to be entertained. Therefore I got a copy of the Mail on Sunday instead of my usual Sunday Times.
As I was flipping through the magazine that came with the paper, I saw a fashion column that said something about Taiwan. Obviously Taiwan rarely has anything to do with fashion, so I read on. Basically she was sharing her shopping experiences with the reader. And this particular shop was so cheap taht THEY MUST BE MADE BY TAIWANESE TODDLERS!
Do you see my point? Do taiwanese toddlers make clothes? are there sweatshops in taiwan? From my experiences, I would think taiwanese toddlers are too busy learing english and attending all cram schools that their parents sending them to. Not to mention toddlers, I don’t think Taiwanese are making clothes anymore. I felt that piece of information was rather incorrect and far from the fact. Being a taiwanese who has been trying very hard to fight with people constantly calling you chinese, it is really quite an insult to me. Therefore i thought i need to put this straight , i then emailed her and gave her the facts about GDP, competiveness all those figures. I also demanded a apology.
A few days went on, no reply whatsoever. I guess one email from a Taiwanese might be considered to trivial and biased. Therefore I wonder if you could do me a favour, sending this fashion journalist your experience and your impression regarding SWEATSHOPs in taiwan.
Unfortunately, that article isn’t available online. But I am more than happy to send u a photocopy of it. I am sure you’d at least want to see the article before deciding whether you’d like to help.
I will first quote her article
My mind was in turmoil, crowded with the jagged thoughts of a person plagued with guilt. I’ll give you just a sampler… "How can these clothes be so cheap? They MUST BE MADE BY TAIWANES TODDLERS, PAID TUPPENCE A DAY TO SEW BULGE BEADS ON TO THIS T-shirt’.
And the email address of this fashion journalist is mimi@you.co.uk
Don’t think so … under chinese laoban in a family owned home sweatshop.
:s
Could be made in a London sweat shop too … illegal immigrants from all over Asia
Actually there are plenty of Taiwanese sweatshops in overseas countries. eg. In South Africa about a couple of years back there were a series of incidents in the Durban area of Taiwanese factory-owners locking local staff into the factories at night, not letting them out etc. As far as I know, the workers were not children, but that is not the traditional definition of a sweat shop anyway.
I visited many of the Kaohsiung Export Processing Zone’s garment factories several times in the late 1970’s and never saw any underage children working there. I doubt that there are any now.
It’s a metaphore or allegory or some other literary device. It’s not meant to be taken literally. Maybe it was meant to be humourous, but it wasn’t funny, and it was in bad taste and you are quite right to complain. Dont worry, even Americans have trouble understanding English like this sometimes too.
I agree with BFM, the “Taiwanese toddlers” line was not meant to be taken literally and it was a stupid line. But I also agree with DSN that there are plenty of Taiwanese sweatshops in overseas countries. For example:
Western companies also employ sweatshop labor, but I suspect Chinese and Taiwanese companies are more willing to do so, in part because they experience less bad repercussions as a result of such practices. Nike, etc, are greatly harmed when activists and journalists make sweatshop allegations about them, but Taiwanese and Chinese companies aren’t affected as much when the truth comes out – partly because Taiwanese and Chinese consumers don’t care how it was made and partly because the Taiwanese/Chinese factories are actually making the product for some other company.
Yes I know, lesson learnt, the mail on sunday is crap.
Come on! It cannot possibly be a metaphore. Otherwise Ken Livingston wouldn’t have got in trouble by calling a journalist jewish. Prince Harry wouldn’t have got into trouble by wearing that nazi outfit. And that tory MP wouldn’t have got into trouble by telling a joke in private (don’t remeber the cotext). It is just a very wrong thing to write, she has no sense of responsibility in what she writes. Checking the fact isn’t that difficult, if she cannot be bothered to find out some information about what she writes, she could at least turn over the clothes and check the label!!
Really, you believe sweatshops actually employ toddlers? Maybe they would if it were economically feasible, but I’m sure they would work too slowly, eat the buttons, get the thread all tangled up, spit up on the products, and take too many naps during working hours.
[quote=“Kriek”]Toddlers as a metaphore, maybe!
But how do you explain the Taiwanese?[/quote]
Its where a lot of cheap crap used to come from before they started making computers. Some people are behind the times. Like the author of that article. Its the Sunday Mail, for god’s sake!
